New York Rangers Spotlight: Dan Girardi
At season's end, Rob did an analysis of each player on the roster, and gave some thoughts on what lies ahead for each player. Since so many of you are new to Blueshirt Banter, we thought we would bring some of those profiles to you again. Today we have Rob's look at Dan Girardi:
#5 - Daniel Girardi (Age: 25) - Grade: B
Let's get one thing straight, Dan Girardi is the Rangers #2 Defenseman in my book. I see him as a Defensive Defenseman with a little offensive flair. If I had one word to describe Girardi's season, I would call it sporadic. I don't think he was inconsistent, just more like all over the place at some times. The situation with Girardi is if you notice him that means he made a mistake. He is solid overall on Defense along with the breakout. If he is having a good game, you rarely notice him because it is mistake-free. That's how it goes with Defensive D-men.
Either way, I thought Dan had a solid third season with the Blueshirts despite a -14 +/- rating and 53 penalty minutes. He put on a lot of weight coming into this season, so I think he will be better acclimated to his body come September 2009.
Contract Status: Girardi will make $1.6M this year, it is the final year of his contract. He will become a restricted free agent after this season