New York Rangers: Situations where Trading Rick Nash makes sense

Rick Nash is in the last year of an eight-year contract with the New York Rangers. Although the winger is a solid contributor, there are situations where a trade could be beneficial to the team.

The New York Rangers traded for Rick Nash by sending Brandon Dubinsky, Artem Anisimov, Tim Erixon, to the Columbus Blue Jackets in 2012.

The trade was a classic Glenn Sather move, acquire a premier name at the expense of young talent. Nash’s five-year tenure with the Rangers has been up and down. Although the veteran forward is a positive contributor in all three zones, his contract and inconsistency have skewed the perception of him.

The Rangers are in a weird crossroads type season where the team is overly dependent on young talent, but still dependent on goalie Henrik Lundqvist. That’s what makes every roster decision so difficult. It’s a balancing act between developing younger inexpensive talent versus competing with established more pricey veteran talent.

That’s where the value and role of Nash are in an ambiguous state of flux. Nash has only played more than 60 games in a season for the Rangers twice in his time with the team. The elite goal scorer who holds all of the Blue Jackets franchise records has eroded and had to change his game to survive.

Nash’s contract will be the ultimate hindrance in any possible trade scenario. Nash carries a $7.8 million dollar cap hit and has a limited no-movement clause where he submits a list of 12 teams he’d be willing to be traded to. That combination means that the Rangers would likely need to eat some of Nash’s cap hit to move the winger.

Nash’s Value

Nailing down exactly what Nash is worth at this point in his career is a bit tricky. According to NHLReference’s player similarity scores, the active players he best compares to are Jason Spezza, Eric Staal and Henrik Zetterberg. Nash, at his peak was never statistically good as these contemporaries. Nash also didn’t have the luxury of the talent around him that the other three had.

The Detroit Red Wings traded winger Thomas Vanek to the Florida Panthers last year, Vanek’s numbers compare pretty well to Nash’s.  Vanek’s cap hit with the Vancouver Canucks this year is only two million. Vanek was traded for a third round pick and Dylan McIlrath.

The Rangers would not eat half of Nash’s contract for a third round pick and a fringe NHL defenseman. That would simply be bad business

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The less than ideal situation

There is only one situation where I could see the Rangers trading Rick Nash and the team not getting ripped off.

After game one of the season and Philip Chytil only played seven minutes, it seems that coach Alain Vigneault wants to stick to his usual routine. Veterans play over younger guys, they’re more dependable. This likely means that Chytil will go back to Europe to get meaningful playing time to develop.

This would leave the Rangers with just Kevin Hayes, Mika Zibanejad and David Desharnais as centers on the depth chart. The team would be forced to trade for another center if one got injured. There is no scenario where moving J.T Miller to center doesn’t cripple the team’s forward depth.

In this situation the Rangers would move Nash for an established NHL center for around 50 to 75 cents on the dollar. Meaning that although the center wouldn’t be able to match Nash’s output, they’d still be a serviceable pivot to keep the team afloat.

The Rangers punt

If disaster were to strike and the team were out of the playoff hunt by the trade deadline, redeeming some value from Nash’s expiring contract could make sense. This trade would be for pennies on the dollar.

Teams acquiring veterans as deadline rentals don’t typically hand out first round picks like the Rangers. But, if a perennial contender like Minnesota, Dallas or St. Louis wanted to bolster their forward group Nash would not be a bad idea.

The Rangers would likely have to bite the bullet on some of the cap hit and likely take on a player to make the cap hits work mathematically.  This would be something along the lines of the aforementioned Vanek trade.

Next: Why Henrik Lundqvist is under appreciated

Letting value leave your team for nothing isn’t ideal, but in some situations, like Nash’s it’s probably the only positive net outcome for a team.