Gary Bettman longs for parity and Adam Silver strives for excellence. This is the fundamental difference between the NHL and NBA and their respective commissioners, and that difference is never more clear than right now in the aftermath of each final and on the eve of free agency. But for all the faults of Bettman […]
Read MoreThe Rangers are in a strange place approaching Saturday’s noon bell that signals the opening of the free-agent market. They are no longer just one or two pieces away from being a legitimate Stanley Cup team as they’d entered each summer since 2011. But they have enough good players— and enough good, young players — […]
Read MoreThe Islanders have a top priority come Saturday, and it’s not the opening of free agency. While the rest of the league is looking elsewhere, that is the first day that franchise bedrock John Tavares can sign a contract extension. Set to be 27 years old when the season starts, this would be the final […]
Read MoreRay Shero finds himself in an enviable position, as the general manager of the Devils has created a relatively blank slate to continue his rebuilding process. Enter his hot pursuit of the top free agent on the market, righty defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk, who might have priced himself out for teams with better chances to win […]
Read MoreSo now we will see whether goaltender coach extraordinaire Benoit Allaire can have the same impact working with Ondrej Pavelec as he has over the last four years with backups of disparate backgrounds and experience named Antti Raanta and Cam Talbot. After trading Raanta to the Coyotes on June 24 as part of the Derek Stepan […]
Read MoreFor years and years and years, the Rangers essentially bribed free agents to come to New York with bloated contract offers in reverse auctions in which the organization sold its soul as the highest bidder. Saturday, the world spun 180 degrees when Kevin Shattenkirk, a New Rochelle native and resident who always dreamed of wearing […]
Read MoreIn the parlance of the day, the Rangers’ facelift looks like this: First-line center Derek Stepan’s annual $6.5 million cap hit for the next four years plus backup goaltender Antti Raanta exchanged for presumptive first-pair right defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk’s $6.65 million cap charge over the same term plus seventh-overall draft selection Lias Andersson, young defenseman […]
Read MoreIt is going to be difficult for Devils general manager Ray Shero to see what is going on across the Hudson River this season and not cringe. Shero not only missed out on his most coveted free-agent target, but it was rubbed in his face when righty defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk signed a four-year, $26.6 million […]
Read MoreIt would be one thing, defensible even, if the NHL’s hard-cap system simply acted as a mechanism to prevent power-revenue teams from buying all the best free agents on the market and instead promoted the organic construction of teams through the entry draft and player development system. But no. Instead, this unyielding system — whose […]
Read MoreRay Shero asked that Devils fans look at his actions as general manager and recognize the direction he is trying to lead the team. And Shero is correct that the evidence is there, and at the very least he isn’t sitting on his hands. The active offseason continued when he was able to pry salary-cap […]
Read More