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Sooner or later the Rangers are going to lose an important front office resource in Chris Drury, and that moment could be sooner than expected if the Penguins come calling.
The highly respected Blueshirts deputy general manager and AHL general manager Wolf Pack is seen as a shortlist of candidates in which Mario Lemieux and the team aim to replace Jim Rutherford, who abruptly resigned as general manager of Pittsburgh this week.
We understand that the Ranger hierarchy would not stand in the way of the Connecticut Yankee’s advancement when and if the Penguins seek permission to speak to the 44-year-old executive. Our best information is that at least on Saturday afternoon that request had not been made to Blueshirts president John Davidson.
Rutherford is believed to have resigned due to an internal dispute with ownership – and that essentially means Lemieux – over the direction of the club. No.66 and PPP partner Ron Burkle are optimistic about the prospect of gearing up for another Stanley Cup race with Sidney Crosby, 33, Evgeni Malkin, 34, and Kris Letang, 33, as the centerpieces of the effort.
Most outside the organization believe the club need to replenish a mostly empty closet of prospects rather than pushing all of its chips into the middle of the table in a paradoxical quest for a title. Indeed, the Penguins could be in a 2016-17 Rangers mode, if not 2017-18, although letter dictation probably isn’t what one would expect from Lemieux.
So among the questions: Will the Penguins only hire someone who says what the property wants to hear, and does Drury think the view of the property represents the best path for this franchise? There is the paramount question of what authority the CEO would have if Lemieux looked over his shoulder.
There is no doubt, however, that a mid-season start would disrupt the Rangers’ organization. Drury oversees the operation of the minor leagues while being a trusted confidante of general manager Jeff Gorton. He has a say in all decisions. He would miss the franchise. It is obvious, however, that it will only be a matter of time.
That moment could come quickly.
Libor Hajek works under the same bilateral NHL contract as Tarmo Reunanen, although the salary of the former in the NHL is set at $ 832,500 and the latter at $ 750,000. Everyone is expected to earn the required $ 70,000 for entry into the AHL.
But because Reunanen was assigned to the Wolf Pack on January 12, he hasn’t received a dime in training and skating with the club in preparation for the start of the AHL season next week, while Hajek received his full AHL fare because he was assigned to the taxi crew the same day.
Is it fair?
It’s even worse for these guys. PHPA and AHL are set to ratify a deal under which AHL players would be guaranteed 48% of their salary, with a minimum of $ 30,000 in the truncated schedule in which teams will play between 24 and 44 games . Players would get 40% if their team’s season was suspended. Entry-level two-way cars would earn $ 33,600 for the year… after most of them haven’t been paid for about nine months.
So let’s say in a few weeks the Rangers believe Hajek would be better served playing games for the wolf pack rather than skating and training as the guy on a taxi team. It would go from a salary scale of $ 70,000 to a rate of $ 33,600.
On the same contract!
Obviously, this applies throughout the league. Hajek, Reunanen and the Rangers are simply cited as an example.
Then you have what has become the common practice of moving players from the NHL roster to the taxi team in order to save space. When high draft picks with big bonus packages – such as Rangers’ Kaapo Kakko or 2019 Avalanche Bowen Byram, fourth overall – the savings are significant.
But the same goes for the actual wage losses suffered by the player (s). Kakko and Byram each earn $ 832,500 at the NHL level and $ 70,000 at the AHL. Taking into account the NHL escrow holdback, each player loses just under $ 5,137.93 per day on the taxi team. Of course, they are also 19 years old.
It is like that during the pandemic season. Maybe these guys, as well as the dozens around the NHL who will be on the yo-yo taxi team, should just be grateful that they don’t go into the AHL.
So I was listening to our podcast “Up in the Blue Seats” hosted by Ron Duguay and his colleague Mollie Walker in which Mike Bossy appeared as a guest. Of course, the Rangers passed Bossy twice in the 1977 entry draft, selecting Lucien DeBlois eighth overall and Duguay 13th before the Islanders placed 22nd for 15th.
It was the forerunner of one of Fred Shero’s great aftershocks as Rangers general manager / coach, in 1978-79, claiming he would rather have Duguay as he plays than Bossy as he plays.
Foggy, indeed.
The Canadians overtook the Quebecer in 10th place overall on the advice of scout Claude Ruel, who cited Bossy’s defensive shortcomings. The Habs instead caught Mark Napier, who had three very good seasons in Montreal scoring 40 goals twice and 35 once.
But, let’s say, the Canadiens had chosen Bossy. How exactly does he think it would have worked with his arrival in a team that had cut Guy Lafleur as a frontline right winger?
“One of the main reasons I didn’t want Montreal to draft me is because they were sending about 98 percent of their young guys and draft picks to AHL Nova Scotia,” Bossy told Slap Shots Friday. “Honestly, I don’t think I would have had a fair chance to make the squad unless they put me with veterans in a training camp where I could fill the net without giving them the choice.
Finally, and there, I thought the Rangers are just going to have to rig another lottery.
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