Speculation: Roster Building Thread : Part XV (Light em up!)

[Machinehead]

Igor was drafted in 2013 and predates the rebuild. We didnt acquire and pay him in any wrong order. The thing we did out of order was pay a winger 11.6 million dollars 18 months into a rebuild (and a 4th RHD another 8 million, but I digress). That's why they were never bad enough to truly bottom out. That f***ed our whole rebuild when we stopped prioritizing young homegrown players because our stars wanted to win. It's got nothing to do with Igor being on the team. He was on it when we got the first overall pick in the draft lol, its just our luck the consensus wasnt a C that year.

You're right, but then we turned around and extended a goalie at 11.5 million right at the outset of what's shaping up to be another rebuild.

 

[McRanger92]

You're right, but then we turned around and extended a goalie at 11.5 million right at the outset of what's shaping up to be another rebuild.

Just sounds to me like we dont have to worry about the goalie position. 25 other teams GM's are losing sleep over their goalies. Igor is overpaid and overrated by the media but he's probably underrated here at this point. What's done is done. The mandate now should be, how to we turn Panarin/Kreider/Mika and the cap space they are taking up into a Cup winning 1C.

 

[LokiDog]

Igor was drafted in 2013 and predates the rebuild. We didnt acquire and pay him in any wrong order. The thing we did out of order was pay a winger 11.6 million dollars 18 months into a rebuild (and a 4th RHD another 8 million, but I digress). That's why they were never bad enough to truly bottom out. That f***ed our whole rebuild when we stopped prioritizing young homegrown players because our stars wanted to win. It's got nothing to do with Igor being on the team. He was on it when we got the first overall pick in the draft lol, its just our luck the consensus wasnt a C that year.

We didn’t have to re-sign him. We were in the midst of a historic slump and could have retained on him and sold him for a fortune, bottomed out for 1, maybe 2 years and drafted a center. You CAN get an adequate goalie FAR more easily than you will ever acquire a 1C. Replacing Igor with a goalie CAPABLE of winning a Cup wouldn’t be difficult. I’m sure LA would be happy to send us Kuemper, and he’s already done it once. Getting the 1C we need is virtually impossible.

We weren’t supposed to win that draft lottery AND Igor only played 12 games the year we got the 1st overall pick. He wasn’t a franchise goalie at the time. Once you have a goalie PLAYING AT IGOR’s LEVEL you will not acquire a prime 1C. Why is this a hard concept? It has NOTHING to do with HOW MUCH he is paid. It has to do with, once you have an elite goalie PLAYING for you (it doesn’t matter that they were in the organization when they’ve only played 12 career games) you will not be ABLE to draft an elite center, so if you don’t already have one or have one developing, you are now locked in to goaltending that is too good to allow you to draft one. I’m really not understanding the disconnect here.

Igor became elite. We don’t have a 1C. We faced a choice; re-sign him and continue down the path of madness, trying what doesn’t work over and over and over again like we have done for the past 20 years OR trade him and pursue finally getting ourselves a 1C (something new that might yield different results than doing the same thing over and over again). We chose to lock ourselves in to 8 years of continuing to do the same thing. So any of you who support that move and expect DIFFERENT results, I don’t know what to tell you, but good luck. We should have traded Igor at a 2.7M cap hit to a desperate Edmonton or Colorado (pre Blackwood) so that they could go get their Cup and we should have accepted that we need to draft a legit top tier center if we want to win a Cup in this decade. Now we can wait until Igor is 35 and slowing down for that chance to come around again.

 

[LokiDog]

Just sounds to me like we dont have to worry about the goalie position. 25 other teams GM's are losing sleep over their goalies. Igor is overpaid and overrated by the media but he's probably underrated here at this point. What's done is done. The mandate now should be, how to we turn Panarin/Kreider/Mika and the cap space they are taking up into a Cup winning 1C.

You shouldn’t ever lose sleep over the goalie position. That’s why guys like Huet and Crawford and Murray and Kuemper have their names on it. You should lose sleep over how to acquire a 1C.


You can’t “turn” Panarin, Kreider and Mika’s cap into a 1C. You can draft one, or you can OCCASIONALLY acquire one who has big question marks in a risky gamble. That’s it. God this is simple.

 

[GAGLine]

Um… yes. It has nothing to do with Igor’s contract. It has to do with - like Hank’s tenure - you can’t draft an elite center when your goalie guarantees you never suck badly enough to be in the race. Even this year with the atrocity of a slump they had, the Rangers will not finish bottom five. It has nothing to do with the money. It has to do with the fact that 1Cs under 27ish only become available if they are headcases like EP or have a broken neck like Eichel. Otherwise they are drafted, period (and either play for one franchise ever, or play with one franchise until they’re 30+ alla Stamkos). So yes, I believe myself and many others would be saying that when you lock in a franchise goalie before you have a franchise center, you are essentially doomed to never have the franchise center. It’s not the contract that is prohibitive, but then you do ask yourself what’s the point of paying the elite goalie when - without the 1C - you’re basically just going to tread water and waste their entire career never getting over the hump.

And yes, this makes hockey a bit of a crap shoot, because you either draft an elite center or you don’t. ROR and St. Louis is the one case in 20+ years that goes against the data. Every Cup winner had a 1C (or future 1C in a 2C role) that they drafted. Staal, Getzlaf, Toews, Kopitar, Bergeron, Crosby, Backstrom, Mackinnon, Stamkos/Point, etc.

Vegas acquired Eichel when he had question marks around his health. If we pull the trigger on Kakko + Chytil + 1st for Eichel we probably have a Cup.

I'm all for drafting a 1C, but Igor or not, I don't think Dolan has the stomach for a true rebuild. Short of that, it means being lucky enough that we are unintentionally bad at the right time. We got the 2nd and 1st overall picks in successive drafts and took 2 wingers.

We weren't lucky enough to draft Hughes, and objectively, he's probably the only 1C to come out of that draft. In Laf's draft, who is the 1C we could have drafted? There were some decent centers, but none I would call a true 1C at this point in their career.

We were playing some truly awful hockey for a while there despite Igor, and Igor has had his stretches where he wasn't at his best. I don't think he's in any way the difference between us drafting and not drafting a 1C, but if he factors into it at all, it's far down the list behind a ton of other issues.

 

[LokiDog]

I'm all for drafting a 1C, but Igor or not, I don't think Dolan has the stomach for a true rebuild. Short of that, it means being lucky enough that we are unintentionally bad at the right time. We got the 2nd and 1st overall picks in successive drafts and took 2 wingers.

We weren't lucky enough to draft Hughes, and objectively, he's probably the only 1C to come out of that draft. In Laf's draft, who is the 1C we could have drafted? There were some decent centers, but none I would call a true 1C at this point in their career.

We were playing some truly awful hockey for a while there despite Igor, and Igor has had his stretches where he wasn't at his best. I don't think he's in any way the difference between us drafting and not drafting a 1C, but if he factors into it at all, it's far down the list behind a ton of other issues.

Yes, ultimately, there are two debates. One, academically, it’s the debate about the need to draft your own 1C and how critical that is to winning the Cup and whether or not you can do that when you have a goalie of Igor’s quality. Two, practically, would the owner of the NYR ever intentionally allow his team to bottom out for a couple of years.

They’re very different debates. Academically, I believe there’s really only one way forward in the modern NHL and if we want to win a Cup we gotta draft a center. Practically, I know that Dolan cares more about being consistently “good” and generating lots of revenue than making sacrifices to eventually win. Puts us in a no-win situation.

 

[McRanger92]

You shouldn’t ever lose sleep over the goalie position. That’s why guys like Huet and Crawford and Murray and Kuemper have their names on it. You should lose sleep over how to acquire a 1C.


You can’t “turn” Panarin, Kreider and Mika’s cap into a 1C. You can draft one, or you can OCCASIONALLY acquire one who has big question marks in a risky gamble. That’s it. God this is simple.

Matthews and Hughes are a couple 1Cs people keep mentioning who haven't won shit because their goalies suck. The goalie is not the reason we dont have a 1C. Signing Panarin to the biggest contract in the league at the time, and thinking Zibanejad was an elite 1C were much bigger barriers than the goalie. We also just flat out didnt draft centers. And you mentioned Pettersson being a huge risk, well guess what, teams that win Cups dont do it by being timid. I have been calling for bold moves to add to this team for literally years.

 

[Machinehead]

Yes, ultimately, there are two debates. One, academically, it’s the debate about the need to draft your own 1C and how critical that is to winning the Cup and whether or not you can do that when you have a goalie of Igor’s quality. Two, practically, would the owner of the NYR ever intentionally allow his team to bottom out for a couple of years.

They’re very different debates. Academically, I believe there’s really only one way forward in the modern NHL and if we want to win a Cup we gotta draft a center. Practically, I know that Dolan cares more about being consistently “good” and generating lots of revenue than making sacrifices to eventually win. Puts us in a no-win situation.

Dolan would let them cook. He hired a guy to run the Knicks that basically knows what he's doing and he's staying out of the way.

He axed Gorton because Gorton is a moron. As simple as it gets.

 

[RangerBoy]

I don’t mind Igor's contract. The cap will be $92,400,000 without a CBA extension or $97M with the CBA extension. The salary cap will/should be $110M when it starts becoming linked to revenue again. The NHL and the players will smooth out the drastic increase. There should be enough money to ice a competitive and winning team paying Igor $11.5M. The rest of the stranglers need to go.

 

[Machinehead]

I'm not worried about Dolan at all. He's just vibing. He's 69 years old (nice) and this team that he probably bought for like $6 is worth 3.5 billion. He's not as involved as he used to be.

When you tell him "let's spend $20 million and the rebuild I promised will be over" and then the team still sucks, he might notice.

Hell, this guy might have the longest fuse in the NHL right now. Glen Sather was still employed until June.

If anything, I'm concerned that Dolan hasn't blown his fuse enough at the people running this team.

 

[NYR Viper]

I could be convinced that a team that ices (3) good 2-way centers who all score in that 50-75 point range could seriously compete for a Stanley Cup. I agree that having an elite 1C is ideal, but I'm not sure if its absolutely necessary. I would say that having a good top-6 on defense is a must.

The Ranger team last year, if they had allocated the cap space from Lindgren and Trouba to another elite d-man and a physical scorer up front likely could have beaten the Panthers.

 

[Machinehead]

Matthews and Hughes are a couple 1Cs people keep mentioning who haven't won shit because their goalies suck. The goalie is not the reason we dont have a 1C. Signing Panarin to the biggest contract in the league at the time, and thinking Zibanejad was an elite 1C were much bigger barriers than the goalie. We also just flat out didnt draft centers. And you mentioned Pettersson being a huge risk, well guess what, teams that win Cups dont do it by being timid. I have been calling for bold moves to add to this team for literally years.

I would move my unborn children for Elias Pettersson and I don't care what his issues are.

He has legitimate Hart talent when he's on his A-game.

Don't get it twisted, when people harp on a 1C, they're not looking for perfection.

 

[JohnC]

Assuming the bolded is true, do you honestly believe Panarin is the guy who will get us there? How long are you willing to give him?

At some point, your worst fear is going to be realized. Panarin is going to leave, one way or another. Personally, I'd rather rip the band aid off now while we can still get a good return for him.

Are we also going to pretend that we’re not exactly far removed from an era where the team was arguably as successful without a skater of Panarin’s caliber on the roster?

 

[effen]

Vegas acquired Eichel when he had question marks around his health. If we pull the trigger on Kakko + Chytil + 1st for Eichel we probably have a Cup.

IIRC the end demand was Adam Fox (coming off a LOL Norris in his 2nd year) + 1st OR Laf, Kakko/Chytil, Schneider/KAM, and a 1st.

Which is like 150c on the dollar at the time considering for all anyone knew Eichel's head may have fallen off his body.

The backlash was they took basically 3 1sts from Vegas while demanding 4-5 1sts from the Rangers.

Eichel has also missed 15+ games a year since... if he's a 1C he's a middling one. This year he's just on a PDO bender.

 

[LORDE]

Igor was drafted in 2013 and predates the rebuild. We didnt acquire and pay him in any wrong order. The thing we did out of order was pay a winger 11.6 million dollars 18 months into a rebuild (and a 4th RHD another 8 million, but I digress). That's why they were never bad enough to truly bottom out. That f***ed our whole rebuild when we stopped prioritizing young homegrown players because our stars wanted to win. It's got nothing to do with Igor being on the team. He was on it when we got the first overall pick in the draft lol, its just our luck the consensus wasnt a C that year.

He's not talking about DRAFTING Igor

He's talking about paying him 11.5 for 8 yrs when we don't have a team in front of him... especially the 1C WE NEVER EVER HAVE HAD

 

[haohmaru]

You shouldn’t ever lose sleep over the goalie position. That’s why guys like Huet and Crawford and Murray and Kuemper have their names on it. You should lose sleep over how to acquire a 1C.


You can’t “turn” Panarin, Kreider and Mika’s cap into a 1C. You can draft one, or you can OCCASIONALLY acquire one who has big question marks in a risky gamble. That’s it. God this is simple.

The Rangers organization, historically, is historically inept at the 1C position and at forward. Drafts, trades, you name it.

Last "number one" C before a couple of good Zibby years? Messier. Don't throw Richards at me. He was, as per the Rangers usual "solution", a tailing off 1C that really wasn't an elite 1C anymore. And, even if he was, he wasn't a good enough 1C to win anything.

Think about it - the few "great" 500+ points at forward that the Rangers have ever drafted were all traded away - Savard, Amonte, Weight, possibly JT Miller, possibly Buchnevich, Kovalev, Dahlen, Gagner, Sandstrom, Middleton, etc...

This organization has a penchant for trading away young talent for the quick grab at past greatness.

Kakko is the latest example of this. Borgen has been fine but Kakko will be another stick in the craw for the next decade.

Like Friedman always says, "I'd rather solve a problem that I already have than trade it away". Kakko will never be what we all would've liked a 2OA to be. That being said, Laviolette, Gallant, etc... all should've said, at some point, "you're our 1st line RW'er. Go and play and don't look over your shoulder".

He's not talking about DRAFTING Igor

He's talking about paying him 11.5 for 8 yrs when we don't have a team in front of him... especially the 1C WE NEVER EVER HAVE HAD

Messier

 

[will1066]

The Rangers organization, historically, is historically inept at the 1C position and at forward. Drafts, trades, you name it.

Last "number one" C before a couple of good Zibby years? Messier. Don't throw Richards at me. He was, as per the Rangers usual "solution", a tailing off 1C that really wasn't an elite 1C anymore. And, even if he was, he wasn't a good enough 1C to win anything.

Think about it - the few "great" 500+ points at forward that the Rangers have ever drafted were all traded away - Savard, Amonte, Weight, possibly JT Miller, possibly Buchnevich, Kovalev, Dahlen, Gagner, Sandstrom, Middleton, etc...

This organization has a penchant for trading away young talent for the quick grab at past greatness.

Kakko is the latest example of this. Borgen has been fine but Kakko will be another stick in the craw for the next decade.

Like Friedman always says, "I'd rather solve a problem that I already have than trade it away". Kakko will never be what we all would've liked a 2OA to be. That being said, Laviolette, Gallant, etc... all should've said, at some point, "you're our 1st line RW'er. Go and play and don't look over your shoulder".



Messier

Agree with everything but the problem here was that no one played the way Kakko played up until Cuylle.

 

[Greg02]

Dolan would let them cook. He hired a guy to run the Knicks that basically knows what he's doing and he's staying out of the way.

He axed Gorton because Gorton is a moron. As simple as it gets.

Is there any better hockey owner than James Dolan? Say what you want about Sather (who I loathed), but Dolan hired the most respected executive in the sport who was the architect of the Oilers dynasty, gave him unlimited resources and unlimited rope, and then just went away to focus on JD and the Straight Shot.

 

[duhmetreE]

McDavid. The Rongos way

 

[Machinehead]

McDavid. The Rongos way

I would do that tho.

That's Messier part 2. The guy is foolproof.

 

[Lindberg Cheese]

My neighbors dog, Sam, who barks all day long says our D for 25-26 will be:

Gavrikov Fox
Dumolin Schnieder
Vaak Borgen/Mancini