The Ledger: Rangers picked the $3.97 million door, and they're right

The number: $7.6 million. That's the gap between the cap relief the Rangers took for Igor Shesterkin and the relief they could have had. They chose the small door. I argued for the big one on Sunday, and after another pass through the numbers, their sequencing is better than mine.

Shesterkin is out for the season with a right knee injury. New York put him on standard long-term injured reserve, which frees $3.97 million, last season's average league salary. The season-ending version frees his whole $11.57 million cap hit.

The catch is that the big door only swings one way. Season-ending LTIR rules a player out of the playoffs too, and he can't come back until next season. Standard LTIR keeps a spring return alive on paper. The Rangers can still convert at any point this year.

So the question isn't which door, it's whether anything on the other side is worth an additional $7.6 million today.

Cap sheet: Space as of Tuesday: about $4.6 million, with Shesterkin on standard LTIR. Relief in use: $3.97 million. Relief if they convert: the full $11.57 million. Retained-salary slots used: 0 of 3. Contracts: 47 of 50. Roster: 22 of 23. Projected deadline space: the same $4.6 million.

What $4.6 million rents

The goalies who make sense are on expiring deals, because Shesterkin has six more seasons after this one. Anyone New York adds has to be gone by next October.

The comparables: three names set this market.

Jordan Binnington carries $6 million in St. Louis. Darcy Kuemper carries $5.25 million in Los Angeles. Philipp Grubauer carries $5.9 million in Seattle. All three deals end after this season, and all three come with a 10-team no-trade list.

None fits inside $4.6 million at full price, but all three fit comfortably at half. A seller that keeps 50 percent turns Binnington into a $3 million goalie, Grubauer into $2.95 million and Kuemper into about $2.63 million. Retention costs New York a better draft pick, though it doesn't cost any cap room.

There's a fourth route with no retention at all. Montreal's Sam Montembeault makes $3.15 million on a deal that ends in June, with no trade protection. He's hurt for about two more weeks, which is roughly when this decision should be made anyway.

Here's the Ferda number. Those three rental names are a combined 2-4-1 this season, by our count. Binnington has an .847 save percentage in two starts, and Kuemper has an .865 in three. Grubauer is the only one above .900, at .915 in three appearances. That's roughly a week and a half of hockey, a tiny sample for any goaltender.

Dylan Garand has stopped 52 of 55 shots, a .945 save percentage, per NHL data. At even strength it's 44 of 46. The Rangers are 5-2-0 and killing 90 percent of their penalties.

Three appearances prove very little. But as of today the available rentals aren't outperforming the $875,000 goalie they'd replace, and I've already priced that contract.

Why the big door can wait

Dallas wrote the playbook. The Stars lost Tyler Seguin to a season-ending knee injury last December and put him on standard LTIR. They converted in late February, about a week before the trade deadline. That opened roughly $6 million right when the market was fullest.

The patience matters more under this CBA. A playoff lineup now has to fit under the ceiling as dressed, at full cap hits. The old move, where a team stashed a star until Game 1 and dressed him beside his replacement, is gone. Relief for a player who might return is capped because he might return.

That's the trade the Rangers will make sooner or later. Converting ends any hope of Shesterkin in May. It should buy something specific on the day it happens, because unused room in October purchases nothing.

And it shouldn't buy term. Connor Hellebuyck has four seasons left after this one at $8.5 million. Beside Shesterkin, that's $20 million a year in goalies through 2031. Gord has the rumor side of that. The arithmetic closes that conversation without any help.

My call: stay on standard LTIR until Joonas Korpisalo is back, which is about four weeks out. Give Garand the month he's earned.

If he holds, the Rangers need a $3 million insurance policy, and that fits today. If he doesn't, convert. The budget becomes about $12 million, with a deadline market to spend it in.

What I'd watch: the first week of November. Korpisalo is due back, Montembeault should be healthy, and Garand will have a real sample. A save percentage starts to mean something around then, and it's also when Chris Drury discovers which door he actually needs.