Lets evaluate the rebuild returns so far.

[Ghost of jas]

Seriously. Now that we're rebuilding, the standard return isn't the standard anymore. And nobody gets hurt. And we're outstanding in the shootout. And Kreider and Zibanejad finally become elite. We're cursed.

You know, the trade that really started waking teams up to this was Forsberg for Erat, so as usual, **** Washington.

You know, having Mika and Kreider reach elite status could be a factor that actually speeds up the rebuild.

 

[patnyrnyg]

Like I said in the Zucc trade thread....

I get that. With the rebuild, the Rangers need to get something out of a potential UFA. Losing Zucc for nothing would've been even worse for the organization. Same goes for Hayes, McQuaid and others....

But the fact that he's been a consistent 50 point playmaker for the Rangers and got that kind of return is ridiculous, even if he's a rental. The way he sees the ice and is responsible in all three zones definitely deserves a guaranteed 1st rounder. No question. I'm not even talking about the fan-favorite aspect with the Rangers, but the way he plays (offensively gifted vision, grit with antagonizing traits, PK/PP strengths, consistent 50 point production in 5 seasons, etc.) he's a wizard with the puck. There is literally NO ONE in the organization that has that kind of ability, ATM. Kravtsov could become something like that, but that isn't a sure thing until he starts playing with NYR. To make matters worse, they even retained salary on him (even though that doesn't matter in the slightest long term). It's almost like Gorton did Dallas a favor.

I knew Zucc was getting moved, but this was a massive slap in the fanbases face and the organization should be ashamed with that kind of return.

Do you think there was a GM out there that would have given a 1st rounder and Gorton opted instead for the 2nd and 3rd with conditions?

Look at what Detroit got for Nyquist. 2nd and 3rd that will likely be later in each round, conditions to improve picks are not as good as what the Rangers picks from the Stars can turn into. Similar production and Nyquist is 2 years younger. Opposing GM's aren't going to pay more because a guy is a fan favorite or has a lot of heart. They make these moves for results.

 

[patnyrnyg]

so far our rebuild has been not bad. But they should have traded Vesey for 2nd rounder this deadline, also so far many top prospects like Chytil, Lias, Howden, Hajek, even Pionk have been disappointing. Day, Gropp, Lettieri, Ronning look like busts. 2nd rounder was wasted on some garbage goalie. 6th rounder was wasted on some son of a scout so he could get a college scholarship.

I think if Gorton could have got a 2nd for vesey, he would have taken it. He admitted they had discussions about other players, but decided not to move them. Hold him for a year, and if he plays well next year might get a better deal. The rest of the post is ridiculous. Complaining about a 6th round pick? Dodgers did that for a friend of Lasorda one time. Worked out pretty well.

 

[Machinehead]

You know, having Mika and Kreider reach elite status could be a factor that actually speeds up the rebuild.

This is true

 

[ThirdEye]

I think if Gorton could have got a 2nd for vesey, he would have taken it. He admitted they had discussions about other players, but decided not to move them. Hold him for a year, and if he plays well next year might get a better deal. The rest of the post is ridiculous. Complaining about a 6th round pick? Dodgers did that for a friend of Lasorda one time. Worked out pretty well.

I don't think he would have let go off Vesey for a 2nd.... He's still been very effective this year and still relatively young. Can always trade him at the draft or next deadline if needed

 

[True Blue]

Speaking of Vesey--he's been much better this year than he was in his first two years. It's not just the points (and if he continues on Zibanejad and Kreider's line he could push near 50) he's not nearly as lost in space on the defensive side of things. He's more physical and playing a lot smarter. Quinn uses him often on the PK and it's not like he's terrific at it but generally he's been okay. I'd value him at around a 2nd but like Tawnos I don't think we would have got that in this winger happy trade deadline scenario.

Really people might ask themselves would they rather have Vesey or Marcus Johansson? I'd rather have Vesey. The Bruins gave up a 2nd and a 4th for Johansson which IMO was a big overpayment. To me Vesey though is a lot like a younger Johansson. Complimentary players who are much more than less carried by their linemates.

I think that Vesey is going to get a long look from Quinn. Who knows? There could be more untapped potential there. So far, Quinn has shown that he can extract "better" from his players.

 

[Off Sides]

I think a lot of guys are missing the forest for the trees. The big deal is the fact that we are capitalizing on our aging assets to accelerate and strengthen our rebuild instead of mortgaging our future to try and prop up a team that's past its prime. The biggest choice is really between adding any of these players at all or subtracting future assets. Gorton has gotten that 100% right, in a very tough market to rebuild in, and deserves a ton credit for it.

Everyone, including me, wants generational building blocks, but it seems to me like a lot of people's expectations about how easy it is to get them are totally unrealistic.

Firstly, we're evaluating the returns Gorton has got, but it's not like he's getting better offers and turning them down. So the choice is really what he's got or nothing. It's not like this is the Godfather or Star Wars where Gorton can make other GM's offers they can't refuse or play Jedi mind tricks on them to get what he wants, he can only trade for what other teams will give up and the other teams aren't going to give up their generational players for the exact same reason that we want them.

Secondly, if you evaluate Gorton's tenure, I think he's actually been very good at identifying potential franchise players and very aggressive in pursuing them, but the ability to acquire them just hasn't been there:

- In the 2016 draft, Gorton identified Clayton Keller as someone he wanted and reportedly made every effort he could to trade up for him, but no one was willing to trade down.
- Before the 2017 draft, he moved Stepan for the 7th pick and gambled that he'd be able to get Pettersson, Makar, or Glass, who were at the top of his list. On top of that, he reportedly tried to move up from 7th to ensure he could get one of them, but no one above us would move down. Based on the rankings of Mittelstadt, Vilardi, and Tippet it still seemed like there was a reasonable chance he could get one of them at the 7th pick, but he didn't get a break. It seems to me like this was a smart, aggressive gamble to try and get a generational player that he just didn't get lucky on.
- Getting DeAngelo in the Stepan deal was a high-risk / high-reward move for a player with big upside that seems to look good so far.
- At the 2018 TDL, he held out till the very last minute of the deadline trying to get Tampa to offer Sergachev or Foote for McDonagh and that offer didn't come.
- In the 2018 draft, he picked Kravtsov and then traded up to get Miller, who is one of the highest upside players in the draft. (By the way, our board passed on Kravstov and Miller for Dobson and Addison in the HF Mock Draft, so Gorton's judgment was unquestionably better than his critics on here)
- On top of that, he's maintained cap flexibility and acquired a ton of young assets that give him the trade chips to try and get a generational player if one does become available.

I really don't see what else anybody could reasonably expect him to do. It seems to me like if someone thinks he's not trying to get generational players, the problem is with their analysis instead of Gorton's work. Everyone in the league knows generational players are important, so they're obviously going to be really tough to get. It's certainly not like you can decide you want generational players and just go out and get a bunch of them in a year. If that were the case, every team in the NHL would rebuild within a year. This is why rebuilds take time.

Maybe the one thing you could criticize him for is not tanking harder, but:
1) He's traded away McDonagh, Stepan, Nash, Miller, Grabner, Hayes, Zuccarello, etc for futures. There's not much that more to sell off.
2) Even if we somehow became worse than Ottawa, we still wouldn't be likely to end up with a top-2 pick because of the lottery system. It seems to me like getting a small increase in our chances of top-2 pick by totally sabotaging our team wouldn't increase our odds of getting generational players when you weigh it against the cost of sacrificing a positive environment for the players we have to develop in.

At the end of the day, we can quibble over the returns, but I think that misses the point. He's absolutely done the right thing in deciding to rebuild and he's made every possible effort to acquire generational players as a part of that. It seems to me like that's everything you could reasonably ask for.

Again good post,

Since the letter I think they have committed full steam towards the rebuild. I think they've done what they've needed to toward that.

My quibble would be I just don't see the start of the rebuild as either the Brassard or Stepan trade. (perhaps Gorton sees it that way, yet I think he may have had to get there through a longer process)

I think they believed they could replace Stepan with Hayes or Miller, retool the D, minus Girardi + Shattenkirk and Smith and still make the playoffs.

Without injury and some regression that season I think they may have done so and I'm not sure the letter ever goes out.

With that said I do think they also hedged their bets on the retool, they gave both Shattenkirk and Smith term that ended at the same time as Lundqvist and Staal.

More of less, I'm wondering if among management there was some disagreement about if they should retool or rebuild given Lundqvist still had many years left under contract, so some compromise and placating was necessary. Once they missed the playoffs (which may have been bad luck) the pendulum swung far enough to push it into a total rebuild with less resistance, thus the letter.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I think a lot of guys are missing the forest for the trees. The big deal is the fact that we are capitalizing on our aging assets to accelerate and strengthen our rebuild instead of mortgaging our future to try and prop up a team that's past its prime. The biggest choice is really between adding any of these players at all or subtracting future assets. Gorton has gotten that 100% right, in a very tough market to rebuild in, and deserves a ton credit for it.

Everyone, including me, wants generational building blocks, but it seems to me like a lot of people's expectations about how easy it is to get them are totally unrealistic.

Firstly, we're evaluating the returns Gorton has got, but it's not like he's getting better offers and turning them down. So the choice is really what he's got or nothing. It's not like this is the Godfather or Star Wars where Gorton can make other GM's offers they can't refuse or play Jedi mind tricks on them to get what he wants, he can only trade for what other teams will give up and the other teams aren't going to give up their generational players for the exact same reason that we want them.

Secondly, if you evaluate Gorton's tenure, I think he's actually been very good at identifying potential franchise players and very aggressive in pursuing them, but the ability to acquire them just hasn't been there:

- In the 2016 draft, Gorton identified Clayton Keller as someone he wanted and reportedly made every effort he could to trade up for him, but no one was willing to trade down.
- Before the 2017 draft, he moved Stepan for the 7th pick and gambled that he'd be able to get Pettersson, Makar, or Glass, who were at the top of his list. On top of that, he reportedly tried to move up from 7th to ensure he could get one of them, but no one above us would move down. Based on the rankings of Mittelstadt, Vilardi, and Tippet it still seemed like there was a reasonable chance he could get one of them at the 7th pick, but he didn't get a break. It seems to me like this was a smart, aggressive gamble to try and get a generational player that he just didn't get lucky on.
- Getting DeAngelo in the Stepan deal was a high-risk / high-reward move for a player with big upside that seems to look good so far.
- At the 2018 TDL, he held out till the very last minute of the deadline trying to get Tampa to offer Sergachev or Foote for McDonagh and that offer didn't come.
- In the 2018 draft, he picked Kravtsov and then traded up to get Miller, who is one of the highest upside players in the draft. (By the way, our board passed on Kravstov and Miller for Dobson and Addison in the HF Mock Draft, so Gorton's judgment was unquestionably better than his critics on here)
- On top of that, he's maintained cap flexibility and acquired a ton of young assets that give him the trade chips to try and get a generational player if one does become available.

I really don't see what else anybody could reasonably expect him to do. It seems to me like if someone thinks he's not trying to get generational players, the problem is with their analysis instead of Gorton's work. Everyone in the league knows generational players are important, so they're obviously going to be really tough to get. It's certainly not like you can decide you want generational players and just go out and get a bunch of them in a year. If that were the case, every team in the NHL would rebuild within a year. This is why rebuilds take time.

Maybe the one thing you could criticize him for is not tanking harder, but:
1) He's traded away McDonagh, Stepan, Nash, Miller, Grabner, Hayes, Zuccarello, etc for futures. There's not much that more to sell off.
2) Even if we somehow became worse than Ottawa, we still wouldn't be likely to end up with a top-2 pick because of the lottery system. It seems to me like getting a small increase in our chances of top-2 pick by totally sabotaging our team wouldn't increase our odds of getting generational players when you weigh it against the cost of sacrificing a positive environment for the players we have to develop in.

At the end of the day, we can quibble over the returns, but I think that misses the point. He's absolutely done the right thing in deciding to rebuild and he's made every possible effort to acquire generational players as a part of that. It seems to me like that's everything you could reasonably ask for.

Great Post!

As for the generational talents, it takes A LOT of luck. Have to be bad when they are available. Have to win the lottery, and need the players to live up to their potential. Pens got lucky in that they were bad when Fleury and Malkin were available. Then, got lucky in the lotto for Crosby. When they won the Cup in 2009, they had 7(?) consecutive 1st rounders playing a regular role for them. Caps got lucky in that they had their worst season in years when Ovechkin was in the draft. However, it took years for them to get it right and win the Cup and could say they had to build twice. They were great regular season teams early in his career, never won in Play-offs. Then had some down years (7th seed in 2012, out in first round in 2013, missed play-offs in 2014), then guys like Carlson, Backstrom, Kuznetsov worked. Chicago got lucky in that they were terrible when Kane and Toews came out.

For this group of youngsters and picks to be a team that wins the cup or cups, it is likely going to have to be like the Devils (I know a long time ago), the 2011 Bruins, the Kings teams that won. Lots and lots of depth, but without that superstar who is among the pre-season favorites for the Hart/Rocket/Ross trophy each and every year they play. Yes, Kings had superstars in Doughty and Kopitar, but for the most part it was their depth. That is what the Rangers are going to have to build.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I think a lot of guys are missing the forest for the trees. The big deal is the fact that we are capitalizing on our aging assets to accelerate and strengthen our rebuild instead of mortgaging our future to try and prop up a team that's past its prime. The biggest choice is really between adding any of these players at all or subtracting future assets. Gorton has gotten that 100% right, in a very tough market to rebuild in, and deserves a ton credit for it.

Everyone, including me, wants generational building blocks, but it seems to me like a lot of people's expectations about how easy it is to get them are totally unrealistic.

Firstly, we're evaluating the returns Gorton has got, but it's not like he's getting better offers and turning them down. So the choice is really what he's got or nothing. It's not like this is the Godfather or Star Wars where Gorton can make other GM's offers they can't refuse or play Jedi mind tricks on them to get what he wants, he can only trade for what other teams will give up and the other teams aren't going to give up their generational players for the exact same reason that we want them.

Secondly, if you evaluate Gorton's tenure, I think he's actually been very good at identifying potential franchise players and very aggressive in pursuing them, but the ability to acquire them just hasn't been there:

- In the 2016 draft, Gorton identified Clayton Keller as someone he wanted and reportedly made every effort he could to trade up for him, but no one was willing to trade down.
- Before the 2017 draft, he moved Stepan for the 7th pick and gambled that he'd be able to get Pettersson, Makar, or Glass, who were at the top of his list. On top of that, he reportedly tried to move up from 7th to ensure he could get one of them, but no one above us would move down. Based on the rankings of Mittelstadt, Vilardi, and Tippet it still seemed like there was a reasonable chance he could get one of them at the 7th pick, but he didn't get a break. It seems to me like this was a smart, aggressive gamble to try and get a generational player that he just didn't get lucky on.
- Getting DeAngelo in the Stepan deal was a high-risk / high-reward move for a player with big upside that seems to look good so far.
- At the 2018 TDL, he held out till the very last minute of the deadline trying to get Tampa to offer Sergachev or Foote for McDonagh and that offer didn't come.
- In the 2018 draft, he picked Kravtsov and then traded up to get Miller, who is one of the highest upside players in the draft. (By the way, our board passed on Kravstov and Miller for Dobson and Addison in the HF Mock Draft, so Gorton's judgment was unquestionably better than his critics on here)
- On top of that, he's maintained cap flexibility and acquired a ton of young assets that give him the trade chips to try and get a generational player if one does become available.

I really don't see what else anybody could reasonably expect him to do. It seems to me like if someone thinks he's not trying to get generational players, the problem is with their analysis instead of Gorton's work. Everyone in the league knows generational players are important, so they're obviously going to be really tough to get. It's certainly not like you can decide you want generational players and just go out and get a bunch of them in a year. If that were the case, every team in the NHL would rebuild within a year. This is why rebuilds take time.

Maybe the one thing you could criticize him for is not tanking harder, but:
1) He's traded away McDonagh, Stepan, Nash, Miller, Grabner, Hayes, Zuccarello, etc for futures. There's not much that more to sell off.
2) Even if we somehow became worse than Ottawa, we still wouldn't be likely to end up with a top-2 pick because of the lottery system. It seems to me like getting a small increase in our chances of top-2 pick by totally sabotaging our team wouldn't increase our odds of getting generational players when you weigh it against the cost of sacrificing a positive environment for the players we have to develop in.

At the end of the day, we can quibble over the returns, but I think that misses the point. He's absolutely done the right thing in deciding to rebuild and he's made every possible effort to acquire generational players as a part of that. It seems to me like that's everything you could reasonably ask for.

Great Post!

As for the generational talents, it takes A LOT of luck. Have to be bad when they are available. Have to win the lottery, and need the players to live up to their potential. Pens got lucky in that they were bad when Fleury and Malkin were available. Then, got lucky in the lotto for Crosby. When they won the Cup in 2009, they had 7(?) consecutive 1st rounders playing a regular role for them. Caps got lucky in that they had their worst season in years when Ovechkin was in the draft. However, it took years for them to get it right and win the Cup and could say they had to build twice. They were great regular season teams early in his career, never won in Play-offs. Then had some down years (7th seed in 2012, out in first round in 2013, missed play-offs in 2014), then guys like Carlson, Backstrom, Kuznetsov worked. Chicago got lucky in that they were terrible when Kane and Toews came out.

For this group of youngsters and picks to be a team that wins the cup or cups, it is likely going to have to be like the Devils (I know a long time ago), the 2011 Bruins, the Kings teams that won. Lots and lots of depth, but without that superstar who is among the pre-season favorites for the Hart/Rocket/Ross trophy each and every year they play. Yes, Kings had superstars in Doughty and Kopitar, but for the most part it was their depth. That is what the Rangers are going to have to build.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I don't think he would have let go off Vesey for a 2nd.... He's still been very effective this year and still relatively young. Can always trade him at the draft or next deadline if needed

If he thinks he can get a 1st for him next season, then I would agree that he did the right thing by keeping him even if he was offered a 2nd.

They have 5 picks in the first 2 rounds this year, so adding a 2nd may not have been as attractive to him. If anyone took an intermediate microecon course, you may remember the concept of Marginal Rate of Substitution.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I don't think he would have let go off Vesey for a 2nd.... He's still been very effective this year and still relatively young. Can always trade him at the draft or next deadline if needed

If he thinks he can get a 1st for him next season, then I would agree that he did the right thing by keeping him even if he was offered a 2nd.

They have 5 picks in the first 2 rounds this year, so adding a 2nd may not have been as attractive to him. If anyone took an intermediate microecon course, you may remember the concept of Marginal Rate of Substitution.

 

[NYRKing]

Great Post!

As for the generational talents, it takes A LOT of luck. Have to be bad when they are available. Have to win the lottery, and need the players to live up to their potential. Pens got lucky in that they were bad when Fleury and Malkin were available. Then, got lucky in the lotto for Crosby. When they won the Cup in 2009, they had 7(?) consecutive 1st rounders playing a regular role for them. Caps got lucky in that they had their worst season in years when Ovechkin was in the draft. However, it took years for them to get it right and win the Cup and could say they had to build twice. They were great regular season teams early in his career, never won in Play-offs. Then had some down years (7th seed in 2012, out in first round in 2013, missed play-offs in 2014), then guys like Carlson, Backstrom, Kuznetsov worked. Chicago got lucky in that they were terrible when Kane and Toews came out.

For this group of youngsters and picks to be a team that wins the cup or cups, it is likely going to have to be like the Devils (I know a long time ago), the 2011 Bruins, the Kings teams that won. Lots and lots of depth, but without that superstar who is among the pre-season favorites for the Hart/Rocket/Ross trophy each and every year they play. Yes, Kings had superstars in Doughty and Kopitar, but for the most part it was their depth. That is what the Rangers are going to have to build.

There's a lot of different ways to do it but you need a strong core to start, be it with super stars or several all-stars. So the Kings and Bruins didn't have the MVP, but they had a really strong young core and veterans in their prime. Kopitar, Doughty, Quick, Toffoli etc. etc. The Bruins also had a good young core, but to this day I think they may have been the luckiest team to ever win the cup. Vancouver gave it away more than Boston won it imo. I would have felt the same if we beat the Kings in 2014, a superior squad.

 

[Edge]

I've always been a fan of the approach of not letting the quest for the perfect get in the way of the good, or the work that needs to be done regardless.

Yes, the team needs more elite talent.

Yes, a generational talent would benefit this organization tremendously.

Yes, not every prospect we have is going to be an NHL player, let a lone an impact NHL player.

But that doesn't mean we just stop in our tracks until all the pieces fall into place and the stars align. That's just not how life, or business works.

So we press forward, accumulate what we can, with what we have, and control the things that we can control.

 

[True Blue]

So we press forward, accumulate what we can, with what we have, and control the things that we can control.

Stay the course. Which is what Gorton has done. The belief that only a generational talent can rescue the team may involve waiting a generation to get one. Trust the process.

 

[offdacrossbar]

generational talents are rare.

doing a better job drafting is a start and KEEPING those guys here who are on the cusp of becoming elite players in their own right is just as important. CK being shopped ? is that smart ?

this idea that anyone due a 2nd deal needs to be moved is flawed. you cannot build a team, even with top draft picks, without some older established players. there needs to be a mix to create a team.

we have some nice looking young dmen and forwards actually but this team lacks HIGH END TALENT.

we need minimum 1 or more like 2 true SCORING FORWARDS and a TRUE TOP PAIR DMAN.

this rebuild is real. hold the line and all that sounds good but again, ill repeat my narrative, you cant do it by drafting late 1sts and 2nds. that isnt how you rebuild a team like ours and if thats what you try to do, the only way it happens is over long period of time and with substantial luck

we have TWO LEGIT TOP NHL forwards on this team right now. 93 and 13. thats it.

we have NO LEGIT dmen. some good ones like 76, 77 and maybe 22 but not a top pair guy on the roster.

this organization is barren of high end talent for the most part, except for the last draft, its been pretty lean. sure kravtsov looks like a keeper. same with chytl. andersson who knows if hes a 2C or a 3rd line 2 way guy. shesty looks amazing but still an unknown. k'ndre is gonna be a good one but when ? lundkvist looks good but again who knows when ? hajek. lindgren. rykov ???

there will need to be some talent IMPORTED. its going to happen. hartford is VOID of any real talent. the few dmen there haven't really stood out. there are ZERO forwards. our top prospects aren't ready yet and they are primarily dmen.

this team will be epically bad next season. good year to be bad with a top end 2020 draft. maybe thats the plan but again, were 1-3 yrs out after that.

pressing forward sounds great but the reality is that press forward may be both long and painful.

was quinn brought here to lose 40 games his first 2-3 seasons ? can JG survive that ? will the garden faithful allow that ? why keep 93 and 20 if thats the plan ?

there is a middle ground here and i think thats here JG is heading.

 

[True Blue]

there is a middle ground here and i think thats here JG is heading.

I have seen nothing to suggest that Gorton is not proceeding to the plan that he laid out. And that is not by straddling the middle.

 

[Lindberg Cheese]

Going into draft, we look like the below but need to..

1. Fix the D - transition from Staal, Smith, Shatty into pipeline
2. Deepen/elevate the F pool - NHL depth is good (4 lines) but farm is pathetic and we lack high-end in general.

Draft will be interesting, i think we make some trades.

Krieds Ziba Krat
Names Chytil Buch
Vesey Howton Andersson
Son of Claude Strome Fast
Nieves
Staal ADA
Skjei Shatty
Claesson Pionk
Smith

 

[offdacrossbar]

I have seen nothing to suggest that Gorton is not proceeding to the plan that he laid out. And that is not by straddling the middle.

straddling ?

his plan seems to be exactly what you would do to be in the middle ????

this organization will not support or tolerate a complete tear down.

quinn wasn't brought here to lose 40 games per his first 3 seasons.

no way this organization allows that. we couldn't even tank properly.

they will try to make the playoffs every season and just miss for a few years

sadly, we are in the middle right now and will be there for a while.

 

[Shesterkybomb]

Brian Burke figured we got more for Hayes than Vegas got for Stone.

 

[Shesterkybomb]

Interesting thought here but Ottawa is going to need some salary (cheap cap hit) to make the floor next year. Could we retain on Smith or Staal and send one of them there. Staal is owed around 7 million I believe in real dollars over the next two years but a cap hit over 10 if memory serves me correct

 

[Thirty One]

Brian Burke figured we got more for Hayes than Vegas got for Stone.

That explains his recent success as an executive.

 

[Shesterkybomb]

That explains his recent success as an executive.

He wasnt the only one on the talk shows in Canada. Some felt Brunnstrom was too small to be as impactful as he has been in the NHL.

 

[apoptygma]

Quinn have amanged to get career year out of 5 of our established forwards (Mika, Kreider, Vesey, Hayes, MZA), integrated 4 rookies (Boo, Howden, Chytil, DeAngelo) and at the same time changed out system to stopping bleeding so many hich dangers chanses against.
Impressive results, but not really expected.

NYR not being in a top 5 drafft position at this time is more of a flaw then intended design. Hopefully the sell off this weekend will help them to get a couple of top 5 picks the 2 comming drafts.

 

[Shesterkybomb]

Coaching has been excellent for this team. The one thing I'm not on board with anymore is keeping Hank around. Not that it matters and we should be looking to lose anyway but I feel Georgiev probably wins that game vs Washington. Hank isnt as fast as he once was and his glove hand is suspect. I'm not sure having him taking games from younger goalies is the best idea. Love the guy, and love that he wants to stay and be a ranger for life but I feel this is heading down the Martin Brodeur road.
The options for him should be, we trade you at next years deadline or you retire.

 

[eco's bones]

Stone is a great player and yeah probably the best player dealt but he's not a lock for the Hall of Fame when his career is over.

With Hayes--I think what he wanted for a new contract is one main reason why the Rangers moved on from him. I suspect he'll get close to it but where are team was--signing guys for 7 years is maybe not a good idea. Lemieux and Winnipeg's 1st isn't too shabby IMO for a player who kind of had you over the barrel to sign him or not. That said I'm a big fan of Kevin Hayes. I wish him well.

Zucc was tough but depending it wouldn't surprise me if the Rangers re-signed him though if there's a team out there that gives him 5 years it ain't likely to be us. We shall see. It wouldn't piss me off if we gave him three. Unfortunate that he broke his arm. Wish him well too.

I also liked McQuaid--steady D and other teams didn't f*** with us very much when he was on the ice. Good luck to him.

The Rangers also are better set up for finishing out the season than they were last year. Our D might not be great but it doesn't look like we're going to be playing the likes of Sproul, O'Gara, Gilmour and a brand new to the NHL Pionk in the final stretch. I can see this team pretty much doing what it's done all season and it wouldn't surprise me if we finish the year with 80 to 85 standings points. So I suspect we'll be picking somewhere between 9 and 12--unless we get lucky in the lottery. So far luck in NHL lotteries though hasn't been on our side.

As far as prospects go though we're as deep as we've been in a long long while and we're going to be adding more the next two years. Two 1st's and 3 2nd's this year and a couple of the 2nd's could turn into 1st's. Maybe we can grab a couple good college free agents too.

 

[McRanger]

straddling ?

his plan seems to be exactly what you would do to be in the middle ????

this organization will not support or tolerate a complete tear down.

quinn wasn't brought here to lose 40 games per his first 3 seasons.

no way this organization allows that. we couldn't even tank properly.

they will try to make the playoffs every season and just miss for a few years

sadly, we are in the middle right now and will be there for a while.

You might eventually be right, that Gorton deviates from his plan due to internal or external pressures. It wouldn't be the first time that happened.

But until that happens, TB is right.

 

[GAGLine]

Interesting thought here but Ottawa is going to need some salary (cheap cap hit) to make the floor next year. Could we retain on Smith or Staal and send one of them there. Staal is owed around 7 million I believe in real dollars over the next two years but a cap hit over 10 if memory serves me correct

If we are retaining, then they are getting less of a cap hit. I think what they would want would be players with high cap hits and low salaries.

Staal has a 1 mil signing bonus in July. After that, he is owed 8.2 mil. That's an average of 4.1 mil for a 5.7 mil cap hit. It's not really that much savings for them. The same is true with Smith. He will be owed 7.875 mil, average of 3.9875 mil per year against a 4.35 mil cap hit. Even less savings. Us retaining would only reduce the amount of savings.

2020 is when we may be able to trade them. After July 1st, Staal will be owed 3.2 mil against a 5.7 mil cap hit. Smith will be owed 2.35 mil against a 4.35 mil cap hit. The savings would be 2.5 mil and 2 mil, respectively.

And in case you are wondering, Shattenkirk is in a similar boat, though the savings in the final year are even higher. 2 mil after his signing bonus against a cap hit of 6.65 mil, a savings of 4.65 mil. He will make 6 mil next year and is owed 2 mil on July 1st, 2020, so trading him to a cap floor team before then isn't likely.