Rangers News and Notes: Wednesday Afternoon Edition

Doth my eyes deceive me? Is Larry Brooks praising the Rangers here?: (click link for full story)

The power play is snappy and the lineup is filled with kids in prominent roles, but the most striking difference between this Rangers squad and the scores of teams preceding it is that drama only comes in the games.

Rick Carpiniello talks about Sean Avery facing "Fatso" tomorrow night:

Mostly I will be interested to see how Sean Avery plays against his old foil, you-know-who. I will be interested to see if this is the game where Avery becomes a difference-maker again. I am not blaming Avery for anything, not at all. In fact, he has been one of the more reliable Rangers so far. But I haven’t seen the guy who was a difference-maker in almost every game he played down the stretch last season. He has only four penalty minutes, to boot.

Rick will be a guest on the Wednesday night edition of Blueshirt Banter Radio tonight with Mouth, Mandar, and yours truly. We'll also be joined by Mitch Beck, who runs the Hartford Wolfpack blog Howlings.

More after the jump......

This is actually from Monday, but the Rangers moved RW Ryan Hillier from their ECHL team in Charlotte to Hartford.

Detroit Red Wings senior vice-president Jim Devellano, along with former New York Rangers Mark Messier and Mike Richter, will be honored on Wednesday as this year's winners of the Lester Patrick Award. I am pretty sure Mark Messier has won every award known to man with the exception of the Grammy Award for "Best Female Vocalist"

One last thing: Ranger fans in upstate NY have started a petition to get the Sabres off MSG, because they are interrupting Rangers, Devils, and Islanders coverage in places like Utica and Albany . If you want to sign the petition, you can find it here.