Since the draft’s conclusion, most Ranger fans have been desperately trying to gain insight into what the team’s strategy was heading into Tuesday’s free agency period.

Then comes this article, from the Post’s Larry Brooks, on just that topic.

Brooks claims that, ideally, the Rangers would love nothing more than to retain Jaromir Jagr and pair him with Toronto captain Mats Sundinas the team’s top offensive duo, with Chris Drury moving over to the wing on Scotty Gomez’s line. Brooks also mentions that the team would like to retain the services of Sean Avery and Michal Rozsival.

This line of thinking is pretty close to what I’d like to see this team do myself, actually. Signing Jagr and Sundin to one, or even two, year deals worth around $5 million each would be a much smarter idea than overpaying a guy like Marian Hossa for the next seven years. With Sundin and Jagr in the lineup, the Rangers would be able to stay competitive for the next season or two, while continuing to groom young players.

If the Rangers could manage to sign both Jagr and Sundin, even to two-year deals, then by the time their contracts expired, the Rangers would be a deep team full of quality young players and with enough cap room to sign a franchise player, like Ilya Kovalchuk, for example, who will be an unrestricted free agent after the 2009-10 season. The Rangers would still have veterans like Drury, Gomez, Henrik Lundqvist and Blair Betts to go with a score of young players, like Brandon Dubinsky, Nigel Dawes, Dan Girardi, Ryan Callahan, Marc Staal, Bobby Sanguinetti, Mike Sauer, Artem Anisimov, Alexei Cherepanov and others, who have already either had some NHL experience at that point or are would be ready to step in.

Even if Sundin goes elsewhere, I’d stick with essentially the same plan. Signing Hossa won’t make the Rangers a contender, and he isn’t a franchise player. Hossa is a great, great player, but he’s more of a compliment than a main piece. Thanks to the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Rangers won’t have the opportunity to highly overpay for a player like Ryan Malone, after the former Penguin signed with the Lightning yesterday, but the Rangers must be sure to avoid similar temptation from the likes of Hossa and many of the other top free agents available this summer.

I’d much rather see the team go after a cheaper player like Michael Ryder. Give Ryder three years at $3 million per season and maybe he goes back to scoring 30 goals again. It’s a better risk than paying Hossa $8 million.

If there is one free agent from the top crop this season that I wouldn’t mind seeing in Broadway Blue next season, it’s Wade Redden. I’ve never been a big fan of Rozsival, and if teams are going to offer him $5 million (or even more), I’d rather pay a little more for a guy like Redden. His last couple of seasons in Ottawa weren’t great, but I believe he’s still got it. He’s only 31. I’d give him a 5 year deal at $5.5 million per, though I don’t know if I would go past that.

Truth be told, what I’d really love is to see the Rangers send a second or third round pick and a player to Anaheim for former Ranger Mathieu Schneider. Due to salary cap constraints, the Ducks are likely to move Schneider, who can still put up points from the blueline despite his age. Yeah, he’s 39, but he only has a year left on his deal, and he wasn’t bad last season. He’s still a solid offensive defenseman, and he could hold the fort until Sanguinetti is ready for duty.

I must take umbrage with Brooks’ claim that the Rangers want to keep Avery, however. Granted, I’m not an “insider,” but from what has been made public, nothing that the Rangers have done so far shows me that they want to retain the Annoying One’s services. Personally, I think they should, as long as he earns no more than $3.25 million per season. That figure is overpayment as it is, but anything more would be too much.

Obviously, we’ll see what happens on Tuesday, but I’ll be hoping that the Rangers resist temptation and go for the smart, affordable personnel.

While the focus of my efforts here is to analyze and discuss the NHL through a Ranger-tinted lens, I’d be remiss if I neglected to touch upon some of the draft’s other big stories, though most didn’t have much of an impact on the Rangers.

There were 13 trades in the first round of the 2008 NHL Entry Draft, far and away a record. The most notable of these was between the Florida Panthers and Phoenix Coyotes.

1) The Jokinen Trade

Phoenix General Manager Don Maloney, formerly a player and assistant general manager with the Blueshirts, pulled off what most are calling a “steal” by acquiring center Olli Jokinen in exchange for defensemen Keith Ballard, Nick Boynton and the Coyotes’ 2nd round pick, which Florida used to select defenseman Colby Robak.

Jokinen’s name has been at the center of NHL trade rumors for at least two years, so it’s a relief to finally see this saga conclude. When the deal was announced, many were caught off-guard not only because the team that acquired him was Phoenix (the rumors always centered around teams like Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal and Minnesota trying to get their hands on Jokinen), but because the return for him is perceived as being very small.

Although Ballard and Boynton are pretty solid defensemen, they are not the star players most anticipated would go the other way in a Jokinen deal. In my eyes, however, this deal didn’t come as much of a shock at all. Sure, I may not have guessed that Jokinen would go to Phoenix, but the return for him is no shock by any means.

Olli Jokinen is a solid player, a good player, but he’s not a superstar. A lot of people believe he’s an elite player, but two 90-point seasons are not enough to convince me. I like Jokinen, I think he’s a good player, I think for his production (and reputation), his $5 million dollar cap hit is very affordable, but I also see Jokinen as being perhaps the most overrated player in the league.

No NHL player has as many regular season points without a playoff victory. In fact, it’s not even close. Jokinen isn’t a winner, he puts up points but he doesn’t do much to make his club a better team aside from that. He’s a –73 player for his career.

Good deal for Phoenix, as they now have a number of pieces offensively, including Jokinen, Shane Doan, Martin Hanzal, Kyle Turris and Peter Mueller, to build around. Just don’t be shocked that Jokinen brought back so little in return.

2) The 3-Way Deal

I like this trade for each team involved. The Kings’ offense can survive the loss of Mike Cammalleri, who had high salary demands in his sights, while the draft pick they got they used to select a solid young defenseman, Colton Teubert. Calgary, on the other hand, got themselves a talented offensive player in a contract year in Cammalleri, allowing them to unload Alex Tanguay’s salary to Montreal, while still coming out of the draft with a first round pick. As for Anaheim, they were able to trade down a couple of times and re-stock their organizational depth with some solid prospects. Drafting Nicolas Deschamps in the 2nd round was a great pick.

I like Cammalleri’s style of play, and even though the word is he’s a me-first type of guy, he’ll probably play lights-out next season with unrestricted free agency on the horizon.

3) Tanguay to Montreal

I like this deal for the Canadiens. Let’s face it, this team has a tough time signing free agents. Tanguay isn’t an elite player, but he’s a pretty good one and he’ll fit in with the type of players Montreal has. He’s a skilled playmaker and he’s fun to watch, too. They could have still gotten a pretty solid prospect with the 25th pick, but this team is deep in terms of prospects and wants to win now, so this deal makes sense.

4) Umberger dealt to Columbus

It’s so easy to hate the Flyers when they pull of trades like this.

Philly desperately needs the cap room to re-sign Jeff Carter, so they trade a solid 2nd liner in Umberger to Columbus and essentially get a mid-round 1st in a deep draft. That’s not half bad. They picked up Luca Sbisa with the picl, who should be a solid defenseman down the road.

This wasn’t a very good deal for the Blue Jackets, but I understand why General Manager Scott Howson agreed to it. Columbus isn’t exactly a prime destination for free agents, either, while Umberger went to school at Ohio State and has a good relationship with Blue Jackets coach Ken Hitchcock, previously of the Flyers.

Umberger is a nice player and does fill a hole for Columbus, but they could have gotten more for that pick, in my eyes.

5) Islanders and Devils Trade Down

The Islanders and Devils both had pretty good drafts. While I think the Islanders should have used the 5th overall pick to select Nikita Filatov, the player they really need, I understand why they traded down and picked Josh Bailey. They traded down twice and collected some extra picks that allowed them to get quite the haul in the 2nd and 3rd rounds.

While Bailey might have been a bit of a reach at #9, the Isles managed to pick up talented prospects like Corey Trivino and Aaron Ness in the 2nd round, and David Toews (brother of Chicago’s Jonathan), Jyri Niemi and Kirill Petrov in the third.

If the Fishsticks are right about Bailey, then they could be the big winners of this draft, as at least some of those other prospects should develop into really good players.

The Devils, meanwhile, traded down a couple of times and still got a great player in Mattias Tedenby with the 24th pick. I explained in my last post how I hoped that the Rangers would select the crafty Swede, so I guess it’s only fitting that he goes to New Jersey. Figures.

Well, another NHL Entry Draft has come and gone, and this year’s version was not without its twists and turns. I’d like to give my thoughts about some of the big deals from around the league that went down, but I guess I’ll do that later on.

First things first. Let’s talk about what the Broadway Blueshirts did, because Glen Sather, the team’s president, and his scouting and coaching staff made some intriguing decisions this year.

Of course it’s impossible to judge these selections today, but I’ll break down each of the Ranger picks and add my two cents about whether or not I liked the players the team went after, with some thoughts as to why or why not, as well.

1st round, 20th overall - Michael Del Zotto, D

The most notable selection for the team this year is defenseman Michael Del Zotto, from the Ontario Hockey League’s Oshawa Generals. Del Zotto was one of the highest ranked players for this draft a year ago, but his stock slid due to a lack of progress in his own end this season.

There are quite a few things to be excited about with this player. For one, he had more points in the OHL last season, 63, than either Drew Doughty, Zach Bogosian, or Alex Pietrangelo, the three defensemen who were selected 2nd, 3rd and 4th, respectively, in the draft. In fact, only two defensemen in the entire OHL had more points than Del Zotto in 2007-08, one of them being the Blueshirts’ 2006 first round pick, Bobby Sanguinetti.

Indeed, the 6-foot, 211 pound Del Zotto figures to be a top-notch offensive defenseman, with the ability to move the puck up the ice, make the right pass and quarterback a power play. He’s also not one to shy away from physical play, as Del Zotto has a penchant for making the big hit.

While these are all valuable qualities, however, Del Zotto comes with some issues as well. For one, his play in his own end is supposedly porous. Some teams seemed to be scared off by some maturity issues, which probably feeds into the concern about his defensive play. He started his career playing forward, so it makes sense tha he would enjoy surprising his opposition by joining the rush. The problem is, he often does so at the expense of proper defensive positioning, something that also seems to happen when he looks for the big hit.

Also, while there’s no doubt that his offensive skillset is impressive, his numbers may be over-inflated, as he played on a stacked Generals team that featured two of the best offensive players in the OHL, John Tavares and Brett McLean.

The most important question, however, is whether or not this was the right pick for the Rangers to make. My gut says the team didn’t expect Del Zotto to be available by the time their 20th pick rolled around, which is why they went for him. While I believe Del Zotto is a good player, and any problems with his defensive play can be straightened out, especially with the likes of Tom Renney working with him, I’m not convinced this was the pick the Rangers needed to make.

I’m not terribly disappointed the Rangers selected Del Zotto, but I think the right choice for them was Mattias Tedenby, selected four picks later by the Devils. I think the Rangers need to add some forward scoring talent to their wings, and it looks like Tedenby has the skills to develop into a very solid, skilled 2nd line scorer. Yes, you can never have too many defensemen, but Del Zotto is very similar to what you’re already getting in Sanguinetti.

Like I said, not a horrible pick by any means, and I fully expect Del Zotto to become a solid player, as well as a nice piece of what’s shaping up to be a very solid blue line with Sanguinetti, Staal, Sauer and Girardi, but I think Tedenby would have filled a bigger need.

2nd round, 51st overall - Derek Stepan, C

Admittedly, I know very little about Stepan, a graduate of the famed hockey prep school Shattuck-St. Mary’s, also known as the Alma matter of the Pens’ Sidney Crosby. Stepan put up big scoring numbers there last season, but will be heading to the University of Wisconsin, a school that pumps out NHLers every year, in the fall.

At 6 feet tall and weighing 168 pounds, Stepan is rather smallish, but that was a growing trend at this year’s draft as teams acclimate to the rules of the “new” NHL. Everything about him seems positive, and you’ve gotta love that he’s heading to a fine program like Wisconsin, but I just wonder if the Rangers couldn’t have gotten him later in the draft.

3rd round, 75th overall - Evgeny Grachev, C

This is the pick the Rangers got from the Carolina Hurricanes in the Matt Cullen trade, and this is a pick that’s hard not to like. I believe that the Rangers had their sights set on another Russian, Kirill Petrov, but when the Islanders snagged Petrov two picks earlier, the Rangers were more than content to select his countryman.

Grachev, a former teammate of fellow Russian and Ranger prospect Artem Anisimov, is a big power forward-type, who many had ranked as a first or second rounder. Of course, concerns about Russian players and the ability to get them over to the NHL continue to haunt most NHL teams, but I doubt it’s much of a concern to the wealthy Rangers.

Standing 6-foot-3 and weighing just over 200 pounds, Grachev is a very strong puckhandler who needs to work on his skating ability. Supposedly, the young Russian is capable of playing all three forward positions, a plus for a Ranger team that is heavy down the middle with Chris Drury, Scott Gomez, Brandon Dubinsky, Artem Anisimov and others. The biggest plus, however, is that unlike Petrov, who many believe would be content to stay in Russia, Grachev is interested in playing not only in the NHL, but perhaps even in one of the Canadian junior hockey leagues.

This is my favorite pick in this year’s draft because while Grachev may not be the best player the team got in this draft, he seems to be the best relative to where he was selected. Of course, you never know, Grachev may end up a bust while one of the later selections could become a star. It’s kind of funny that way.

3rd round, 90th overall – Tomas Kundratek, D

The Rangers traded prospect Alex Bourret to the Phoenix Coyotes for this pick, and it’s probably the decision I’m most down on as far as this team’s moves during the draft. If you recall, the Rangers acquired Bourret, a former first round pick in 2005, from Atlanta at the 2007 trade deadline as part of the Pascal Dupuis trade.

Anyone who follows the Ranger organization knows that while Bourret does indeed have tremendous skill and talent, he also has a lack of focus and what has been described as a bad attitude. Although it appears that all that is true, I am still somewhat disappointed that the Rangers traded him, not to mention that all they got was a late third round pick. I would have liked to see them give Bourret another season to try and clean up his act, but I suppose if he didn’t by then, it’s unlikely another team would give up anything remotely valuable for him.

As for the player the Rangers got with the pick, well, there isn’t much to tell. In a weak year for Czech prospects, Kundratek was the top ranked player among his countrymen. He weighs 185 pounds and stands 6-foot-1, with skills at both ends of the ice, but that’s about all there is to read about him.

4th round, 111th overall – Dale Weise, RW

The Rangers reacquired their own fourth rounder, which had ended up in the hands of the Nashville Predators, in exchange for their 7th round pick and next year’s 4th. They used the pick to select Weise, a 6-foot-2, 205 pound wing from the Western Hockey League’s Swift Current Broncos. The almost-20-year-old was passed over in the previous two drafts, but the Rangers decided to pick him after the bruiser added an offensive touch to his game this past season.

I don’t really know what to make of this pick except to say that obviously the team would hope that Weise’s inflated offensive stats are not a fluke, as there seems to be enough physical young forwards, like Dane Byers and Justin Soryal, in the system already. Lest we forget, the team still has Ryan Hollweg and Colton Orr, too, and both are fairly young to boot.

5th round, 141st overall – Chris Doyle, C

The 6-foot, 193 pound Doyle was a point per game (63 points in 63 games) offensive threat last season in the high-scoring Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, playing for the Prince Edward Island Rocket. The knock against him, however, is his consistency.

Seems like a high-risk, high-reward pick, which works for me this low in the draft.

6th round, 171st overall – Mitch Gaulton, D

Similar to the last pick, it’s clear the Rangers are trying to hit a home run here. Gaulton was a highly touted defenseman who played just 20 games for the OHL’s Erie Otters last year due to a serious elbow injury. The Otters drafted him just behind Pietrangelo and just ahead of Bogosian in the 2006 OHL Draft, so clearly there were some good expectations about this kid before he went down.

Gaulton is a 6-foot, 210 pound strong, physical two-way defenseman, according to some scouts, who also has a good shot from the point. He probably won’t be a star, but if he gets healthy, perhaps the Rangers might have gotten a steal here.
Definitely worth the risk this late in the draft, in my opinion.

At first glance, this was a decent, if unspectacular draft for the Rangers, but as I’ve said before, at this point, that statement means nothing. Who knows? Perhaps Del Zotto will pick up his defensive game and become every bit the player that Doughty or Bogosian are expected to become. I’ll admit, the potential of a Sanguinetti and Del Zotto pairing on the power play in the future does sound pretty good.

The Grachev pick and the Gaulton pick are the two that seem like the best value picks right now, while the Kundratek pick and the Weise selection are the two I question the most right now.

I mentioned that I wanted to touch on some of the other stuff that happened in the draft that didn’t concern the Rangers, primarily the trades that were made, as I feel that some of these deals were really interesting ones to examine. I’ll get to that in my next post.

Adios.

While most of the rumors thrown around the NHL tend to lack any credence, one that I have been intrigued by is the one that involves Sean Avery taking a trip down the Long Island Expressway and over to Nassau Coliseum if the Rangers don’t cough up the kind of cash he’s looking for. If indeed Avery ended up signing with the Fishsticks this summer, I wouldn’t be very surprised.

Avery craves attention and he also craves a certain kind of lifestyle, the kind of lifestyle he wouldn’t be able to get playing for some small market, Midwestern team with cash to throw around. The Islanders should have a decent amount of dough to offer this summer, and while they’re not likely to be much of a contender next season (though, to their credit, they have proven to be quite the group of overachievers recently), playing on the Island would allow Avery to stay close to Manhattan, plus, on a team bereft of personality, save for Rick DiPietro and Ted Nolan, the media would eat Avery up. That would be good for him, but probably even more of a boon for the Islanders, who would love any attention, even the kind Avery would bring.

Besides, you can be sure that the Isles are already gearing up to toss way too much money at yet another talented underachiever, like Kristian Huselius, not to mention the talk of a return by Mr. Overpaid himself, Alexei Yashin. Why not toss $4 million big ones at Avery while sticking it to the Rangers at the same time?

I’m not saying it’s definitely going to happen, but if it does, it wouldn’t come as a shock.

Word around town is the Rangers have imported a new employee from the land that gave us Henrik Lundqivst. 25-year-old Andreas Jämtin is the newest member of the Ranger organization, but it’s the reputation that follows the Swede that may be most interesting to Ranger fans.

A former 2001 5th round draft pick of the newly-minted Stanley Cup champs, the Detroit Red Wings, Jämtin has been described both here and abroad as an agitator and a pest, one in the vain of the Pens’ Jarkko Ruutu or Sean Avery. Of course, the first thought that came into my head, and I’m sure yours, revolves around why the Blueshirts felt the need to sign a kid in the Sean Avery mold if they already have Sean Avery himself. The original, as TNT likes to proclaim regarding “Law & Order,” is the best. So, does a signing like this foreshadow the departure of the Annoying One from the World’s Most Famous Arena?

Well, we won’t know the answer to that question for at least a few more weeks once the NHL’s free agency gets underway on July 1st, but it’s important not to read too much into something like this. For one, at 25, Jämtin is past the age when most players who are going to get to the NHL do. Also, while he was drafted by the Red Wings, the best team in hockey and an organization that has an impressive mastery over evaluating Swedish hockey, they’re also the same team that decided to end their relationship by not offering him a contract. Most importantly however, unlike Fabian Brunnstrom, who emerged out of nowhere earlier this season as a “can’t-miss prospect” that had slipped through the cracks and was later signed by the Dallas Stars with the guarantee of significant NHL playing time next season, Jämtin will have to have a heck of a training camp and preseason to get a spot on a Ranger team that already has a glut of future 3rd and 4th liners toiling within the prospect ranks.

The Avery dilemma aside, there are some interesting things to think about where Jämtin is concerned. Jamtin, at 6′0” and 200 lbs., isn’t the biggest player on the ice, but, like Avery, he doesn’t show any signs of fear. Jämtin spent much of the past five seasons with HV71 Jonkoping of the Swedish Elite League, but his offensive output was minimal prior to the last couple of seasons. In 2006-07, Jämtin notched new SEL career-highs of 14 goals, 11 assists and 25 points in 49 games, but he topped those numbers last season, with 17 goals, 13 assists and 30 points in 51 games. HV71 finished first in the league and won the championship last season, as well as in 2004, with Jämtin a part of both squads.

Jämtin also played for TPS Turku of the Finnish League for most of the 2005-06 season, where he scored 8 goals and added 7 assists in 37 games.

It’s unlikely that Jämtin will make the Rangers out of training camp, but with a two-way contract, he’ll be able to show his stuff in Hartford, but his value to the organization will certainly increase should Avery walk away this summer.