Blogs – Page 114 – Keefe To The City

Feb 10, 2020

Monday Mail: Is the Yankees’ Roster Complete?

Spring training has yet to officialy begin and already the Yankees are once again proving you can never have enough pitching.

Wednesday is the big day. Wednesday is when pitchers and catchers officially report to spring training for the Yankees (though many of the Yankees are already in Tampa and have started their spring training). There’s still more than six weeks until Opening Day and real, meaningful baseball, but spring training is here.

This week’s questions and comments are related to the current roster and if the Yankees did enough this offseason to improve it.

Email your questions to KeefeToTheCity@gmail.com or engage on the Keefe To The City Facebook page or on Twitter to be included in the next Monday Mail.

We need another bonafide starting pitcher. – Mario

Last week in the blog Spring Cleaning: A Fresh Start for Giancarlo Stanton, regarding J.A. Happ, I wrote:

I understand you can never have enough pitching, except when you’re talking about a 37-year-old coming off the worst season of his career and set to earn $17 million.

What felt like minutes after writing those words, it was announced that James Paxton will be out for the next three to four months after undergoing a back procedure. It was almost as if the Baseball Gods were upset with me mocking the idea that you can never have enough pitching.

The Paxton news certainly isn’t ideal, but it’s not the worst thing ever either. Paxton has never pitched a full season in the majors. Not one. His career-high innings came in 2018 when he threw 160 1/3. In his first season with the Yankees, he only managed 150 2/3 when he missed nearly four weeks and then admittedly pitched with a knee problem for most of the season before being shut down in his final start of the regular season with a back problem, which he eventually needed this recent surgery for.

The Yankees won’t have Paxton for at least the first month of the season and I would expect him to miss at least the first two months of the season. So now, instead of having Happ as the team’s fifth starter in what needs to be a bounceback season, Happ moves up to the No. 4 spot and Jordan Montgomery, most likely, becomes the No. 5 starter.

There isn’t really an available free-agent starting pitcher the Yankees could go out and sign at this point like the comment suggests. If Happ sucks again and Montgomery proves to be not ready as he separates himself from his Tommy John surgery, I would rather see what Deivi Garcia or Mike King or someone else within the organizatio can before giving an opportunity to the scrap heap.

So it’s true, you can never have enough pitching, even when you’re talking about a 37-year-old coming off the worst season of his career and set to earn $17 million.

Nolan Arenado is the best third baseman in baseball. You get the best when you can. No need to be concerned with costs. If they don’t mind paying the luxury tax, I’m not complaining. – Vinny

I couldn’t agree more, Vinny. I wrote about this extensively in the blog If the Yankees Can Get Nolan Arenado, Go Get Him.

The problem is while we aren’t worried about the luxury tax, Yankees ownership certainly is. It’s why they held back the last few years on free agency. The Yankees are the best team in baseball right now and good enough to win the World Series as currently constructed and ownership likely looks at Arenado as a luxury and not a necessity. They know they can win with a third base combination of Gio Urshela at $2.5 million and Miguel Andujar at somewhere around the league minimum, so there’s no need for them to go take on another nine-figure contract.

The franchise can more than afford to take on Arenado’s contract, but they know they can win with a third base making $32 million less.

I don’t get this obsession with Nolan Arenado, what the Yankees actually need is to lock up and secure our infield with Francisco Lindor. The kid makes perfect sense across the table. We need left-handed punch and to fill the hole that Didi Gregorious left at short. Gleyber Torres with all due respect is a much better second baseman than he is a shortstop. – El

The obsession with Arenado is that he’s the best all-around third baseman in baseball. As for Lindor, if the Yankees could somehow trade for him I would also be all for it. The difference is Arenado would cost only money as the Rockies are looking at moving him in a straight salary dump the way the Marlins moved Giancarlo Stanton, while Lindor will cost actual players.

As for the knock on Torres, I disagree. I would expect Torres to be a better second baseman than shortstop the same way I would expect any major leaguer to be a better second baseman than shortstop since it’s an easier position to play. But Torres came up as a shortstop (except for the brief time he playing third base in the minors before a season-ending injury in 2017, so the Yankees could stop playing Chase Headley), and he was only playing second because of Gregorius. Gregorius is gone, so Torres is the shortstop the way he was before Gregorius came back last season, and he’s going to be playing shortstop for a long, long time … unless the Yankees do something like acquire Lindor.

I’d like to have the best player in baseball at every position, but there are financial implications. They got in trouble chasing every free agent and came back to prominence developing their farm system. They laid out big money with Gerrit Cole, and huge payouts lie ahead for Aaron Judge, Gleyber Torres and Luis Severino. – Michael

There are financial implications to signing big-name free agents, but the Yankees are the Yankees and have more financial resources than any other team in the sport and should use that to their advantage. It was disgusting when they came one win away from the World Series in 2017 and then cut payroll by nearly $50 million for 2018, and their decision to sit out on every free-agent pitcher not named J.A. Happ for 2019 cost them the AL pennant once again.

The Yankees have returned to prominence by building up their farm system, but when you have a young core making the league minimum or in arbitration years, that’s when you should add free agents to the roster before the young core needs to be paid. Judge and Sanchez both got significant raises this season and Severino got a four-year, $40 million contract last season. Those numbers are only going to continue to go up, and that’s why it’s more important than ever for the Yankees to win a championship as soon as possible before ownership decides to go back into a signing freeze due to an increasing payroll they can more than afford.

I predict Giancarlo Stanton will have a banner year. Hope he has a great year and opts out. – Jack

Last week, I wrote that I’m going to give a clean slate to Stanton for 2020. No sarcasm to start the season, no snarky comments, no “Ladies and gentlemen” tweets on Opening Day. I’m going to be positive when it comes to Stanton for as long as he lets me be positive.

The response to that blog hasn’t been great. Either people don’t believe me, saying I won’t be able to last through the fourth inning of Opening Day, or they despise Stanton so much that they’re appalled that I’m willing to be positive when it comes to him.

I really do believe Stanton is a luxury for the Yankees. He was a luxury when the Yankees were able to acquire him for nothing and he’s become even more of a luxury with the team proving it can win without him. They don’t need him to be his pre-Yankee self to win. Last season, they were able to win 103 regular-season games and get to within two wins of the World Series without him. But even though he’s a luxury, I would very much welcome him returning to his pre-Yankee self and being an MVP candidate, especially with Aaron Hicks out for most of the season and the unpredictability of what Brett Gardner, Mike Tauchman and Clint Frazier will provide.

When it comes to his opt-out clase though, you can forget about that. Even without a 2017-like season, on the open market, Stanton wouldn’t come close to getting what he’s owed as a 31-year-old who will obviously spend his later years as a DH. Even if he thought he was worth more and could get more, who would pay him? The Yankees would be out on him. The now small-market-operating Red Sox would be out on him. The Astros? No. Unless the NL adopts the DH, I can’t see any NL team wanting him. He will be three years removed from his historic season with one good season (2018), one nine-game season (2019) and whatever he does in 2020 since his MVP campaign. Stanton isn’t going anywhere. He’s going to be a Yankee.

Want to be included in the next Monday Mail? Email your questions to KeefeToTheCity@gmail.com or engage on the Keefe To The City Facebook page or on Twitter.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

Feb 6, 2020

Rangers Thursday Thoughts: Leave Henrik Lundqvist Alone

I understand Henrik Lundqvist’s age and his salary and cap hit for 2020-21. I also recognize what he has done for the organization for nearly 15 years and I will never not feel indebted to him as a Rangers fan.

The Rangers returned from their long layoff and won three of four. It’s what they need to do keep their playoff dreams alive and prolong a third straight deadline selloff from the front office. The Rangers still have nine games left before the deadline to showcase their available players while at the same time try to prove they can make a miraculous run to the playoffs.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Rangers as usual.

1. The only person who was happier for Henrik Lundqivst than Lundqvist following his 1-0 shutout on Saturday in Detroit was me. More than two years since his last shutout, a feat that used to be accomplished weekly it felt like, Lundqvist once again posted a zero. The Rangers’ defense was never anything special when it featured Ryan McDonagh, Marc Staal, Dan Girardi, Anton Stralman, Dan Boyle, Keith Yandle or Kevin Klein as Lundqvist routinely made that group and many others appear much better than they actually were from a scoreboard standpoint. But I’m sure Lundqvist longs for the days when he had some of those names given the current state of the Rangers’ defense and what he, Igor Shesterkin and Alexandar Georgiev, need to do each game to prevent lopsided results.

2. To see Lundqvist get pulled against Dallas in the game immediately following his shutout was disheartening and rather unfair, but the reason for the goals didn’t matter to many Rangers fans, just that there were goals. The franchise legend was turned on as the reason and not the unnecessary penalties, slot deflections, odd-man rushes and defensive-zone turnovers, which set up the goals. The loss was hardly Number 30’s fault.

3. The three-goalie situation has now been going on for a month. Here’s how it’s gone since Shesterkin’s debut:

Shesterkin
Shesterkin
Lundqvist
Georgiev
Georgiev
Shesterkin
Georgiev
Shesterkin
Lundqvist
Lundqvist
Shesterkin

Sometimes the next game’s starting goalie has been based on the previous game’s performance, sometimes it has been based on being already scheduled and sometimes it’s been based on past performance against the next game’s opponent. It’s been hard to predict who will start from game to game, but I’m going to make a prediction for the games between now and next week’s Thoughts.

Friday vs. Buffalo: Georgiev
Sunday vs. Los Angeles: Shesterkin
Tuesday at Winnipeg: Lundqvist

4. Toronto was seen as the favorite to land Georgiev in a pre-deadline deal and then Los Angeles had to step in and trade them Jack Campbell. After ruining Lundqvist’s chance at the elusive Cup, it might be the Kings who once again ruin his legacy. With Toronto no longer in need of a goalie, the odds on Georgiev getting traded this season take a hit and it makes it more likely Lundqvist is somehow talked into waiving his no-trade clause or is bought out in the offseason. I hate the Kings.

5. Georgiev getting moved is still the most likeliest outcome of the three-goalie issue, but with each passing day and especially with Toronto no longer a suitor, it’s not as likely as it was just a few days ago. The cold, rainy winter days coupled with all of these Lundqvist trade and buyout rumors are depressing. I understand the Rangers’ love for Georgiev and their reluctance to trade him for anything less than their seemingly over-the-top demands, but it’s still the right move. I also understand Lundqvist’s age and his salary and cap hit for 2020-21. I also recognize what he has done for the organization for nearly 15 years and I will never not feel indebted to him as a Rangers fan. An offseason buyout would be even worse.

6. On the topic of buyouts, how many buyouts are the Rangers doing to need to do? They bought out Brad Richards and Dan Girardi and Kevin Shattenkirk, and should have bought out Staal. (Maybe start rethinking the organization’s handling of contracts and when extensions should be made?) If the Rangers do decide to extend Chris Kreider, there’s a good chance I will be writing about the Rangers needing to buy him out in a few years as well. I get that Kreider makes the Rangers better right now and next season as well and the season after that, but they’re not even a playoff team this season and next season they won’t be close to contending and might still not be ready in 2021-22. Realistically, the Rangers are three years at best from possibly being one of the elite teams in the league and by then Kreider will be 31-32 and getting paid to do things he did on the other side of 30. Given the weak expected rental class for this deadline, let some team overpay for his services for two months and use the return to actually help the team win in three and four years from now.

7. Given Artemi Panarin’s recent drop in even-strength production, I gladly welcomed Ryan Strome being removed from his line. It didn’t last long though as David Quinn put the two back together during Wednesday’s win over Toronto. One day I will get my dream of a Panarin-Mika Zibanejad-Kaapo Kakko line. One day.

8. I was a fan of the trade for Jacob Trouba and still am, but I completely understand why he is a potential trade asset. He’s signed long-term at a solid number and he’s now a luxury for the Rangers. Given the abundnace of young defense and the eventual need to pay that young defense, Trouba isn’t needed the way he was when they traded for him. I will still happily have him as a Ranger, but I now almost expect him to be traded before his no-trade kicks in this offseason. When it comes to trading young defensemen with long-term deals, how about Brady Skjei? There has to be a landing spot for Skjei is his $5.25M cap hit through 2023-24. After Georgiev (because it helps Lundqvist remain a Ranger) and Kreider (because extending would be a mistake for when the team is ready to contend), I most want Skjei to be traded.

9. The best day of the season will be the day the day Greg McKegg, Brendan Smith and Micheal Haley no longer play. We’re getting closer to that day. With the deadline approaching and the Rangers’ playoff odds on the brink, it’s only a matter of time until the Rangers start to implement more young players into the NHL lineup and stop wasting valuable regular-season minutes and icetime on three players who should have never been a part of this season’s roster.

10. The Rangers came out of their 10-day layoff needing to win 75 percent of their remaining 34 games, and they have done that so far, going 3-1 against Detroit, Dallas and Toronto. They are now on pace for 88 points, and the second wild card is on pace for 99 points. That’s a lot of points to make up and every projection I have seen gives the Rangers a single-digit percentage of reaching the playoffs. The Rangers are going to need a 21-6-3 finish to play an 83rd game.

Blogs • Yankees • Yankees Offseason

Feb 5, 2020

I’m Going to Miss David Price Pitching Against the Yankees

Unfortunately, the Yankees will no longer have the luxury of seeing David Price multiple times during the regular season. There won’t be anymore video game-related injury excuses or last-minute scratches or early exits for the $217 million pitcher against the Yankees.

Early in the 2018 season, David Price was scheduled to start against the Yankees before being mysteriously scratched. The reasons for the surprise missed scheduled start varied from wrist tightness to hand numbness to tenderness, but when Price was able to return to the mound and start just a few days later, it was obvious what the reason for him being scratched was: the Yankees.

Not even a month prior to his scratch on April 11, Price lasted only an inning against the Yankees, and not even two months after the scratch, Price would have his worst performance against the Yankees on July 1 on Sunday Night Baseball. Price’s line from that July 1 start: 3.1 IP, 9 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 0 BB, 3 K, 5 HR. The Yankees produced five home runs without Gary Sanchez, who has hit Price better than any other major leaguer. Price would pick up a no-decision against the Yankees on Aug. 5 and then was embarrassed once more by them on Sept. 19 (5.1 IP, 5 H, 6 R, 4 ER, 4 BB, 2 K, 3 HR).

That season, his miserable history against the Yankees culminated in Game 2 of the ALDS when he was once again lit up. Ten pitches into the game Aaron Judge sent a 1-2 pitch high over the Green Monster in left-center where few have ever hit a ball, and then leading off the second, Sanchez crushed the third pitch of the inning over the Monster as well. Price didn’t make it through the second inning as he was pulled after recording only five outs (1.2 IP, 3 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 0 K, 2 HR), leaving the game with two runners. After his departure, Judge barreled up Joe Kelly, but the 109.8 mph line drive was hit directly at Betts otherwise Price’s final line would have been much worse than it already was.

The last time the Yankees got to face Price as a Red Sox was on Aug. 4 of this past season, and he put together his usual performance, unable to last three innings at Yankee Stadium (2.2 IP, 9 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 2 HR).

Price leaves Boston and the American League with the current Yankees roster having a .317/.383/.639 line against him in 231 plate appearances. That’s a 1.022 OPS. Within the overall performance are some memorable individual performances:

Gary Sanchez (21 plate appeances): .500/.619/.1625, 6 HR, 12 RBIs
Aaron Judge (16 plate appearances): .308/.438/1.000, 3 HR, 3 RBIs
Luke Voit (10 plate appearances): .444/.500/1.444, 3 HR, 4 RBIs

(Aaron Hicks, Gleyber Torres, Gio Urshela Miguela Andujar and Kyle Higashioka have also homered off Price.)

Unfortunately, the Yankees will no longer have the luxury of seeing Price multiple times during the regular season. There won’t be anymore video game-related injury excuses or last-minute scratches or early exits for the $217 million pitcher against the Yankees.

The Yankees won’t have a chance to see him until 2022 — in the last year of his contract — when the Yankees next play the NL West in the regular season, unless the Yankees and Dodgers meet in the World Series. If they do finally meet in the World Series, the Dodgers will want to begin whichever game he starts with their bullpen up.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

Feb 4, 2020

Spring Cleaning: A Fresh Start for Giancarlo Stanton

Because I’m a nice person, I’m going to give Giancarlo Stanton a clean slate for the 2020 season. I’m going to be positive when it comes to Stanton for as long as he lets me be positive.

Spring training begins next week. NEXT WEEK! The offseason is long as it is, and it’s made even longer when the postseason ends on a pennant-winning, walk-off home run. But baseball is almost here, even if it’s not real, meaningful baseball.

To follow the format of Off Day Dreaming from the actual season, I decided to do a weekly Yankees thoughts blog to lead us into the season until the first Off Day Dreaming the day after Opening Day.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Yankees as usual.

1. Because I’m a nice person, I’m going to give Giancarlo Stanton a clean slate for the 2020 season. No sarcasm to start the season, no snarky comments, no “Ladies and gentlemen” tweets on Opening Day. I’m going to be positive when it comes to Stanton for as long as he lets me be positive.

The Yankees were able to win 103 regular-season games and get to within two wins of the World Series without him, so he’s almost become a luxury at this point. I don’t want to say whatever Stanton gives the Yankees is a bonus the way it is for someone like Brett Gardner, but the Yankees proved he’s not crucial to their success the way Aaron Judge is.

Even though I will try to maintain a clean slate for Stanton, he has unforunately entered A-Rod territory at the Stadium in which the cleanliness of his slate is only as good as his most recent at-bat. Once you reach that territory, there’s no going back. Stanton could have the kind of postseason A-Rod did in 2009, and it won’t matter. He just needs to realize it, and somehow “clear the mechanism” like Billy Chapel when he’s playing at home and not let the inevitable boos affect him the way they clearly have in his first two seasons as a Yankee.

2. Nolan Arenado is still on the Rockies, which means he hasn’t been traded yet, which means the Yankees can still trade for him. Rockies owner Dick Manfort tried to downplay the rift between Arenado and general manager Jeff Bridich, but the rift is real and it exists. If it weren’t, Arenado wouldn’t have said the things he said this offseason about the Rockies and rumors wouldn’t be flying around about him potentially going to the Cardinals.

Here’s what I said last week in If the Yankees Can Get Nolan Arenado, Go Get Him: When a player like Arenado is made available, you don’t let him go somewhere else. And when a player like Arenado is made available and you’re the odds-on favorite to win the World Series in the middle of a championship window in the middle of a championship drought, you make sure he doesn’t go anywhere else.

I understand it’s most likely not going to happen, but it should happen. Arenado will essentially only cost money, which incase you forgot because the Yankees sometimes forget, is the organization’s greatest resource. Any player or prospect the Yankees would have to add would either be blocked for playing time by the trade, no longer part of the team’s plans anyway, far enough away from the majors to know if they will actually reach the majors or possibly Deivi Garcia. But you don’t let Deivi Garcia prevent you from getting Nolan Arenado. (Then again, Brian Cashman let Eduardo Nunez prevent him from getting Cliff Lee.)

3. The pictures on social media of Gary Sanchez over the last few weeks have shown a leaner, more fit and muscular Sanchez. Without seeing his face, you would never know it’s Sanchez. I’m not sure if Sanchez started eating vegetables, went the Joe Torre route of cutting out soda or just hit the weights harder, but it’s clear he had a goal of coming to spring training with a different look, and he has it. Is this new diet or workout regimen an attempt to stay off the injured list or prevent passed balls or possibly create even more power? I have no idea, but Sanchez is currently the favorite to win the most “(Player name) came to camp in the best shape of his life” headlines over the next two weeks.

4. I was watching MLB Network on Monday and there was a discussion on the top shortstops in baseball. Gleyber Torres was ranked sixth. Most likely this list was created with the idea of creating buzz and making Yankees fans (which there are more of than any other team) upset enough to talk about or write about, kind of like what I’m doing here. I may be writing about it, but I’m not upset about it. I find it more comical than anything. At least it’s not as egregious as ESPN ranking the Yankees as having the ninth-best offense in the majors.

5. The Yankees’ No. 4 starter is Masahiro Tanaka. The first pitcher in history to allow two earned runs or less in each of his first seven postseason starts is the Yankees’ No. 4 starter.

6. The Yankees had to bring J.A. Happ back last season based on his 2018 with the team after the trade deadline and because they decided to not sign any other free-agent starter. But after last season and with no one knowing what the state of the baseball will be for this season, I’m holding out for Happ to get traded before spring training. I understand you can never have enough pitching, except when you’re talking about a 37-year-old coming off the worst season of his career and set to earn $17 million. As long as Happ is on the team, he’s going to start. It will take a long, long time for him to removed from the rotation, the way it always takes the Yankees a long, long time to make a move like that, and if he’s not starting and not doing well as a starter he has no place on the team. Pitching twice a month out of the bullpen in mop-up duty while taking home nearly $3 million a month isn’t ideal.

7. Curtis Granderson retired from baseball the other day and if you told me on the day the Yankees traded for Granderson that he wouldn’t win a World Series, I would have gladly taken that bet. The Yankees had just won the World Series when they traded for him and were essentially returning the same exact roster the following season. But as a Yankee, Granderson experienced two ALCS losses and a five-game ALDS loss, as the Yankees were eliminated twice in those series by his former team. Granderson played for a long time, played for a lot of good teams and made a lot of money, but he should have a won a ring, and he should have won it with the Yankees. If not for the aforementioned keeping of Nunez for Lee, he would have won at least one.

8. Not only do the Yankees have the best team in baseball and not only are they the favorite to win the World Series, but at the same time as the Yankees’ core is entering it’s prime, the Red Sox are holding an Everything Must Go! sale and will likely move the team’s best player before spring training begins. Not only are the big-market and rich-beyond-anyone’s-wildest-dreams Red Sox adamant about trading Mookie Betts so they don’t have to pay, they also don’t have a manager and have yet to receive the results of the commissioner’s investigation into their sign stealing under their former manager. 2020 is going to be great.

9. The Yankees rarely ever get off to a good start. It seems like every season they are around .500 a few weeks into the season before going on a run, and this isn’t a recent trend, it’s been going on for years. Last season, the Yankees opened against the Orioles and lost two of three, then went on to lose two of three to the Tigers, got swept by the Astros and lost two of three to the White Sox and were 10-10 through 20 games. The year before, they were 9-9 through 18 games. Let’s not do that again this season.

It would be good for both the Yankees and my overall health if they took advantage of their early-season schedule this year. The Yankees open the season with three games in Baltimore followed by three in Tampa Bay and then open at home with three against Toronto and four against Baltimore. You can’t ask for a better schedule to start the season than that.

10. The Yankees over/under win total right now it at 102. It’s the highest it’s been since 2009 when I believe it was at 100. Last year, it was at 96.5 following a 100-win season, and the Yankees won 103 games. Every expected starter except for Torres and DJ LeMahieu missed time last season and the team won 103 games. Expecting a team to win more than 100 games is a lot, but in the current state of baseball where spending money and trying to win isn’t on every team’s agenda, it’s easier than ever to do so.

The AL East has already been won. The Rays’ ceiling can’t compete with this Yankees team, the Red Sox are in the process of cutting payroll, the Blue Jays are still a few years away and the Orioles … well, they would be lucky to win 60 games this season. This Yankees team is better than the last two and the division is much worse than it was the last two years. The Yankees are going to win more than 102 games.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

Jan 30, 2020

Rangers Thursday Thoughts: Who’s Getting Traded?

Two years after sending the letter to fans to publicize their plans to tear the team down and what will be three selloffs later, the Rangers will be on to the next phase of this rebuild.

It feels like it’s been months since the Rangers last played a game and they’re still another day away from returning to action. I’m sure the players have enjoyed the 10-day layoff, but with baseball in its lull period before spring training and only one football game left, it’s been a grind since the last Rangers game though I’m sure a lot of the feeling has to do with the back-to-back losses before the break.

Here are 10 thoughts on the Rangers as usual.

1. The Rangers have one last chance to make a run before the front office begins its third straight selloff. The Rangers have 13 games before the trade deadline, and I feel like it would take at least 12 wins for them to hold on to their assets. With 12 wins before the deadline, the Rangers would then be on pace for 100 points and it would put them in contention for a playoff berth. However, Carolina currently holds the second wild card, and their current point pace is still better than the Rangers’ would be if they won 12 of 13 over the next three-plus weeks.

Even if the Rangers won 12 of 13 (or won all 13), their post-deadline schedule includes the Islanders, Philadelphia (three times), St. Louis, Washington (twice), Dallas, Colorado, Calgary, Pittsburgh (three times), Columbus, Washington, Tampa Bay and Florida. In this magical, fairytale world where this Rangers team could win 12 of 13 or set the franchise record with 13 straight wins, it still most likely wouldn’t be enough to reach the postseason.

There’s no scenario over the next 25 days in which the Rangers shouldn’t stick with their rebuild plan. The plan was never to go all out for the postseason in 2019-20. It was to be ready for a possible playoff berth in 2020-21, but most likely in 2021-22, and contend for the Cup in maybe 2021-22, but more like 2022-23 and 2023-24. The team’s play for most of this season was unexpected and enjoyable, but it was never enough to be one of the Top 8 in the East and to make any sort of extended run in the spring.

2. It seems like Alexandar Georgiev, who will be a restricted free agent this summer, is as good as gone. Whether it’s before the deadline or before the beginning of next season, Georgiev won’t be a Ranger. It will be before the deadline if teams like Toronto and Colorado realize their goaltending will be what keeps them from a postseason run and if they are willing to meet the Rangers’ ask of an NHL-ready forward. In an ideal world, the Rangers would be able to keep Georgiev and pair him with Igor Shesterkin for years to come, while also giving Henrik Lundqvist the kind of end to his career he deserves as a Rangers legend and all-time great. But Lundqvist’s no-trade clause, which he more than earned for carrying the franchise for 15 years, isn’t going to get waived, and it shouldn’t.

4. If Lundqvist wants to remain a Ranger through the end of next season and the end of his contract before walking away, good for him. I could also envision a scenario where Lundqvist returns at a much more team-friendly rate beginning in 2021-22 to serve as the backup when this team is ready or close to ready to contend. You can do a lot worse than having Lundqvist as a veteran presence in the room, a mentor to his heir and the backup of your team. Would Lundqvist, a career starter and millionaire, want to sit on the bench and travel around North America and be away from his family at 40 to only play 20-or-so games a season? I don’t know. But I want him to because when this team is Cup-contending good again, I want him to be a part of it.

5. Aside from Georgiev, the Rangers’ restricted free agents include Ryan Strome, Brendan Lemieux and Tony DeAngelo, and I have to think all three are in play. My order of preference to keep would be DeAngelo then Lemieux then Strome. There is no way Strome’s stock will ever be higher than it is now, and it has everything to do with playing with Artemi Panarin. Panarin is on pace for 117 points with Strome and Jesper Fast as his linemates, and the Bread Man has a chance at Jaromir Jagr’s 123-point record despite playing with these two. There is this weird faction of Rangers fans who are very pro-Strome though I’m not sure how they can watch him every game and not see how all of his success is directly tied to Panarin. Trade him. As for Fast, he’s an unrestricted free agent, but he won’t cost much. He’s only getting $1.85 million now, and whatever number he were to sign for after this season certainly isn’t going to significantly hinder the team’s cap situation in the future. But unless the Rangers plan on extending him if they don’t trade him, losing him for nothing in the offseason as a free agent would go against the team’s goal of acquiring as many future or draft assets as possible.

6. DeAngelo is an interesting trade candidate because he’s a restricted free agent who will command a substantial raise and because he’s only 24 and on pace for a 63-point season. Defensemen who can score like DeAngelo does aren’t exactly easy to find, and they are rarely ever available at a deadline when they’re 24 years old. But with the Rangers’ abundance of young defensemen, a player like DeAngelo could be expendable, if the Rangers believe they will hit on most of those young defensemen and if they believe they can get the kind of haul DeAngelo could return. The Rangers also might have to believe this season is the ceiling for DeAngelo and that his scoring is a product of the Rangers’ offensive-minded style of play which will surely need to change in order to truly contend. It’s hard to envision a team which allows the most shots per game winning the Cup.

7. It would be a lot easier to keep DeAngelo if the Rangers could move Brady Skjei, who is one year older than DeAngelo and who is owed $5.25 million through 2023-24. Or maybe there is a plan to move Jacob Trouba, as the 25-year-old is owed $8 million through 2025-26. If it were my call, I would move Skjei though I could see why the Rangers might feel they no longer need Trouba, especially at $8 million per year, the same way they thought they did last summer when they traded for and extended him. Trouba’s deal wasn’t unreasonable coming off a career-best, 50-point season, and over time his number won’t seem like as much as the cap goes up, but there is certainly a case to be made to move him. After next season, the Rangers will have Marc Staal’s $5.7 million coming off the books as well as Brendan Smith’s $4.35 million (unless some team wants to take either of them off the Rangers hands before Feb. 24 … any takers?!). But they will also be looking at paying raises to restricted free agents Pavel Buchnevich, Filip Chytil, Brett Howden and Ryan Lindgren.

8. I can’t believe it’s already been eight years since I wanted the Rangers to trade Chris Kreider in order to land Rick Nash before the 2011-12 deadline. The Rangers had a chance to trade a college kid with no professional hockey experience for a Team Canada first-liner for a potential Cup run. The Rangers chose not to make the move and ended up losing in the Eastern Conference finals to New Jersey, losing Games 4, 5 and 6 of the series while scoring only six goals combined in those three games. It’s possible landing Nash could have been the difference in that series and maybe the Rangers beat Los Angeles for the Cup rather than playing and losing to an even better Los Angeles team two years later. Even though the Rangers were able to land Nash that summer without having to include Kreider, I would still make that pre-2012 deadline trade today.

9. When it comes to Kreider now, the only option is to trade him. I keep seeing and hearing about the idea of extending him, but there’s no way Kreider risked injury in his impending free-agent season to lower his contract demands and take a hometown discount. Kreider will be 29 for next season and this is his one chance to cash in. It’s unfortunate his career timeline doesn’t match up with the timeline of this rebuild and he won’t have a chance to compete for another Cup as a Ranger (if only some of his Cup Final breakaways had found the back of the net), but that’s been the case for nearly the entire previous core of Rangers over the last three seasons. The Rangers can’t afford to be overpaying for Kreider on the wrong side of 30 when they will be in need of cap space to pay their new, young core. Sure, Kreider would provide veteran leadership in what’s currently the youngest locker room in the league, but the Rangers won’t be in any position to pay for an intangible in a few years.

10. There are so many ways the next three-plus weeks could play out for the Rangers that it feels like a choose-your-own adventure book as each decision has signficant, franchise-changing ramifications. The Rangers could move only Kreider. They could move no one. They could move everyone mentioned here. They could move players not mentioned here. Whatever they do, it looks like this is it: the last selloff. Two years after sending the letter to fans to publicize their plans to tear the team down and what will be three selloffs later, the Rangers will be on to the next phase of this rebuild.