Update: Oreo, Dog Thrown Off Building, Was Euthanized
People Wait For Tomorrow's UWS Apple Store Opening
Cheap Chicken Wing Deal Ruined by Gunslinging Teens
FIT Students Busted For Drug Dealing Get Probation
Views From Your Windows
Photograph of Marion Gaborik by Paul Sancya/AP
But, we should have known that all that cap space was burning a hole in Sather’s pocket and he couldn’t help but spend it. From Pavel Bure to Wade Redden, Sather has always swung for the fences and he did it again by signing Marian Gaborik to a 5 year/$7.5 million a season deal. There are certainly many positives about Gaborik. When healthy, he is one of the most dynamic players in the game, capable of scoring 40 goals. The problem is he isn’t usually healthy. Gaborik has played in 65, 48, 77 and 17 games in the four seasons since the lockout. If the injury bug follows him to New York, the Rangers will have a disaster on their hands.
And, what about the addition of Donald Brashear? When we last saw Brashear he had just cheap-shotted Blair Betts into next week and earned himself a six-game suspension. While it seems certain that Betts won’t be around next season, how are all the other players who were Rangers in April going to feel about Brashear joining their club?
Luckily for Sather, most of them will be gone. He has gotten rid of the fourth line, a solid if unspectacular unit of Orr-Betts and Sjostrom, leaving the question of exactly who will kill penalties next year? Derrick Morris and Paul Mara are gone from the blueline, so Sather is obviously betting that some of the young defensemen are ready to step up.
Maybe he will be right about that, maybe Sather has a deeper plan—but it seems much more likely that he is content to throw Cablevision’s money around and hope it works. How many more years will Rangers’ fans have to watch him do it?
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
What's wrong with the Gaborik deal? I think it's a great one. Yes he's injured a lot, and yes it's a gamble, but he's been an amazing scorer on a team that plays defensive hockey. He's entering the prime of his career. The deal definitely has a lot more upside reward than downside risk. The Brashear deal on the otherhand....
As with every move Sather makes, I'm hoping for the best but expecting the worst. Does he have a plan? I doubt it. Hopefully, Gaborik stays healthy. It may be a big risk to put that much money into one player, but realistically there aren't a lot of scorers available, and the Rangers desparately need one ... thanks to Slats' earlier genius moves. And you are correct in pointing the question of who will kill penalties next season.
I hate the Brasher signing. He's a thug, whose actions borderline on criminal. They should have just kept Orr.
So Rangers fans, can any of you say Lindros? If you can't, then check your history and you'll see what happens when you sign a star player that gets hurt a lot.
I can't believe Rangers fans have the nerve to call Brashear a thug, when they lauded every little asshat move that Avery made.
Oh please, Avery has never engaged in the type of on-ice thuggery that Brashear has. Avery annoys people and fights, that's it. Not even close to the type of thing Brashear did to Betts.
Avery constantly used his stick, his mouth, his knees, and everything on and around him as a weapon (usually on goalies because Avery is a pussy and knows goalies can't pursue him). I'm not defending Brashear's hit on Betts (I personally thought it was a minor elbow and nothing more), but the only reason you're mad about it is because Betts is on the Rangers. Period.