Player Discussion Worst Mistakes Made By Rangers

[kinger8998]

just a thread to talk about a what could have been scenario...

for me aside from the obvious ones like handing out Jessiman, Montoya, McIlrath and handing out massive contracts to guys like gomez and redden and betts (etc), here are my thoughts:

1) getting rid of girardi. yes i know the contract was horrible but he really was our best defenseman in the montreal series in 2017 and had a bit of a resurgence. so i guess this could be changed to how big his contract was, but maybe if they didnt offer him that he wouldve left. one of my favorite defenseman the was he sacrificed the body and would do whatever it took to win.

2) letting go of yandle. 1000% better than shattenkirk. horribly misued/underused by AV and shouldve been given whatever contract he wanted. god do i miss him, he is beyond smarter than any defenseman we have.

3) trading stepan. complete panic move. shattenkirks miss of a contract just replaced stepans. obviously no way to know that shattenkirk tenure couldve gone so sideways but i would rather have stepans deal over shattenkirks any day.

4) buying out richards. yes again a horrible contract, but such a smart player. just miss him. see the business side of things with how bad his contract was but the player was increible

5) not giving st. louis a 1-year deal. i know he struggled in the playoffs of his last season here, but still had a solid regular season with 50+ points. couldve easily helped, and wouldve been had for less than what he was already making

any others? feel free to dispute/add to mine

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[NYRFAN218]

I don't agree with almost any of these being "worst mistakes" and most of these weren't mistakes at all.

1. Girardi was finished. The only argument to keeping him was if they had decided to rebuild that offseason then they should have just rode out the contract another year or two.

2. They were going to have to offer Yandle probably 7 million at the years he got to match the no income tax money he got in Florida. They simply didn't have the cap space.

3. This is the only debatable one. The value of the trade sucked IMO but it was clear they didn't want to be stuck with Stepan's skating ability and that NMC about to kick in. Stepan has 18 points in 44 games this season so maybe what they saw coming has finally come.

4. Richards they had to buy out because of cap recapture. He was already on the decline and this was a no brainer.

5. St. Louis was also finished as a player. He was a corpse of himself in the playoffs and the 2nd half of the season and they still had no cap space to sign him.

 

[NYRFAN218]

If we're creating a thread like this, letting Stralman walk has to be up there. We can argue whether extending Girardi or signing Boyle was the reason he's gone but regardless, letting him leave was a colossal mistake.

 

[Vinny DeAngelo]

Trading for Mcquaid, instead of letting young Dmen play.

Not drafting a high ceiling player 7th overall.

Not trading Spooner at the draft

Drafting a goalie in the first couple rounds.

Waiting to trade guys st the deadline every year

 

[Harbour Dog]

1. Disagree. Loved his heart, but as long as we were running AV's system he was going to get toasted most nights.

2. Agree. We should of found a way to sign.

3. Disagree. The merits of the trade can be debated, but it was far from a panic move. We'd almost made the near-identical trade at the previous year's draft.

4. Disagree. He hit a wall and was a justified healthy scratch in the playoffs.

5. No opinion. Price-depending, and if he even wanted to play anymore.

 

[Filthy Dangles]

Letting Stralman walk

Not re-signing Yandle

Not forcing Mike Sauer to properly secure his bucket

 

[Staxgod90]

Putting this into one mistake since one lead to another.. not trading Girardi and letting Stralman walk.. could have recouped assets and got a younger a piece while still having a reliable RD for 4-5 years. Boyle was a good piece regardless of what people said but dont think he wouldve been as much needed with that move. Didnt mind the Stepan trade but there was no hedge in place when Lias/Chytil showed they werent ready for NHL action

 

[The Crypto Guy]

just a thread to talk about a what could have been scenario...

for me aside from the obvious ones like handing out Jessiman, Montoya, McIlrath and handing out massive contracts to guys like gomez and redden and betts (etc), here are my thoughts:

1) getting rid of girardi. yes i know the contract was horrible but he really was our best defenseman in the montreal series in 2017 and had a bit of a resurgence. so i guess this could be changed to how big his contract was, but maybe if they didnt offer him that he wouldve left. one of my favorite defenseman the was he sacrificed the body and would do whatever it took to win.

2) letting go of yandle. 1000% better than shattenkirk. horribly misued/underused by AV and shouldve been given whatever contract he wanted. god do i miss him, he is beyond smarter than any defenseman we have.

3) trading stepan. complete panic move. shattenkirks miss of a contract just replaced stepans. obviously no way to know that shattenkirk tenure couldve gone so sideways but i would rather have stepans deal over shattenkirks any day.

4) buying out richards. yes again a horrible contract, but such a smart player. just miss him. see the business side of things with how bad his contract was but the player was increible

5) not giving st. louis a 1-year deal. i know he struggled in the playoffs of his last season here, but still had a solid regular season with 50+ points. couldve easily helped, and wouldve been had for less than what he was already making

any others? feel free to dispute/add to mine

How was trading Stepan a "complete panic move"? We still had Mika and Hayes, and now we have 2-3 more good prospects that can play center.

And really the buyout of Richards and Girardi? Both players were well over their hill and declining fast. Richards had his worst 2 seasons after we bought him out then retired. Looks like a great move on their part.

 

[SingnBluesOnBroadway]

Going 4 years without a first round pick comes to mind.

 

[YoSoyLalo]

Girardi over Stralman

McIlrath

Keeping AV too long

 

[Cassano]

Letting Stralman walk and signing old man Dan Boyle to replace him.

Then getting knocked out by Stralman in the same year he leaves. We maybe win the cup that year with him on our team.

One step further and signing Girardi to that contract over Stralman for cheaper length/AAV was franchise crippling.

 

[SA16]

Walking away from Zherdev

 

[True Blue]

Going 4 years without a first round pick comes to mind.

Don't forget trading all of the second rounders as well.

Trading of assets for Yandle, and then letting him walk away without getting any assets back.

 

[Webster]

Brendan Smith must be the biggest bust, at 4.35M cap hit Quinn won't play him unless there is no other choice.

Some say Gorton is the worst GM in Rangers history. I don't know much about their history in the early days, but I'm not impressed.

 

[Irishguy42]

Trading Amonte/Weight.

Letting the players continue to "bully" Gordie Howe when he joined the team during training camp/didn't try to make him feel more welcome.

Lot of recency bias in this thread that likely doesn't even make Top 5 mistakes made by this franchise.

 

[True Blue]

Some say Gorton is the worst GM in Rangers history. I don't know much about their history in the early days, but I'm not impressed.

Who says this?

 

[FJB]

Trading Zubov.

 

[EpicDing]

We do this in every thread already, it doesn't need its own.

 

[brachyrynchos]

Ferraro, LaFayette, Laperriére, Norström, and a 4th for Kurri,McSorley, and Churla was pretty bad. Nice depth and youth shipped out for some good players that unfortunately were past their prime.

 

[Riche16]

I'm going to say McIlrath.

At the time this team was starved for offense... had we picked Tarasenko I think we have a cup in 2014.

Two first for St. Louis was horrible since he only wanted to come here.

 

[True Blue]

Trading Zubov.

Is this for recent or are we going back in history? If so, Rick Middleton says hello.

 

[SingnBluesOnBroadway]

If we’re going to do this then it has to be said: Jessiman. At the time and where the team was, they had to get a guy who was going to play in the NHL. They went for a risky pick. And it backfired enormously.

 

[nyrage]

We do this in every thread already, it doesn't need its own.

As if being Rangers fans isn't masochistic enough on its own

 

[BringBackLibertys]

People may laugh because I grew to LOVE Espo and his personality (but not his GM trades), but the worst trade by far for me was:

Phil Esposito and Carol Vadnais from the Boston Bruins for Brad Park, Jean Ratelle and Joe Zanussi.

We screwed that one up

 

[SML2]

The St. Louis deal IMO was catastrophic.

We had a situation where the other teams player only wanted to come here, yet we paid top dollar.
On top of that, we had a guy who we should have sold off in Callahan to kick start a rebuild. Instead we added 2 first rounders. In the end we would have been far further ahead just letting Callahan walk.

I have always had my suspicions about St Louis in the first place. I wonder why Yzerman left him off an Olympic roster. I wonder why he went from being one of the top players in the game to having his game fall off so fast. That all involves speculation we don't do here on this board. But I think Yzerman knew something he didn't let on. Whatever Marty gave during that finals run, it wasn't worth the price paid.