Jacob Trouba Autographed Card

After acquiring Jacob Trouba in a trade with the Winnipeg Jets in mid-June, the New York Rangers have now signed the restricted free agent to a fair $56M seven-year deal worth $8M against the salary cap, avoiding arbitration.

They now have a legitimate top-tier defenseman who, at age 25, is set to enter his prime - unlike their prized 2017 free agent Kevin Shattenkirk, who has seemingly and prematurely just stepped out of his, although in fairness, Shattenkirk should never have been considered any higher than a #3 defenseman.

This leads me to the right side of the Rangers' defense, which now consists of the following players and cap hits:

Trouba, $8M
Shattenkirk: $6.5M (10-team no-trade list)
Brendan Smith: $4.35M (15-team no-trade list)
Adam Fox: a maximum of $1.75M if all bonuses are reached.

That's to go with the left side, made up of:

Brady Skeij: $5.25M
Marc Staal: $5.7M (full no-move clause)
Libor Hajek: $833K

Keep in mind the salary cap is $80.5M, a team needs 12 forwards in uniform (and this one has $11.64M man Artemi Panarin), one or two more as reserves and a pair of goalies. Oh, and the Rangers have one of the best of the millennium in Henrik Lundqvist, a luxury which comes with a $8.5M hit.

The Blueshirts have four remaining unsigned restricted free agents (forwards Pavel Buchnevich, Brendan Lemieux and Vinni Lettieri, and defenseman Anthony DeAngelo), none of whom are likely to break the bank this year, but the Rags already being over the cap by a couple of million only complicates things.

The most obvious solutions include trading one of the defensemen (with or without retaining salary to sweeten the deal), or trading pending UFA forwards Vladislav Namestnikov and/or Chris Kreider, who are both on affordable and good-value deals at $4M and $4.5M respectively, but in the straight "dollars-and-cents" perspective coupled with trade value, may be easiest to move.

It's a puzzle, that's for sure, but that's when GM Jeff Gorton will have to prove he's got what it takes to justify making the big bucks. He's definitely got the foundations of a Stanley Cup contender on his hands, maybe not to take a run at it this year, but they should have a decent window in two or three years.

Here is a card Trouba signed for me in February:

It's #394 from Upper Deck's 2018-19 O-Pee-Chee collection, showing him wearing the Jets' white (away) uniform.

Jacob Trouba Jersey Card

A cool thing about the midway point of a season in terms of card releases is to see rookies wearing a brand-new uniform, as was the case when I unwrapped this 2013-14 Series 2 Jacob Trouba Rookie Materials card from Upper Deck last season:

It shows him wearing the Winnipeg Jets' current white (away) uniform, with a black (or dark blue) swatch from a photo shoot, well placed below the action shot, in a very lively design.

Trouba was selected 9th overall in 2012, and at the time I didn't know who he was, because he'd mainly played with the U.S. Development Team, though the team had won two U-18 World Championship gold medals.

I saw a lot of him the following year, as Team USA won gold at the World Juniors and he was named the tournament's top defender, before also suiting up for the national team at the World Championships in the Spring, where he participated in winning bronze.

You never want to get carried away with young defensemen, but it seems like 2012 was a particularly stellar year for the position at the draft, with Ryan Murray leading the charge at second overall, followed by Griffin Reinhart (4th), Morgan Rielly (5th), Hampus Lindholm (6th), Mathew Dumba (7th), Derrick Pouliot (8th), Slater Koekkoek (10th), Cody Ceci (15th), Olli Maata (22nd), Mike Matheson (23rd), Dalton Thrower (51st), and Shayne Gostisbehere (78th) all within the first three rounds.

Trouba, a tall, skinny, quick skater who can throw some hits but might need to add 20 more pounds to his frame to survive a decade of the contacts he initiates, had 10 goals, 19 assists, 29 points and was a +4 on a very poor Jets team in his rookie season last year, in just 65 games. This year, he has 12 points and is a +6 through 29 games, showing no signs of slumping. Granted, three of those points came in just one game against the Edmonton Oilers last week, but he still put them up on the board.

He, Tobias Enstrom, Dustin Byflugien, and Zach Bogosian make for a very interesting top-4 on defense, definitely one of the strongest such units in the Eastern Conference.