Rangers vs Canes Afterthoughts: Breaking Corsi and Patrick Marleau trade BS!

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CF% by game for NYR (war-on-ice)

CF% by game for NYR (war-on-ice)

Chalk another win for the anti-corsi Rangers last night. Yup folks the Blueshirts are now 11-2-2 on this young season and continue to irritate and mystify the advanced stats community.

Their record when losing the corsi battle that so many fancy stat bloggers hold dear is 10-1-1. Matter of fact when they do win the corsi war, they are just 1-1-1 which makes them very sad.

For me, I watched the Rangers come out of the gate slow against Carolina. Held up to the pressure and kept shots out of the more dangerous areas of the ice. The team gave Henrik Lundqvist clear sight on many of the Canes shots and when your goalie is that elite, he’s going to stop them. FYI, apparently Annti Raanta is elite also because he hasn’t lost in his 3 appearances.

After about the 8 minute mark, the Rangers started to get it together and eventually exploded and exposed a weaker Hurricanes team. First it was Jesper Fast who capitalized on a loose puck for a quick snapper past Cam Ward. That was followed by Rick Nash‘s beauty move across the “slot-line” (more on that in a future piece) for the 2-0 lead.

If not for the string of penalties against the Rangers, they probably would have poured it on further. Ryan McDonagh pinballed the third marker early in the final period and it was basically game over for Carolina.

Never once in that contest did I feel threatened by the Hurricanes. The Rangers appeared in control from the midway point of the first period on. Even on the PP, the Canes couldn’t muster much. Save for some amazing quick hands by Jeff Skinner, this was an easy win (although corsi stats would have you believe the Rangers were under siege and dominated).

For the record, I did my own analysis and it appears the fancy stats DON’T mean more wins. You can read that here.

Mats Zuccarello is the Rangers best forward so far

The play he made on Nash goal was a snapshot on just how incredible and deft a playmaker he’s been this year. His head/shot fake drew both Canes defender to him as Nash snuck behind. His threadlike pass hit Nash in stride who was able to take it in and stuff it around Ward. Slick play and he should only continue to improve.

Emerson Etem finally looked like a fit to me

I have been hard on the kid and still feel he needs to continue to compete harder. However, given ice time, his game is starting to fit into AV’s system. The kid deserves credit. On the fourth line, he used his size and speed to his advantage and was a factor in getting the Rangers on the board first. While Dominic Moore was the odd man out last night, a rotation between him, Etem and Stoll could be possible in the early going.

Dan Girardi Bashing is reaching Super Stupid Levels Girardi played a great game last night and even got an assist on the Nash tally. Apparently Girardi who was a -12 in silly corsi events is the reason everyone he plays with suffers. Here’s the Rangerd worse offenders last night via war-on-ice (it’s the last negative number to the far right).

Screen Shot 2015-11-11 at 2.28.04 PM So even though his partner was a -12 (McDonagh) and the forward line he played with most was worse…he’s the problem. Oh, and he apparently infected Kevin Klein and Keith Yandle who are corsi blogger darlings this season too. However, it was in the third period that the vitriol was amped up to 11. With a 3-0 lead Henrik Lundqvist made an incredible cross ice stop.

On the play, the puck bounced over two Rangers sticks. The last stick belonged to Dan Girardi. No one mentions the first Rangers to miss the puck or the fact that Ryan McDonagh completely failed in his job on the subsequent 2-1 opportunity. In the clip below, you can see that he fails to stop the pass which is his job in that situation. But yeah…Dan Girardi sucks. Ryan McDonagh is great by the way…my point is that it’s hockey and all teams make mistakes, even corsi darling players.   

Afterwards, twitter lit up with ridiculous Girardi hate. Very few actually admitted they were wrong after…just par for the course now that Tanner Glass is gone. My favorite is Dan Girardi didn’t play it like a shortstop to lead it off.

Girardi hate tweets...yes it's a thing

Girardi hate tweets…yes it’s a thing

Henrik Lundqvist has a darkside…

I wrote about the stick melee earlier, but here’s a glimpse at Hank looking on at the chaos he caused. MUAHAHAHAHA

Patrick Marleau isn’t coming here for about 6 million reasons

So reports have surfaced that Patrick Marleau of the Sharks would consider waiving his no-trade clause to go to three teams and of course…1 is the NYR. Aside from needing to clear out SIGNIFICANT cap space which means moving a roster player…he’s 36 years old and gets paid 6.7M on the cap until 2017.

Of course, everyone is like “let’s trade Girardi, Staal or Boyle for him” and some suggested Nash. Nash! This is for real some stupid stuff. Here’s my quick tweet on the matter.

So you still want Marleau? Then tell me which of these young Rangers you say goodbye to? Because none of the guys you mentioned above (no matter how stupid it sounds) is going to waive their no move/trade clauses to make YOU happy.

BREAKING: INSIDE VIDEO SHOWS DAN GIRARDI REACTING TO TWITTER HATE

By Anthony Scultore

Anthony Scultore has been covering the New York Rangers and the NHL since 2014. His work also appears at... More about Anthony Scultore

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