It’s not so much the increase in the ticket prices that has me pissed off.  I do think they have a colossal nerve to ask us for more money to watch a team that barely made the playoffs (and yet again failed to make it past the second round). What really irks me is that fact that they want a commitment before June 22.  They want the subscribers to re-up before free agency on July 1. For a subscriber to commit before July 1 is like buying a pig in a poke.

They are asking the fans that support this team to pony up a lot cash on blind faith. How can the subscribers make a decision about renewing if we are unable to see what the Sather BrainTrust intends to do to rectify the piss poor product we watched last season? Yeah, that’s right. Piss poor. Drury and Gomez tank on Renney and get the rest of the team to buy into it. Now Sather and Dolan expect the fans to buy in to next season without finding out if we will still have to endure both these Skating Judases for another season.

Getting Avery on the cheap and hiring Tortorella are not the whole solution. In fact, it remains to be seen if they may yet become part of the problem, ie the Tortorella bottle throwing incident.  And then, there is the issue of Wade Redden. Like Ranger season ticketholders really want to shell out over 8% more to watch that inept excuse of an NHL defensemen get paid on average $7 million for the next 4 years.  Yeah, Glen, that’s what we want to spend our money on. Not.

And, to add insult to injury, we get a sweet little letter from Sather asking for our continued patience and support. For your reading enjoyment:

“Rangers Subscribers,

Five years ago, we made it our priority to build the New York Rangers team for long-term success by developing a core foundation of young players and adding key veterans as our youngsters matured. Our philosophy remains steadfast, and this past season, six young players whose NHL careers began here in New York played major roles in taking us to the playoffs for the fourth consecutive year.

Although we were not satisfied with this past season’s results, we believe we are on the right track. We continue to focus on the development of players and are excited about several talented prospects in our system. At the same time, we still have work to do as we strive toward our ultimate goal — to compete for the Stanley Cup each and every season.

Under the direction of our new Head Coach, John Tortorella, you will see a retooled Rangers team in 2009-10 that will feature a system that emphasizes aggressive forechecking and puck possession. This up-tempo approach has made John an accomplished winner in the NHL, earning a Jack Adams Award as Coach of the Year and delivering a Stanley Cup to Tampa Bay in 2004.

The key objective for this off-season is to complement our strong defensive play and league-leading penalty-kill with more goal-scoring, stemming from this aggressive system. We are determined to add players who make significant contributions in 2009-10, enabling us to dictate the pace of the game on a regular basis.

With an All-Star goaltender, and a mix of accomplished veterans and hungry youngsters, we expect to make our fans especially proud this season. Your loyalty and enthusiasm has always made The Garden a very intimidating place for visiting teams, and you will see a team whose style of play makes it even tougher.

We remain humbled and thankful for your energetic support and look forward to seeing you at The Garden for a great season of Rangers hockey.

Sincerely,

Glen Sather, President and General Manager, New York Rangers”

And, if that weren’t enough to make you sick, Dolan is rattling his sabre again about the renovations to the Garden. I’ll believe it when I see it. Many subscribers and fans know how little Dolan cares about the Rangers. The Rangers are  just a cash cow to keep his building and his programming schedule filled and to pay off the Knick lawsuits. 

The renovations are calling for a 5000 sq ft Super Suite that can hold 300 people. Obviously, Dolan hasn’t realized that this city and country are in the depths of a deep recession. MSG had a hard time selling the Luxury Suites this season, constantly bombarding the audience with in arena advertisements for them. Witness how the overpriced Yankee tickets went unsold. Hey Jim,  put the renovations on hold and stop sticking it to the subscribers. 

Many people have lost their jobs as companies have tightened their bottom lines. How has Sather retained his job after underperforming for the last 9 years? How does Jim Dolan keep his job? Oops. I forgot.  His Daddy owns the company!!!

The unkindest cut of all is that even if  subscribers renew, they will have a harder time getting rid of the games they can’t attend. Last season, many subscribers had a hard time selling their tickets for face value. And, Ranger TicketExchange still gets their cut regardless of the selling price.  

So, thanks Jim and Glen, for making the decision to renew harder then it has to be. You may not hear from this subscriber until 11:59 pm on June 21, the longest day of the year.

Rangers:

21 shots/17 missed shots/35 hits/5 giveaways/2 takeaways/21 blocked shots/20 faceoffs won/46 lost faceoffs

Caps:

35 shots/16 missed/27 hits/11 giveaways/7 takeways/10 blocked shots/46 faceoffs won/20 faceoffs lost.

The final score was 4-3 but only because Theodore was vulnerable and Lundqvist was kingly and kept the Rangers in the game in the first period, when they were completely outplayed by the Caps.

My stars of the game are Henrik Lundvist, Ryan Callahan and Blair Betts. They stopped the Caps offensive juggernaut by making saves, dishing and taking hits and killing penalties (sometimes without sticks).  Wade Redden was not as terrible as usual. Staal, Girardi, Mara, Roszival and Morris were superior to the Caps defensemen, even Green.

I don’t know if  Avery got under anyone’s skin but he certainly got under Green and sent him ass over tea kettle into the Ranger bench. Callahan put Ovechken on his kester at mid-ice. The way for the Rangers to get into the heads of the Caps is to continue to take the body. 

The only two Ranger players I had any big issue with was Gomez and of course, Naslund. Naslund is the new Captain Hook for the New York Rangers. He took three minor penalties and the Caps made him pay for the one legitimate call the refs made on him. Tortorella can’t sit him with Drury out . Despite his goal and assist tonight, I just wanted to strangle him.

Scott Gomez made yet another boneheaded giveaway pass that I thought for sure would have cost the Rangers a goal. And, while Dubinsky and Bett’s faceoff win percentage was slightly lower at 39%, Gomez needs to pick up his game on faceoffs especially if Drury is going to be out. Gomez had a key momentum shifting goal and two assists but his defensive play left a lot to be desired.

Lastly, the officiating was once again very tilted toward the Caps. Questionable calls on the Rangers and non-calls on the Caps, especially the Green boarding of Sjostrom. That’s a penalty on the Rangers if they did that to Semin. These Refs Suck! (just warming up for Monday).

They scored two powerplay goals and two more at even strength to beat the offensively dominant Caps and kept their defensive composure.

Feelin’ good now, yeah but I can’t explain…

The assist on Crosby’s game winning goal was from Fedetenko, not Talot, though I thought  that was what  I heard on the broadcast.

Unfortunately, I am old enough to remember this song by Leslie Gore. I even wore my hair in a flip back in the day, just like Leslie.

For the last month I have been loathe to criticize John Tortorella in any way lest I be accused of sour grapes because I was and am a Renney supporter. But this blog is my party and I’ll cry out if  I want  to.

As the last month has unfolded, I have seen John Tortorella  do some of the same things that got Tom Renney fired. Wasn’t the biggest indictment against Renney his failure to hold players accountable? Wasn’t lack of accountability one of the chief complaints of the Renney haters out there. Renney let the high priced, underachieving players continue to play big minutes. One Wade Redden comes immediately to mind.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not here to crucify Tortorella. I just find it a little ironic and unfair that Tortorella can make himself off limits to the press and doesn’t have to explain his decisions, good or ill. Accountability should start with Tortorella.

The fact is that there are soooo many sub-plots in Ranger hockey now that you may as well be watcing One Tree Hill. Dolan wants as much season subscription and playoff money as he can get. He pressures Sather to fill the seats and make the playoffs. In turn, Sather goes out and pulls the trigger on marque players and overpays them and hog ties the organization with long, no movement contracts.

Sather turned around and handed a stacked deck to Renney, who in his 3+ years as the head coach accomplished his mission. Renney was able to keep peace in the valley while juggling tempermental players, the press and the fan base. In order to do that, Renney had to be the ultimate diplomat. He couldn’t scapegoat players. He couldn’t tell the press to f*ck off and he couldn’t scream and curse at the officials.

Because Renney approached every aspect of his job in a calm, well prepared way he was accussed of being Coach Butterscotch. He was boring. His system was boring and both the players and the fan base wanted him out and to see run and gun, exciting hockey.

Unfortunately, you can’t play exciting hockey without a good defense to cover for the lack of defensive responsibilty by your forwards. Renney knew that. And despite the fact that there were 6 defensemen on his roster, he really had only 3.5 decent defensemen. He rolled four lines playing a boring, defensively conservative game for that reason. And, until the players bought out of that system, the Rangers were winning games 2-1 and in shoot outs. But, they did WIN.

Tortorella comes in and lets the team loose and they do score more goals. But instead of winning 2-1 or in shootouts, they lose 4-3 and in shootouts. Tortorella says he doesn’t need to roll four line like Renney did but he does anyway. And, for some inexplicable reason, he doesn’t use one of his best players in the shoot out. He is also shortening his bench to four defensemen. In my opinion, that’s a prescription for disaster.

If you look at Crosby’s goal yesterday in microcosim, you see why having all three forwards down low on that play lead to disaster. Renney’s five in the frame might have helped there. Avery was being tied up by Orpik, who hooked Avery in the corner. Zherdev plays the puck around the boards to Dubinsky who gets beat by Talbot. Talbot passes to Crosby at center ice who then splits the defense. Unfortunately, two of Rangers slower defenseman were at the points. Redden should have used his head and tripped or grabbed Crosby and taken a good penalty for a change.

Maybe if Sauer was on the ice instead of Redden, he might have been able to catch Cindy. We’ll never know because Tortorella only played the kid for two minutes for the entire game. But God forbid giving Redden fewer minutes.

I’m telling ya, the more things change the more they remain the same.

I found this entry on the HF Boards on Monday. It was written by a poster named Lion Hound. This was his reaction to the game on Sunday against the Flyers. I will quote it in its entirety. Please keep in mind that this was written with the emotions we are all feeling, hurt, anger and disappointment. Please forgive the author for any spelling and syntax errors.

“This loss hit home pretty hard for me. At points of the game, I was so angry that I found myself holding back as I was about to either say or do something that I would later regret! Had seasons in my fam for 20 years now. Today was the first time I left (by my own power) before the game was over! For anyone else that was at the game, there were quite a few Flyer fans in the garden. Right in front of me were two, that were rubbing it in pretty good. I have no problem ribbin on fans when they come into the Garden, but I keep it freindly. Today, I was so pissed that I literally had to get up and leave. What made me most angry was the couple in front of me waiving goodbye, and standing and cheering when Henrik got pulled. In my younger days I think I would have dragged the guy by his hair and thrown him out myself, but…i guess in my older years I made it clear…”You’re winning the game, you are in our arena…enjoy the victory, but don’t provoke it…cause this can and will get ugly fast!” …After I said that, I sat back and just took a breath like…”Is this really worth it?”…

But as I left the arena, I looked around at all the little kids that were there today.(Day games always have a lot of children there)…but how are they going to understand when a fan gets up behind them screaming obsenities at Wade Redden, or Tom Renney? Monkey see monkey do…and I am pretty sure that all the dads there that went to the afternoon Matinee, dumped $200-$300 didn’t plan on taking thier kids to the game to have some loudmouth cursing up a storm to have a fire sale, to where the kid turns and asks his dad what the obsenities meant, and why is that guy yelling!…But the point is not to direct this at the fans. They are paying customers…but to me it is just terrible to see the the lazy uninspired play that they left on the ice today. I am not of the doom and gloom mode and try to stay on the positive side, but todays effort was putrid. And IMO this Organiation should be ashamed at what has transpired over the last 10 games or so.”

Every single person involved in the New York Rangers organization needs to read this. They need  to  realize that Lion Hound is one of their more supportive fans. For every fan like Lion Hound and myself, there are ten times as many mean spirited, nasty and angry fans out there who want Sather and Renney fired and a fire sale to ensue.

On a personal note, I would like to wish my husband a happy anniversary and thank him for  always being there for me and putting up with all my Ranger craziness.