Overall it was a slow news day for the Rangers, but there were some tidbits that can all be wrapped up at one time. Let us first start with the minor trade of a few hours ago where the Rangers shipped out malcontent Nigel Williams for Stu Bickel who is a tough player, but is really more of an ECHL defender than anything else. The move was purely about getting Nigel Williams out of the room in the AHL as he had been demanding a trade for since the spring and never realized that the best way to get traded was to play well enough for someone to actually want to acquire you. I would not expect much from Bickel as he has been a healthy scratch many times this year in Syracuse, but maybe he will give us a good fight or two.
In better news as was clearly expected 2010 2nd round draft pick Christian Thomas was awarded the OHL player of the week with the likely announcement of his as CHL player of the week coming tomorrow when the choice is made. As I said in the prospect stats update Thomas had an outstanding week scoring 5 goals and adding 5 assists while being a plus 5 in just two games of action. Just as if not more impressive than the numbers themselves was the fact that Thomas scored in all phases of the game and scored at important stages of both games.
Finally on the NHL level there were no definitive answers in terms of the returns of Michal Rozsival, Chris Drury and Vinny Prospal but there was some news. The goal now for Rozsival is for him to play on Friday as he recovers from the should strain and the PRP treatment he had in the past week. He participated in practice today wearing a yellow non-contact jersey. Chris Drury for his part watched practice from the bench and then did on ice conditioning drills following the team practice. Vinny Prospal has yet to resume skating and does not know when he will but he is said to be progressing with his pool rehabilitation and no change has been made to the prior mid-late December timeline.
