New York Rangers: In defense of Jeff Gorton’s moves

The case

Much of the criticism of Gorton stems from a lack of a cohesive plan. Several have argued that the G.M. is making these moves because he feels obligated to, instead of genuinely believing in their merit.

In addition to the lack of faith in the intent of the moves, there is also a skepticism to who will be making the decisions. David Bruce of Bluelinestation was hesitant in Gorton and director of player personnel Gordie Clark who will be in charge of making the roster choices for the future.

There is always a reason to be skeptical of those in charge of anything, there’s a reason that the average NHL G.M. only has a shelf life of 4.5 years. If these executives are allowed to constantly kick the can down the road, they never have to be held accountable and never produce results.

In Gorton’s case, his track record is extremely vanilla. A single home run trade in acquiring Mika Zibanejad for Derick Brassard back in 2015 and then just a lot of okay and meh trades.

Must read: Grading all of Jeff Gorton’s trades

The main criticism of these trades was a lack of proven assets in return. The Rangers were giving up quality veterans for several mid-level assets. Think of the team trading Ryan McDonagh and J.T. Miller for Libor Hajek, Brett Howden and two draft picks as giving up two dollar bills for six quarters because there are more of them.

In the world of trades, it’s more about quality over quantity. Getting a single blue chip prospect is favorable over a handful of mid-level pieces.

The defense

Granted, all of these criticisms are totally legitimate and with solid ground. Gorton has struggled to get maximum value at either of the past two deadlines for his assets and the team’s draft history, especially in recent history is spotty at best. Yet, I’m not particularly worried about the direction of the team.

However, to all of the skeptics, I would point out the recent moves and draft picks of the past two years as a sign that things are heading in the right direction. Yes, swapping Ryan Spooner for Ryan Strome is not the sexiest move in the world, but it shows a willingness to extract value from a player that was miscast with both the New York Islanders and Edmonton Oilers.

Similar to what the New York Knicks have done the past several years, it appears as if the Rangers are revisiting other team’s failures that showed success at various points but needed further fine tuning.

The strongest defense of Gordon and Clark has to be the draft selections of the last two years. Sure, the jury is still out on Lias Andersson, but at 20 years old, the Swede has time. Thus far, Filip Chytil seems to be right on schedule in his development. Throw in the picks of Vitali Kravstov, K’Andre Miller, Nils Lundkvist and Joey Keane and there is some reason for hope.

In addition to the recent draft selections, the hiring of David Quinn was a great decision. It’s early in the former Boston University coach’s tenure at the NHL level, but his hands on no-nonsense approach is clearly hitting the right notes with the players he currently has. The Rangers are not very talented, but Quinn has them playing their collective tails off.

Closing argument

The detractors will argue that Gorton hasn’t gotten full value for his assets and that he’s waited too long to make certain moves but to say he does not have a plan would be a disingenuous argument.

Today on a conference call Gorton made the point that the team acquired a bundle of assets and could stand to use them in a variety of ways.

So the long term plan for Gorton is two-fold. First, he wants to dramatically overhaul the existing talent pool within the organization through the draft with as many picks as possible. The Rangers having 20 draft picks over the course of two years is exactly the type of maneuver that a rebuilding team must commit to.

Then, there is the obvious need for high-end talent. This can come in the form of trading some of the aforementioned assets or courting a player during free agency. The sell to a potential free agent may be a tad difficult because a “hey, we’re rebuilding, but we’ll be good again soon,” is a tough sell to most players.

Much of the Rangers’ success this decade came from this strategy of drafting a core and then using extra pieces to acquire outside help. The front office drafted Ryan Callahan, Brandon Dubinsky, Carl Hagelin, Derek Stepan, Artem Anisimov, Michael Del Zotto, Chris Kreider, Jesper Fast, J.T. Miller, Brady Skjei and Pavel Buchnevich.

It was through this multi-year stretch of quality draft selections that the old regime under Glen Sather built a perennial contender. Now, Gorton is looking to replicate a similar formula, he just needs time for his vision to come together.

In the impatient New York market, rebuilding was a taboo. Gorton and company are looking to make it as practical as a bodega on the corner. It’s up to them to stock that bodega with dependable goods that people want.