The New York Rangers and Tony DeAngelo are at a crossroads
New York Rangers defenseman Tony DeAngelo is coming off a career year and is an arbitration eligible restricted free agent (RFA). The Rangers, like many teams in the NHL are in salary cap bind. The Rangers added cap space with the recent trade of Marc Staal and the buyout of Henrik Lundqvist. The Rangers now have just under $23.1 million in cap space with only 12 position players and one goalie under contract at the NHL level.
Hard decisions are in the New York Rangers immediate future. The biggest and hardest among them is what to do with Tony DeAngelo. They could retain him, but at what cost and term? They could trade him, but for what return? The thought of a trade adds in the questions of production and situational replacement. Unless DeAngelo is willing to take a short term, team friendly deal, no decision is simple.
Last season, the Rangers had all of the leverage in contract negotiations with DeAngelo. It was a take it or leave it offer, where ‘leave it’ would have meant losing a year of his career. With no arbitration rights and the team not budging, DeAngelo, after a short holdout, finally signed for $925,000 on a one year deal. This year however, with arbitration rights, and a top four finish in points by a defenseman, DeAngelo now has all the leverage.
The Rangers current salary cap situation is well known, and a defenseman as offensively gifted as DeAngelo could quickly break the bank. The negotiations will boil down to how much DeAngelo wants to remain a Ranger. There is only so much cap space to go around and the Rangers need to bring in seven other position players into the fold just to ice a full NHL team.
The Rangers also need to do all they can to avoid arbitration. In no way, shape or form should the team allow an outside influence to be the deciding factor of this situation. To review the best course of action, let’s look at the Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Tony DeAngelo, to make a detailed assessment.