Yes, New York, please waste $4 million on a scrubby little agitator instead of, I don't know, some offensive talent that ISN'T 6,000 years old and well into the decline phases of their careers.
Signed,
Penguins fan
You mean like Gary Roberts?
Your post would have made sense a few years ago. Our offensive talent now consists of a number of guys decidedly not into the decline phases of their careers...Gomez, Drury, Dawes, Callahan, Prucha, Dubinsky, with more young talent that hasn't made it to the NHL yet.
Our players who are into the decline phases of their careers are still contributing, both offensively and in other ways. Jagr is well worth his salary, considering only half of his salary counts against our cap (the other half counts against the Caps' cap). Marty Straka works as hard as anyone. And Brendan Shanahan is no longer counted on for 40 goals a year, his role is as a locker room presence and occasional goal scorer. He's paid as such.
Sometimes you need players on the team who have won, to teach the young guys how to win. There are a lot of Stanley Cups in that locker room, gold medals, and even a little league world championship.
Does that automatically mean the Rangers are going to win? Of course not. There are many many variables, and at the top of the list is the play of the goaltenders. Personally I don't think Lundqvist has proven anything yet, but I'm a Mike Richter fan. I've seen Fleury play great, and I've seen him play terrible. Hopefully for your sake he'll lean toward great.
But to come on here and make such an assessment of the age of the Rangers, well, you must not have been paying attention to the team the last couple of years. Credit the salary cap, credit Sather for remembering how to build a team, credit luck, credit whatever, but the Rangers have been getting contributions from a lot of young guys, including another rookie who is a potential franchise defenseman, Marc Staal, and second year regular Dan Girardi.
At the start of the season the average age of the Penguins' roster was 27.48. The average age of the Rangers' roster was 27.86. I think you need to update your material.
Sandra