10 Team, Points Only, Cash League
25 Man Roster (no position), top 20 point getters count at end of month
Keep 20/25 at seasons end, Cut 5 to FA for redrafting
Goalie points W=2pt L=-1pt SHO=2pt
Stamkos, Tavares, Eichel, Mercer, JRobertson, RThomas, Kucherov, Nugent-Hopkins, Tuch, KConnor, Necas, Point, Konecny, SJarvis, Cozenz, Morrissey, Bouchard, Josi, Novak, Tolvanen, Peterka, SBennett
G- Vasilevskiy, Sorokin, Oettinger
"Cleavage is like the sun. You can look, but dont stare.. Unless you're wearing sunglasses."
Middle of a probable year long lockout with a big mess of an owners/arena issue and his job is to get people to listen to his radio show.
I'd say that nothing happening is the most likely
10 Team, Points Only, Cash League
25 Man Roster (no position), top 20 point getters count at end of month
Keep 20/25 at seasons end, Cut 5 to FA for redrafting
Goalie points W=2pt L=-1pt SHO=2pt
Stamkos, Tavares, Eichel, Mercer, JRobertson, RThomas, Kucherov, Nugent-Hopkins, Tuch, KConnor, Necas, Point, Konecny, SJarvis, Cozenz, Morrissey, Bouchard, Josi, Novak, Tolvanen, Peterka, SBennett
G- Vasilevskiy, Sorokin, Oettinger
"Cleavage is like the sun. You can look, but dont stare.. Unless you're wearing sunglasses."
Not to add any unfounded rumours or anything as this could all be baseless... but basically Stauffer implied on his show that it would involve an unsigned RFA on a cap strapped team.
Eeesh, that's juicy - the list of unsigned RFAs is quite short:
Kulikov
Petrecki
Del Zotto
Ryan O'Reilly
Subban
Benn
Nick Palmieri
Franson
Brett MacLean
Sheppard
Flames, meet fuel!
How many of those RFA's are with a cap strapped team? Most of them arent. It would also depend on certain teams looking to bring in an expensive player (hello Leafs, meet Lou. Franson, we can no longer afford you!) Most of the other RFA's are with teams who still have decent cap space.
There are plenty of excellent RFA's on that list but how many would actually get away from their squads. Benn, no chance in hell. Same for Subban. I would love to see Ryan O'Reilly come to the Oil but realistically theres no way the Av's let him go, plus they have tons of cap space.
The last three names on that list are probably available to some extent, although I believe MacLean has retired due to medical reasons.
10 Team, Points Only, Cash League
25 Man Roster (no position), top 20 point getters count at end of month
Keep 20/25 at seasons end, Cut 5 to FA for redrafting
Goalie points W=2pt L=-1pt SHO=2pt
Stamkos, Tavares, Eichel, Mercer, JRobertson, RThomas, Kucherov, Nugent-Hopkins, Tuch, KConnor, Necas, Point, Konecny, SJarvis, Cozenz, Morrissey, Bouchard, Josi, Novak, Tolvanen, Peterka, SBennett
G- Vasilevskiy, Sorokin, Oettinger
"Cleavage is like the sun. You can look, but dont stare.. Unless you're wearing sunglasses."
I'd say that the only guy who both makes sense and is a big splash is Del Zotto. The Rangers aren't cap strapped per say but if you figure they have a lot of cap space earmarked for Stepan and McDonagh next summer then you have to think that they don't want to spend much on Del Zotto. You also have to wonder how Del Zotto fits into the future for the Rangers anyhow given the prospect depth the team has and all the other blueliners who have passed him on the depth chart. Finally, I'd say that the Rangers are fairly forward thinking with regard to how you should manage for the future. They would gladly take multiple first round draft picks from a team like Edmonton in exchange for Del Zotto if the Oilers were to overpay him.
They are if NHL gets their wish and Redden will be back on the books and cap gets close to $60 million.
Though I don't see Rangers having any other offensive D-man in their roster or even in the system besides MDZ, so hard to see them moving him. Well unless you want to count Stralman as one.
UHL Pittsburgh Penguins
24 Team Fantrax Salary Cap H2H Dynasty League
G, A, +/-, PIM, PPP, SHP, GWG, SOG, Hits, Blks, FOW
W, GAA, SV, SV%, SO
23 Man Roster - 3C, 3LW, 3RW, 3F, 6D, 1G, 4BN, 4IR
27 Man Minor Team
C- Tavares, Stepan, Granlund, Bjugstad, Couturier
LW- Ryan, Perron, Ennis, Killorn, Spaling
RW- Wheeler, Simmonds, Coyle, Wingels, Shaw
D- JJ, Schultz, Cowen, Muzzin, Bortuzzo, Stanton
G- Lehtonen, Rämö
F: Lehterä, Wennberg, McNeill, de la Rose, Fast, Leivo, Arnold, Archibald, Lindström
D: Gelinas, Beaulieu, Koekkoek, McCabe, Johns, Gryba
G: Berra, Talbot, Brossoit, Ullmark, Lieuwen, Rynnäs
*UHL Champion 2014*
The numbers don't really bear this out but I kind of got the feeling like Del Zotto really wasn't high up on Tortorella's list of favourites. It's true that they don't really have another defenseman who brings the puck moving that he does but I wouldn't consider him expendable, otherwise he'd already have a contract.
And, I mean, try Googling "rangers hardball del zotto" and you'll get an endless stream of links discussing how the Rangers and Del Zotto were not close in their contract talks this summer and extending into the fall. The last offer was supposedly like $2.5 million per season, which is well below what I think you'd see Del Zotto getting on the open market.
I also wonder about putting Brad Richards in a better position to succeed. He's always been great when the puck is on his stick in a playmaking position. He's already the Rangers' pseudo PPQB (as are most top playmaking forwards in the NHL by the way) but they still have Del Zotto anchoring the point at the top. I'd argue that a guy like Stralman or someone with one very specific set of skills could fit that role. Hell, Corey Potter played that role for the Oilers power play.
The point is that the Rangers are seemingly better off with some sort of four forward alignment on the power play with Richards, Nash, Gaborik, Stepan and or Callahan all out there leaving room for one defenseman. That defenseman really just needs to be sensible enough to not take big chances and allow odd man chances the other way while also possessing a solid one-timer. That's it, that's the job. You can carry a mediocre sixth defenseman who only plays 12 minutes a night but can fill that role at the league minimum. Del Zotto does other things but is he one of the Rangers' best three defensemen? Is he a guy you definitely want out there for high leverage minutes?
I just think that long term you can only ever really afford to pay three guys on defense while the rest of the guys have to be role players or on entry level type deals. Girardi, McDonagh and Staal are all clearly ahead of Del Zotto and that includes thinking about upside. You could even sell me that McDonagh is ready for more power play time and slide into that lone defenseman on the power play role without missing a beat.
Del Zotto is a luxury for the Rangers and he's not one that they can afford. If they can find a cheap veteran who can do 75% of what Del Zotto does then they will be fine because they have other guys ready to fill the void. They probably only need someone who can do 75% of what Del Zotto does and the best part of letting him go is that they can use him as trade bait or get multiple picks with which to restock their prospect pool.
Great franchises make smart decisions like this all the time. You pay the guys you can't live without and when it comes time to pay the guys you can live without you simply maximize the asset through some form of compensation and you move on.
And to be fair, you could also sell me on Girardi and McDonagh having made Staal expendable while Del Zotto's offensive lean isn't quite so expendable but that makes me question why the Rangers would take such a hard line with Del Zotto.
Here's a wow move:
Yakupov for Subban
MTL gets rid of Subban who I hear isn't very popular in the dressing room while reuniting Galchenyuk with his good buddy Yakupov.
EDM gets their stud Dman they so deperately need while trading from a position of strength.
You heard it here first! I rule!!!