Monday, August 16, 2010

Goddamn it that is some funny shit

So, today I completely unjustifiably clicked on a link to a Brasilian Rangers blog, despite the fact that I don't speak Portuguese (I know enough Spanish to get by, like so many modern Americans, but that's really it). So I click on the link, and the following is the very first thing on the blog:

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Wade Redden e seu salario de US$ 6.5 milhões pode estar dando bye bye para o New York Rangers. GRAÇAS A DEUS!!
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Amazing.

Monday, August 9, 2010

Playing with rosters

Larry Brooks poses a funny little question in yesterday's Post: "What if Wade Redden plays really well?" The idea is basically that if Redden realizes his entire career is on the line and actually has a fantastic training camp, if he's the best defenseman at camp, the Rangers basically have no contingency plan for that. This seems largely pedantic - personally, I can't imagine Wade Redden turning around and having a really good camp - but it's pretty funny to think about. Redden could screw us again by actually playing very well and forcing us to make a decision around that.

However, the really interesting part of this article comes much later, when Brooks is listing through our forwards. He claims that, much like with Redden, the team could be going into camp preemptively assuming that Sean Avery will be cut out of the picture. The theory is contingent on Todd White making a good case for himself at camp, which I think is a completely reasonable possibility. If it happens, Brooks argues, that will make Christensen, Anisimov, and White our top three centers, which will push other "centers" out to the wing. Brooks lists Frolov, Prospal, and Dubinsky as a possible top three left wings, and Gaborik, Callahan, and Drury as top three right. If this pans out, that pushes Avery down to the fourth line at best.

I think this is mostly pre-training-camp-panic-because-we-have-nothing-else-to-talk-about: no one's to say that White will make the team at all, or that Drury will be a top three winger, or anything else: we're going to be doing a lot of reconstruction at training camp, and this speculation is largely unfounded. But it's interesting to think about, anyway: we don't really know whether or not Avery and Torts (both are responsible) have figured out how to use Avery best. Let's hope they have. Meanwhile, I'm sure much more unfounded speculation is to come before this season gets underway.

Finally, from the hilarious Maple Leafs blog Down Goes Brown comes a list of this off-season's winners and losers: which teams did particularly well for themselves, and which did particularly poorly. The whole thing (as with everything this guy posts) is worth reading, but I mention it because the Rangers sit atop the winners list. The justification? "Their annual 'free agent signing which everyone agrees was the most outrageously over-priced mistake of the summer' ended up being a lot cheaper than usual this year." I'm gonna go ahead and agree and call that good news.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Can I get a HELL YEAH

Hey, quick show of hands: who wants to not pay $1.3 million against the cap for Donald Brashear to play in Hartford? OK, OK, quite a few of you, huh? Yeah, that's reasonable. OK, let's make that happen, then.

In a move that seems to reaffirm that if all our good unwanted players go to Phoenix, all our bad unwanted players go to Atlanta, we've managed to trade Brashear along with rarely-heard-from prospect Patrick Rissmiller (remember him? a little?) to the Thrashers, in exchange for center Todd White. White is 5'10", 195 lbs, and 35 years old (but don't worry, he's on the last year of a contract that was signed well before he turned 35). He had a hallmark season in 2008-'09, scoring 73 points (22-51) - outside of that, he's good for what looks like 40 or so points a year. Another candidate for our center rotation, basically: if he happens to work well with Gaborik, he'll end up there; otherwise, he'll end up somewhere else.

He's costing us $2.375 million against the cap this season, which is only about a million more than Brashear was costing us to not play for us, and it expires at the end of the year in case it doesn't work out. It should still leave us room to sign Staal and it should still not leave us room to bring back Redden. What it actually does is likely close out another spot for a kid, leaving us less room to bring up Mats Zuccarello-Aasen, for example. I don't think that's the worst thing: it offloads the dead contract and gives this White guy a chance to be a really useful center for us, and if it doesn't work out, we can always send him to Hartford at any time this season and replace him with a kid.

In conclusion, who gives a shit about Todd White right now? Donald Brashear is no longer affiliated with our organization! It's fucking party o'clock!