Judging Sather's Offseason

[Zil]

I like how the forwards look. The defense worries me both now and in the future.

 

[tlallstar6]

B- because of the Glass signing.

 

[darko]

-31- would be the Billy Beane of hockey

I hope not. Beane's won nothing.

 

[Zil]

I hope not. Beane's won nothing.

Considering the Rangers' finances, wouldn't -31- be the Theo Epstein of hockey?

 

[Raymones]

I think too many are willing to give a pass based on tough circumstances, without consideration of why the cirumstances were tough.

How cheap could he have signed Pouliot and Stralman had be begun meaningful negotiations in December?

I agree with this. I love the aquisitions of Hayes and Haggerty, but the rest of the moves are just a product of questionable decisions that might have been avoided. He HAD to sign leftovers (Stempniak, Mueller, Lombardi, Malone) because he put himself in that situation. It might turn out pretty well, but only time will tell.

If I was Sather I wouldn't have traded Callahan + top picks for 39-year old Marty St.Louis, I would have tried to trade Callahan (and maybe Girardi) for youth to avoid this cap hell. I would definitely NOT let an asset like Stralman walk for nothing and sign a 38-year old on the first day of FA. Stralman could probably be signed for 3 years 10 million if negotiations started a bit earlier. This is bad asset management leading up to the decisions they had to make this off-season. The premature signing of Tanner Glass is mindboggling.
Stralman and Zuccarello could have been locked up and there would be assets aquired in the Callahan trade along with this years first rounder. The Marc Staal contract situation would be quite pleasant to deal with.

Would the Rangers have made the SCF without that Callahan trade? Maybe not, but to be fair there was a bit of (un)lucky circumstances involved in that run. Would they even get past Pittsburgh if not for the passing of Marty's mother (R.I.P.)?

I'm pretty torn apart on this. The cup run was such an amazing experience. I was supposed to judge this offseason and that might turn out to be a great one, but I can't ignore the decisions leading up to it. If the Rangers do well this season it is not because of shrewed moves. Desperate moves, IMO. Let's see if he gets lucky I guess..

 

[Ail]

I accidentally selected B+, but I meant F.

 

[silverfish]

If its a good move its Gorton's

If its a bad move its Sather's

Its been this way for quite some time now

You've picked up on this trend too? I love that about HFNYR

B+

Hand-strung by the cap and still managed to put a good looking roster together. Got all RFAs locked up before camp started. Excellent work in the college UFA market - which is an area for me that I think is wildly untapped for organizational depth. Think we could've done better with our fourth-line signings and our camp invites, but that's my only complaint - which kept Glen from getting an 'A' from me.

 

[Blue Blooded]

I voted F, and this is coming from someone who has been giving Sather a lot of credit the past few years.

Good moves:

Stempniak - Good depth player at a cheap price.

Dorsett - Too expensive for a 4th liner.

Cheap vets - Some stick and some don't, but it is good to have depth that doesn't incur cap penalties from the AHL. The 2nd year on Lombardi's deal was not very good though.

Terrible moves:

Strålman/Boyle swap - Letting our 2nd best defenceman go for a declining vet, who does fill a need but opens up an even bigger hole.

Brassard/Zuccarello extensions - Brassard should've gotten the 1-year contract and Zucc the long term extension. Brass is a PP specialist who is below average 5v5 and has been carried by his linemates in that situation, while Zucc may be the best forward on the team. We'll regret Brassard's contract when Zucc demands $6.5M on his next deal.

Glass - Not a potentially crippling mistake as the above two, but just an all around bad move signing perhaps the worst non-goon in the league to that contract.

Draft - The goalie lottery tickets might become something, but I was hugely unimpressed with the picks - especially considering the talent that was falling through the draft. I thought the team would learn that picking talent over intangibles/size is the the best strategy after the 2013 draft.

(Girardi extension) - Not really this offseason as it was signed during the 13/14 season, but that contract will haunt us unless the cap rises fast the coming years.

Sather might be bailed out by the kids (Duclair, Miller, Fast) stepping up, but that doesn't affect his grade in my book.

 

[JCrusher*]

Good offseason. As others have mentioned hayes was a big steal even if he doenst start out guns blazing this year. People knock the Dan Boyle signing(i guess out of loyalty to stralman) but lets face it we needed a good point man on the PP and Boyle brings that along with offense.

 

[Blue Blooded]

I think too many are willing to give a pass based on tough circumstances, without consideration of why the cirumstances were tough.

How cheap could he have signed Pouliot and Stralman had be begun meaningful negotiations in December?

Stralman, maybe. Pouliot, no way. Poo started the season poorly. Any mention of an extension at that point would have been laughed at.

Well you are probably the only one.

Then you're definitely the only one that even remotely thought that.

I wanted Strålman extended in August and Pouliot as soon as the CBA allows for 1-year contracts.

I also wanted Zuccarello extended ASAP.

Sather's only good in-season move in 13/14 was trading Callahan, and I don't really like the trade itself TBH - I just like that we didn't extend him.

 

[Roo Returns]

MSL trade seems to have worked out especially if he signs after this offseason and plays for another 2-3 years.

Personally, I would have tried to trade Cally to SJ for a package around Nieto and taking Havlat off their hands, and G to the Ducks for Vatanen, but what do I know?

 

[JCrusher*]

I wanted Strålman extended in August and Pouliot as soon as the CBA allows for 1-year contracts.

I also wanted Zuccarello extended ASAP.

Sather's only good in-season move in 13/14 was trading Callahan.

The oilers are gonna regret that contract to Pouliot. Lets face it Zucc and Brass caried him on hat line and he still was inconsistent. I liked Stralman but i do think he is a tad overrated to some fans. We needed a PP specialist and some more offense from the defense and boyle brings that. Im a big stralman fan but you cant keep everyone

 

[Zil]

The oilers are gonna regret that contract to Pouliot. Lets face it Zucc and Brass caried him on hat line and he still was inconsistent. I liked Stralman but i do think he is a tad overrated to some fans. We needed a PP specialist and some more offense from the defense and boyle brings that. Im a big stralman fan but you cant keep everyone

Pouliot and Zucc carried Brass, not the other way around. Stralman was not the guy to sacrifice to improve the powerplay. Even strength play is far more important than special teams and Stralman is dramatically better than Boyle 5 on 5. Girardi was the guy who shouldn't have been extended.

 

[Hi ImHFNYR]

What are the measurable we are using to determine if it's good?

We should come to a consensus on what we're evaluating first!

Seems like it was pretty average based on what there was to work with. But since we haven't seen anyone play of course that can change. You'd also have to take into consideration cap space and FA available + what roster spots needed to be filled. Do you mark points off of previous off seasons for no cap space or do you mark off this one?

We also have to learn: out of the people who left via FA, who turns out to be someone we should've resigned and who turns out to be a bad contracts. hard to judge for another full year or two with any degree of certainty.

I think it'll turn out to be a solid B. Helped the team a little bit now and for the future but not by a lot.

 

[JCrusher*]

Pouliot and Zucc carried Brass, not the other way around. Stralman was not the guy to sacrifice to improve the powerplay. Even strength play is far more important than special teams and Stralman is dramatically better than Boyle 5 on 5. Girardi was the guy who shouldn't have been extended.

Not saying Brass isnt inconsisent however i dont think Pouliot was anythign special. Sure in is career which had been disappointing he had a decent year but not tremendous and he was too inconsistent esecially dumb penalties. I know people have a soft spot for stralman since he became a decent defensemen but peopel gotta move on. I think our team is better, younger and faster

 

[HatTrick Swayze]

I voted B. Made some good moves for the future, especially the Hayes and Haggerty.

Those two signings are the only reason it isn't a C for average. Because on the ice we have exactly no reason to believe one way or another that the moves to the NHL roster will make the Rangers better. I am optimistic based on what we've seen but there hasn't been a single regular season game played yet. Not ready to start handing out kudos.

And the Boyle situation is going to piss me off for a long time but I've posted enough on that. Not leveraging Zucc's RFA year to bring down the cap hit is something I am not fond of either.

 

[Hi ImHFNYR]

Yep. That's what people keep telling me with zero evidence.

The only significant evidence I've ever seen is the McD trade story. He was clueless about who to trade for. I don't know if this may be the norm with many trades though...but if it is I would have thought it'd be that way for lower end talent not a high prize C and top prospect.

Shows he may often defer and that only the good decisions and hard work of those around him help acquire winning talent. He didn't negotiate many FA contracts too if I recall correctly.

 

[eco's bones]

I think too many are willing to give a pass based on tough circumstances, without consideration of why the cirumstances were tough.

How cheap could he have signed Pouliot and Stralman had be begun meaningful negotiations in December?

If we had signed Stralman there would have been no room for Dan Boyle. Stralman no doubt is a more effective player in his own end and he worked well with Staal but Stralman was not going to do us a lot of good on the pwp. What happened here was a tradeoff--give up some defense maybe and get a better pwp. We gave up some age too but we also got a cheaper and shorter term contract than we would have signing Boyle instead of Stralman and looking to the future--Stepan, Staal, Zuccarello are all going to be getting Dan Girardi/Derick Brassard contracts in relative terms of money and term and St. Louis may be asked to take a bit of a paycut--and then there's Hagelin and Talbot. We can't make everyone happy.

Which brings us to Pouliot. Look at any of the above names and he doesn't merit the same. He's not worth what Edmonton gave him. He's not a big loss IMO--not as much as Stralman or Brian Boyle anyway--so who expects a team--especially one that stay at or near the cap ceiling to be able to bring everyone back from the previous year? I get that Stralman was a very good player and to at least some he was a favorite or their favorite player. He wasn't a guy to break the bank for however. If Boyle does improve our pwp we should be better off. People have been *****ing about our pwp since Jagr left and we haven't had a real pwp qb since Leetch. Finally get one--albeit a very old one and now they complain that we should have kept Anton.

 

[Raspewtin]

I voted F, and this is coming from someone who has been giving Sather a lot of credit the past few years.

Good moves:

Stempniak - Good depth player at a cheap price.

Agreed

Dorsett - Too expensive for a 4th liner.

Eh. I'd rather have kept him than sign Glass. But preferably I'd rather have neither.

Cheap vets - Some stick and some don't, but it is good to have depth that doesn't incur cap penalties from the AHL. The 2nd year on Lombardi's deal was not very good though.

Lombardi can be buried so does it really matter?

Terrible moves:

Strålman/Boyle swap - Letting our 2nd best defenceman go for a declining vet, who does fill a need but opens up an even bigger hole.

I don't have an opinion on this until we see how Staal-Boyle play.

Brassard/Zuccarello extensions - Brassard should've gotten the 1-year contract and Zucc the long term extension. Brass is a PP specialist who is below average 5v5 and has been carried by his linemates in that situation, while Zucc may be the best forward on the team. We'll regret Brassard's contract when Zucc demands $6.5M on his next deal.

Brassard got his contract just for being a center. It's the going rate for them now. I don't love it, but I don't hate it like some here do. I do not think Zuccarello is not the best forward on the team, and he shouldn't be paid like it. But giving him a 1 year deal DEFINITELY has the potential to bite us in the ass.

Glass - Not a potentially crippling mistake as the above two, but just an all around bad move signing perhaps the worst non-goon in the league to that contract.

Pretty much

Draft - The goalie lottery tickets might become something, but I was hugely unimpressed with the picks - especially considering the talent that was falling through the draft. I thought the team would learn that picking talent over intangibles/size is the the best strategy after the 2013 draft.

I don't really agree. There were some picks I felt we could've done better on, but this was a draft to fill needs. We had no top picks, and the draft was garbage anyway. We got two HRHR offensive defensemen, two goalies that are thought very highly of, and a really rough player in Keegan Iverson. Nejezchleb I know nothing about, and I don't like the Mantha pick. I don't think you can have a lot of drafts like (so far) our 2013 draft is looking. Two very high quality players dropped like rocks, in a draft that was already tremendously deep. 2015 is definitely the draft to go all out with those swing-for-the-fences picks, but not this draft IMO. You need players from every draft.

(Girardi extension) - Not really this offseason as it was signed during the 13/14 season, but that contract will haunt us unless the cap rises fast the coming years.

Seriously on the fence with Girardi's extension. I'm caught between not liking his game at all, but having no better options to play 24+ minutes a game.

Sather might be bailed out by the kids (Duclair, Miller, Fast) stepping up, but that doesn't affect his grade in my book.

Can you really use the term "bailed about by the kids"? I mean, he did draft/sign/whatever them with the intention of filling roles on the team. It's not like they came out of nowhere. Maybe their progress is why he didn't make certain moves?

Bolded are my thoughts on the moves.

 

[pld459666]

I have been a vocal proponent of canning his candyass, but he is at the helm and we really can't assign all the blame to him when things go bad and all the praise to others when things go well.

He took a bad situation with Callahan and turned that into a SC finals showing witht he acquisition of MSL.

He didn't capitulate when marginal (Pouliot and Boyle) players were getting pay days else where.

He was smart not to try to match Stralman's contract. Adjusting for the Income Tax differential between FLA and NYC, the right move was to let Stralman walk.

Draft got some solid prospects and if the 2013 draft is any indication of what 2014 could be, well...just WOW.

I did not want him hired. I did not want him to lead the franchise post lockout. But the team has two ECF showings and a Stanley Cup showing in the last 3 years and the core of the team is still pretty young.

I don't like him, but I can give credit where it's due. He gets an A+ from me.

 

[Zil]

Not saying Brass isnt inconsisent however i dont think Pouliot was anythign special. Sure in is career which had been disappointing he had a decent year but not tremendous and he was too inconsistent esecially dumb penalties. I know people have a soft spot for stralman since he became a decent defensemen but peopel gotta move on. I think our team is better, younger and faster

Not on the back end it's not. We just replaced Stralman with a guy ten years older than him. Beyond McDonagh there isn't a lot to be excited about on our blue line this year. Girardi will continue to be called a warrior by the anti-stat crowd while our captain and Lundqvist carry him on their backs. Boyle will replace Richards' powerplay presence, but leave our second pairing incredibly vulnerable in their own end. Staal will have good games and bad games in alternating stretches and continue to struggle with speed and hard forechecks. Klein will continue to be a possession black hole and cause arguments between people who believe it's a defender's job to keep the other team from burying Lundqvist in pucks and those who apparently don't. And John Moore might take a step forward and become more reliable, but the upside does not appear to be very high.

We really need our wings to be not just strong, but superb this year. If enough of the kids establish themselves (and I mean really establish themselves as major contributors, Duclair and Fast at least need to establish themselves as significant presences) then it might be a good idea to look into packaging Staal and Hagelin for a young, cost-controlled upgrade on the second pairing. Again, I cannot stress enough that we only do this if we see big time production out of our rookie wings plus the other veterans. We have an overflow of wing talent that is only going to continue next year with the arrival of Buchnevich and the continued maturation of Duclair, Fast, Haggerty, Hrivik, etc. Hagelin's an extremely valuable asset, and if we find ourselves in the position to move him without hurting our wing depth, then he might be the guy to flip.

 

[Nightshift]

B-

Didn't like the Boyle move. Need for a PP QB and his ability to provide it are overstated. We need more shooters, we have plenty of puck movers and passers. Would have kept Stralman's rock solid dependability over What Boyle brings. Probably would have come cheaper then what Tampa gave him had we looked to extend during the season.

 

[eco's bones]

Technically Haggerty wasn't an offseason move. The Rangers signed him right before the end of the season--and before the playoffs.

A lot of the Rangers are in their mid 20's now--have grown and developed with the team. They are moving towards bigger paydays. There are only so many players you can sign to $5 mil per year + multi year terms--so you need to constantly be able to bring in younger and cheaper players. The Rangers have offset this by filling in a couple chinks here and there with cheaper veterans like Stempniak, D. Moore, Glass, Malone. But it gets harder to hold a team together when you have so many players in their mid to late 20's who have developed into good players.

I'm not going to jump all over Sather/Gorton over the Callahan trade. It is what it is. Without it--I doubt we go to the SC finals. Had a real shot at the cup for the first time in twenty ****ing years. We gave up a lot for St. Louis but even so. And MSL is still a really good player--even if he is old. The experience for younger guys like Stepan, Kreider, Hagelin, Miller, J. Moore, Fast, Zucc, Brassard of going to the last game of the playoffs should make them all better players. They all have a better idea of what it takes to win a championship than they did before. They all have a reason to become hungrier players. Beyond that it should bond them to each other even stronger.

 

[Mikos87]

Gave him an A for this off season. I think the structure of the Brassard deal is a good one since it allows him to be traded if he shows signs of inconsistency.

I would have signed Zucc to term on a 3-4 year deal rather than face the prospects of him as a UFA. A good season means Zucc gets 6M. Step is a lock for ~6M.

Rangers now have Staal, Zucc, MSL and Talbot as UFAs leaving quite a bit of exposure for next year's roster while Stepan and Hagelin is RFA.

Of those 6, 2 might not return, and the Rangers are potentially hamstrung by some inconsistent underperformers in Nash, Brassard, and Glass for the next 3+ years.

Good news is that the Rangers have a farm where one or two forward slots can be filled, but can the quality be matched?

By next July 1st, $9M of Brass's $25M is paid off, so he essentially is a 4x4M deal to clear up cap space.

Having Mac Truck at half his value (See Subban deal) allows for a lot of flexibility, and while yes the Rangers have a lot of winger depth, it doesn't mean that they are going to have 60 pt seasons.

The organizational malpractice of not handing out early extensions will cause them to lose talent and overpay for other players.

 

[Blue Blooded]

Bolded are my thoughts on the moves.

RE: The kids. They weren't acquired this offseason so I don't count them amongst the offseason moves.

RE: Zucc and Brass. I think it would've been fair to give Zucc the Brassard contract and vice versa (maybe a bit more for Brass than Zucc got, but we can afford that if we hadn't signed Glass), so Zucc wouldn't have been paid like the best forward on the team. I do think he is in the conversation of best forward on the team, in my book it is between him and Nash.