Rangers officially make a decision on this year's 12th overall pick

UPDATE: The Penguins have now made it official.

New York Rangers GM Chris Drury was faced with a difficult decision to make this offseason and has reportedly made his choice.

As part of the trade with the Vancouver Canucks that saw the Rangers acquire JT Miller, the Rangers flipped a conditional 1st round pick to the Pittsburgh Penguins. The condition though was that Drury has the option to trade his team's 2025 1st round pick (12th overall) or his team's 2026 1st round pick.

Today, Drury and the Rangers informed the NHL that they will in fact be shipping out this year's 1st rounder to the Penguins. This means the Penguins will now pick 11th and 12th in Friday's draft.

From Rangers insider Larry Brooks

The Canucks first acquired the conditional pick from the Rangers along with Filip Chytil and Victor Mancini for JT Miller, Erik Brannstrom and Jackson Dorrington. The Canucks then immediately flipped that pick to the Penguins along with Danton Heinen, Vincent Desharnais and Melvin Fernstrom for Marcus Pettersson and Drew O'Connor.

So, in effect the Canucks got Chytil, Mancini, M. Pettersson and O'Connor for Miller, Heinen and Desharnais. The Rangers ended up with Miller for Chytil, Mancini and 12th overall. The Penguins go 12th overall and a bunch of junk for M. Pettersson and Drew O'Connor.

Despite the fact that the Rangers and the Penguins never made a deal together, Drury was handcuffed by the Canucks' move. Now all he can do is watch while a Conference rival selects a player with his team's very own pick. Ouch...

Then again, Drury could have deferred to 2026 which could have been an even bigger ouch.