What if the Rangers opt to walk away from Ryan Strome

The Rangers are hammering out deals with restricted free agents over the last few days. They signed Alexandar Georgiev and Tony DeAngelo a few days ago along with two Wolf Pack resignings yesterday.

Two more remain with Brendan Lemieux and Ryan Strome. While many anticipate Lemieux’s deal to come before his arbitration hearing on November 6th, no one is sure about Strome.

Ryan Strome is more difficult situation

The Rangers currently have around $10 million in cap space to sign both. Reality is that number is close to $7 million because of performance bonuses. So if we anticipate Lemieux to come in between $1.5 million, which I feel will be closer to $2 million, that leaves the Rangers very little wiggle room for Strome.

ryan strome contract
Ryan Strome and Artemi Panarin celebrate (Photo by Jared Silber/NHLI via Getty Images)

Ideally the Rangers would like to get Strome in around $4 million to $4.5. Of course that is a marginal raise to his current $3.1 deal. If they get to arbitration, he could receive over $5 million and put the Rangers in a bind.

What if the Rangers walk away?

I doubt it will happen, but if the Rangers were to walk away from a large Strome reward what will they do? Well, they could simply opt to move Filip Chytil up to the second line center and slot Morgan Barron as the 3C.

They could also bring in cheaper options like Erik Haula for instance. Of course, plan B if it is still available would be Mikael Granlund on a team friendly deal.

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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