Wearing the As and C This Year

The conventional wisdom right now is that Chris Drury will likely be named captain of the Rangers during the preseason. I’d be fine with that, as Drury has always been a leader and a winner. He’s a class guy and would do a fine job. However, I don’t think he’s necessarily the only legit choice.

A guy I wasn’t impressed with when he signed – and I've heard people say nobody is really impressed with him unless he plays for your team – was Scott Gomez. But seeing Gomez’ leadership and enthusiasm and connection with the other guys makes me think he’s a terrific choice for captain as well. At the very least he should be wearing an Alternate “A.”

As for the other “A,” with Marty Straka gone and Brendan Shanahan in limbo, I feel a solid choice for it would be defenseman Michael Rozsival. Rozsival has been a consistent, talented backliner for the past couple of years and it’s been so much fun seeing him grow up before our eyes, getting high-pressure minutes in the ‘05’-’06 campaign and never giving any reason why he shouldn’t continue getting those minutes.

Markus Naslund will likely be in the running for an “A” as well and that’s more than fair. While the guy is new to the Rangers, he’s been a captain before and has been well-respected in that role.

These are critical decisions that I know Tom Renney takes seriously. For the entirety of the ’05-’06 season he went with three “A” designations and no “C,” which I remember thinking was simply brilliant. The last captain had been Messier, which nobody on that team was qualified to follow. And with no expectations and very young team, it made sense to see who would step up. And as the wonderful results were yielding a 100-point season, Renney saw no reason to mess with it. It wasn’t until the playoff loss to the Devils that it became apparent that the Rangers needed an officially designated leader. And by then one had emerged in Jagr.

This season brings about some uncertainty as well and while I’d love to try to recapture the magic by using the three-A system again, I think there’s too much leadership already established to try that again and doing so would just seem like a gimmick.

Let’s give it to Drury and let him lead.