Stick a Fork in Him

Larry Brooks has written three consecutive stories in the past two weeks detailing the non-details about Brendan Shanahan’s murky situation with the Rangers. Bottom-line: Brendan wants to play for the Rangers and he does not have a contract. Larry has a man-crush on Brendan.

Camp has started and Shanahan is not on the ice at the Ranger training facility. Good. I had no problem with the Ranger version 1, and Ranger version 2 of Shanny. But I say "no" to a potential version 3. Shanahan displayed an alarming drop-off in production during the second half of last season. And his defense and power-play skills looked extremely diminished.

Some fans in the Ranger universe have suggested that he could play less minutes on the 3rd or 4th line.

I’m not going to draw cute little proposed line charts but, personally, I would hope the Rangers 4th line is such a hard skating, hard banging 4th line that an old guy like Shanahan would look out of place out there.

A similar thing can be said about the 3rd line — being an energy line. Shanahan chugging up the ice behind the play is not going to help anyone except the medic alert company.

Some within the nutty Ranger universe have talked about the value of his one-timer. As good as it is — the one-timer is typically not a shot used too often on a 3rd or 4th line. Those lines only occasionally set up the offense with the cycle. Instead they are cutting to and from the net, attacking at angles, not nifty little passes back to the slot allowing for a 1-timer. Shanahan is wrong for those lines. He used to be a top 6 forward. But he is no longer the best option for the Rangers.

The last argument used by the sign-shanny-now crowd is his leadership. Of course this leadership role assumes diminished ice-time. This is the most precarious reason of all. If there is one thing true about the dog-eat-dog world of hockey is that leadership is not a give-away quota program. In hockey leadership happens with play on the ice. Not in the locker room. Shanahan himself told goofy Larry Brooks — "I appreciate compliments about my role as a leader or mentor, but I'm not playing in the NHL this year to be a, 'Good locker room guy,' . . ."

Glad to see Brendan agrees. Now answer the phone from John Davidson, or Brian Burke. Obviously they don’t see the fork stuck in your backside.