Might have told this story on here before, not sure. Anyways, had a chance to speak with Adam Graves at a Ranger provided lunch-in a couple years ago. This was the season after Cherepanov passed away, when it looked like we were going to be stuck with Gomez, Redden, and Drury as our core. He spoke about how hard it is to get a franchise player in the draft, unless you pick 1st overall. He brought up how Cherepanov was viewed as a franchise player by the organization. He also mentioned how much Alexei wanted to be a Ranger. Graves said when the organization went to Russia to pay their respects to his mother, she took them into his room and the only thing he had in there, was his Ranger draft jersey hanging on the wall.
While it has certainly been frustrating with our lack of offensive forwards over the past 15 years or so, I do believe Cherepanov was a huge loss for this organization.
rule in the 100 pt players and seasons . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NHL_players_with_100-point_seasons
