and they will. I think they will go to Girardi and ask him to accept a trade. They will have to retain half his salary most likely. I think they deal Nash and they will start to rebuild the defense with youth and speed. Remember when the Rangers made defenses of other teams look slow. Now, the Rangers defense looks slow. Said it then and I'll say it again. Not dealing Yandle was stupid. I would say Nash, Hayes and Girardi are the first three to go. I don't see much of a return for Girardi. I think a 4th line role player and a second if they eat half his salary is the best they can do. Nash they have legit chance of getting back a late first and perhaps a big, physical, 3rd line role player. Hayes because of his age, they can probably trade for a good defenseman prospect with some speed and a second. That is the route I would go to start.
They might have to shop for a new coach. AV has fallen into a lot, not a few, a lot of bad habits. He doesn't even come close to putting the best lineup out there each night. He shows favoritism towards players that quite honestly, play like crap. Hrvik came up and made the 4th line work. He banished him to the minors. McIlrath was outplaying our entire defense at one point and all he did was scratch him. Miller is punished constantly but Hayes continues to play while he's sucked all season. Nash is never scratched for playing like a useless sissy. Seriously, when does the conversation happen with AV and Nash where he tells him that if he doesn't start playing like a powerforward, he will scratch and humiliate him and that includes playoff games? At 7.8 million, Nash is worthless to this team if he doesn't score goals. I could care less about his defense. I think a lot of this teams problems this season have come directly from the coach. Unwilling to get rid of Glass on the 4th line. Unwilling to sit old fart vets who aren't playing well. AV has been close minded and stubborn this year. He has shown a lack of ability to hold all his players accountable as well as committing to young players. His sad loyalty to old fart vets who can't get it done is at times, pathetic.
Very well said about AV. I would be very surprised if they got rid of him though. Nash must be shown the door for sure. Girardi has been a warrior but he is too slow now and must go somewhere else, to more defensive minded team. I would shop Hayes at the draft but I think they might wanna hang on to him as he is young and still comes at a cheap price.
Where the fuck is the 'hunger' on this team? This group has won nothing and yet they persist with their lackadaisical play...... a sure sign of an early playoff exit. Do you think Lundqvist is fed up with giving up 3 or more goals a game? You bet he is. I'm really disenchanted with AV as coach of this club with his continuing to play 'has-beens', thus banning the youth, and not to mention the horrible special team performances and his negligence to improve in-game strategies.
Did you watch Lundqvist postgame after Sharks game? If you read between the lines that is what he is saying, that he is fed up. He says. "To be honest, I don't think there is anything I can do at this point with my game, I feel sharp out there and not much I can do". He is pissed and he should be. Enough is enough. AV did say that Lundqvist is alone out there, so he is backing up his goalie, but seriously this has got to stop. I hope AV does something drastic on Monday.
I hope Vigneault's around for a long time as he's been excellent for this franchise in his few years here. Sometimes he makes a questionable lineup change but i wouldn't trade him for any coach in the league. Glass is obviously not an all-world player but he has actually looked pretty good in the last month or so. Hrivik did a nice job in the limited time he was up so maybe into next year he can at least be a reliable callup. Hayes and Girardi are the two contracts they need to shed in the summer to open up 7-8m and help recoup a few picks at the same time.
I thought for sure Chuck would be in here telling us we are all overreacting as the team is still in 2nd....oh wait, we're now in 3rd tied in points with Pitt but they hold the regular season series as of now. Oh, and let's not forget we are only 3 points clear of the islanders, who have 2 games in hand. Looks like a first round matchup against Washington for us this year. At least we will be put out of our misery quickly this post season. But in all seriousness, if this team can't pull its head out of its ass and continues to play this poorly with this much talent, they need to move people and fire people. I know you've said to move people dump, but you forgot Stepan. There's no way in hell I would pay him $6M to lose 65% of his draws and float around on the ice for 50+ games a year and give him a NTC. He HAS to go. Hayes I would try to keep, but only for the right price. Same with Kreider. The problem is this fan base can't see beyond the end of their nose. This franchise is about to take a swift hard turn into the ground. Once Hank is gone and/or can't bail this team out, we've seen what we are as a team. An overpaid defensive group that has no real game changer to lead the team. We should be trying to build for the future now. They overpaid Hank, regardless of how good he is. No goalie should be making $8M. And if a goalie is making $8M he better be shutting out teams all on his own with a horrible defense and a team emphasis on offense. This team did the EXACT opposite. They took a great goalie, and then focused on defense and tried to win games 1-0, 2-1. That worked under Torts because he didn't like flashiness or goals. He wanted sound defense first. Now with AV, he's the complete opposite. He wants goals and typically will leave the goalie out there to dry, and if you don't believe me look what he did to goalies in Vancouver. He burns them out. That's why Hank is losing his shit these days. As a goalie, you can't face 40 shots a game, most of which are high quality, and not lose your shit. We've regressed BIG TIME with AV this year, but we've actually played a more AV style of hockey. Less focused on defense, more focused on offense, which is ironic because this team still can't score goals, but now we also can't prevent them either. Regardless of it all, I will always root for this team and hope that the best happens. Sadly, I don't expect to see it this year. But hey, I also didn't expect to see Michigan State get knocked out in the first round!!!
To play the Caps in round 1 we'd have to finish 8th in the East/as the 2nd WC. That means not finish behind just the Pens AND Isles, it also means we have to finish as the lower WC, which means behind the Wings or Flyers as well, whichever team ends up making the playoffs as the WC between the two. If we finish behind just the Pens and Isles, which BTW is still very unlikely IMO, but ahead of the other WC team (most likely the Wings or Flyers) we'd actually play the Atlantic division winner, and get put into the Atlantic bracket, which means we couldn't play the Caps until the ECF if we got that far. Just wanted to clarify the way the playoff matchups work. Now you can all go about your bashing of everything....
Of course you are not 2009...LOL. Sports club stats has us at 99.1% chance to make the playoffs: http://www.sportsclubstats.com/NHL.html And they also list a 70% chance we finish either 2 or 3 in the Metro. Remember...it is 5 teams for 4 spots (us, Wings, Flyers, Pens, Isles) AND the Flyers/Pens/Isles have 6 games remaining against each other. AGAIN...carry on with the bashing everything nonsense....
Always nice to bathe in the optimism here. Also important to note that like the Rangers most team's remaining games are rival teams in their own division with playoff implications so no team has a cakewalk to finish out the year.
Rangers will obviously make the playoffs. However, AV is going to have to get over his playing 3 righty and lefty defenseman. The system doesn't have that. Best two D prospects are lefties. Boyle will be replaced by McIlrath. Yandle by Skjei. Eventually, maybe soon, Girardi by Graves. Girardi has really lost a lot this year. Up front, Buch is going to replace somebody. My guess Hayes who isn't fitting in here. NY is a first class organization. Not a good place for lazy players. He needs to go somewhere like NJ where they treat their players like crap and they play for every cent they can. It will be sad to see Dan get dealt but he really should be a 11 minute defenseman on a team with 5 young guys trying to figure it out. Rangers as I said will have to eat half his salary.
They should have kept Stralman instead of signing Boyle... He turned into a top pair Dman. No need for Boyle.. Yandle wouldn't have came here..
