Barring a trade to shed significant salary, don’t expect any fireworks from the Rangers when the free-agent market begins Friday. At this point, they simply don’t have the salary-cap space to add a long-term, lucrative contract from the list of top players available.
The Blueshirts have $57.7 million committed to 15 players; that’s not counting the $925,000 for prospect Pavel Buchnevich, expected to make the roster. The salary cap is $73 million, which leaves about between $14 million to spend on restricted free agents Chris Kreider, J.T. Miller and Kevin Hayes (who together could receive about $9 million) and players to fill out the roster.