Last Friday saw the franchise’s best goaltender immortalized, when his number 30 was raised to the Garden rafters. Whenever a number gets retired everyone asks the question who’s next? In 2018 when the Rangers retired Jean Ratelle’s number 19, they announced Vic Hadfield would join his linemates in the rafters. No announcement was made on Friday night but former Rangers radio voice Howie Rose, shared his thoughts on who should be next.
Wonderful ceremony for Henrik Lundqvist last night. I don’t know if I’m in the majority on this, but to me there has to be one more Ranger to receive the honor of his banner going to the rafters, and that is Brad Park.
— Howie Rose (@HowieRose) January 29, 2022
His tweet got many Rangers fans to chime in on who they thought should be next. A lot of great Rangers were thrown out there which made me think the Rangers should take their lead from the NFL and start a Ring of Honor along with retiring numbers. A Ring of Honor allows a team to pay respect to players, coaches and other off ice figures.
A Ring of Honor actually increases the importance of a retired number. You can’t retire everybody’s number as it loses meaning. It makes me think of an episode from Futurama where the “New New York Mets” had to go to fractions because all the whole numbers were retired.
I think a good example of what I think the Rangers should do is follow what the Giants and Jets do. This season the Giants retired both Eli Manning and Michael Strahan’s numbers and inducted Manning into the team’s Ring of Honor with Strahan already inducted in 2010. Having both is a great way to celebrate beloved players and coaches and also immortalize the truly great players of a franchise.
Potential Members
The Rangers are in their 96th season and have 11 retired numbers which ranks fourth most among the Original Six teams. With the 96 seasons there are a lot of players who deserved to be honored in some way.
The first player anyone talks about when it comes to getting his number retired is Brad Park. Park definitely deserves to have his number 2 hanging from the rafters with Brian Leetch, but it isn’t and unfortunately I don’t think that it ever will. Park was a homegrown Ranger, but would end up playing more games with Boston and ultimately considers himself a Bruin. At the 100 greatest players unveiling during the 2017 All Star game, Park wore a Bruins jersey. Park would certainly be in the Rangers Ring of Honor.
Emile Francis is an example of a front office member who could be in the Ring of Honor. For 10 seasons as coach of the Rangers, “The Cat” only missed the playoffs once. Francis also holds the Rangers record for wins and games coached. What about Lester Patrick, Frank Boucher, Ching Johnson, Dave Kerr and the Cook brothers? They all played before players even wore numbers.
Some other recent choices would be Mike Keenan, Ron Greschner, Glen Sather, Dave and Don Maloney, John Davidson, Jeff Beukeboom, and even Ron Duguay. Players from more recent teams I could see being honored Dan Girardi, Marc Staal, Mats Zuccarello. I think that you could throw Jaromir Jagr in there as well given all his single season offensive records and his importance to the Rangers return to the playoffs. And of course they have to honor the greatest goalie coach ever, Benoit Allaire.
I think the idea of having a Ring of Honor along with retiring players’ numbers is a great way to honor a team’s history. It also gives fans a chance to honor some of their favorite players even when they may not have been good enough to get their numbered retire. Adding a Ring of Honor also helps with the debate about who should get their numbered retire. Everybody has a different criteria for a player to get their number retired. The Ring of Honor shows acknowledgment of a player’s value to the franchise even if they weren’t good enough for their number to be retired.
If the Rangers were to introduce a Ring of Honor or team Hall of Fame what players or coaches would you like to see added?