New York Rangers: One week to go and trade speculation builds

An interesting name

Elliotte Friedman reports on TSN that the Florida Panthers are willing to listen to offers for center Vincent Trochek and they are looking for defensive help.

That immediately set off a fever of speculation on social media that a Trochek for Brady Skjei deal would help both teams. On the surface, it makes sense.  Trocheck is only 26 and is two season removed from a 31 goal, 75 points season.   He is also a good face off man, with a lifetime winning percentage of 51.3%, an area the Blueshirts are sorely lacking.

Trochek is signed for two years after this one at an annual cap hit of $4.75 million.  The Rangers couldn’t take on that kind of salary unless it was an even cap hit swap and that’s where Brady Skjei and his $5.25 million annual hit comes in.  The only consideration is that if Gorton was to offload Skjei, it would probably be in a cap clearing trade and this one definitely is not.

The common thinking is that a Trochek arrival would mean that the Rangers could give up on trying to re-sign Ryan Strome.   Without Strome, the odds of their inking Tony DeAngelo to a new deal becomes much more possihle.

Back to Colorado

The Avalanche are in a solid playoff position, but are in a dogfight with St. Louis and Dallas for first place in the Central Division.  They got the news Monday that top goalie Philipp Grubauer is out indefinitely with a lower body injury.  His back up, rookie Pavel Francouz, has been very good this season, but the Avs could be in the hunt for more experience to fill in for Grubauer and back him up when he is healthy.   Can anyone say  Henrik Lundqvist?

Could a blockbuster deal with Colorado that would see them getting Chris Kreider and Henrik Lundqvist, be a possiblity?   The Avalanche have the cap space to take on a Lundqvist contract, especially if the Rangers retained some salary.

The big question is whether Lundqvist would agree to such a deal. Remember this.  Ray Bourque  played 21 seasons for the Boston Bruins before winning the Stanley Cup in his last NHL game as a member of the Avalanche.  Rob Blake played 14 years in Los Angeles before winning his Cup in Colorado.  Who was a teammate of Bourque and Blake on that 2001 Cup winning Avalanche team?  Current Avalanche general manager Joe Sakic.

If Lundqvist is not an option, does a Georgiev trade get back on the front burner?

TSN published their latest edition of the Trade Bait List   and  Chris Kreider still tops  the list. Pavel Buchnevich and Tony DeAngelo are still on the list, but are not as hot as they were last week.  How accurate is it?

Let’s just say that Andy Greene and Blake Coleman were not on the list last week.

You can be sure that Jeff Gorton is working the phones every day.  One sure sign that trades are in the offing is if the Rangers do not dress their players on Wednesday in Chicago, Friday in Carolina  or next Saturday versus San Jose.  They did that last season with Mats Zuccarello and Kevin Hayes and the season before with Rick Nash.   That means we may have see Chris Kreider’s last game as a Ranger at Madison Square Garden.  Stay tuned.