Blueshirt Boggle

Brief Update

With the season gradually getting closer, press coverage is starting to get a little better. As they prepare for their initial forays to New York, new Rangers Wade Redden and Markus Naslund speak to reporters back home -- see the National Post on Redden and Expressen on Naslund, with excerpts of the latter better translates at Slap Shot and Rangers Report. Blue Notes has an item on how hockey and politics mix in Alaska -- although if history is a guide, the last presidential candidate who played hockey lost [see photo at right]. Finally, the PEI Guardian talks to Ranger draftee Chris Doyle about the upcoming Traverse City Prospects Tournament.

Tomas Misses Tiger Camp, Tim Misses Sean Already

Training camp has already started for Ranger prospects playing junior hockey this season. But two of them have not yet taken to the ice with their respective teams. Tomas Kundratek could only watch as Medicine Hat practiced because his transfer papers have yet to arrive from the Czech Republic -- we still haven't learned exactly how the Rangers arranged for his release from his contract there. And Evgeny Grachev remains in New York resting a hip pointer and will not report to Brampton until the end of next week.

Prospect Park has a complete update on these two players as well as all the others. Justin Soryal is working out with his junior team, the Peterborough Petes, in preparation for his first pro season in the Ranger organization. All of the prospects will leave their teams and report on September 11th to Traverse City, Michigan, for the start of their annual Prospect Tournament. Meanwhile, in Russia, injury-prone Ivan Baranka, a defector who is still Ranger property, is hurt already, sustaining a broken rib (see Beyond the Blueshirts).

In one other bit of news, celebrity Ranger fan Tim Robbins will be participating in a benefit game along with Sean Avery and other players and personalities, and has asked to be on a line with Avery, whom he regrets will no longer be a Ranger. Robbins has always been a great promoter of the game, both as a fan and as a recreational player -- he was on our Sky Rink team for a few seasons a few years ago, around the time when Dead Man Walking came out (he told us before it was released that he expected critics to like it but viewers to ignore it -- the rest, as they say, is history).

Who Let the Dogs Out?

The dog days of August is a phrase that was first used in ancient Greece and has primarily survived these days as a baseball term, referring to the time of the season when things begin to drag on through the long schedule and the often unbearably hot weather of late summer. The advent of the internet has perhaps extended the concept to ice hockey -- during the dog days when there is nothing happening on the ice, hardcore fans have little else to do other than speculate about how their favorite teams have reshaped their rosters.

So where do the dogs come in? The Greeks characterized the dog days as a time "when the seas boiled, wine turned sour, dogs grew mad, and all creatures became languid, causing to man burning fevers, hysterics, and phrensies," according to an 1813 text called Clavis Calendarium. In our time, unscrupulous rumormongers are the mad dogs causing us "hysterics and phrensies" with their unfounded ruminations -- like the Rangers trading Scott Gomez to Vancouver to open up salary cap space with which to sign Mats Sundin.

Never mind that the Rangers just let Jaromir Jagr get away because they were reshaping the roster around Gomez and fellow 2007 free agent signee Chris Drury -- why on earth would they then sign Sundin, another version of Jagr, at the cost of Gomez, who is nearly a decade younger? Why let facts or logic get in the way when you have a "trusted source" telling you differently? One initiator of this particular rumor is a known fraud who admitted flat out when asked about last year's Jagr-to-Edmonton rumors that he made them up to keep his readers well fed -- we're not going to mention his name, link to his site, or otherwise give him the attention he so desperately craves other than pointing you to this Puck Daddy posting on this same subject, which has links to all relevant material should you be interested in reading more.

We'll go gentle on another purveyor of the Gomez rumor, Greg Caggiano of the Bleacher Report, because a) he admits here that he made a mistake in posting his initial report too soon (after first defending it in an E-mail quoted in the above-linked Puck Daddy report), and b) he's a Ranger fan. Having gone down the path he himself is on from "fan reporter" hoping to elevate his game to professional hockey writer, we have a bit of advice for Greg: journalists verify their original source for this very reason -- your second source contradicted the first, which would have been a much better story than going with an unverified rumor ("someone told us Gomez was going to Vancouver, like he who shall not be named reported, but a better source said the rumor was false"). We can't claim to have never gone with an unverified single-source story, but we always make sure to let people know in those cases that the story is as a result less than watertight.

So where does it all stand then? Larry Brooks of the Post, who has a strong personal relationship with Gomez, says that he is not being shopped (in a footnote to a perhaps more interesting story on the status of European players like Ranger draftee Alexei Cherepanov -- see Beyond the Blueshirts for an update on him). The Ottawa Sun, on the other hand, not only parrots the unfounded rumor, they throw Drury into the mix as well. The Toronto Sun adds more, while RDS adds that the Canadiens are not interested in signing Brendan Shanahan if they can't get Sundin.

In other reading, the IIHF has an interview with the GM of the Russian team the Rangers will face in Bern, Switzerland for the inaugural Victoria Cup, Prospect Park has more on that as well as the Gomez rumormongering, and Blue Notes reports that MSG will televise all Ranger pre-season games for the first time that we recall including the two games in Bern. Hartford has signed a back-up goalie, career minor leaguer Mike Brodeur (for more see Howlings).

Prospect Roster Gets Messier

There was a small surprise on the roster the Rangers released yesterday for the Traverse City Prospects Tournament. Lyon Messier, Mark Messier's son [pictured at right], was one of five players who are not Ranger property who were invited to participate on a try-out basis. The 21-year-old defenseman has been kicking around various junior leagues, playing in the OHL, WHL, and USHL last season.

Also invited were three other defensemen -- Tysen Dowzak, a 20-year-old bruiser at 6'5-225 who finished three seasons in the WHL after coming out of the Shattuck-St. Mary's hight school program (read more about him here), Czech native David Stich, a 6'2-215 pound 19-year-old who played in the QMJHL the past two seasons, and Nick Pageau, 20, who gets a second look after participating in Prospect Development Camp in June -- the smallish (6'1-175) offensive defenseman played three seasons in the OHL. The final invitee is Matt Meropoulis, a 5'11-190 pound winger with no offense to speak of who most likely received the invitation because he is an Edmonton native who played for the WHL team partly owned by Glen Sather (read about that here).

See Blue Notes for the complete roster, which is otherwise composed of prospects drafted by the Rangers or signed by the Rangers or Wolf Pack. On the roster is newly signed Czech defenseman Tomas Kundratek. A report at hokej.cz fails to shed any light on how the Rangers resolved the one problem they had in signing their 2008 third round pick -- Kundratek's Czech club has not yet acknowledged that he has signed, let alone how the Rangers gained his release from his contract with them. See Red Wings Central for a tournament schedule -- the players will practive on September 12th and then play against prospects from seven other NHL teams between the 13th and 17th.

The Rangers will pare the roster down at the end of the tournament -- some players will be cut and others will be sent to their junior teams, with the remainder coming to the MSG Training Center for Ranger training camp. For news on former prospects no longer in the organization, see Howlings -- this article has some comments on the Rangers from Bruce Graham, who becomes the ninth of the Rangers' thirteen 2004 draftees to leave the organization (remaining are Brandon Dubinsky, profiled at NHLPA.com, Ryan Callahan, Lauri Korpikoski, and Dane Byers).

The final installment in our Blueshirt Bulletin+ series on new Rangers is available now, covering depth players Patrick Rissmiller, Dan Fritsche, Andreas Jamtim, and Vladimir Denisov. Click here to read it if you have already gained access to BB+, where you can also join in the discussion with other Ranger fans. E-mail us at [email protected] to learn how to access this and all other postings at BB+ whether you are already a subscriber or would like to order a subscription. Here is the lead-in to the article:

Belmont, Belarus, the Baltic, and Blue Jacket country -- those are the locales that sent four free agents to New York as candidates for depth positions with the Rangers. For Patrick Rissmiller, the left winger from the Boston area suburb of Belmont, for Dan Fritsche, the restricted free agent the Columbus Blue Jackets threw into the Nikolai Zherdev trade, for Andreas Jamtin, the Swedish Sean Avery, and for Vladimir Denisov, the Belarussian defenseman hoping to compete for his first NHL job, a change of scenery to New York is meant to be a launching pad for an NHL career, not the re-launch that veteran free agents are hoping for.

Father Knows Best?

Jaromir Jagr is history as far as the New York Rangers are concerned, but that history is still being written as various people look back at what he did as a Ranger and why he left. The latest to check in on the subject is Jagr's father [pictured at right with his famous son]. In a Czech interview, the elder Jagr had some strong opinions about why his son did not fare that well last season and is now in Russia instead of still in New York. [Thanks as always to DaTeL for the translation from the original Czech.]

"Jarda is very demanding of himself and it wasn't easy for him in New York," his father said of Jagr. "When he wasn't having a good run, we were talking a lot. There were big expectations for the club. The Rangers have always bought expensive players -- if someone has a good season, they make a star out of him and think it will work for sure. But it didn't. When you put together players who are incompatible, you can do nothing about it.

"Hockey is a team sport. The roster in New York wasn't as glorious as it seemed. They brought some players in, it didn't work. He had to find himself players [to play with] -- it wasn't working with those stars. I don't want to criticize New York, but the team wasn't built well. [The Rangers] have made lots of mistake before. They bought many players and went without playoffs for several years.

"Jarda has always told me, 'You should've signed me up for tennis. That way you could've cursed me out. But here I'm dependent on other players.' And the North Americans are different than Europeans. Not all of them, but those in New York were all so north-south, not very creative. Sure he was [sour]. But he was also saying, 'Just you wait for the playoffs!' And he was right. If Drury didn't get hurt, it could've been even better."

Jagr-pere said he advised his son to leave the NHL for Russia this season, although he isn't sure just how much Jagr listens to him these days. "At his age, he has bigger motivation to play there," he said, citing the rigors of a compressed schedule in Russia. "There were few [NHL] teams interested in Jaromir. It was difficult. And he never wanted to play on a team that didn't rely on him. It's obvious that if he was North American, they'd handle him completely differently. I remember Craig Patrick's words from the Pittsburgh days. Patrick told him in 2000 that America doesn't want him to be best. But Jarda still wanted to show them."

These are words that are not going to further endear Jagr to Ranger fans, but these are the feelings his father expressed. Ranger fans have already begun rewriting Jagr's history as a Ranger, and Prospect Park has some equally harsh words for them. Rocha at Rangerland takes a comic look on fans' attitude toward Michal Rozsival -- as incendiary as Jagr's father's attitude toward North America may seem, there does seem to be a different standard that Czech players have been held to here.

Meanwhile, Jagr's protege in Russia, Ranger 2007 first round draftee Alexei Cherepanov, called him his fourth coach in an interview translated at Beyond the Blueshirts. Czech defenseman Tomas Kundratek, a Ranger third round draftee last June, has officially signed a contract with the Rangers and will come to North America this fall (see Howlings and NYR.com). In other reading, the St. Louis Blues have admitted an interest in signing Brendan Shanahan, according to AHN, SI.com lists Wade Redden and Markus Naslund as the two free agents most likely to go bust, the Hockey News looks at potential 2009 UFAs, and THN rates the Rangers' recent draft highly.

Doing the Right Thing

In a surprise development, the Rangers have done an about-face and will retire jersey #9 in honor of Andy Bathgate as well as Adam Graves, and will reverse the longtime neglect of Harry Howell, retiring his #3 too. We have known since Brian Leetch night that Graves was headed to the rafters to reside forever with his 1994 Cup winning teammates Mark Messier, Mike Richter, and of course Leetch. That date has now been officially set at February 3rd.

But what we didn't know was that Bathgate and Howell would get the full retirement treatment -- Larry Brooks reported last April in the Post that their jerseys would be raised as "honored numbers" rather than retirements. That plan has now apparently been amended, with the two legends from the Original Six era now slated to be honored on February 22nd in the same manner afforded Rod Gilbert and Eddie Giacomin, the only numbers recognized prior to the 1994 Stanley Cup win.

Stan Fischler, who saw Bathgate and Howell play extensively, recalls Bathgate at Game On! here and writes about Graves here. To read more, see the official announcement at NYR.com as well as articles in the Post, Newsday, Blueshirts Blog, Blue Notes, and Rangers Report. In one other piece of news about 1994 Cup winners, Prospect Park seems to be the only place that noticed that Jeff Beukeboom is joining Barrie of the OHL as assistant coach.

Solution to Sundin Salary Cap Riddle

Riddle me this, Batman: If Mats Sundin wants so badly to come to New York rather than return to Toronto or takes Vancouver's big bucks, but the Rangers need to shed enough cap space to make room for him, why not just make a trade with one of the aforementioned teams? After all, they'll have to use the cap space they had reserved for Sundin on other players once it sinks in that the 37-year-old Swede doesn't want to play for them, right? Why not use that space on Michal Roszival and a young forward with offensive upside?

The Canucks have nearly $10 million of cap space left -- the amount they have offered Sundin. They aren't hurting for a defenseman of Rozsival's caliber, but if the right forward was added to the deal, it should work for them. The Leafs will have $12 million available once they dump Bryan McCabe and will have to use some of that to replace him. Is there a better replacement available for McCabe than Roszival? And they are so thin in every other area that adding a decent forward should make the deal a no-brainer. Both teams have a low-cost defenseman they can throw back the Rangers' way to help fill the hole that would be left by Roszival's departure.

Is GM Glen Sather thinking along these lines? Or is he getting no quarter from those teams because they're still holding out hope that Sundin will choose them because the Rangers have no cap room for him? The Fourth Period reports (strictly on the rumor level, even though they cite a source) that Sundin has already agreed to come to New York and will wait until training camp for the Rangers to open up the space they need to sign him in the $7 million range. Meanwhile, the Globe and Mail checks in with another Sundin watch story, and also takes a look at some of the other name veterans who remain unsigned, including Brendan Shanahan.

In other reading, the annual Chris Drury little league world series story is trotted out by NHL.com, Theo Fleury's baseball career will end after two games, TSN lists the only untouchable Ranger among the top 25 players in trade value (Henrik Lundqvist), Prospect Park gets ready for the upcoming season here and here, and the Wolf Pack have signed Belarussian forward Sergei Demagin -- see Howlings and Beyond the Blueshirts for more on him. Also at the latter, former Ranger Sergei Nemchinov talks about the prospects of Ranger prospects Alexei Cherepanov and Evgeny Grachev joining Russia's WJC team, which he coaches.

And speaking of Grachev, Blueshirt Bulletin+ now features a lengthy excerpt of an article by Steve Zipay of Newsday that will appear in the September issue of Blueshirt Bulletin on him and fellow Russian prospect Artem Anisimov. E-mail us at [email protected] to learn how to gain access to this and all other postings at BB+ whether you are already a subscriber or would like to order a subscription. Here is the lead-in to the article:

In New York, two young Russians -- Artem Anisomov and Evgeny Grachev -- had been among the most impressive in the week-long [prospect] camp, which featured, according to Ranger coach Tom Renney, "more speed and quickness, generally, than we've had in the past. And I think the skill level is maybe a litle bit higher." If the Rangers are indeed transitioning to a younger, faster squad, that could bode well. In last year's camp, defenseman Marc Staal made a major leap forward from the prior year. This June, that player was Anisimov, a 20-year-old center who blossomed in Hartford last season. Whether he follows Staal's footprints to the NHL at the same swift pace is uncertain.

Veteran Outlook: Sunny or Shanny

The top remaining free agent, Mats Sundin, he of the neverending "will he or won't he?" saga, has put the Rangers at the top of his wish list, according to Larry Brooks of the New York Post, even though other teams are able to offer him tons more money. In order to accommodate Sundin under the salary cap, Brooks says Glen Sather will have to find a way to trade Michal Rozsival and replace him with a cheap NHL-capable defenseman. But Sundin's agent has denied portions of Brooks's report that have to do with his possible return to the Maple Leafs, according to the Toronto Star and TSN. See Blue Notes for more.

Meanwhile, another "name" veteran who has put the Rangers at the top of his list awaits to hear his fate. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported last week that the Blues want to make an offer to Brendan Shanahan, but Blueshirts Blog contacted Shanahan and was told that he is still holding off all suitors as long as he has a chance to return for another turn as a Ranger. Blueshirt Bulletin subscribers can join the discussion on these and other subjects at Blueshirt Bulletin+. In other reading, Prospect Park takes on a couple of topics (here and here).

His Own Team Is Not Our Team

He may be gone, but he just won't let himself be forgotten, no matter how many times we think we've written the last episode of "The Sean Avery Show". The Late Grate One can be seen all around town in a new ad campaign for The Gap, one that has the now-ironic tag line, "Believe in Your Own Team" -- yes, Sean Avery has made his own team, because that team was no longer going to be the Rangers, even though being a Ranger is what got him the visibility he needed to break into the fashion industry. [Thanks to reader Ken Hoffman for forwarding the ad image.]

Elsewhere, NHL.com put up a slew of Ranger-related stories -- they get Gordie Clark's take on the prospects in the system, they focus in on recent draftee Dale Weise, they include another recent draftee, first rounder Mike Del Zotto, in an article on superstitions, and they have a piece on the newest member of the Rangers' front office, Mike Barnett. Prospect Park explains some of the subtler ways to look at prospects' prospects. Blue Notes and Rangers Report have updates on the recently released NHL TV schedule. And the Hockey News explains why the Rangers will underachieve this season.

Now available at Blueshirt Bulletin+ is Part 5 of our Change of Scenery series on the crises of confidence defenseman Dmitri Kalinin undergoes. E-mail us at [email protected] to learn how to gain access to this and all other postings at BB+ whether you are already a subscriber or would like to order a subscription. Here is the lead-in to the article:

What if the Rangers had a free agent defenseman who a) rarely threw a hit or cleared his crease despite having good size, b) was prone to giveaways and deflecting goals into his own net, c) had dropped down the depth chart from first pair defenseman to third pair, d) was widely despised by his team's own fans, and e) was earning too much money to be a player like that? No way you re-sign a defenseman like that, right? After all, that's Marek Malik, right? And it's true -- the Rangers didn't re-sign Malik. But the Rangers did sign a player that met the above description to a T -- in Buffalo.

Click here to read more if you are Blueshirt Bulletin subscriber.

On Nigel and Numbers, Voros and Forums

UPDATE: Brian Leetch and Mike Richter were named as two of the four 2008 inductees to the US Hockey Hall of Fame today. Cammi Granato and Brett Hull are the other two. For more, see NYR.com, NHL.com, and ESPN.

The Nigel Dawes roster riddle has been laid to rest -- NYR.com has added him onto the online listing. So if any trade is in the works, there is no clue hidden between the lines there. Nikolai Zherdev got his #13 back too -- does that mean the Mats Sundin watch is officially off, or will the two players arm wrestle for the number should Sundin miraculously choose to turn down Vancouver's $10 million offer and opt instead to come to New York for the Rangers' remaining cap space, the league minimum salary? And Scott Gomez will not have to undergo another puck flip for his number, with Markus Naslund taking #91 instead of his customary #19.

Part 4 of our Change of Scenery series is up at Blueshirt Bulletin+, this time analyzing newcomer Aaron Voros (E-mail us at [email protected] to learn how to gain access to this and all other postings at BB+ whether you are already a subscriber or would like to order a subscription). Here is the lead-in to the article:

Most of the Rangers' new acquistions have come to New York in search of a change of scenery they hope will re-invigorate their careers. But in one case, it's not so much a change of scenery, it's a change in casting. Sean Avery was the protagonist cast in the role of antagonist. Anticipating his departure, Glen Sather signed Aaron Voros to play the role of agitator.

Only 15 months younger than Avery despite having played just part of one NHL season, Voros already has a reputation as a yapper, his hits have ignited line brawls, and he celebrates goals in a way that grates upon the opposition. And like Avery, he can score the odd goal, and he can take the odd detrimental penalty.But is Voros, a 26-year-old rookie with the Wild last season, capable of filling Avery's role as a spark plug and super pest who can catalyze wins? Or will he prove to be little more than an energetic fourth liner predisposed to taking bad penalties and losing fights, like Ryan Hollweg?

Click here to read more if you are Blueshirt Bulletin subscriber. Blueshirt Bulletin+ is also the place for subscribers to discuss the Rangers. Our apologies to non-subscribers that we can no longer host an open discussion here at BlueshirtBulletin.com, but we were plagued by trolls who ruined things for our subscribers and were asked by them to take this action. For non-subscribers, here is a list of online locations that currently host robust discussions for Ranger fans: the comments sections of the reporters' blogs -- Rangers Report, Blue Notes, Blueshirts Blog, and Game On! -- and the forums at Hockey Rodent, Rangerland (previously Hockeybird), Outside the Garden, Hockey's Future, NYR.com, MSG.com, Ranger Nation, and ESPN.com (there are others, but these are the longest running and/or most visited).