Varying Reports Over Rangers Potential Offer For Richards

As we await the Brad Richards today there are conflicting reports floating around about what exactly the New York Rangers offered the center to come to Broadway.  Last night, after it was decided there would be no decision, Bob McKenzie of TSN reported that the Rangers were offering a heavily front-loaded deal for nine-years that could be worth $63 and $65 million


Larry Brooks of the New York Post counters that report this morning with one suggesting a shorter term if not less per season.

It is believed the Rangers originally offered a frontloaded deal of between 6-8 years representing an average of $6.5-7M per, the contract structure largely based on Buffalo's Christian Ehrhoff model, with huge money and signing bonuses pushed into the first 12 months to provide protection against a possible rollback or lockout.

The key to the differential in the two reports could simply be that Brooks had sources on the Rangers original offer and New York upped what they were willing to give in response to the other offers out there.  This would make sense because Brooks did say yesterday that the Rangers would be given the chance to match other offers in the end.

Both sets of numbers are frightening in terms of the long-term impact to the team, but obviously the six year end of the speculation is a lot better than the nine-year term would be.