Regarding some thoughts about signings
That would be this group: Danny Dekeyser, who everybody wanted to come out of Western Michigan last year. Eight NHL general managers have been in to see the 6'3 mobile defenceman in the last couple of weeks. I think that Detroit, St. Louis, and Tampa Bay are among the frontrunners for Dekeyser; he's high profile.
Andrej Sustr, a 6'8 Czech defenceman who plays at Nebraska-Omaha, is on the All-WCHA team this year. Lots of teams are lining up to get him signed as soon as his season ends.
And Montreal-area product Antoine Laganiere from Yale is a big winger – 6'4, 215 lbs – who projects as a third- or fourth-liner.
This year's college free agent crop is not outstanding, but Dekeyser is the best of that group.
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=418215
what college free agents will the NYR sign?? im hoping for Lain and Sustr... Lain was a teammate of Kyle Jean for 2 seasons at Lake Superior..
Right now we are at 49 contracts
MSC is signed and will count against the 50 number next year. As will
Josh Nicholls
Most likely
Sam Noreau and
Shane McColgan will also get ELCs this offseason
A big ?? is
Peter Ceresnak IMO. Might have a very late development curve as is the case with many bigger players. Scouts saw something when he was picked for sure. I think he will not be signed though.
The NCAA College kids (
Skjei, Nieves, Fogarty) will most likely stay in school another year, at least...
Do not see us signing any of the unsigned Euros in the org either this year (
Fast &
Lindberg are already signed and will both be here for camp - maybe earlier)
Mats Zuccarello is of course a big ???
So we will most likely not have many new contracts given to our own draft picks for next season
That makes it around 53(54?) players that will be contracted into the offseason.
But there will be a lot of roster players that are free agents and are also probably goners as well. Maybe something like:
RFAs - likely gone (3)
Sauer
, Delisle, Pyett
UFAs - likely gone (7)
Hamrlik, Eminger, Halpern, Gilroy, Collins, Segal, Vernace??
RFAs - will likely resign (8)
McDonagh, Stepan, Hagelin, Ferriero, Palmieri, Mashinter (he is RFA - no?), Parlett, Niemi ??
This means - pending other roster action that you know is going to happen - that we would have something like 53 minus 10 spots = 43 signed contracts for next year.
I could therefore see us take a flyer on 2-4 names listed below here (or other unknowns), all of course depending on what happens in general. In addition - we would likely sign 3 - 5 names as free agents (or through trades) for filling up the NYR & CT Whale rosters.
CT is going to have a young and interesting makeup next year. That is for sure.
Regarding unsigned NCAA players mentioned
here
DeKeyser - seems like he chooses his destination. Apparently has high ceiling - but will ne choose NYR? Likely not...
Sustr - was a Ranger camp invitee. Gargantua Kjell Samuelsson reincarnated? Definitely intriguing and a possibility
Laganiere - Big guy. Montreal bound? Interesting name though...
Lain - has history with Jean. Center. Want!
Some more free agent names out of the NCAA that might be of interest are here:
Defense
Nate Schmidt, Minnesota
Chris Casto, Minnesota-Duluth
Shayne Taker, Notre Dame
Kenney Morrison, Western Michigan
Wade Epp, Northern Michigan
Mike Boivin, Colorado College
Forwards
Eriah Hayes, Minnesota State
Ryan Walters, Nebraska-Omaha
Austin Czarnik, Miami
Alex Krushelnyski, Colorado College
Drew Leblanc, St. Cloud
Gabe Guertler, Minnesota
Outside of that there are some more interesting unsigned guys that might warrant a look. They include:
Joel Vermin, Switzerland
Petr Straka, Baie-Comeau Drakkar
Regarding the draft
Connor Hurley,
Pat Mullane,
Will Butcher,
Miles Bell,
Jacob de la Rose and
Emil Djuse are IMO all names to look into at the draft.
But some of these players will likely be gone before we pick. I think looking at a goalie or two might be a wise way to use a lower pick too.
Undrafted dark horse Swedish goalies
Anton Forsberg or
Sebastian Idoff could be worth a 7th rounder (which we need to pick up) IMO. Back to the future thing...
