When Villains Become Heroes: Rangers' Edition

[Phil]

Welcome to August content, y'all!

 

Here's the assignment: you can "fix" the Rangers tomorrow through any means necessary (think NHL94 forced trades) but there's a catch: you can only do so by acquiring historic Rangers' villains. Who do you bring in and why? Show us your villains to heroes roster!

 

I'll start:

Laugh + for Tom Wilson. Washington can retain for whatever the cost of the + is.

 

Panarin - Zibanejad - Wilson
Kreider - Trocheck - Wheeler
Goodrow - Chytil - Kakko
Vesey - Bonino - Pitlick

[LindG1000]

3 minutes ago, Phil said:

Welcome to August content, y'all!

 

Here's the assignment: you can "fix" the Rangers tomorrow through any means necessary (think NHL94 forced trades) but there's a catch: you can only do so by acquiring historic Rangers' villains. Who do you bring in and why? Show us your villains to heroes roster!

 

I take a guy who scored a backbreaking playoff goal against us with mere seconds left in regulation, put him in as the GM, and have him acquire the goalie that stole our Stanley Cup run.

[Phil]

1 minute ago, LindG1000 said:

 

I take a guy who scored a backbreaking goal against us with mere seconds left in regulation, put him in as the GM, and have him acquire the goalie that stole our Stanley Cup run.

 

[LindG1000]

7 minutes ago, Phil said:

 

[fletch]

I think the Rangers already made their move of a villain to become a hero when they brought in Jonathan Quick for Jaroslav Halak in goal.

[Phil]

1 minute ago, fletch said:

I think the Rangers already made their move of a villain to become a hero when they brought in Jonathan Quick for Jaroslav Halak in goal.

 

They did, but that one's in the books already. This is a silly August thought exercise. Go have fun out there!

 

[LindG1000]

Fucking painful but Erik Gustaffson for Alec Martinez makes us better.

 

So does Goodrow for Henrique.

[Ozzy]

I'm going old school:

 

Bringing in Reggie Leach to play RW

[Phil]

1 hour ago, LindG1000 said:

Fucking painful but Erik Gustaffson for Alec Martinez makes us better.

 

So does Goodrow for Henrique.

 

I immediately regret this decision.

 

This post has me re-thinking the need for negative reputation.

[RJWantsTheCup]

1 hour ago, Ozzy said:

I'm going old school:

 

Bringing in Reggie Leach to play RW

I'm surprised you didn't go with Bossy at RW.

[Keirik]

.....Rangers hire Martin Brodeur as President of Hockey Operations to be the face of the franchise.....

[LindG1000]

28 minutes ago, Phil said:

 

I immediately regret this decision.

 

This post has me re-thinking the need for negative reputation.

Take it up with resident arm surgeon Denis Potvin.

[Ozzy]

29 minutes ago, RJWantsTheCup said:

I'm surprised you didn't go with Bossy at RW.

 

Ohhhh yeah, that's a good one too!

[BrooksBurner]

Trouba w/o retention for DeAngelo.

Take the cap savings and go back to July 1st and do cool stuff.

[Phil]

1 minute ago, BrooksBurner said:

Trouba w/o retention for DeAngelo.

Take the cap savings and go back to July 1st and do cool stuff.

 

Gross. This totally qualifies. Well done. But again, gross.

[fletch]

On 8/1/2023 at 12:27 PM, Phil said:

 

They did, but that one's in the books already. This is a silly August thought exercise. Go have fun out there!

 

This thread topic is close enough to a thread topic I was going to introduce closer to preseason/regular season, so I'll just post my answers to the challenge here:

 

Pick your all-time villains against Rangers by your own criteria (physical/dirty play, outright production of goals/assists, clutchness, whatever).

Pick one goaltender, one defenseman, one forward.  You can only pick one player from each NHL team, based on their villain actions for that team (you can't pick 3 Devils, 2 Islanders, whatever).

 

My all-time villains

Goaltender - Jonathan Quick - LA Kings.  Heartbreakingly good in the Stanley Cup Finals in 2013-2014, winning all 3 OT games, and denying Lundqvist and the Rangers the Cup

Defensemen - Scott Stevens - NJ Devils.  Captain during their Stanley Cup run, and a brutal physical force.  Just despised him more than any other Devil.

Forward - Mario Lemieux - Pittsburgh Penguins.  I was living in Pennsylvania at the time and surrounded by Penguins fans.  Scored so many big goals and made so many big plays, and I got so sick of the Iron City celebrations.

[Sod16]

Rights to Jim Ramsey for John Druce.

 

If you are defining villains with an emphasis on dogs who killed the Rangers, there is no one who can hold a candle to John Druce (8 goals in a five game series after scoring 8 in 45 in the regular season).  From his Wikipedia entry:

 

During the 1989–90 NHL season, his regular season statistics would continue to be unspectacular (8 goals in 45 games), but during the playoffs he exploded for 14 goals (a club record until 2018) and helped guide the Capitals to their first conference finals appearance.

 In the division finals versus the New York Rangers, Druce provided a shocking amount of offensive output. In game two of the series, Druce scored a hat trick, his first since midget hockey.^[2] Game three saw Druce tally two more goals and two assists. The Capitals needed this offensive production since their top scorer Dino Ciccarelli was injured.^[2]

Druce scored two goals in game four to lead the Capitals to a three games to one lead. In overtime of game five, Druce fended off a check by Ron Greschner and deflected Geoff Courtnall's shot over goalie John Vanbiesbrouck for a 2-1 series winning victory.^[

[RangersIn7]

1 hour ago, Sod16 said:

Rights to Jim Ramsey for John Druce.

 

If you are defining villains with an emphasis on dogs who killed the Rangers, there is no one who can hold a candle to John Druce (8 goals in a five game series after scoring 8 in 45 in the regular season).  From his Wikipedia entry:

 

During the 1989–90 NHL season, his regular season statistics would continue to be unspectacular (8 goals in 45 games), but during the playoffs he exploded for 14 goals (a club record until 2018) and helped guide the Capitals to their first conference finals appearance.

 In the division finals versus the New York Rangers, Druce provided a shocking amount of offensive output. In game two of the series, Druce scored a hat trick, his first since midget hockey.^[2] Game three saw Druce tally two more goals and two assists. The Capitals needed this offensive production since their top scorer Dino Ciccarelli was injured.^[2]

Druce scored two goals in game four to lead the Capitals to a three games to one lead. In overtime of game five, Druce fended off a check by Ron Greschner and deflected Geoff Courtnall's shot over goalie John Vanbiesbrouck for a 2-1 series winning victory.^[

I’m a Druce hater for life because of that series. Fucking douchebag bum.

Hate that guy

[jamsim1967]

Gonna go back in time and bring in Scott Stevens for K'Andre Miller, and let him hit anybody who comes across the blue-line.

 

 

Edited August 13, 2023 by jamsim1967