Throughout last season, fans of the New York Rangers made signs, shirts, and even held rallies, all involving the theme ?Fire Sather.? The fan-base had had enough of watching a proud franchise fail to string together any sustained success. General Manager Glen Sather, the man who built the product on the ice, was taking the brunt of the blame; simply put, the fans wanted him out of town and wanted someone new to attempt to build a roster worthy of their admiration. In no way am I saying Rangers? fans were wrong; I would be lying if I didn?t admit to questioning Sather?s abilities to build a roster capable of winning in the salary cap era. In the salary cap era, player contracts are heavily scrutinized, and must be well-planned. Before the lockout, Sather made such notable free agent blunders as Bobby Holik (5-year/$45M) and Darius Kasparitus (6-year/$25M) in 2002. Then came the lockout, and the Rangers hadn?t been to the playoffs in seven seasons ? four of which were under Sather?s guidance. In 2007, fresh off of making the second round of the playoffs and tasting a small amount of success, Sather?s free agency failures came back to the surface. He gave Scott Gomez $51.5M over seven years and Chris Drury $35M over five. Gomez played two seasons in New York and accumulated only 128 points. Drury, the current Rangers captain, was coming off of a 37-goal season, but has failed to surpass 25 goals or 60 points in any season since he signed his contract. The worst free agent signing of all came in 2008 when Sather inked Ottawa Senators? defenseman Wade Redden to a six-year contract worth $39M. Redden had reached the 40-point mark on a few occasions, and was a good defensive zone presence with five straight seasons over +20. But at the time of his free agency, Redden was 31-years-old and his skills were clearly starting to decline. Add in the fact that Redden was known for his size more than his speed, and this was clearly not going to end well. Sure enough, this season Redden is playing in the AHL so that New York doesn?t have his contract affecting their salary cap, and after only 14 points last year, he has 29 already for the Hartford Wolfpack. Given that he has three more seasons left on his contract, the only thing he can do is try and play his way back to the NHL, though it will be tough to see any team wanting to take his full contract and subsequent cap hit. While he hasn?t made mistakes to that degree financially since, he is still prone to overpaying. For instance, this past offseason he allotted $6.5M over four years to enforcer Derek Boogaard. This is a head-scratcher considering Boogaard averages around five minutes per game for his career, with three goals and 13 assists in 277 career games. He has tried to counter these signings by trading well, and to a degree he has been successful. Most notably, he convinced Montreal give up defensemen Ryan McDonagh and Pavel Valentenko in the Gomez trade; McDonagh was the 12th overall pick in 2007 and is ranked as New York?s 5th best prospect, while Valetenko is rated 12th in their system. Additionally he pried forward Brandon Prust from Calgary when he agreed to take Olli Jokinen off of their hands last season. Prust has proven to be a good third-line forward, contributing 20 points so far this season while playing very physical hockey. And most recently he used his extreme blueline depth by sending Michael Rozsival to Phoenix for a young offensive threat in Wojetk Wolski. Sather?s main coup has been his draft success, which can be traced all the way back to his first draft with New York in 2000 when he found a gem in the 7th round by the name of Henrik Lundqvist ? an All-Star goaltender who has been nominated for three Vezina trophies. In 2001 Sather found another late gem in the 6th round where he chose Marek Zidlicky 176th overall (unfortunately Zidlicky was traded in 2002 to Nashville in a failed trade that brought in goaltender Mike Dunham). Before we move on with the good, we should discuss the bad: In 2004, armed with the 6th overall pick, Sather selected goaltender Al Montoya out of the University of Michigan. It was even seen as a reach at the time, considering Montoya was more of a project than a sure thing. It was especially curious considering the Rangers had Lundqvist in their pipeline. Montoya has since bounced from Phoenix?s AHL team and now onto the Islanders with decent but not-spectacular AHL numbers. Chosen after Montoya in 2004: Drew Stafford (13th), Travis Zajac (20th), Wolski (21st), Mike Green (29th), David Krejci (63rd), Alexander Edler (91st) and Johan Franzen (97th) to name a few. 2003 was the worst blunder of all. It was perhaps the deepest draft in recent NHL history, and Sather wasted the 12th overall pick on Hugh Jessiman, a player who hasn?t played an NHL game, and most likely never will. That draft was littered with All-Stars, captains, and Olympians chosen after Jessiman: Dustin Brown (13th), Brent Seabrook (14th), Zach Parise (17th), Ryan Getzlaf (19th), Brent Burns (20th), Ryan Kesler (23rd), Mike Richards (24th), Corey Perry (28th), Loui Eriksson (33rd), Patrice Bergeron (45th), Shea Weber (49th) and David Backes (62nd) to list some notables. Imagine how different the Rangers? fortunes would be with one of those players on their roster. But there isn?t a GM in the league with a perfect record in the NHL Entry Draft, so it would be silly to focus solely on those two errors, however big. The 2004 draft may have seen the Montoya mishap, but it also yielded two extremely key players to today?s Rangers squad that currently sits in a playoff spot. Sather selected Brandon Dubinsky, the club?s leading scorer this year and a very good two-way forward, in the second round (60th overall). In the fourth round of the same draft, 127th overall, Sather selected Ryan Callahan, an emotional leader and alternate captain who has played over 260 games for New York. Both selections have to be seen as great successes. As important as 2004 was in building a foundation for the offense, 2005 was its equal on defense. With the 12th pick in the draft, Sather selected newly-appointed All-Star Marc Staal, a potential future captain. The Rangers? next pick was defenseman Michael Sauer, taken 40th overall. Sauer is currently seen as their 11th best prospect, but his emergence as a plus-player (+8 in 52 games this year) in his rookie campaign is what made Rozsival expendable earlier in the year. Jump ahead to 2006, which was a weak draft away from the top. Sather did have a minor miss in Bob Sanguinetti at 21, but there weren?t many quality players chosen after him apart from Claude Giroux and Semyon Varlamov. Sather did manage to select Artem Anisimov in the second round of that draft. Anisimov is steadily growing into a reliable top-six forward, and has 12-17-29 in 58 games this year. 2007 saw them nab Alexei Cherepanov with the 17th pick; he looked like a future star until his unfortunate death at 19-years-old while playing in Russia due to an inflamed heart. The sixth round of that draft saw them take winger Carl Hagelin. In the last two years, Hagelin has potted 85 points in 73 games for the University of Michigan, and is currently ranked as the organization?s 9th best prospect. In the fifth round they selected Max Campbell, a center for Western Michigan who has 25 points in 28 games this year. The 2008 Entry Draft has turned out to be fruitful so far. Defenseman Michael Del Zotto was selected 20th overall. Though he has been a minus player so far, the 20-year-old is getting meaningful minutes the last two seasons and looks like a sure-fire top-four defeseman. In the second round, Sather found a keeper in Derek Stepan. The 20-year-old is among the rookie scoring leaders and is third on the team with 15-17-32. Stepan was their third-best prospect heading into the season, and their second-best was taken in the third round of ?08 ? Evgeny Grachev. The 6?4? winger has only played in eight games so far and doesn?t have a point, but he is only 20-years-old and the future is bright. The 2009 Draft is home to the Rangers? top prospect ? center Chris Kreider. He was taken 19th overall and has NHL size already; he is currently playing for Boston College and has 16 points in 22 games. The 47th overall pick was another center, Ethan Werek, who has had a very good OHL career (153 games, 78-83-161) and is ranked seventh among Rangers? prospects. Unranked third-rounder Ryan Bourque, son of Hall of Famer Ray Bourque, is a 5?9? winger. The 20-year-old is currently in the QMJHL and has 88 points in 78 games there. Lastly, this past draft already features the 6th and 10th ranked prospects in the organization. The former is 10th overall pick Dylan McIlrath, a 6?5? defenseman currently in the WHL (45 games, 20 points, 97 penalty minutes). The latter is 5?9? winger Christian Thomas, who has great goal scoring ability currently on display in the OHL (34-26-60 in 45 games). So through the draft, Sather has stocked the cupboard full of young guys currently, or soon-to-be, contributing to the teams? success. Add in signing undrafted free agent Mats Zuccarello (4th ranked prospect, 14 points in 23 NHL games), and Sather deserves more credit than he receives because if not for the last few drafts, the teams? future wouldn?t be as bright as it is today. So long as he doesn?t come into a large amount of cap space that needs spending? Nick is RealGM?s NHL Feature Writer. You can reach him by email nick.obergan@realgm.com or on twitter @NickObergan