Br4d

Vesey probably knew the rule and decided if he had to fight he wanted to stay in the game afterwards.

Cuylle has been odd man out a couple of times now. That doesn't feel right.

Rempe is getting rink-trained by the coaching staff.

Trouba misplay.

Anybody else think Sam has had lip transplants?

The way the Rangers draft and develop players I wouldn't take 1sts over a young player playing well. No, the issue is, that the Habs (and anybody else who likes him) will take the RFA opportunity to suss out a deal with him and those offers will force the Rangers hand. You want Laf tied down before he ever gets to the market as a successful player. Also, given the way the NHL works, whoever makes a big offer to Laf is likely to get the worst of the deal. The team most likely to profit from a big deal is the Rangers, because they know what they have and they know how he fits.

You can make an argument that Laf and Fox are the only guys on this roster that will matter in 2029 5 years down the road. I think if you can get him at something like $7M/8 yrs you jump all over that. I don't think you can get him at that. To the Canadiens he is probably worth $12M-$13M a year for the same term if he proves it next season with a big glance at this year's playoffs also. So if the Rangers believe then they want to get him off the market this summer without him ever getting an offer from the Canadiens. That probably means $10M/8 yrs.

If Roosevelt was assassinated in the 30's there are scenarios where President Lindbergh made deals and even treaties with Germany during the late 30's and effectively tried to "balance" out US foreign policy, which had favored the WWI allies for a generation.

If you want to know how to shutdown Lafreniere and turn him into an ordinary player the answer is simple: put him on a line with Kaapo Kakko.

Right. Because he wouldn't be playing on PP1 with Adam Fox and Artemi Panarin...

Also Panarin has been unlucky on breakaways this season. 0-11. Figure Laf gets 3 or 4 assists that way if the breaks go the other way.

Bucket full of lice and worse.

I was just going to post (somewhere else) that the Laf Reset thread had not been bumped in 2+ months and you bumped it!

Well, that's 2 for Goodrow. Guess we're keeping him...

For most athletes this is the sweet spot to retire. You have all the money you made earlier and you are young enough to start doing something else with it and have a real life.

Oh dear God! We're in the dog train now. I can't face 2 weeks of the Rangers playing down to the level of execrable teams!!!

Kreider actually passes very well when that is what he's looking to do, which is rare. The enigma of Chris Kreider is why he can do so many things well but rarely tries too.

With how tight the standings are at the top he's probably right. I think the Rangers have something like a 20% chance to actually be the best team in the NHL right now. That's a pretty good percentage to own.

Kreider is going to be good right up until the moment he is suddenly bad.

Wow, that's the definition of bad sports management in terms of competitiveness. However it is possible that Crosby is worth so much in the merchandising and season-ticket sales that the team is just doing what it has to do to keep the money faucets on now and are unable to appropriately factor in the desert sands ahead of them.

The Penguins should have traded Crosby last season, like before the beginning of last season. Instead they added some vet contracts to support him. The cost of those decisions was not writ onto '22-'23 or '23-'24. It was writ onto the next decade. The Oilers traded Gretzky, Messier and Coffey before they were done. It's what you do when your run is getting close to ending and you need the money and roster space to rebuild.

The issue I have with him is that he has two play levels. When he is going hard he's one of the best forwards in the NHL. When he is in conservation mode he's close to invisible. What's not clear to me is what triggers the switch of modes.

Imagine how bad the matchup would have been if Laviolette had to cover Wheeler and Bonino's lack of speed?

If any of these guys were missing for any period of time it would be hard for their team to win. That said, I think probably McDavid is the best candidate this year. Oilers looked terrible without him and then like world beaters as soon as he got back.

When he's on he does that a lot. I think he's still the active all-time saves percentage leader at this point.