State of the Rangers: Deadline Editon

To be quite honest, I have no idea how I'm not sitting here typing about how if Rick Nash and Brad Richards click on the Rangers 1B line, it could very well lead the Rangers to their 1st Stanley Cup in 18 years. Instead, miraculously Brandon Dubinsky remains on the Rangers. Following Larry Brooks' report of the Rangers last ditch effort in the 2 pm hour Monday afternoon with the Rangers offering Dubinsky, Chris Thomas, JT Miller, Tim Erixon and a first round pick that was turned down by the Blue Jackets, I pretty much came to the conclusion that the Blue Jackets were simply not going to accept any offer that didn't include Chris Kreider in it. That goes to show how much the Rangers organization values that kid. Overall the trade deadline came and went with little fanfare and a few eyebrow raising trades across the NHL. With the Rangers, it appears like they were all in on acquiring Nash and Nash alone all the way up til 3 pm cutoff.

The best thing that came out of the Rangers not acquiring Nash is their absurd amount of cap space they inherited upon moving Wolski to Florida that all but insures Gaborik stays in New York likely for the remainder of his career if he so chooses, re-up Prust, Del Zotto and Biron going into next season, pay Kreider who will have a quite pricey entry level contract if he forgoes his senior season at BC, and have the cap space to re-sign Stepan, McDonagh, Anisimov and Hagelin to new deals following next season. It truly is quite amazing what a team can accomplish financially without two contracts with cap hits over 7 million dollars hanging over the Rangers. If Kreider declares for the NHL next month, you can forget about Nash coming to Broadway.

Moving on from the Rick Nash sweepstakes that ultimately went no-where thanks to a particularly greedy GM out in Columbus who will likely be out of a job in 6 weeks.... The Rangers have to feel like they can go to battle in the playoffs with the team they've had so much success with for the vast majority of the season. The Rangers have been getting stellar goaltending, stifling defensive play, and timely, clutch scoring from their top 6 forwards. IF and a big if, Dubinsky is able to get untracked come playoff time, which he has been a key guy for the Rangers over his career in the postseason, (15 points in 22 games) the Rangers will be an extremely tough out if anyone is able to do it. A lot is being made of the Rangers inept power play this season, which I may add needs a heavy shot from the point more than another scoring winger. As teams advance, refs will be more and more reluctant to call ticky tack penalties and it's usually the team that is best 5 on 5 that will win the majority of playoff games. You have to look no further than last year's Boston Bruins who finished the season in the bottom half of the NHL in terms of power play success and won a Stanley Cup.

This will be the last State of the Rangers column for the regular season, as the next column won't be until the completion of game 82 and the columns like this thereafter will be giant playoff previews for the Rangers likely 1 vs. 8 matchup. I've been telling you guys since October that the best is yet to come for the Rangers and it's nearly here...

The Captain comes to the Rangers rescue, down Buffalo 3-2 in OT

The Good: Carl Hagelin scored the 10th goal of his rookie campaign on a fluky goal, shot along the goal line which pinballed around Miller's stick and pads and through his five hole at 7:38 of the second period to tie the game at 1. The Rangers tied the game at 2, five minutes into the third period, on a beautiful head-man pass from Del Zotto to Gaborik, beating Ryan Miller high glove for his 29th. When those high risk passes from Del Zotto connect, there's a good chance Gaborik is there to put the puck in the back of the net. Ryan Callahan came through with the GWG in OT at 2:59 for his 24th of the season and 100th of his career, deking around a sprawling Patrick Kaleta and depositing a wrister under Miller's armpit to send the fans home happy.

The Bad: Drew Stafford opened the scoring for the Sabres at 13:29 of the first period with some sloppy backchecking and defense by both Stepan and Del Zotto when they left Stafford wide open in front of Lundqvist.  Stafford got his second of the game on the power play just 44 seconds into the third period, when he was the recipient of some nifty passing between Pominville, Roy and Vanek down the ice while the Rangers could do little but watch.

The Ugly: To say the Rangers needed two points badly tonight is quite the understatement. With the trade winds circling around the Rangers, which is quite uncommon for any team with a huge lead in their conference entering the month of March. Whether the rumors or whispers are affecting the team or not, or if this is just part of the ebbs and flows of an 82 game season, the Rangers needed tonights win not only to get off this mini skid, but to send confidence and good feelings back around the locker room again.

BREAKING NEWS: RANGERS TRADE WOLSKI TO FLORIDA

Per Bob Mckenzie at TSN the Rangers have traded Wojtek Wolski to Florida for defenceman Mike Vernace and a 3rd round pick in 2013. The trade clears a ton of cap space for whatever moves Glen Sather has in store for the Rangers in the next 3 days before Monday's 3pm trade deadline.

Trade Deadline thoughts/obs... so far

• As we all know, Columbus Blue Jackets captain Rick Nash has been heavily rumored to be traded to the Rangers for the past couple weeks, but due to CBJ GM Scott Howson's insane trade demands at the moment, it doesn't seem like the Rangers and Blue Jackets are even in the same stratosphere as far as making a deal work. Some of the tradebreakers include the Rangers parting ways with Chris Kreider and Tim Erixon, two top Ranger prospects that according to Larry Brooks, the Rangers have deemed untouchable. The rumor is the Rangers are offering Brandon Dubinsky, Chris Thomas, Dylan McIlrath and a first round pick in the 2012 NHL Draft. While that's quite a bit to trade away for a semi-elite scorer in the NHL (yes, I'm putting Nash in that category) that isn't enough for Scott Howson to trade away with the face of the franchise since the Blue Jackets inception into the NHL in 2000.
• Last night the Blue Jackets traded away Jeff Carter to the Kings for Jack Johnson and a conditional first round pick. According to various reports mainly from the guys at TSN, the holdup there was that the Blue Jackets wanted a prospect from the Kings in addition to Johnson and the pick. It's bad enough that the Blue Jackets easily won last nights trade, trading away Carter's contract and they freed up cap space but Howson is downright nuts demanding THAT in return for Jeff Carter and I think we are seeing that mentality going on with the Rangers right now. Yes, with the acquistion of Jack Johnson, if there were demands on the Rangers throwing in MDZ or McDonagh for a Nash deal to work, they probably don't exist this AM which does mean they are closer to a deal. 
• After the CBJ-LA trade last night, reports immediately popped up surrounding the availability of Kings captain Dustin Brown which I am 100% for. Apparently LA is in the midst of a "culture/regime" change and perhaps no longer thinks their captain is part of that change. So who goes in a trade?  The Kings, who are much closer to the cap ceiling than the Rangers are, took on cap space last night acquiring Jeff Carter from the Kings so I don't think they'll be in the mood of taking on more cap space in addition to trading away their captain, so Dubinsky stays. I might offer them a package of Anisimov, McIlrath or Chris Thomas and a conditional first round pick dependent on how far the Rangers advance in the playoffs. It's worth an offer for Brown who is another New Yorker, another 25 goal scorer which the Rangers need right now and most importantly fits the Rangers needs like a glove for their potential Cup run.

NYR Available/Unavailable players for the deadline

Below is a rundown of Rangers players and prospects who I feel could be available for a trade if and when the Rangers do pull the trigger for a player not particularly Rick Nash.

Available: 

Christian Thomas: Growing concerned that there may not be anywhere on the top 6, let alone top 9 on the Rangers to put this kid once he's ready. Thomas is a definite top 5 NYR prospect and will be the biggest prospect thrown in a possible trade.

Artem Anisimov: I know this kid has a following in NY similar to the following Dubinsky has, but I'm not sure how much better Anisimov can be. You would think playing with Gaborik and Stepan for about half of the season would net him better statistics but he only has 10 goals and 18 assists. If Anisimov is just going to be another 40 point player for his career you move him for a bigger piece.

Stu Bickel: Nice defensive defenseman who would be claimed off of waivers in a heartbeat if the Rangers were to waive him, and secondly Bickel provides a physical presence on the blue line which is normally an attractive trait to have come deadline time.

Other Rangers I feel could be available: Carl Hagelin, JT Miller, Dylan McIlrath, Jonathan Audy-Marchessault, Mats Zuccarello, Wojcek Wolski.

Unavailable:
Chris Kreider: Just the time the Rangers have invested waiting for Kreider to declare himself for the NHL is not worth the chance that if Kreider pans out, I believe he will be better than Rick Nash. The only way I would ever move Kreider is if it means Ovechkin, Crosby, Datsyuk or Stamkos coming back the other way.

Marc Staal: The fact that I even have to write this is quite frankly absurd. He is still the best defenseman the Rangers have and needs the upcoming offseason to fully recover from his concussion. He will be the Marc Staal we all know is lights out against the best in the NHL given the time to fully recover. The simple fact that he's on the Rangers third pair at the moment goes to show the ridiculous amount of depth on the Ranger blue line.

Brandon Dubinsky: I left Dubinsky last for a reason. I've given it thought as to whether the Rangers should move Dubinsky in a trade to Columbus for Nash and I decided against it. Someone brought up on my twitter awhile back that the reason why Dubinsky isn't scoring this year is because there currently isn't any pressure on him to do so. While that may be the case, I don't think that is the direct reason to Dubinsky's early season slump, I believe his new contract may have had something to do with his struggles out of the gate which snowballed on him through the early part of the schedule. At his best Dubinsky is a 60 point player, who is instrumental to the Rangers in the locker room as well as the Rangers top 5 PK unit. While I wouldn't be opposed to trading Dubinsky in the future, I would be against trading him to Columbus for Rick Nash.

Rick Nash to me is in the bottom tier of the elite NHL'ers. I'd still rather have Marian Gaborik and Brad Richards over Nash any day to lead my team to a potential Cup. Hell, I'd rather have Zach Parise than Rick Nash knowing how bad former Devils have played in NYC and at least you don't have to trade the toilet and kitchen sink for him.

Good, Bad, Ugly: Captain Cally's hattie leads the Rangers to victory in Philly

The Good: The Rangers opened the scoring at 8:25 of the first period miraculously on the power play with Brad Richards simply skating the puck up ice, who then fed Gaborik at the top of the circles, and he found Callahan along the goal line next to a down and out Bobrovsky and Cally banked it in for a 1-0 lead. Only if all the power play goals were that easy. The Rangers made it 2-1 when the Flyers let Gaborik skate the puck into their end, connected with a cross ice pass to Stepan who quickly got the puck back to Richards at the point and he found Gaborik alone in front of the net and re-directed Richards' pass behind Bobrovsky at 16:40 of the first. The Rangers took the lead for good at 9:15 of the second period, again on the power play. Brad Richards again sets up the entire play and the Rangers with some quick passing, Richards to Gaborik to Del Zotto across the crease to Callahan for his second of the game. The Rangers made it 4-2 with Anisimov getting on the board. Not too long after getting robbed by Bobrovsky, Stepan, following some back and forth passing with Gaborik found Artie cross ice for his 9th of the season. Callahan completed his hat trick just 5 minutes after the Anisimov's goal, potting home a rebound of a Brad Richards shot at the bottom of the right circle.

The Bad: All you need to know is Simmonds tied the game at 1 off of a lucky tip and Giroux beat Hank on a breakaway off a miserable line change by the Rangers to make it 2-2, ho-hum.

The Ugly: It simply does not matter where the Rangers and Flyers play, indoors or outdoors, NYC or Philadelphia, the Rangers have thoroughly dominated the Flyers this year out-scoring them 19-8 in 5 games. The writing was on the wall when the Flyers lost Pronger for the season, leaving their already pedestrian blue line very vulnerable to a team like the Rangers who will wear and grind you down for 60 minutes (in most games.) The simple fact that the Flyers easily let the Rangers score 3 power play goals against them after the Rangers have only scored just 3 power play goals in the 2012 calendar year is downright embarrassing. CSN Philly also showed a graphic that the Flyers PK has a 78% success rate at home which has to be at the bottom of the league. The Rangers, more so Lundqvist, are in the back of the Flyers minds and their frustration clearly showed on the ice today. Fun fact: today was the Rangers 35th win of the year, a feat they didn't accomplish last year until March 6th, a 7-0 laugher against the Flyers at the Garden.