Rangers More Limited In Options To Replace Wheeler This Season

Blake Wheeler suffered a leg injury in the New York Rangers' previous game and after evaluation, is considered month-to-month. He is expected to miss the remainder of the regular season and likely all of the playoffs. So, after the Rangers got this veteran winger at a huge discount in the offseason, they will be hard pressed to find a replacement around the same cap hit who can have the same impact.

The obvious option for the Rangers is to try to scour the trade market and find someone with a cap hit of under $1 million AAV like Wheeler has to replace his production. That isn't as easy as it sounds. Their best option for that second line role may actually come internally from Jimmy Vesey or Kaapo Kakko. Vesey has had another underrated season in which he has scored 12 goals and 18 points in 52 games. Wheeler only had nine goals and 21 points in 54 games.

As for Kakko, everyone is still waiting for him to take the next step like Alexis Lafreniere has. Kakko is playing on the third line and still has the potential at age 23, but with an opportunity, this is the time. I wouldn't hold my breath on Kakko this season and moving Vesey up still takes his production out of the bottom-six, so here's a few options that may have to suffice.

The Rangers have nearly $4.5 million in cap space right now, but they have both a bottom-six center role and a winger role to address. Before this injury, there was more cap to direct just to finding a centerman. Teams can eat salary to make it work and may have to in order for the Rangers to fill both holes. Players like Scott Laughton, Frank Vatrano, Nic Dowd, Anthony Duclair, Jack Roslovic, and more could all help the Rangers this season. It will be interesting to see what players they do end up getting, because sitting on their hands is not an option.