Rangers offseason report

[yave1964]

2016=17 A QUICK LOOK BACK: 

The Rangers entered the year another year older and concerned that the window might be closing in regards to winning a cup under the reign of King Henrik, they added versataille and exciting young forward Zibenajad (at the cost of Brassard) bargain shopped for Michael Grabner, won the sweepstakes for top rated rookie free agent Jimmy Vesey and brought draft pick Pavel Buchnevich, the teams top prospect over from Europe to shore up the forwards, the hope was the gritty veteran defense would withstand the loss of Yandle to free agency and respond.

  They were good, 4th place in the worlds toughest division is nothing to be ashamed of as they went 48-28-6 good for 102 points. No one forward had that monster year but they were solid throughout their top nine, very tough to play against. The defense was okay but showed cracks, they added Brendan Smith at the deadline and he played well.Lundqvist played poorly at times and in fact was outperformed by his backup Raanta to the point where coach Alain Vigneault sat Henrik for five games at one point starting Raanta to give the King a chance to get his head on.

  They bested Montreal in the first round and lost to Ottawa in a spirited second round series (probably my favorite series of the whole postseason) that by most accounts the Rangers outplayed their opponents but came up short.

 

FREE AGENTS:

 

Dan Girardi has been bought out and is probably done.

 

Brendan Smith acquiited himself well for the blue shirts and they want him back.

 

Kevin Klein wants out of his deal to go to Europe.

 

Tanner Glass was a rock in the postseason for the Rangers who want him back.

 

OFFSEASON QUESTION MARKS

 

1) WHAT TO DO ABOUT THE DEFENSE

 

Klein and Girardi simply cannot play anymore and are gone, Marc Staal has stalled, Brendan Smith is okay but will be seriously overpaid if they keep him. the defense is a three man show of McDonough who is always hurt and a bit of an underachiever, Skjei who came from nowhere to be good last year and Holden who punched waaaay above his weight class having a good year. After that?

  That is the biggest question in MSG as far as the Rags go, how to rebuild the defense. Stepan is being shopped, rumors of a Stepan for Justin Faulk deal with Carolina have started, same with Dumba in Minny for him. But IMHO it is not the offensive d-men, it is the self sacrificing warriors like Klein and Girardi that they need to find and they are few and far between right now.

 

2) DOES LUNDQVIST HAVE A CUP IN HIM?

No. IMHO the window has closed. He had his run, he can still play but he is a weary old vet who COULD  win a cup with the right team behind him but this is not the right team. They have talented forwards but they are kind of a miss mash of talent that while potent arent quite the right mix and three gaping holes on defense and hoping that Holden and Skjei can repeart last years good numbers which is a stretch. 

  The King is dead. It is over in New York. Still a few playoff runs possible but they will always be stopped short.

 

3) CAN THEY TRADE RICK NASH?

 

He has one year left on his deal with a 7.8 million dollar cap hit and scores 25 goals a year so logic says heh, no. But this is a poor free agent class and if the Rags are willing to eat a big portion of his deal they may find a suitor and use the rest of his salary relief to go after defense. I personally would rather go that route than trading Stepan.

  Chicago is supposedly very interested in Nash depending upon the leagues ruling in the retirement of Marian Hossa because his uni makes him itch. If the league allows the Hawks to place him on IR the Hawks can make a move for a veteran forward and Nash plays in all situations, plays hard, kills penalties and scores on the power play and the Hawks are dangling Hjalmarsson looking for offense so they may make a match.

 

The Rangers best days as currently built are behind them although they do have a nice core of young forwards to build around and who will keep them semi relevant for awhile as long as they figure out what to do about their defense.

[OccamsRazor]