Coyotes send Morris to Rangers

by James Mirtle on Mar 4, 2009 2:05 PM CST Comment 12 comments

Some busy times for New York here at the last minute.

The Rangers send a trio of players in Dmitri Kalinin, Petr Prucha and Nigel Dawes to Phoenix for Derek Morris, which is big value for the Coyotes. New York obviously had to shed some salary to take on Morris and Antropov, and former Rangers assistant GM Don Maloney, now Phoenix's GM, benefits from the dump.

Kalinin's not work a bag of pucks now, but Prucha and Dawes both have some potential. Phoenix's forward lines look remarkably different after a busy deadline for them.

Morris is a great fit for the Rangers, who really needed an upgrade on defence. He's an underrated player in the league as he's upgraded his defensive play considerably the past few seasons.

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it would be pushing NYR pretty hard on the cap to get both Antropov and Morris, if they don’t give up any players. Curious to see what goes the other way.

by IAmJoe on Mar 4, 2009 2:04 PM CST reply actions 0 recs

Kalinin, Prucha, and Dawes? Yeah, that’ll do it.

by IAmJoe on Mar 4, 2009 2:08 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

Nigel Dawes and Petr Prucha

"Without good hard work, it is impossible to reach the pinnacle of success." - Anatoli Tarasov

by PRC on Mar 4, 2009 2:06 PM CST reply actions 0 recs

...and we're done?

Is there any chance there are deals that have been done that just haven’t been announced yet?

"Without good hard work, it is impossible to reach the pinnacle of success." - Anatoli Tarasov

by PRC on Mar 4, 2009 2:08 PM CST reply actions 0 recs

definitely possible. Moore was still never moved, I believe, i wouldn’t be surprised if Burke took a dollar in return for him at 2:59, just to get SOMETHING.

by IAmJoe on Mar 4, 2009 2:09 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

and just when you said that, they moved him to buffalo. i think it can take a while for the league to issue the approval, so as long as the paperwork was submitted by 3pm EST we could still see some valid trades for a little while post-deadline

by no ah on Mar 4, 2009 2:11 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

I expect trades trickling in until 4 or so.

Shut up when you're talking to me!

by Afino on Mar 4, 2009 2:40 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

James, I really don’t see why you (or a lot of others) keep saying that the Rangers needed a defenseman. Despite some inconsistent play from Redden, Rozsival, even Staal, overall they have been a top 5-8 defense all season. A lot of that has to do with Hank, of course, but none of the d-men were so poor that a shakeup was absolutely necessary.

Rather, this dead-last-in-the-league-in-goals-team desperately needed scorers, and that’s what Antropov provides. To give you an idea of how woeful the Rangers’ offense has been, Antropov and his 21 goals just became the Rangers’ leading goal scorer, and is only one point behind Zherdev for the team lead.

That said, I do agree that Morris is a solid player, and has some good size, which is always welcome. Looking at it this way:

Antropov + Morris + Avery

vs.

Prucha + Dawes + Kalinin

The Rangers are clearly a better team now than they were 48 hours ago.

Rangers, Royals, Raiders, Knicks...the man loves a winner.

by self loather on Mar 4, 2009 3:16 PM CST reply actions 0 recs

They had a bottom pairing they were afraid to play in Kalinin and Reitz. That’s not a workable situation for a contending team.

by James Mirtle on Mar 4, 2009 5:35 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

Reitz was definitely a bizarre addition, but Kalinin had been much better since mid-December. Again, though, despite all of this, the Rangers were still tops in team defense. People always talk about how defense wins championships, but if you look back at past playoff teams in the NHL, a top offense is at least as important, if not more so.

Anyway, Slats improved both today, so kudos to him.

Rangers, Royals, Raiders, Knicks...the man loves a winner.

by self loather on Mar 4, 2009 7:22 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs

kalinin

Kalinin play of the week: http://www.nhl.tv/team/console.jsp?hlg=20082009,2,929&event=NYR399 (He’s #45)

good riddance.

by engineer on Mar 5, 2009 2:11 AM CST up reply actions 0 recs

Have you considered that their defensive statistics are a product of Renny’s “No-offense” system rather than the Dmen they have (had) on the team? A lot of teams could have pretty nice defensive numbers if they had one of the most restrictive defensive schemes and never let their forwards attack with any aggression. I think it is at least plausible that Renny was trying to compensate for the lack of skill/depth on the blueline when he implemented that system.

by Fehr and Balanced on Mar 7, 2009 5:02 PM CST up reply actions 0 recs