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Rangers Could Use A #1 Guy
by Paul on 04/27/09 at 11:13 AM ET
Comments (6)
from Mike Brophy of Sportsnet,
Assuming Glen Sather is still running the New York Rangers next season, he might want to find a bona fide No. 1-line player or two for his team.
Currently, the Rangers have none; good team, but no star forwards or defencemen.
Outside of goalie Henrik Lundqvist—the only reason New York is even in a Game 7 in the first round against the Washington Capitals—the Rangers do not have a single established player they can claim to be a front-liner.
Not Scott Gomez. Not Chris Drury. Not Markus Naslund.
Two solid second-liners on a good team and a guy who scores on occasion, but rarely stands out in a game that matters.
Filed in: NHL Teams, New York Rangers | KK Hockey | Permalink
Comments
Drury, Gomez, Naslund, and Redden were bad signings at their prices. At lower price tags, in different roles, those signings are fine, but not at their salary hit and term. Zherdev can still come around, but he’s a gamble on a team without true top line offense. I’ll be pretty disappointed to see the Rags in the next round - not because I don’t like the Rangers, but because they have little chance of winning the next round against the B’s and seem to be the beneficiaries of a Caps team that has hit a shaky, inconsistent stretch of hockey.
Posted by PDXWing on 04/27/09 at 11:53 AM ET
Primis, they were all overrated. Drury played behind Sakic and Forsberg. Gomez played with Elias and Gionta. Naslund produced as much as he was expected to though—he scored 25 goals last year, many times playing with the Sedins. This year he pulled off 24 goals even though he didn’t get first line minutes.
Posted by bcrt on 04/27/09 at 12:12 PM ET
Again though I have to ask—how come it takes playing on the Rangers for people to then say “Oh, they’re just overrated”? How come nobody says these things (save for Redden) before the Rangers sign them?
At some point the Rangers and their fans need to wake up I guess and realize there’s more at work here than underachieveing or overrated players.
Posted by Primis on 04/27/09 at 12:39 PM ET
Drury played behind Sakic and Forsberg.
Did he? Reeeally? Because, uh, I don’t think Sakic or Forsberg were playing in Calgary or Buffalo over the last four years prior to his NYR contract, during which he set two consecutive career high point totals.
Posted by shanetx on 04/27/09 at 02:30 PM ET
Sorry, bcrt, but the only ones who “overrated” those players were the Rangers themselves. Drury’s numbers since he got here have been the same kind of numbers he’s put up his entire career. Gomez only had 2 less points this year than the year before he signed. Naslund’s career is winding down, and anyone could see that before he signed. They are all good players, but the Rangers threw top dollar at them and expected them to put up the points to match. Not a rational move.
And I sort of agree with Primis that it has something to do with the culture of the Rangers. I liked Tom Renney when he first started because he seemed to be changing the organization a little. He played rookies. He benched Michael Nylander (then Jagr’s center) for a game because he took a couple of bad penalties. But then that stopped, Sather started going free-agent crazy again, no more accountability for vets, Renney gets fired, and here we are with the same problems as pre-lockout, only with a salary cap this time.
Posted by K24 from NYC on 04/27/09 at 09:52 PM ET
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Isn’t funny how all these players he mentions were great players on other teams… and suddenly they come to the Rangers and aren’t good enough?
Maybe it just has more to do with the team and it’s culture
Posted by Primis on 04/27/09 at 11:42 AM ET