CHANGES were made in the off-season so that the Rangers would go farther in the playoffs. Personality was declared out of vogue. Vanilla was established as the flavor of the month; the flavor of every month.
And so here are the Rangers 51 games into the regular season that’s been far more successful than we ever envisioned, that’s for sure. But it all somehow seems so empty, doesn’t it?
Because where are the expectations?
Where is the color?
Where is the edge to their game?
Where is the player who can be expected to step up his game in the tournament?
Where is the player with the capability of inspiring his teammates?
Where is the player an opponent is going to have to worry about stopping in a best-of-seven?
The ceiling seems low for this group of Rangers, earnest as they may be. There is no Jaromir Jagr to carry the team on his back. There is no Sean Avery to unnerve the opposition. There is no player in the room who seems capable of stimulating passion on the ice or inside either room.
There is no Ranger other than Henrik Lundqvist who appears equipped emotionally or otherwise to be the team’s best player.
There is little reason to believe the Rangers are capable of going even as far as they did the last two tournaments during which Avery was clearly one of the two or three most important players in each of the two series they won, and no less effective than eight or 10 of his teammates in the two series they lost.
This doesn’t seem at all like a Glen Sather team, now does it?
This is a GM who likes brash, who likes charisma, who likes reclamation projects, who likes pushing the risk/reward envelope as far as possible, and always has.
So what are he and New York doing with this class of players that seems more like a busload of tourists determined not to get separated from the group than they do citizens of the city the way Jagr was and Avery was and Messier, Leetch, Richter and Graves were?
And Brendan Shanahan is.
If the decision not to re-sign Shanahan was made because the Rangers didn’t believe he could help on the ice over a 40-to-45 game season, then OK, that’s one thing, debatable though it may be.
But if the decision not to bring back Shanahan was made in order to spare the room of a strong personality, well then, no, that’s something else entirely, and that’s unacceptable.
Should we tick down the list of strong personalities in the Devils’ room these days, or would it be more constructive to simply print the scores of the eight straight victories they’ve recorded since Jan. 13, the last five of which were achieved with Shanahan in the lineup and the universally popular Jay Pandolfo in street clothes?
Darn right that as bad as Wade Redden has been, Scott Gomez has been immeasurably worse when weighing team need against contribution.
And Chris Drury has been every bit as big a disappointment in his year two on Broadway.