Salary Cap: Salary Cap & Roster Building | Monday, February 26

[Tender Rip]

I don’t think anyone has suggested any trades lately or thinks he’d be moved right now

I read Warm Cookies and previous posts about imagining our D without him as just that.... not to mention Coach John yesterday.... ie. talking about him being traded. Something I am game for in the offseason - more so if he doesn't turn things around.

Maybe I will even suggest bringing a wife-beater out of Russia (Dr. Warm Dark Champagne Cookie Wishes used to share my man-crush a little decade ago) to replace him while trading Letang for futures.... but again, all that is for the off-season. Until then I am on team post-pallatal something something.

 

[Tom Hanks]

It's crazy. Hopefully he steps it up and can turn things around the way he did in the 2016 playoffs

I’d settle just for relatively mistake free hockey. He causes the most turnovers on the team and it’s potentially more dangerous because of where he plays. If Sid causes a turnover down low we still have 4 guys to clean things up. Letang’s will be at the blue line and everyone is chasing from there.

 

[Tender Rip]

He’s not great defensively or in the circle and he’s on pace for 35 points this season.

I get him having shown he can play well with scoring wingers and adds size and youth to the center position.

But I doubt we’d be looking at him.

I don't understand the thinking here.
He is the top shut down option on the Rangers, taking on opponents best and having the lowest OZ start rate of any Rangers C's and second lowest among forwards in total.

He is above 50% on draws, having in latter years improved from 36% to 45% to now 50%.

As regards points, in his first three seasons in the league - where Rangers were good in all three of them - he had 45, 36 and 49 points while playing third line minutes on a very deep and balanced team, and getting very little PP time. We're talking a much more offensively productive ES player than Bones, who scored more goals.

Now the Rangers have sucked and have had severe injury issues to crucial forwards, and Hayes has faced much harder competition. Would you suggest that his past accomplishments are more indicative of what could be when snuggling in on a Pens 3rd line for relative softie match-ups with Kessel beside him.... or that this soon to be 26 year old is just.... regressing?

 

[HandshakeLine]

He doesn’t have a real strong M-NTC (he can go to 18 teams). It’s a hard move in season though, seems JR has explored that option already. Letang not missing any games for the rest of the year will put some GM’s minds at ease. That was the main issue according to the media regarding trades (other than large cap during the season). They know he’s good but will he play enough.

My point was more that anything that makes it harder to move Letang, it reduces the willingness of the front office to gamble on moving him while we're making the post-season. Better the devil you know (and who has some legit upside) than the devil you don't and all.

 

[HandshakeLine]

Here's a question, Rip- is it better to have Hayes and Sheahan putting up 35ish points both in the bottom 6, or would you target someone who's got more top-end potential for that 3rd line?

Because honestly, there's a lot of similarities between Hayes and Sheahan, which are not bad things at all, and he could be a good "buy low" acquisition.

 

[JimmyTwoTimes]

Here's a question, Rip- is it better to have Hayes and Sheahan putting up 35ish points both in the bottom 6, or would you target someone who's got more top-end potential for that 3rd line?

Because honestly, there's a lot of similarities between Hayes and Sheahan, which are not bad things at all, and he could be a good "buy low" acquisition.

Going forward, your second option is the way to go. I just dont think its something we will do for this playoff run tho. Theyll adress that after the season(longterm top end 3c) , and look for a stop gap 3c for this run imo.

And id rather them do that than trade Sprong just because weve been desperate for a 3c.

 

[HandshakeLine]

Going forward, your second option is the way to go. I just dont think its something we will do for this playoff run tho. Theyll adress that after the season(longterm top end 3c) , and look for a stop gap 3c for this run imo.

And id rather them do that then trade Sprong just because weve been desperate for a 3c.

I don't know what the asking price is on Hayes, so that's all with a grain of salt. But honestly, if we're talking about production, Sheahan isn't that far removed from Bonino's production. So, either it's like Bonino was not that elite as 3C, or Sheahan isn't producing as badly as people think.

Hayes would be a step-up, at least on paper, and is more of a goal scorer it seems, but how much more than 15G 25A do we want from our 3C? Because Hayes will give you that and Sheahan very well might too.

It's really not a bad idea and the more I think about it, the more I like it depending on what the ask is for Hayes.

 

[HandshakeLine]

Also, an insane stat tidbit that's not relevant to anything at all because +/- is a garbage stat, but I like that Sheahan has had a +30 swing from last year's performance.

 

[JimmyTwoTimes]

The way Plekanec has been playing in the past 2 years he wouldn't be an upgrade on Sheahan.
If we are going to trade for a center it needs to be a major upgrade like a Bonino type of center

Pleks is slowing down due to age, but also needs a spark. Whole team has been bad and players underachieving. Hes played with them his whole career, i could see him coming here( maybe playing along side kessel) and gettting a huge boost in energy/motivation. And doing well. Hes played in a lot of playoff games, putting up solid numbers.

Also want us to add a vet who hasnt won a cup before, that always seems to add to the locker room.. extra motivation.

I could see if pleks has bounced around his whole career, but being with the habs his whole career, and then getting a chance on a team whos coming off back to back cups? Id like to see what he could do. Also comes cheap.

 

[Tender Rip]

Here's a question, Rip- is it better to have Hayes and Sheahan putting up 35ish points both in the bottom 6, or would you target someone who's got more top-end potential for that 3rd line?

Because honestly, there's a lot of similarities between Hayes and Sheahan, which are not bad things at all, and he could be a good "buy low" acquisition.

Hayes is much more talented. The similarity is that they’re tall and not as physical as people would like.

Hayes averaged about 45 points/82 games over his first three years in the league. As a third liner, with little PP time. This season is his only relative letdown, and you check reasonable Rangers fans here and they know its circumstantial/about deployment much more than about Hayes.

More principally.... I go with solid two-way players for 3rd and 4th line every day. The idea that a team with Sid and Geno should need a high profile C behind them rather than funds for quality line mates and depth was always an absurdity to me.

 

[Le Magnifique 66]

Pleks is slowing down due to age, but also needs a spark. Whole team has been bad and players underachieving. Hes played with them his whole career, i could see him coming here( maybe playing along side kessel) and gettting a huge boost in energy/motivation. And doing well. Hes played in a lot of playoff games, putting up solid numbers.

Also want us to add a vet who hasnt won a cup before, that always seems to add to the locker room.. extra motivation.

I could see if pleks has bounced around his whole career, but being with the habs his whole career, and then getting a chance on a team whos coming off back to back cups? Id like to see what he could do. Also comes cheap.

Living in Moontreal and having seen Plekanec since his NHL debut, the guy has never ever stepped it up come playoff time and is the type of player to disappear when it gets nasty. Sorry but he is not the type of player you go to war with.
If JR does go after him, I hope it's cause he comes really cheap and be that I mean no more than a 3rd rounder

 

[Riptide]

How convinced were people of Bonino and Cullen heading into the playoffs? Bones got the benefit of how how HBK got, Cullen slowly won over many people here. Then last year, Bones was struggling and people were still ok with that.

I might be the only one not worried.

Well in 15/16 HBK was rolling... so pretty confident. Add in Cullen with his long career of success... and yeah no issues. My mild concern isn't with Sheahan specifically... it's more so that we haven't locked down some sort of line for L3 that's really worked. We've seen things that have worked, but we haven't done much to follow up on those. We want to put Kessel there (which is understandable), but have made few efforts to find something that works other than GSK - something that doesn't work anywhere else.

I don't really believe that players "suck in the POs" vs "are only good in the RS" or that... and that because of someone's historical numbers, we need to be concerned or not. I think some guys have terrible PO numbers... but that it's more a function of how good the team around them is or isn't and how good they are individually.

So with RS... I would just be a lot more comfortable if we could see a L3 that was working. GSK isn't that, and thus I have some concerns with how he and others will do. But then that doesn't really change even if we brought in another RS caliber center... as I'd still have the same concerns.

 

[Riptide]

Here's a question, Rip- is it better to have Hayes and Sheahan putting up 35ish points both in the bottom 6, or would you target someone who's got more top-end potential for that 3rd line?

Because honestly, there's a lot of similarities between Hayes and Sheahan, which are not bad things at all, and he could be a good "buy low" acquisition.

I don't think we need someone better than Sheahan to have success. So having someone else like him would be amazing. That said, I'm not sure how "buy low" Hayes would actually be. And w/o looking into it further I'm not sure how much of his production the last few seasons came with him at center or on the wing (pretty sure his first season was as a winger). Anyway, if we could get him, I'd be pretty happy with that, but with only 1 RFA season left, I'm not sure I'd be willing to move Sprong. 1st+, sure, but Sprong? Meh...

I don't know what the asking price is on Hayes, so that's all with a grain of salt. But honestly, if we're talking about production, Sheahan isn't that far removed from Bonino's production. So, either it's like Bonino was not that elite as 3C, or Sheahan isn't producing as badly as people think.

He's also doing it entirely without any PP minutes. Bonino put up 25ES points and 37 pts overall... RS is on pace for 35 points, and IIRC 30 ES points. All while getting much harder zone starts.