You know the hockey offseason is in its death throes when Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman fires up his ’30 Thoughts’ column and get the rumor mill churning. Even at the start of the 2016-17 season, there’s no shortage of things going on elsewhere around the league without the Rangers somehow connected to it and Sunday’s edition was no different.
Friedman offered a bit of an update on the status of Jacob Trouba, which we discussed here on this blog two weeks ago. For the first time, we heard which teams that could be involved in a deal and of course, the Rangers were one of the 6-8 teams that could serve as logical landing points.
Who’s in on Jacob Trouba? As best as I can tell, the list includes Arizona, Buffalo, Boston, Colorado, Detroit and the Rangers. This is purely a guess, but I could see Dallas and Tampa lurking. No idea how the Lightning could do it but Stars GM Jim Nill is always looking to upgrade his blue line. I’d thought Montreal but a couple of sources doubted it. Florida was trying before the draft but its moves afterward likely eliminate the possibility. The asks have been high. It wouldn’t surprise me, for example, if the Jets asked Buffalo for Rasmus Ristolainen, a right-hand shot who has played the left side. Apparently, some of those teams have been told they don’t have enough, which has led to them trying to involve third parties. Another note on Trouba: word is the Jets specifically asked him (or, more likely, agent Kurt Overhardt) what the number was to sign but were told it wasn’t going to happen if the right side remained status quo.
Friedman also mentioned the involvement of that potential third team to make a potential trade possible cap wise since Trouba is without a contract.
Again, as I stated in my write up two weeks ago. The Rangers’ interest isn’t surprising. Trouba would automatically become their best right handed defenseman by a large margin and they get the beginning prime years of a guy who’ll run the power play and chip in about 25-30 points to boot. (McDonagh was the only NYR defenseman last year to break 30 points)
The return back to Winnipeg is presumably a left handed shot, which again puts Brady Skjei in the spotlight, but if Winnipeg was willing to take a forward from the Rangers long list of them, I’d do it.
I also undermarketed Trouba a bit in that last write up. Not sure where Trouba would end up term wise, but Trouba will get 5-6 million per from someone. And I’m not sure how the Rangers would make that money appear in their cap, without moving someone of significance.
There is a deadline to all this, as unsigned RFA’s have until December 1st to solve their situation, or be forced to sit out for the rest of the season.
There was also one other quip from further down Friedman’s column saying that with the Devils and Panthers playing at West Point on Saturday, the league was in the middle of exploring putting a outdoor game at the football stadium with the Rangers as the host. As we learned a few years ago before the Stadium Series games at Yankee Stadium with the Islander and Devils, the Rangers cannot host a game outside MSG without breaching an agreement with the city that offers the Rangers a tax exemption to play at the Garden. Still a lot of obstacles to cross before getting to play outside again.
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