Dear Rangers: Are You Smoking Crack?

After last night's game against the Flyers, during which Gaborik caught a  beatdown from caveman and noted heavyweight Daniel Carcillo, there is no room subtlety.

HEY RANGERS ARE YOU SMOKING CRACK!?!?!?!11!>?!!>!

Marian Gaborik.  Best player on the team.  By a longshot.  Without him, they're a draft lottery contender, no question.  So, naturally, when he's getting beat up, you do what anyone would do.

You watch!

How can you watch Philly's most notorious goon (and this is a Philly team with like, four of them) beat up Marian Gaborik (the best player on the team, in case you forgot)?  If Gabby gets injured in a fight, the season's more or less over.  Unfortunately for us fans, Hank cannot score goals, he can only prevent them.  Without Gabby no one will score goals except Ryan Callahan, sometimes, and Vinny Prospal, four months ago.  This kind of thinking would seem to dictate that you might want to jump on in there and break up a fight that Gabby is in, especially when he is losing it so badly!  Well think again, because the guys on the ice were happier watching it all go down than actually doing something.

The whole episode speaks to a larger problem with this squad.  They don't respect the sweater.  What happened when no one stepped in last night was that the team and its fans were embarassed.   There's a tradition involved here.  Sure, the Rangers have only won four cups, but they're a historic team.  Wearing a Rangers jersey is not like wearing a Thrashers jersey, or a Stars jersey.  Few players on this team seem willing to either stand up for that tradition or expand on it.  Many of these guys are collecting a paycheck.  Before last night, I would be pretty reluctant to write that a lot of the Rangers don't really care how the team fares, or about what the jersey means.  But now, it's pretty clear that they don't.  Dan Girardi and the rest of the guys on the ice didn't think they had to step in.  The first problem, there, is that they had to think about it.  That kind of back up should be instinctive.  Secondly, it's pretty instructive on how they see the team.  The leading scorer, noted for being an injury prone player, is getting his ass handed to him by Carcillo, who's an animal.  What the hell would make you think you don't need to do anything?

And now the guys who were out there feel bad they didn't do anything, feel like they should've stepped in.  Seriously?  I feel bad that I care so much about a team that doesn't really seem to care at all.  Basically, in closing, ARE YOU SMOKING CRACK RANGERS?!?!!?!?!/1  PROTECT MARIAN GABORIK.