Rangers expected to sign gritty veteran to three-year deal
Sam Carrick.
The New York Rangers are expected to sign forward Sam Carrick to a three-year, $3M contract per David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period. The deal was first reported by St. Louis Blues rinkside reporter Andy Strickland.
Carrick continued to improve his stat line this season — though he wasn’t focused much on scoring. Instead, Carrick recorded 111 penalty minutes in 77 games this season, a career-high in the NHL and the most he’s recorded since the 2014-15 AHL season.
Ninety of those penalty minutes came in 61 games with the Anaheim Ducks, though Carrick dialed things back a bit after moving to the Edmonton Oilers are the Trade Deadline. He recorded a much more modest 12 penalty minutes in 16 regular-season games with Edmonton, though he added 12 more penalty minutes in 10 postseason games.
Between the two teams, Carrick also posted a meager 10 goals and 16 points.
Carrick is certainly not known for his scoring, with his career totals up to 53 points and 316 penalty minutes in 240 games after his eighth season in the NHL. But Carrick makes up for the lack of scoring with grit and intangibles, boasting a dazzling 63.1 faceoff-percentage in his brief stint with Edmonton — bringing his success rate at the faceoff dot up to 50.7 percent across his career.
He’s served as a stout, bottom-line centerman with the ability to play penalty-killing minutes, when it’s not his own penalties that are being killed. He’ll offer depth down New York’s depth chart following the loss of Alexander Wennberg to the open market.
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