Rangers Pay Up
No, unfortunately the Rangers aren’t paying for any new players. According to Larry Brooks at the NY Post, the Rangers are shelling out dough to former players.
An arbitrator on Thursday ordered the team to pay the signing bonuses of Bobby Holik and Jed Ortmeyer that were withheld during the 2004-2005 lockout year.
Holik gets the bulk of the settlement. He will be getting a check for $3.52 million. Ortmeyer will get significantly less, only $150,000 coming his way.
Regardless of the lockout, it’s a bit ridiculous to not pay a players signing bonus. It makes the Rangers front office look stingy and disrespectful toward its talent.
Paying a player what he is guaranteed in a contract should never have to go to court. But, for the Rangers and Holik/Ortmeyer it did.
The Rangers will have to pay up.
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Tags: Eric Rothman
9 Responses
Inferno June 3rd at 5:06 pm
i could be totally wrong here, but i believe this had more to do with Eric Lindros than those 2 players. Again, this could be totally wrong here, and im going strictly off of memory, but i believe the Rangers tried to get out from paying Lindros his bonuses because of some technicality, and in order to not let lindros just point to these 2 guys and say, hey they were due money and they got it, the rangers withheld the money from both of them as well.
again, let me say this a third time, this could be totally wrong. anyone who wants to do the research and let me know would be very much appreciated.
Eric Rothman June 3rd at 5:54 pm
Inferno, I read over the Brooks article again and I believe the Lindros thing is seperate from this. Apparently the Rangers were withholding the money from Ortmeyer and Holik because they claimed the players agents verbally waived the players rights to signing bonuses if a lockout occured. Obviously this defense didn’t hold up.
Also, the team refused to pay a bonus of Darius Kasparaitis, but that was settled out of court.
Michael June 3rd at 6:07 pm
Yeah I read about a week ago, didn’t really understand it then, and don’t really understand it now, nor do I want to. I’ll tell you what though, the Rangers are a team that could’ve used both Ortmeyer and Holik last year, they made a mistake in letting those guys go.
In bigger news, we’re halfway to the dream scenario Inferno and I both want. Torts was fired today by TB, and now the Rangers really need to make a serious run at this guy in my opinion. He’d instantly be loved by the fans in NY because of his fiery, passionate demeanor, and let’s face it, this guy is a better, more proven coach than Renney and has won a Cup.
Michael June 3rd at 6:10 pm
Oh and Eric, one word…”BRRRUUUUUCCCEE!!” He beat my Braves single-handedly last weekend.
How dare someone steal the spotlight from Chipper, who’s having an amazing season so far.
Eric Rothman June 3rd at 7:49 pm
Michael, Bruce is a phenom. I was on hand for the walk of he hit against your boys. Chipper is still incredible, I’m a huge fan of any guy who can still dominate a league after 15 years in the bigs.
Richard S. June 3rd at 11:57 pm
Im also a big fan of a guy who gets every waitress he sees pregnant!
Richard S. June 3rd at 11:58 pm
Go Chipper!
Sorry still sore about that whole 1992 fiasco. Before the wild card when the Giants won 102 games and missed the playoffs by one game because the braves were in the NL west and they won 103 games. BOGUS!
Michael June 4th at 7:48 am
Haha oh come on now, low blow, everyone makes mistakes right…I think one of the heroes out there in SF had an affair or two and had some performance-enhancing clouds over his name in his career..Bonds I think his name was? Something like that, there was never enough coverage of him by ESPN for me to remember.
Richard S. June 5th at 1:12 pm
hes always been an ass though, that stuff was expected from him. Chipper is and was supposed to be a boyscout!