Not Quite Ready For Prime Time

After watching the latest debacle against the Lightning I have come to the conclusion that the Rangers are not ready for prime time. That is, they are not contenders for the big prize, at least right now. In the old days of baseball when they had two leagues of eight teams each, the top four in each league were called the first division, the bottom four were called the second division. The Rangers right now are a second division team. They are eight points behind the second place Islanders and rank eight in the East.

Sure we have beaten Montreal and Pittsburgh, but look at our record against Tampa Bay. We were outscored 15-7 and our goaltending, Lundqvist, was awful. In fifteen days they beat us three times. Lundqvist now has a GAA of 2.70 and a save % of .905. But he isn't the only culprit. Tampa's goalie, Bishop, is now 9-0-0 against the Rangers. He says he is inspired by seeing Lundqvist in the nets for the Rangers. Maybe we should bring up the Hartford goalie and put him opposite Bishop.

Nash and St.Louis are performing well. However, the players coming back from injuries: Stepan, Boyle, McDonagh have taken a while to return to form, and Boyle is out again as is Tanner. Also, the young players, Miller, Hayes, Fast and Duclair have not played to their potential. And why not? They are in the lineup, they are out of the lineup. They are recalled from Hartford, they are sent to Hartford. They play on different lines every night. They get short sifted. They spend too much time during the game sitting on the pine.

So it's win one, lose one. We are now at 11-9-4. We are inconsistent and with 25% of the season gone its getting late early. The players seem to be there. The talent seems to be there. Who knows? Maybe it's the coach that's not ready for prime time.