Arthur Staple writes in The Athletic that Jacob Trouba was “about to be named Captain” prior to this past season and then someone “above” Gerard Gallant decided to go with the six alternate Captains.
Staple writes that the decision may also have come from “above” Chris Drury as well. (The Athletic)
When asked about naming a Captain on Monday, Gerard Gallant said “It’s too early to talk about, we’re going to talk about that again, obviously, real hard, but right now we haven’t talked about it, me and Chris and ownership. It’s just too early for that, but we’ll talk about and discuss it for sure. If we could have went a little further you would have gotten an indication (smile).”
Between the Pittsburgh and Carolina series, Gallant said “if we decide on picking a Captain someday, then that is fine with me, but I love it when our team is about 23-guys, not about a Captain and two Assistant Captains. For me, it’s worked really good with our group this year.”
Gallant said prior to the season that Chris Drury told him that he would have make the “final decision” on choosing the Captain and he decided to go with the group of six.
Adam Rotter: It seemed odd to hear Gallant mention “ownership” in his response to the question about naming a Captain. It does make sense that James Dolan or other high level MSG execs, plus Glen Sather, would have a say in which player gets to wear the “C,” but it felt jarring to hear at the same time.
I don’t think that having six “A’s” this season hurt the Rangers at all, but at some point they do have to name a Captain. I had thought/hoped that once Mika Zibanejad signed his long-term deal that he would skate out at the home opener wearing the “C,” but the Rangers stuck with the six “A’s.”
The Rangers, at this point, have no shortage of candidates. Zibanejad is their best two-way player, Chris Kreider has had an “A” forever, is the last link to the prior era of success and he just scored 50+ goals. Both are signed long-term and it would seem like if either of them was going to be named Captain, that it would have been done.
Because of that, heading into last season Trouba seemed like the obvious choice. The issue with Trouba was that his play on the ice didn’t really warrant it through his first two years. That changed this past season as he became everything the Rangers hoped he would be, delivered momentum changing hits, was stout defensively and even a bigger offensive contributor. His demeanor is also one that is very even keeled and I think that would also be a big appeal. I think he deserves the “C” a lot more than he did heading into last season.
Then there is the Adam Fox factor as the team’s best player not named Igor Shesterkin. The Rangers could put the “C” on Fox and I don’t think anything in his game would change and because of how great of a player he is, I’m not sure anyone would really have an issue with it.
I wonder if they would go with co-captains and that would allow the Rangers to essentially keep six players with letters. They could have a home and road captain and then home and road alternates. My initial though on co-captains would be Kreider and Zibanejad since they are basically attached at the hip as it is, but I could also see just naming Trouba and rotating the home and road alternate captains.