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Laf to RW? Top pair d-man? Prorated entry bonuses. Plane of the blue line.
December 22, 2020, 7:17 PM ET [28 Comments]
Jan Levine
New York Rangers Blogger • RSS • Archive • CONTACT
While we wait for camps to open, we have had a trickle of news and updates over the last two days. Covering a couple of that information below. To keep us busy, Tuesday night saw exhibition hockey in the WJC, which begins in earnest on Xmas Day.

First, giving my take on a few of the posts from Larry Brooks in his Post column.



The abbreviated training camp of 10 days without even a single exhibition game will not grant time or opportunity for much trial and error. So it will likely be incumbent upon David Quinn and the staff to determine right out of the gate whether Brett Howden and Morgan Barron will compete for jobs at center or on the wing.


Without exhibition games and only 10 days until Opening Night when camps open, the incumbent has to have the edge. Howden opened some eyes with his play against Carolina, though you could argue his performance during the regular season was so poor, anything would be an upgrade. Barron showed at Cornell that he has the physique and mean streak to be a difference maker. Initially, I think Howden gets a look at center and Barron on the wing, though that could be fungible early in the season.

Assigning (Alexis) Lafreniere to the third line seems silly. The Rangers should do everything in their power to allow the first-overall selection to hit the ground running. That means giving him the opportunity to skate with (Mika) Zibanejad.

And that means moving (Pavel) Buchnevich out of the top-six and onto (Filip) Chytil’s unit. By the way, No. 89 combined with No. 72 for 219:13 five-on-minutes through which the tandem accounted for a 54.61 Corsi, 58.19 shot share and 12 goals for with eight goals against. So that’s a start.

If it were my call, I’d go with Kreider-Zibanejad-Lafreniere (and don’t be surprised if No. 13 is the one who shifts to his off-wing) and Panarin-Strome-Kakko as the top two units.

And I’d have Buchnevich skate with Chytil, leaving an opening on the wing for Howden, Barron, Julien Gauthier or Brendan Lemieux to seize.


Moving from the left to right wing is like teaching yourself how to brush your teeth with your other hand. If you have never done it, the growing pains and learning process will be difficult. Add in adapting to life in the NHL and asking Laf to do this is doubling down on his transition.

I personally would move CK20 to the third line and leave him on the first pp unit. Shifting Kreider from left to right wing is another, though less palatable, option. If you move Buch down, which could be the end result, in essence you are basically paving his future way out of town since paying him the dollars he will expect as an RFA is probably not happening on the third unit. I get that I just advocated moving Kreider down, but he is a different personality than Buch and already inked to a long-term deal.

It would be a surprise — make that, significant disappointment — if Libor Hajek is unable to nail down a spot on the varsity among the top six defensemen. After all, the 22-year-old earned a position on the team last year off a strong camp. Plus, the Rangers are on an accelerated need-to-know basis here because of expansion-draft protection matters.

So, he should play … unless, that is, either K’Andre Miller or/and Tarmo Reunanen completely eclipse Hajek. Would the Rangers dare go with two kids behind 65-game NHL veteran Ryan Lindgren on the left while carrying Brendan Smith or Jack Johnson as the seventh defenseman and consigning the other to the taxi squad?


In answer to Brooks' last question, heck yeah. Reunanen has been playing in Finland, I believe  on the top pair, so he should be up to the task for the third pair, somewhat sheltered duty. If Miller continues to translate the growth he showed in pre-camp to this season's camp, why not give him a shot? If he falters, then he can go to the AHL when that season opens February 4.

Hajek proved incapable last year of that task. Trying Hajek again opposite Trouba is probably option #1. If you do go that way, would you rather see Reunanen-Miller or Smith-Johnson? I think the answer is clear.

This one will have a material impact on the Blueshirts, PuckPedia tweeted it yesterday, augmented by one from @StatBoy_Steve tweeted it yesterday and Vince Mercogliano had an extensive piece in his column devoted to this topic.







Mercogliano - The maximum performance bonus allotment is 7.5% of the $81.5 million salary cap, which works out to $6.1125 million. If the collective total for the players on your active roster eclipses that number, the overage sum counts against your salary cap.

The Rangers are expecting at least seven players who are eligible for performance bonuses to make the roster. But, because they'll be playing 56 games now instead of the standard 82, their performance bonus maxes should be pro-rated by roughly 68.3% (or 56 divided 82).

In an 82-game season, the performance-bonus total for those seven players would have been $10.0625 million, which would have eclipsed the $6.1125 million allotment by $3.95 million and therefore added that sum to the Rangers' overall cap hit.

With the new pro-rated maxes, the total adds up to roughly $6.872 million. That's only about $760,000 over the allotment.

Essentially, the Rangers could have $3.19 million more in cap space than they originally anticipated.

The big unknown is whether the NHL will also pro-rate the $6.1125 million performance bonus cushion. If that number reduces, they'd be back in the same boat with limited cap space.

The Rangers, clearly, are hopeful the 7.5% cushion won't change.


Brooks - There has as yet been no determination of the impact on the cap of prorating entry-level bonuses. The Rangers, who stand to be charged at least $3.95 million against the cap on entry-level bonuses, would benefit most significantly from a change in the formula, which might be reason enough for the league not to entertain it.


That $3 mil in extra cap room would allow the Rangers to have Barron and Miller on the active roster right from the get-go and fit in Vitali Kravtsov when he comes over. One other option is to sign a free agent. Sami Vatanen is rumored to be heading to Edmonton to replace Oscar Klefbom, who will land on LTIR, so likely cross him off the list. Same with Mikael Granlund, who is re-signing with Nashville for $3.75 million, while Mike Hoffman is out of the team's price range. More probable, if the NHL doesn't close the loophole, as crazy as that sounds, is the Rangers go with the kids and save the space for the trade deadline, in case they need a boost.

All I can say is about damn time. I have been advocating for this for years and the change is being made. Now, a player's skate will not have to be in contact with the blue line in order to be on-side. Rather, If a player's skate has yet to break the "plane" prior to the puck crossing the leading edge, he is deemed to be on-side for the purpose of the off-side rule. The league will use replay to determine if the player broke the plane. Amazing what happens when good sense is used.



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