Podcast Ombudsman Report for Blueshirt Bandwidth Ep. 82
Joe and Eric mixed up Michael and William Nylander, fudged Jagr's post-Rangers timeline, and did some questionable math on McDavid's hometown discount. Charlie corrects the record.
Welcome back to the Blueshirt Bandwidth Podcast Ombudsman Report. Each week, Charlie Vidal will listen to the latest episode of the podcast and correct the record on anything Joe and Eric get wrong. If you aren't already, you can listen and subscribe to the podcast here.
Michael Nylander
The discussion of New York Rangers legend Martin Straka brought up the Rangers tenure of Michael Nylander, who had the good fortune of centering Jaromir Jagr for two seasons.
As Joe and Eric said, he was at his best with the Rangers, putting up 162 points in 160 regular season games. Despite that success, the Rangers decided to let Michael Nylander walk during the 2007 offseason, “upgrading” at the center position by signing Scott Gomez and Chris Drury as free agents. The most points that either of them put up in a single season was Gomez’s 70 during the 2007-08 season, and as has previously been covered by the Ombudsman, neither played out the contract they signed with the Rangers (or any team). We are still paying for the sins of the 2007 offseason to this day.
Unfortunately, Joe and Eric repeatedly referred to Michael Nylander as William Nylander. William Nylander is Michael Nylander’s 30 year old son who is on the Toronto Maple Leafs, at least until they decide that he isn’t a 16 game player and trade him for more grit.
Michael Nylander’s career high in points was 83 with the 2005-06 Rangers. William has topped that total three times, and came close this season by putting up 79 points despite missing 17 games.
While discussing Jagr and his long and illustrious career, Eric mistakenly said that “Jagr went on to play 10 more seasons in the NHL.” Jagr actually went to the KHL to play three seasons with Omsk Avangard before returning to the NHL for 7 more seasons with the Philadelphia Flyers, Dallas Stars, Boston Bruins, New Jersey Devils, Florida Panthers, and Calgary Flames before finally calling it quits in the NHL in January 2018.
Jagr has since gone back to Czechia where he still played nine more seasons for the Kladno Knights, including six games this season. While Jagr has not officially retired, he said that his professional hockey career is likely complete in March.
Rangers International Incident
The question of which Ranger is most likely to cause an international incident reminds us of the fact that the Rangers already traded the one player who actually caused an international incident, which the Ombudsman covered back in December.
2014 Eastern Conference Final
While discussing the 2014 Eastern Conference Final, Eric said that he remembers the Rangers beating the Canadiens 7-1 in Game 1. Game 1 was actually a 7-2 Rangers win. Carey Price was pulled during the second intermission and would not play again in the series.
McDavid Contract
Eric and Joe suggested that McDavid gave the Oilers a discount between $5 million and $15 million. Connor McDavid’s extension is for an AAV of $12.5 million starting next season. The NHL salary cap is going to be $104 million next season. The maximum player contract is 20 percent of the salary cap, which is $20.8 million. Therefore, McDavid is giving the Oilers an $8.3 million discount for the next two seasons.
Draft Lottery
It was awfully bold of Joe and Eric to make predictions about how the draft lottery is going to go for the Rangers when they’re going to be live streaming during the lottery. For the record, Joe predicted that the Rangers will pick fifth and Eric predicted that the Rangers will pick third.
