How high the moon! How high the Rangers revival mode!
You can't any higher than having the two highest – 6-8 and 6-8 – NHL players in the fold. That's been accomplished now that GM Chris Drury has both Adam Edstrom well-inked
along with Matt Rempe. The Twin Towers won't overflow with dough but will be happy. They're guaranteed, full-time work on the fourth line.
"This is definite progress," says The Old Scout, "because Mike Sullivan now has a solid, tough, huge fourth line. He can play Jonny Brodzinski, rounding out the big guys."
One of the few sources hope was evident last season when Rempe and Edstrom teamed up but the Rangers joy to the world abruptly ended when Edstrom suffered a late season-ended injury.
"That not only hurt Adam," adds The Old Scout, "it also set back what loomed as an effective, digging unit that gave some of the grit it so badly needed."
The other issue was coach Peter Laviolette's refusal to acknowledge their ability to tilt a game the New Yorkers' way.
"If Sullivan uses his head," asserts The Old Scout, "he could even use Rempe and Edstrom on a second power play unit. Matt would be screening the goalie while Adam does the dirty digging in the corners."
The Maven can assure you that Drury insisted from his coach an assurance that Sully will give this fourth line quality ice time. Otherwise he wouldn't have signed both to two-year deals.
As for Brodzinski, he's proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that he's a master of all the grit business and doubles as a lamplighter as well.
That's high praise from The Maven, but not higher than 6-8 Rempe and his mountainous brother forward from Sweden.