Posts tagged ‘Moore’

Breathe easy Ranger fans, the Petr Nedved experiment is over.  The center was among the cuts today, ending his attempted third stint with the Rangers.  That’s not to take anything away from Nedved.  Actually, I thought he played quite well in the pre-season.  But signing Nedved would have signaled a throw back to the dark ages otherwise known as 1998-2004.  To block the surplus of young kids vying for a spot, would have been going against the philosophy of the post-lockout Blueshirts.

Others reassigned included Artem Anisimov, Thomas Pock, Greg Moore and Dale Weise.

In other news, it looks as though the Rangers coaching staff has seen what everybody else has: Brandon Dubinsky is an absolute stud and deserves top 6 minutes.  In today’s practice Dubi moved up to the second line centering Zherdev and Dawes, while Drury moved into the first line wing spot formerly occupied by Zherdev.  Whether or not that’s the correct way to shuffle those six forwards remains to be seen, but moving Dru to the wing and elevating Dubi is the right way to go.

With the Rangers lineup dwindling due to the injury bug, tonight’s lines have become a Lets Make a Deal of sorts.

· Behind Door Number One: The always underachieving Marcel Hossa will be thrust into the top line with Jagr and Gomez.

· Behind Door Number Two: Chris Drury will dance in between Brendan Shanahan and Greg Moore. Shanahan will be playing left wing.

· Behind Door Number Three: Nigel Dawes, Brandon Dubinsky and Petr Prucha

Now it’s just a matter of figuring out which door contains the $8,000 fur coat and which door has the donkey pulling the wagon that nobody wants. Boy, what a few hours of the Game Show Network will do to you.

Classic game show references aside, a big game tonight against the Flyers. The Rangers slide has taken them down to the bottom of the Atlantic (oceanic pun intended). Flyers stand one point up on the Blueshirts and are returning Simon Gagne to the ice after missing the last two months.

Steve and I will be back with a new show tomorrow. This team desperately needs two points, so we can have at least a partially positive show.

Well if the western Canada swing wasn’t bad enough, the Rangers have some new injuries to report. After only getting 1 point out of a possible 6 on the road trip, Martin Straka is out with a concussion. The man that has been credited with reviving the first line is out at least two games. Hopefully, Jagr and Gomez (who skated in practice with Nigel Dawes) will be able to keep up some offensive production in Marty’s absence.

• In other injury news, Brendan Shanahan is day-to-day with a knee injury. Don’t expect him to miss any game time even though he’s been out of practice.
• As Steve called for on the show last week, Ryan Callahan has been sent down to Hartford. This brings up the always traveling Nigel Dawes and Greg Moore.