I’m going to tell you right now, Heatley is not going to be a Ranger this season.

There are far too many stars that need to align in order to make this happen.  But don’t go anywhere, I’m going to discuss which star alignments are necessary and pretend that this deal is going to go down.  Let’s break this down.

To start with Heatley’s cap hit is a whoppin’ $7.5M.  That’s ok because he pops in 40-50 goals consistently.  The Ranger’s available cap space is $7.8M.  $7.5 is less than $7.8, YAY it works!  Not so fast.  New York only has 15 players under contract.  Most teams go into the season with 23.  Tampa Bay already has 25.  This means that with the $7.8M, Sather needs to sign at least 8 more players.  If they sign each of those 8 at $850k, then that takes $6.8M of cap space up, leaving only $1M.

So we have $1M, which makes Heatley’s $7.5M now $6.5M.  Let’s make a deal!

Before we go New York Ranger shopping, we need to consult their do-not-disturb list, ie players with no-trade clauses.  This list includes Drury, Redden, Rozsival, and the jury is still out on whether or not Kotalik has one.  I haven’t found a single legitimate source.  So for the sake of fun, we’re going to assume that Kotalik is in play, and has no no-trade clause.

Right off the bat, it’s recently signed Kotalik and Brashear who have the most cap space to contribute with their $3M and $1.4M respectively.  $2.1M is now required from the Rangers in order to make this deal cap-friendly.  Ryan Callahan can certainly make this deal fit, with his $2.3M cap hit.  However, Callahan scored 52 goals in his last season with the Guelph Storm, and popped in 22 last season.  At 24, I say he’s got too much potential for Sather to give up.  But, Sather may say something else.  Chris Higgins‘ cap hit is $2.25M, but he’s a centreman, and the Rangers badly need quality centremen.  You can’t simply mishmash a bunch of forwards like we used to do in pond hockey, Mr. Scanlan.  Marc Staal has been the main headliner in this whole deal.  This guy is quietyly becoming the Ranger’s future captain and a serious shutdown defenseman.  Why any GM would move this kid is unknown to me.  Think Scott Stevens, but with more intelligence.  His salary hit is only $827K.  We’re either going to have to include another defenseman Girardi with his $1.55M, his and Staal’s total $2.37M, or we’re going to have to convince Sather that Callahan needs to be part of this.  There is a lot of talk about Brandon Dubinsky.  The thing is that he’s not on the Ranger’s books at the moment, so he doesn’t help make this deal cap-friendly.

Let’s take a look at what we have.

Heatley’s 40-50 goals

for

Kotalik’s 20 goals, 23 assists
Brashear’s 1 goal, 3 assists, 121 PIM
Callahan’s bright future
1st Round 2010, 1st Round 2011

The biggest problem with this deal is that Kotalik and Brashear do little for Murray.  $4.4M in cap space for a couple of suit-case Charlies doesn’t exactly justify moving Heatley.  The 2nd biggest problem is that Glen Sather needs a #1 centreman in a bigway.  Chris Drury’s 22 goals just isn’t justifying the $7M scam job he did to NYR.  When you start to add in players like Staal and Callahan, it becomes that much more painful for Sather.

That said, I do see one possible way in which we could see Heatley traded, involving the Rangers.  At least Bruce was right about the Sharks being the number one possible destination.  The Sharks badly want Heatley, and have lots of moveable expensive pieces like Cheechoo, Michalek, and Clowe.  The Sens don’t want Cheechoo, they’ve been open about that.  And, they are after Joe Thornton, so fat chance of that happening.  However, if Marleau were to go to the Rangers, Sather would get his centreman.  Heatley could go to the Sharks, and have say Michalek come back, and perhaps the Rangers could toss in something extra.

Not exactly slam dunk material, but it’s the closest to reality that I’ve read.  Marleau waiving his no-trade clause may never happen.  There is speculation that he’s open to it, but not for an Eastern Conference team.  Bottome line, Heatley is not going to New York.