The Rangers have heard through the grapevine that Brad Richards will be seeking a long-term contract worth a minimum of $7 million per when the free-agent market opens on July 1, and they’ve heard it more than once and they’ve heard it from more than one source.
This means that, a) general manager Glen Sather will not be sending an asset to Dallas for the right to try and convince the 31-year-old center to sign before he hits the market; and, b) the Blueshirts already are pondering a Plan B to bring a first-line pivot to Broadway.
We’re told by well-placed sources Richards has no intention of signing for a discount in order to reunite with coach John Tortorella, with whom he won the Cup with Tampa Bay in 2004. That’s fine. If five years at $6.5 million per — that’s the number — doesn’t represent enough green to get Richards into a Blueshirt, then that’s that.
The Rangers are well past trying to bribe an athlete to wear their uniform. If every nickel is that important to Richards, who has earned around $50 million in his career, then he can collect them all elsewhere.
Maybe Richards would take less to return to Tampa Bay, maybe living a life with less daily stress than everyone of us who lives in New York routinely encounters just isn’t for him. That doesn’t make him a bad person any more than Cliff Lee taking less to play for the Phillies rather for the Yankees makes the lefty pitcher a bad guy.
Signing Richards to a five-year, $32.5 million contract would have represented a risk/reward move anyway, given both the history of such free-agent signings here and the matter of the concussion the pivot sustained last winter.
It could have and would have been justified more so for the center’s relationship with the coach than his ability to fill critical holes both in the middle of the first line and at the point on the power play. But attempting to bribe Richards into taking Jim Dolan’s millions cannot be justified at all.
By laying out the ground rules so early in the game — unofficially, of course, for No. 91 still belongs to the Stars — and making it clear he covets the opportunity unrestricted free agency will bring, Richards actually has done the Rangers a favor here.
Sather won’t be Yankees GM Brian Cashman, who was caught by surprise and thus had no alternative when Lee ultimately spurned The Bronx. The Rangers have fair warning and time to establish their priorities and identify their targets, any of whom would have to be acquired by trade. There are no free agents other than Richards equal to the task of centering the first line.
The Rangers will look at Jason Spezza, 28 next week and who has three years at $7 million per remaining on his deal with Ottawa that includes a no-trade clause. Even if Spezza would agree to waive it to come to New York, even if the Senators would move him, chances are GM Bryan Murray would demand far too much in return.
Stephen Weiss is a person of interest, no doubt about that, with two years at a $3.1 million cap hit remaining on his deal with Florida that also features a no- move. Weiss, 28, has registered as many as 60 points only twice in nine seasons (61 the high), but players seem to underperform as a matter of course with the Panthers.
A year ago when the Blackhawks were trapped in Cap Jail, the Rangers were keenly interested in Patrick Sharp, who has the goods to play with elite talent and who has one year at a $3.9 million cap charge remaining on his contract.
If Chicago is looking to regenerate the organization through an infusion of youth, there could be a match here. The Rangers would have to be careful, though, not to yield too much if Sharp is coming as a one-year rental. If there’s interest in an extension, the parame ters of the deal would change.
Look, the Rangers have kind of been counting on getting Richards for a while now. It should have happened at the deadline, but Dallas GM Joe Nieuwendyk’s eyes were bigger than his stomach. Now it doesn’t appear as if it’s going to happen at all.
It represents a blow, no doubt. But the truth is, if No. 91 were going to need to be bribed to play Broadway, if it’s about the money rather than the opportunity, the Blueshirts are better off going in a different direction.
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Impending Group II free agent Brandon Dubinsky is seeking a multi-year deal at $4.5 million a year, we’re told. But not only isn’t he going to get it from Sather, his case became much, much weaker when Buffalo winger Drew Stafford — whose numbers form a direct comparable — re-upped a couple of days ago for four years at $4 million per.
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Finally, breaking with precedent in his final act as the league’s jurist, Colin Campbell cited Rule 21.1 (Intent to Injure) as the basis of suspending the Marlins’ Scott Cousins 15 games for his malicious upper-body blow that destroyed the Giants’ defenseless Buster Posey. “Wasn’t a hockey play,” the VP said on his way out the door.