Battle Of Hudson

This one’s official, as we welcome our new Isles blogger, Frank!

Welcome Frank, you’ve been commenting here for a while, so you know the drill.

Frank will be covering the Isles for us on an everyday basis, while Rob will look in at the team weekly as usual.

Hopefully we can set up some “PTI” style debates between them in the near future.

Tom Gulitti is reporting at his Fire & Ice blog that the Devils signed former Ranger goalie/Devil Killer Kevin Weekes to be Marty Brodeur’s backup.

Absolutely a smart signing for Lou. My faith in him is rising back. Now give us one more d-man (Souray? Sutton? Anyone?) and we’ll be essentially back where we started.

No terms were available at the time of this report.

Thanks to our friend Robert for this…

From John dellapina’s Rangers blog:

Prucha Gets 2-Year Deal

One more down. Four more to go.

The Rangers have re-signed forward Petr Prucha to a two-year deal worth $1.6 million per.

That leaves Henrik Lundqvist, Brendan Shanahan, Sean Avery and Marcel Hossa left to re-up and the Rangers with $10-11 million worth of cap space to do it.

Of course, there are a couple of wrinkles.

During the offseason, teams can go 10 pecent above the team cap (from $50.3 million to $55.33 million) as long as they get back under the $50.3 million figure by the last day of training camp. But Darius Kasparaitis’ $3 million counts in that accounting until he’s sent back to the minors at camp.

Players over 35 can sign one-year deals with lower base salaries and easily-attainable bonuses that allow teams to defer cap compliance. By the end of the season, all the bonuses paid will count and any team over the cap will have that much less cap room the next season. In the meantime, though, players can be sent to the minors and traded in order to clear room. Which means that Brendan Shanahan can sign a lower-base, heavy-on-bonuses deal that can get him back to around $4 million for next season without the Rangers having to count all of it until year’s end.

As for the unsigned four, Shanahan is on the verge. Lundqvist is hammering out a new deal. Avery is likely to take the Rangers to salary arbitration. Hossa is unlikely to get much more than his qualifying offer.

So far, no big news. Reportedly, the Devils are a few details away from Souray, but I’m still extremely skeptical about the possibility.

If they signed Souray, here’s what NJD would look like next year:

Elias-Parise-Gionta
Zubrus-Zajac-Langenbrunner
Pandolfo-Madden-Brylin
Clarkson-Rupp-Janssen

Souray-Matvichuk
White-Martin
Rachunek/Greene/Oduya/Corrente

1st PWR PLAY:
Elias-Parise-Gionta
Langenbrunner-Souray

2nd PWR PLAY:
Zubrus-Zajac-Clarkson
Rachunek-Martin

July 7th: Steve Works at Live Earth
July 11th: NHL Schedule Released
July 12th: Steve’s Annual “Predict the NHL on VERSUS and NHL on NBC” Contest For Those with Really Nothing to Do.
July 13th: Steve’s Annual “Create a completely new TV Schedule for the NHL to Sell to a Better Network” Extravaganza.

July 20th: Battle of New York goes on hiatus for about 6 Weeks. Only our newest bloggers will be allowed to do occasional posts (i.e. weekly) as a tryout for the new season.

Sept. 1st: Battle of New York makes it’s triumphant return to all 7 of it’s adoring fans.

Speaking of new bloggers…joining us soon should be our new “Everyday” Isles blogger, Frank. Frank will be keeping up on the torture on the Isle every day, where as Rob will remain restrained to weekly.

Also, in the fall, Derek will be shifting to more weekly duty. We’re still looking for an additional Rangers blogger! Remember, SMLepore@comcast.net is the address to go to! We also need a weekly Devils blogger, so e-mail me if interested in joining the team.

Until then, enjoy the speculation! See you for more news and (hopefully) a new Devil!

I felt it was time to jazz up the site a little bit.

It’s still a blogger template, so it shouldn’t be too confusing.

All over the place, rumors are swirling that the Devils are going to sign Souray for somewhere between 5.5-6 million.

Sabres re-signed Teppo Numminen for 1 year, $2.6M.

Oilers signed Matt Greene for 2 years.

Fedotenko signs with the Isles for 1 year, $2.9M

And a Biggie: Slava Kozlov signs a multi-year deal with the Thrash.

Easy: Pick the Best Signing So Far…

My votes would be torn between Ouelett in TB, Lang in CHI, Kariya in STL, and Drury with NYR.

What’s your take on this lovely Independence Day?

Minnesota re-signed Wez Walz for 1 year.

Vancouver signed Curtis Sanford – 1 Year, $600K

Raffi Torres re-signed in Edmonton. 3 Years, $6.75M total.

Kings signed Brad Stuart – 1 Year, $3.5 Mill. Kings continue to build.

Brad Ference is signed with the Red Wings.

Speaking of the Kings, Jason LaBarbera signed a 2-year extension with them. Finally, they can keep him at the NHL level.