The Rangers and Brian Leetch are on the verge of a contract agreement that will keep the captain off the unrestricted free agent market and in New York for the foreseeable future, sources familiar with discussions between the parties have told The Post.
According to informed sources, a meeting yesterday between Leetch’s representative, Jay Grossman, and team GM Neil Smith yielded progress to the point where a framework for a multi-year agreement was essentially reached. Though there remain unresolved issues, the parties, scheduled to meet again today, are optimistic that a final agreement will come within the next 48 hours.
It is believed that Leetch, a Ranger since February of 1988 and clearly the team’s most important player, will earn between $9 and $10 million a season, salary heights heretofore reached by only Jaromir Jagr and Peter Forsberg. It’s a number that shatters the previous $6M standard for defenseman established by Raymond Bourque.
Leetch, a two-time Norris Trophy winner, would have become eligible for unrestricted free agency on July 1. The captain had repeatedly made it clear that he wanted to remain with the Rangers and had no real desire to test the market but would if the team did not reward him with a franchise-player-like contract.
The Rangers thus were able to sign both of their marquee pending unrestricted free agents before the opening of the market, having reached a four-year agreement with Adam Graves toward the end of the season.
In keeping Leetch, the Rangers can now go forward with a summer reconstruction process that is expected to include attempts to sign unrestricted free agents including Colorado defenseman Sylvain Lefevbre, Colorado winger Valeri Kamensky, Montreal defenseman Stephane Quintal, and, perhaps, San Jose center Vincent Damphousse. The Rangers are also expected to investigate the availability by trade of Detroit winger Brendan Shanahan, Colorado winger Claude Lemieux and St. Louis center Pierre Turgeon. Young San Jose defenseman Andrei Zyuzin and young Phoenix defenseman Oleg Tverdovsky are also on a Ranger want-list.
But the signing of Leetch, second in the NHL last season in ice time (29:35) to St. Louis’ Chris Pronger, was always the critical centerpiece to any Ranger effort to regain respectability. Leetch’s departure would have left the Rangers as a northeast version of Tampa Bay. Ranger management knew it, Wayne Gretzky knew it – he advised the Dolan family as much in each of his retirement week meetings with ownership – and ultimately so did Cablevision.
Still, it was only this week that talks turned serious, only this week that the Rangers presented Leetch with their first post-season offer. Once the Rangers understood that Leetch would not initiate the bargaining by giving the team the number that would get the deal done, negotiations began in earnest during a meeting on Tuesday that was followed by yesterday’s productive session.
Leetch, who finished last season with 13 goals (including the one off a Gretzky feed in the finale) and 42 assists, was the Rangers’ first selection, ninth overall, in the 1986 Entry Draft. He made his Ranger debut on Feb. 29, 1988, joining the team following the Calgary Olympics, where he was a member of Team USA.
