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Sergei Zubov & Petr Nedved for Ulf Samuelsson & Luc Robataille

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mrhockey193195 said:
It blew my mind. I only heard this for the first time a couple years back. My first reaction was to completely dismiss it, but upon further look...

EDIT: 1:36 of this video is the best angle. Watch frame-by-frame and see if you agree with me.

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all these years i thought it was Noonan. I thought he was on the floor. It was Graves and Noonan was on upright. Knew it wasn’t Messier.
 
NYSPORTS said:
well, didn’t Brian Leetch have a few too many drinks and fell out of a cab in 93?
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That black ice tricks a lot of people, not just the hammered ones. I remember seeing the newspaper articles and being like I need to save this one for if I ever need an excuse for work after a big bender.
 
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SML2 said:
It was a trench war league back then. When the post season came, being fast ranked just above having good hair. Watch a game from then and there's about 4 plays a shift where you can't believe they didn't call a penalty after being used to watching today. And they had the center red line to slow any non conformists like Gartner and Amonte down on top of it.
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With Amonte and Gartner the Rangers swept the season series 6-0.

Devils made no changes and almost beat the Rangers.
 
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Edge said:
All of the above.

He had a lot of work ethic/fitness issues, including chain smoking, eating habits, staying out late, etc.

This wouldn't have been a big deal, save for the fact that he was getting hurt all the time and complaining of having a bad back. There was the perception he was dogging it and it didn't sit right with certain guys who were watching Larmer and Graves go out there and battle with bad backs, or Leetch having to pick up even more slack and run himself into the ground.

There was tension with the coaching staff, the training staff, teammates, etc. The boiling point came when Steve Larmer threatened to knock him on his ass during a practice if he didn't get his shit together.

Contrary to popular belief, the most damning internal relationship to impact Zubov was not Messier. It was Leetch, Lowe and Larmer.
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Great stuff, had no idea about this history.
 
Very interesting discussion bringing up a lot of memories, but a lot of "what if's" we always think about boil down to the fact that what happened in those years led to our only Cup.

And today we're still experiencing the fallout of those moves. For example, looking at the Amonte page today on Hockey Reference I was struck that in his peregrinations through the league after he was traded to Chicago he found himself in Phoenix. From there, he was traded to Philly for a couple of picks in the 2004 draft. Arizona quickly flipped those picks to us for the pick they used on Enver Lisin. We picked Brandon Dubinsky with one of those picks. You know what happened next.

Basically, thanks to the Amonte trade he was able to be on the market elsewhere and we have Strome, Lindgren, and Miller today.
 
Edge said:
Something to keep in mind with the Zubov deal is that Robitaille was a 29 year old LW who was a perennial 40-50 goal. 80-100 point player.

If we're looking for a somewhat similar parallel today, it would be like moving 25 year-old ADA for a 29 year old Panarin.

The difference is, imagine ADA "getting it" three years from now, and Panarin suddenly falling off a cliff during his time with us, before re-finding himself back in Columbus or Chicago.

When we take hindsight off the table, that's more or less what we're looking at with that component of the deal.

So your total deal in today's terms is something like ADA and Chytil for Panarin and McDonagh.
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I always liked Robitaille. Moving him for Kevin Stevens was a terrible decision and doesn’t come up enough in worst trade discussions.
 
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Edge said:
I always felt Robitaille not working out here owed a lot to Colin Campbell.

Campbell wasn't crazy about Robitaille and actually let him know pretty early on he didn't want him here.

If I remember correctly, he had something like 13 goals in his first 31 games as a second line LW. And then there was supposedly a conversation with Campbell in mid-December that just f***ed their relationship from that point forward.

But I also think Ferraro probably wasn't the best choice of a center for him --- being more of a shooting center rather than a playmaking one. Additionally, Graves and Messier weren't going anywhere from the top Powerplay unit, so that probably cut into some offensive production as well.

You start adding all those elements together and it feels like a move that was destined to fail.
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I said it in my first post of this thread, Campbell was an awful coach. His only response or adjustment to anything was to tap Messier on the shoulder & send him over the boards. After Keenan forced his way out of town, Colie was just a lazy hire, even before that term was invented. He was exposed pretty shortly after Messier bolted out of town & it's not a surprise he never got another coaching opportunity.

That aside, they tried to reunite Robitaille with #99 when they signed the Great One & even that was no help. For whatever reason, he did not play well as a Ranger.
 
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The Rangers don’t win the Cup with Gartner. He was a known playoff choker outside of a few exceptions.

He was a big zero for the Leafs against the Canucks in the ‘94 WCF. Anderson scored two huge goals in the SCF. Had instant chemistry with Nemchinov.

Nedved was a prima donna. Had to play with Mario to reach his potential. Was a huge baby who was mad Bure took away all his attention in Vancouver and demanded a star salary anyway. Soft perimeter player who rarely battled. Canucks were bounced in 1993 in Round 2 and Nedved asked Gretzky for a signed stick during the handshake line. Was a massive disappointment in 1995 and was invisible in that postseason except for the huge blowout win in Quebec in Game 2.

Zubov was always rumored to be traded. Smith didn’t like his work ethic and Campbell thought he was a floater. He came to camp out of shape several times and smoked a ton. One rumor in the summer of ‘93 was Zubov, Richter, picks and cash to Boston for Ray Bourque, who was holding out. Then he was rumored to be traded for Selanne but he crashed his car and Smith balked.

The biggest reason why they were traded was Messier. He held out of camp in 1995 and wanted a restructured deal. Once they agreed to deal, Messier was practically de facto GM and wanted the Rangers to chase more Cups as long as he had gas left in the tank.

Personally, I liked the trade at the time. The Norstrom deal Kurri was way worse.
 
Brutal unloading Zubov and Norstrom in a span of 6 months. The dark ages began a year later. I didn’t know until recent years that Moose Dupont was a Ranger first rounder. Must’ve been equally as brutal watching him as a Flyer throughout the 70s

Maybe we’re getting some karma back on D with Lindgren.
 
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Steve Kournianos said:
The biggest reason why they were traded was Messier. He held out of camp in 1995 and wanted a restructured deal. Once they agreed to deal, Messier was practically de facto GM and wanted the Rangers to chase more Cups as long as he had gas left in the tank.
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Zubov's biggest problem in 1995 is that he lost his teammates.

When Brian Leetch is questioning a player, you know they've done alienated some people.
 
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E-Train said:
Brutal unloading Zubov and Norstrom in a span of 6 months. The dark ages began a year later. I didn’t know until recent years that Moose Dupont was a Ranger first rounder. Must’ve been equally as brutal watching him as a Flyer throughout the 70s

Maybe we’re getting some karma back on D with Lindgren.
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they tried to make is all back with that offer to Sakic which was matched. That was the end.
 
E-Train said:
Brutal unloading Zubov and Norstrom in a span of 6 months. The dark ages began a year later. I didn’t know until recent years that Moose Dupont was a Ranger first rounder. Must’ve been equally as brutal watching him as a Flyer throughout the 70s

Maybe we’re getting some karma back on D with Lindgren.
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I think they fell in love with fairly substantial roster turnover at the trade deadline after it worked in 94.
 
I won't lie, I *hated* the Zubov trade. It all just flows, I guess. I was also SUPER pissed off at the Sandstrom/Granato to LA for Bernie Nicholls, but Nicholls turned into Messier, right?
 
E-Train said:
Brutal unloading Zubov and Norstrom in a span of 6 months. The dark ages began a year later. I didn’t know until recent years that Moose Dupont was a Ranger first rounder. Must’ve been equally as brutal watching him as a Flyer throughout the 70s
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Add Tinordi to that. Frankly, keeping LaPerriere would have been the right move to do as well.
 
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