Zherdev's Big Ask

Rumor has it that Zherdev is asking in the neighborhood of $4.5 million. That's a great deal of money for a completely unproven wing. Brooksie thinks the Rangers are absolutely going to walk away from that offer. It would make sense. If Antropov's play in his time with us wasn't worth a $4.5 million contract, I'm not so much seeing how Zherdev's was. That said, however, we've kind of already said Zherdev is on our list of "young people we would like to be our future" - and...do we have enough offense to consider ourselves even slightly contending without him? Are there enough people left that we could pick up with that $4.5 million that would do us a better job? If not, maybe we think we can let this go to actual arbitration and watch the 4.5 come back down a little. If it comes down to, say, $4 million, do we really believe Sather wouldn't pay the extra $750,000? He might not, but I'm not nearly as sure as Brooks is.

Let's try to gain some perspective, together, by looking at the potential roster pool we have in front of us.

Centers
Chris Drury (actually under contract)
Brandon Dubinsky (RFA not eligible for arbitration)
Artem Anisimov (actually under contract)
Brian Boyle (actually under contract, I think?)
Tyler Arnason (Wolfpack)
Corey Locke (Wolfpack)
Evgeny Grachev (Wolfpack)
Left Wings
Sean Avery (actually under contract)
Donald Brashear (actually under contract)
Aaron Voros (actually under contract)
P.A. Parenteau (Wolfpack)
Lauri Korpikoski (RFA not eligible for arbitration)
Christopher Higgins (actually under contract)
Right Wings
Marian Gaborik (actually under contract)
Ryan Callahan (RFA currently awaiting arbitration)
Nikolai Zherdev (RFA currently awaiting arbitration)
...holy shit we don't have any right wings
Defensemen
Wade Redden (actually under contract)
Michal Rozsival (actually under contract)
Dan Girardi (actually under contract)
Mark Staal (actually under contract)
Matt Gilroy (actually under contract)
Michael Del Zotto (Wolfpack)
Bobby Sanguinetti (Wolfpack)
Michael Sauer (Wolfpack)
Goalies
Henrik Lundqvist (actually under contract)
Stephen Valiquette (actually under contract)
Chad Johnson (Wolfpack)

(Sidebar: Chad Johnson is, I hope, the only name you've never seen before on this blog. He's a goalie prospect. Ready for the really sick part? We traded a 5th-round pick to the Penguins for him a week and a half ago. Who did the Pens draft with that pick? Belleville Bulls center Andy Bathgate. The grandson of the Andy Bathgate. No lie.)

So...um...things don't look great? I started this post looking for how comfortable we'd be without Zherdev. Frankly, I'm not particularly comfortable with him. Reason says if we choose not to pay Zherdev his big bucks, we use that money to try to go after a Brad Richards (yes please!) or something. Too bad we've been watching big names get taken day after day this whole time. I wonder who will still be available when the smoke clears?

Sather, if you're listening, I can think of a way you can clear up an easy $1.4 million...