All is calm on the Rangers free-agency front, and now that the dust has settled on the chaos that is the first week of signings, I look around and see.... well, not a whole lot. In fact, I don't see much. In fact, it truly upsets me what I see. When I look at the free-agency tracker on NHL.com and see what the Rangers have done so far this offseason, I am not one bit pleased, or assured that the Rangers are going to be fine in the upcoming season with the moves they have currently made.Let's kick off with the gents who have shipped off that were here last season. Ruslan Fedotenko to Philadelphia, Jeff Woywitka to St. Louis, John Scott to Buffalo, Brandon Prust to Montreal, and John Mitchell to Colorado. I did not look, but I'm pretty sure if I went back and added up every goal all of these players scored last season, it'd be less than 15. So, there is not a lot of tears to be shed on this part, the Rangers have simply trimmed some of the non-producers on the lineup.
That isn't what upsets me. What upsets me is what the Rangers have done in response to all of those players leaving.
The walking of all of those players clears up quite a bit of cap space. So one would think that if the Rangers were letting all of those players go, they would want to sign someone who is going to be worth a pretty buck, like Zach Parise, right? Well, that ship has sailed. He's off in Minnesota swimming in dough with Ryan Suter, who the Rangers were also thinking about targeting. Or, maybe they're looking to swing a trade for someone like Rick Nash, or Bobby Ryan? Possibly, but then that would leave the Rangers down quite a bit of cap space and a few players in exchange for one guy. No, what really gets me mad is what the Rangers HAVE already done with their cap space, and what "good use" it's going to be going to.
