Bantering Points: 9/18/17

The Rangers will hit the ice tonight as they welcome the Islanders into MSG for the first pre-season game of 2017. Here are today's news and links:

Rangers News:

• Alex Squadron highlights Jimmy Vesey and Kevin Hayes as two players that must step up if the Rangers want to have successful season (NY Post)
• Larry Brooks took note Chris Kreider's desire to emerge as a star, as well as Brady Skjei's conditioning test scores (NY Post)
• Justin Tasch believes that Brendan Smith will add another layer of leadership to the Blueshirts' locker room. With any luck, that leadership will be worth the $17.4 million he'll be earning in New York. (NY Daily News)
• Steve Zipay heard from Kevin Shattenkirk about his transition to living out his childhood dream (Newsday)
• Alexandra Russo highlights five issues Alain Vigneault must fix before embarking on the 17-18 season (Blue Line Station)
• Dan Carrozzi relays word from Vigneault about Brady Skjei, Kevin Shattenkirk, and more (Blue Line Station)
• Rob Celletti predicts who will make New York's opening night roster (Blue Seat Blogs)
• Matt Calamia made the rounds after practice and spoke with Ryan McDonagh, Brendan Smith, and a few others (Official Team Site)
• Media Availability: Brendan Smith,(8:00) Jimmy Vesey,(3:47) Alain Vigneault,(2:46) Ryan McDonagh,(7:24) Ondrej Pavelec,(5:38) and Rick Nash (3:58) (Official Team Site)
• He was the shortest player to ever play in the NHL, and washed out of the league last fall after being cut from the Rangers' training camp. Yesterday's player in the picture was.....Nathan Gerbe (Wikipedia)/

Around the NHL:

• Matthew Henriques breaks down the trade that sent Jason Demers from the Florida Panthers to the Arizona Coyotes in exchange for Jamie McGinn (Five For Howling)
• The only reason that trade happened was because of Florida's previous attempt at trading Demers to the Vancouver Canucks for Erik Gudbranson was nixed by Demers himself (Sportsnet)
• Toronto Maple Leafs forward Joffrey Lupul took to Instagram to call out his team's use of Injured Reserve to make "injured" players "disappear" (Sportsnet)
• Adam Gretz reflects on Dale Tallon's successful attempt at undoing a majority of the good work the Panthers' previous front office regime did (NBC Sports)
• Craig Morgan believes that the Colorado Avalanche have crossed the point of no return with forward Matt Duchene (FanRag)

Do you know who the former Ranger in the picture is?