Getting it done just before the lockout becomes official, the Islanders have signed restricted free agent winger Matt Martin to a four-year, $4 million deal, according to Katie Strang of ESPNNewYork.com.
Martin, 23, had seven goals and seven assists for the Islanders last season while playing in 80 games. More notably, he set a single-season NHL record for posting 374 hits in a season. Martin previously had a cap hit of $852,500 over the past three seasons.
The lockout will become official tonight at midnight and it doesn’t appear that the Rangers will reach an agreement with their restricted free agent Michael Del Zotto before then, according to Bob McKenzie of TSN.
Del Zotto, 22, just finished up his entry level deal that had a cap hit of $1.0875 million over the last three seasons. He’s still a restricted free agent so he’s not necessarily going anywhere. There was also no real urgency to get a deal done considering the fact that players can’t sign offer sheets during the lockout.
The only real difference would have been in regards to a signing bonus as the NHL is trying to do away with those. Not that it matters much as the Rangers and Del Zotto will simply go back to negotiating once all this ugliness is finished with.
Del Zotto had a big season last year as he scored 10 goals with 31 assists and a plus-20 rating in 77 games. It was a nice bounce back year for him after he was demoted to the AHL the previous year.
Just a day before the deadline for the lockout, the Phoenix Coyotes and their captain Shane Doan have come to an agreement that will keep him in the desert on a four-year, $21.2 million, according to John Gambadoro of Sports 620 KTAR.
The Rangers were rumored to be willing to go to four years and $24 million so with his $2 million signing bonus this is just slightly less than that. It’s not a surprise though as Doan has made it pretty obvious that his intention was to stay in Phoenix provided they found a way to make him a competitive offer.
Doan’s deal also includes a no-movement clause. So it doesn’t seem like there is a chance that we will ever see him on Broadway.
The Rangers were interested in defenseman Carlo Colaiacovo, but it appears he is instead headed to Detroit where he signed a two-year and $5 million deal to play for the Red Wings, according to the Detroit Free Press.
It makes sense that Colaiacovo signed with the Wings over the Rangers. For one thing, the Rangers are still in negotiations with restricted free agent Michael Del Zotto and that complicates things. Then there is the fact that the Wings will be without Nicklas Lidstrom or Brad Stuart next season which likely means that Colaiacovo will get plenty of opportunities to play. With the Rangers there was no guarantee that he would even be a top four defenseman.
Colaiacovo, 29, has not played in more than 67 games in any of the past three seasons. Last year he scored just two goals with 17 assists from the blueline.
Posted in 2012 New York Rangers Off-Season, New York Rangers
Tagged Carlo Colaiacovo
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Defenseman Lubomir Visnovsky is officially an Islander again after a NHL arbitrator ruled that the Ducks didn’t need his approval to trade him to Long Island, the Islanders announced.
Visnovsky was initially traded from the Ducks to the Islanders back on June 22nd, but he filed a grievance to have the trade voided shortly after that because he claimed that it violated his no trade clause. The reason why this trade was ultimately upheld was because Visnovsky had been traded before this, from the Oilers to the Ducks, and no trade clauses apparently don’t transfer from one team to the other. Waive it once and waive it goodbye.
He had previously stated that he would play for the Islanders next season if the trade was upheld. That is if there is a next season.
Visnovsky, 36, has just one more year on his deal that comes with a cap hit of $5.6 million. He is only actually owed $3 million though as his contract was heavily front loaded. He scored six goals with 21 assists and a plus-7 rating in 68 games with the Ducks last season. Two years ago he had a 18-goal and 50-assists year in 81 games also with the Ducks.
Posted in 2012 New York Islanders Off-Season, New York Islanders
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The Rangers have agreed to re-sign unrestricted free agent defenseman Steve Eminger to a one-year and $750K deal, according to Larry Brooks of the NY Post.
Eminger, who will be 29 next month, played for the Rangers over the past two seasons. Last year he appeared in 42 games and scored two goals with three assists and a zero-rating while making $800K. So this is a bit of a pay cut for him.
Eminger is mostly a depth move for the Rangers as they are still trying to come to terms with restricted free agent Michael Del Zotto and are unsure of the return of Michael Sauer (concussion). They also lost Jeff Woywitka to free agency (St. Louis). He’ll compete with Stu Bickel for playing time.
Posted in 2012 New York Rangers Off-Season, New York Rangers, Uncategorized
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J.T. Miller, arguably the top prospect in the Rangers system, has long expressed a desire to turn pro for the 2012-13 season and make the Blueshirts. With the season now up in the air because of the labor dispute, though, Miller is back with his junior team, the Ontario Hockey League’s Plymouth Whalers.
Training camp and the preseason are both underway for the Whalers, and Miller has stood out in the early going. The 2011 first round pick scored the winning shootout goal for his side in a camp scrimmage, and followed it up with an assist during a 2-0 win against the Windsor Spitfires. The center has already impressed this summer with strong play at the U.S. World Junior evaluation camp.
One of the most intriguing Ranger-related performances last season came from another center, Michael St. Croix of the Western Hockey League’s Edmonton Oil Kings. A fourth round pick in 2011, St. Croix notched 105 points in 72 games (19 points in 20 playoff games). Like Miller, St. Croix is also back with his junior team and off a to a similarly strong start.
In a 5-3 victory over the Red Deer Rebels, St. Croix scored a goal and added an assist. He also scored a goal and recorded three assists in two scrimmages at Oil Kings camp.
Unfortunately, Ranger fans lost the opportunity to see some of the organization’s future with the cancellation of the Traverse City prospect tournament, so juniors and the American Hockey League will have to do. Prospects like Andrew Yogan, Christian Thomas, and Dylan McIlrath are done with juniors and slated to join the Connecticut Whale this season.
As the NHL labor saga drags on, so too does the Shane Doan free agency epic. When we last heard about Doan, word on the street was that the Rangers were willing to match the offer submitted by the Buffalo Sabres: $30 million over four years.
A recent report from Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun, however, places the Blueshirts as one of four teams (including the Philadelphia Flyers, the Pittsburgh Penguins, and the Vancouver Canucks) prepared to hand over $24 million over a four year term. Doan is the most notable of this summer’s free agent crop currently left unsigned.
With the uncertainty over the collective bargaining agreement, and the reports of the NHL’s interest in significantly lowering the salary cap, how exactly the Rangers plan on being able to fit Doan’s cap hit into their budget remains a mystery. The Rangers are already at $58.5 million in cap hits, and that is with restricted free agent Michael Del Zotto still unsigned.
Not gonna budge, eh? That’s certainly the sentiment hockey fans are feeling right now.
Gary Bettman and Donald Fehr met once again on Friday to discuss a collective bargaining agreement that would prevent a lockout. That lockout now seems more likely than ever, since the two sides haven’t scheduled another meeting after failing to make any headway over significant economic issues keeping the two sides apart.
In fact, the two sides can’t even agree on which side made the decision to halt meetings. From ESPN New York’s Katie Strang:
NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr said the owners elected to recess, while NHL commissioner Gary Bettman disputed that claim.
“That’s an unfair and inaccurate characterization,” Bettman said.
The NHLPA spent the most recent meeting responding to the league’s latest proposal, Fehr and the players holding strong in their refusal to give up any more of their collective financial pie, whether through salary rollbacks or escrow. Bettman said agents have clued him into the idea that the players believe October 11 is the real deadline, something that seems to befuddle the commish. He believes that things will only get tougher to settle the longer this lasts.
TSN’s Darren Dreger, on the other hand, says that things won’t really get serious until September 10, five days before the current CBA is set to expire.
As ominous as things may seem, the real negotiating won’t start for either the NHL or PA until or around Sept 10.
— Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) August 31, 2012
We’ve already lost the Traverse City Prospect Tournament. We’re dangerously close to training camp not starting on time. As it stands, the situation is grim.
Dennis Veteri, the man who attacked Rangers fan (and New Jersey police officer) Neal Auricchio and a friend outside of famed eatery Geno’s Steaks following the Winter Classic in Philadelphia, has pled guilty to aggravated and simple assault, as well as conspiracy. The Glassboro, NJ native is currently a free man, out on $250,000 bail.
Veteri, a Philadelphia Flyers fan, escalated an altercation with Auricchio and his friend, Michael Janacko, who were both wearing Rangers sweaters, that was recorded on video by a cellphone. Auricchio was knocked out and concussed, left with a shattered left orbital bone.
Veteri later turned himself in to police, and was ordered to stand trial in March. No one else has been arrested in connection with the incident, although the video shows several others involved in the altercation.
