The rangers are approaching the fourth deadline for trading from the “Letter”, which declared the official beginning of the reconstruction of the organization, sent on February 8, 2018.
So far, the reconstruction has reached a point where Blueshirts does not fall into either the “Buyers” or “Sellers” categories, which are commonly used to describe where franchises are looking for the Stanley Cup. They are somewhere in the middle, where they have achieved their goal of supplying their promising prospects and young players to build, but they still lack components to make them legitimate competitors.
It is safe to assume that by Monday’s deadline, the Rangers will not do any bomb business, such as the one that sent former captain Ryan McDonagh and JT Miller to Tampa Bay in exchange for a 2018 first-round pick, a conditional secondary round. choose in 2019, a 25-year-old Vlad Namestnikov (now in Detroit) and two potentials in defender Libor Hajek and center Brett Howden, who are now on the team’s active roster.
And unless there is (in this economy?) A business too good to be accepted, in which the Rangers would acquire a 1A or 1B center, don’t expect the organization to be big spenders either.
This is a franchise that traded four consecutive selections in the first round from 2013 to 2016, when Rangers were the definition of a winning organization now. But it is also a team that has now used eight first-round picks from 2017 to 2020.
Times have changed. The rangers have changed. And they probably won’t make any revolutionary changes until the end of this season of 56 intra-divisional game games.
“We’ve been through this, obviously this is the third year in a row we’ve been through, our staff has been through this and the boys have been through this in the last four years,” head coach David Quinn said until the 5-2 loss. Thursday of the Penguins. “I think we are in a slightly different position this year, I think I think. You just never know. Obvious, [general manager Jeff Gorton] and I talk quite a bit. But there are things that can happen unexpectedly. You just never know what might happen at this time of year. I’m sure the players will start talking about this much more in the next five or six days.
“Obviously, the islands do that big deal, so people start talking more about the trading deadline once a domino falls.”
Yes, the islands in the first place – which host the Rangers on Friday night – are the team that wins now. This transaction led the islands to acquire veteran strikers Kyle Palmieri and Travis Zajac from the Devils in exchange for minor leagues AJ Greer and Mason Jobst, the first round pick of the 2021 Islands and a conditional pick in the fourth round in 2022.
It was an ideal move for a team pushing for the Stanley Cup. The rangers simply are not in this position at the moment.
But that doesn’t mean the franchise hasn’t accomplished what it set out to do since this memorable announcement was made more than three years ago.
The dismemberment of the team is complete, McDonagh, Miller, Rick Nash, Mats Zuccarello and Kevin Hayes all now playing for different clubs or retirees in Nash’s case. A good portion of the remodel is starting to take shape, with Igor Shesterkin, Adam Fox, K’Andre Miller, Filip Chytil, Kaapo Kakko, Vitali Kravtsov and the surprise addition of choosing Alexis Lafreniere in first place in 2020. Oh, and Artemi Panarin.
But there is still work to be done. It may be in a break.