Grading Matt Rempe’s 2024-2025 season is tough. For all intents and purposes, our report card grades here are based on a number of factors, including in no small part the role expected. That’s why we don’t grade Jonny Brodzinski on raw stat totals or Artemi Panarin on defensive play. That’s where the issue with Matt Rempe’s report card is: His role isn’t defined. We know what he is. We know he’s made some nice progression. But we also know he’s a big work in progress, but to what role is unclear.
Rempe played 42 games for the Rangers last year in a strictly fourth line role with limited minutes. He still managed to put up 3 goals and 8 points while averaging just 8:28 TOI. It’s worth noting Rempe improved enough–and took far fewer penalties–to warrant a near doubling of his ice time from the prior year. That’s progress, even if it doesn’t look like progress. Rempe is a fan favorite and clearly a locker room favorite that everyone is rooting for.
Getting back to his role, it’s unclear. He didn’t have strong possession numbers, but few on the Rangers did. He received mostly defensive zone starts, but not at the same rate as Sam Carrick or Adam Edstrom, signaling Peter Laviolette didn’t have full trust in him. He was also the first guy to lose ice time in a close game.
So what exactly is Matt Rempe’s role? Is he a defensive forward? An energy guy? That’s the mystery. Until we know what his role is supposed to be, we have to be even more subjective when evaluating his season.
So for me, I’m shifting gears on grading Rempe from on-ice performance based on role to on-ice performance based on improvements from last season. It’s very subjective, and that’s the risk here, but without knowing what Laviolette wanted from him on the ice, aside from being a liability, I can’t grade him on his role.
Rempe improved from last season, though some of the improvements were muted because of how bad the Rangers were. He took fewer penalties and definitely looked more comfortable in his own skin. That said, he was a fairly significant net negative statistically and that boost he gave the Rangers two seasons ago certainly wasn’t there this past season. He’s got a long way to go, but if there’s a coaching staff I trust to figure it out, it’s this coaching staff.
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