Good morning all!
Just a few thoughts from yesterday at camp.
First, Skapski is back in Kootenay and Spelling is in Europe. It was decided after Traverse City that they should return to their teams. I have no update yet on Kyle Jean though, will try again later today.
About the Biron/Hedberg battle for backup. At first I thought that the word that there was a battle was pure fabrication, but the more I think about it, the more I wonder about the whole thing, including Biron's disappearance. Hedberg is so well thought of, Talbot is almost ready, the cap hit on Biron is $1.3 million. Hedberg will make less, a lot less. Its just speculation, but it is possible that the Rangers don't come up with a workable deal for Stepan, until a decision re Hedberg is made? One has to believe that a deal with Stepan will be made so he could play sometime during the Western trip, where per AV, the Rangers will only take give or take 40 players. (Cuts are expected to be made after Tuesday night's game in Philadelphia). So, this backup goaltender decision will need to be made soon.
A lot was made yesterday of coach Arniel/Brassard's past relationship--how everything is okay now. Both AV and Brassard specifically spoke about it. I am sure that both parties and the Rangers want this to be true and I think that is everybody's intention. I think that this is a we'll have to wait and see thing, as are most relationships that have a past that is murky. It is just being brought up now, because there are not many stories right now.
To complete the off ice observations, Dylan McIlrath spoke at length to the press yesterday about making the team (the usual "I hope and plan to make the team" words), but then spoke about his knee. He talked about how when the surgeon got in there, he found that it was worse than was expected. That he was nowhere near healed when he was playing last season, that he was not fully healed at Development Camp time, but that now he is 100%. He told us how he was rehabbing the knee over the summer and continues to work on it. Questions I did not ask in front of everyone were, does he continue to work specially on that knee, and does he have full range of motion in that knee. Plan to find out the answer to both over the coming weeks. In the mean time, I still would be surprised if McIlrath starts in New York this year; he has the makings of being the player that the Rangers want him to be, but he's just not powerful enough yet.
On the ice, Conor Allen looked good at finding the open man yesterday, and he was okay defensively too, but I don't think that he is NHL-ready either. The question for him will be whether there is space in Hartford either.
The most noticeable player on the ice yesterday was Josh Nicholls, who had four goals. He moved extremely well and has a very deceptive release. Brassard fed him most of the time, and was excellent at it. Nicholls will start at Hartford and will not have the likes of Brassard to get him the puck while there, but he should be able to contribute offensively to the AHL team this season.
Rick Nash and Taylor Pyatt also played well together. They found each other time after time down the ice and made at least three beautiful plays together. I am not sure that the plan was to have them play together during the season, but some thought should be given to exploiting this chemistry, if other, more expected, combinations don't work.
Surprisingly, Shawn O'Donnell had a couple of really good shots on goal, but after seeing several skating issues on Thursday (that had nothing to do with conditioning), I don't really think he has the speed to keep up at this level of play.
The last thing has to do with Kreider. The Youtube video AV was talking about regarding Kreider's strength was pretty impressive (remember buoyancy makes it a little less so, but lets not take the feat away from him). What concerned me a little was that he got whacked on the wrist by Justin Falk yesterday and seemed to be favoring it the rest of Group B's practice period. Hopefully, just a stinger and he's fine. AV mentioned Kreider's talent after Group B practiced. I expect that Kreider will be penciled in for a top six role to start the season and given a fairly long leash to show that he belongs there.
That's it for this morning.
