The Rangers’ revival may have hit a speed bump at the Garden on Tuesday night with a 2-1 defeat to the Lightning, but the 8-3-1 run into a playoff position, albeit mighty tenuous, has implications beyond the standings.
For if Glen Sather had ever been tempted to be a seller rather than a buyer leading up to the March 5 trade deadline, it isn’t realistic to expect the general manager to adopt that stance now, even if that might still be the wisest course of action over the long run.
Of course, depending on one’s perspectives, “long run” could have alternate meanings. One would apply to the long run over the course of the next five-to-eight years. The other would apply to a long run in this year’s playoffs.
Sands are passing through the hourglass for Sather, who celebrated his 70th birthday in September and is completing his 14th year and 13th season as GM in New York. The Rangers have won five playoff rounds in his tenure, advancing to the Eastern finals once, two seasons ago before losing in an upset to the Devils.
This year’s conference is notably weak below top dogs Pittsburgh and Boston. And with the Penguins guilty in goal until Marc-Andre Fleury can prove himself innocent through three playoff rounds, the Bruins are not only the team to beat, but the only team in the East the Rangers wouldn’t seem to have a reasonable shot of beating in a best-of-seven.
And so, sitting in a position of relative strength in a conference of near equals, which long run would you suppose Sather is looking toward? Five-to-eight years or three-to-five months from now?
As a famous former Governor who once dropped the ceremonial first puck at a Rangers opener in Philadelphia might say, you betcha.
The trade deadline is seven weeks away, but a roster freeze for the duration of the Olympic break that goes into effect Feb. 7 could spark a spate of moves.
But 15 of the 16 teams in the East are either in a playoff spot or within eight points of a berth, with only the Sabres dead and buried. Even with four teams in the West at least 10 points out of a spot pending Tuesday’s results, the logjam has produced a cap-squeezed market with few obvious sellers and many potential buyers.
Which means the cost will be high on the relatively few difference-makers who might be available, and will be very high in terms of the future for the Blueshirts, who have essentially nothing of excess to deal off the roster and have limited expendable resources through the system.
The Rangers do need to bulk up, and if there’s a swap to be made for Michael Del Zotto — mentally deficient on the Tampa Bay winner Tuesday night — that would yield a defenseman capable of playing 16 minutes and moving into the top four if injury were to strike, they would undoubtedly do so.
But they surely are not deep enough throughout the organization in order to justify dealing, say J.T. Miller, highly regarded Russian junior winger Pavel Buchnevich or a future No. 1 draft pick — after sacrificing last year’s in the Rick Nash trade — for short-term gain.
Dan Girardi and Ryan Callahan are the Rangers’ chips as rental properties, but there isn’t a scintilla of available evidence — not even from Anthony Bosch or through purloined material — Sather has made either available … or that he is planning to go in that direction.
There is no doubt Girardi would become the prime rental property on the market given his value to a contender as a right-side, minutes-eating, top-four defenseman. Of course, that is exactly the value he brings to the Rangers so long as the general manager fancies his team a contender.
Sather might consider what the Penguins might be willing to move in terms of young assets in order to get Callahan on Sidney Crosby’s right wing, but the GM is probably far more prone to consider what it would mean if his current captain scored a boatload of goals to knock the Rangers out of the postseason.
In other words, what it would mean not in the long run, but to the chance of a long run in the playoffs.