Thoughts following the 2015-2016 season

www.post-gazette.com

The interesting thing about having a set day to write is that sometimes you are forced to sit on the sidelines while other writers are able to react to certain situations, immediately. In this case, the Rangers were eliminated by the Penguins on Saturday, and I wasn’t scheduled to publish until the following Friday. Lots of digestion time. Since then, there has been breakup day, a myriad of reactions from all over the interwebs and some fine analysis done by the talented staff here. As you can probably surmise, I have thoughts…

1. Not that the result was surprising, but it was still disappointing. The Rangers were never going to make a serious run considering all the issues the team had. Still, the fan in me was hoping to see something amazing that the analyst in me knew was never going to happen.

2. The major offseason talk so far has centered, and rightfully so, on jettisoning the contracts of both Dan Girardi and Marc Staal (and Rick Nash, for some reason). Let’s assume for a minute that, by some miracle, the Rangers were able to trade both of those contracts without retaining any salary. High fives all around, right? Now under this scenario, I still assume that Keith Yandle is going to walk away, and Dan Boyle is still retiring. That means four (!) of your top six defenders turning over in one offseason. This would immediately bump both Brady Skjei and Dylan McIlrath into the top-4. From all available information, Ryan Graves isn’t ready. Mat Bodie does not appear to have the chops for a full-time NHL job. Unless you are looking to sign the Luke Schenn’s of the world, there aren’t many good options on the market.

Don’t get me wrong, I would be fully willing to cobble together a blue line for next season to be rid of those long-term commitments, but I think the addition by subtraction argument has gotten a little out of hand. You still need NHL quality defenseman (we can argue about whether Girardi and Staal are still that) to get through a season, much less contend.

3. I am currently working on a piece of statistical analysis involving Henrik Lundqvist, his value, contract and place amongst the NHL’s elite. I hope to have this out in the next couple weeks, because, quite frankly, the amount of people out there blaming him for this loss, denouncing his importance to the organization and basically claiming he is overrated, is out of control.

If that is how you feel, I probably can’t change that. I can tell you, though, that you are objectively wrong. I am also tempted to tell you that you are stupid, but I would need more information to fully verify that. Stay tuned.

4. On Dan Boyle vs. The Post: My initial reaction is, who cares? The Post beat up on Boyle for his whole contract for not being Dan Boyle, circa 2006.   Fine, whatever. He got sick of it and used his last media session to call them out. Good for you, Dan. Was it professional? Probably not, but certainly not the end of the world, either.

The take away I had from the whole fallout of that situation was slightly horrifying. I’ve written about hockey as an enjoyable hobby for almost five years. The rise of independent websites and blogs have revolutionized coverage of sports and given fans of choice of whose voices they trust to bring them reliable information. This has made beat writers very nervous.

You can poke around on Twitter and find PhD statisticians breaking down the game at a level none of us ever expected to be able. You will find extremely intelligent people from all walks of life spending their personal time dedicating their minds to analyzing the sports we love to debate and discuss. I’ve played and coached this game for over twenty years. I have a doctorate. Just because I don’t have media access to the locker room doesn’t mean I cannot understand the game in a far more meaningful way than a guy who jumped on the hockey beat after covering the NBA for ten years.   The beats know that their status as the all-revered sources of knowledge is shrinking beneath their feet. Their ability to act like entitled babies to ensure their job security is on shakier ground than ever. Now, I understand that this is their livelihood, and they will fight to protect it. However, they are going to have to be a hell of a lot better at their jobs if they want to survive.

5. For all the flak that the blue line gets, the forward corps has some very interesting pieces, but not a lot of cohesion. Depending on what happens to Victor Stalberg and Dominic Moore, the Rangers have two very nice fourth line pieces in Jesper Fast and Oscar Lindberg. They have four proven top-six players in Brassard, Zuccarello, Nash and Stepan. They have the young guys who have flashed tremendous potential, but haven’t put it all together yet in Kreider, Miller and Hayes. Add in Pavel Buchnevich and you have a forward group that skews younger in a hurry.

The question ultimately remains whether or not this group is a contender up front. Depends on if Pavel Buchnevich is more Vlad Tarasenko or Nik Zherdev in his first North American season and whether the aforementioned trio takes a proper next step. I think the focus should rightfully concentrate on the blueline this offseason, but the future composition of the forward group shouldn’t be ignored as if there are no current issues.

Alright, I feel like I’ve gotten everything out about the end of the season that has been fermenting for the past week or so. I’d love to hear your thoughts on my thoughts in the comments, and now comes the off-season proper. We will have plenty of coverage going forward about what should be a fascinating summer. Keep it locked right here.