Tony DeAngelo played his last game for Rangers.
President John Davidson and general manager Jeff Gorton made that statement loud and clear during a press conference ahead of Monday’s game against the Penguins to discuss the consequences of a physical altercation between the controversial defender and goalkeeper Alexandar Georgiev after Saturday’s defeat in overtime to Pittsburgh, which led to No. 77 being placed on exemptions on Sunday.
“Yes, he played his last game for Rangers,” said Gorton. “What will happen from now on, I have no answer for that.”
The Post reported that the incident between DeAngelo and Georgiev followed the lack of communication between the two during Saturday’s overtime, which led to the winner of Sidney Crosby’s game. The 25-year-old made a remark to Georgiev as soon as the team left the ice, leading to the fight.
DeAngelo has been assigned to the taxi squad for now, but Gorton said the organization is looking to orchestrate an exchange. Gorton also mentioned that there was no discussion about terminating DeAngelo’s contract.
Davidson opened the press conference refuting speculation about DeAngelo’s relationship with newcomer K’Andre Miller. There were rumors that DeAngelo would have retained Miller’s first goal puck and that the two had a strained relationship.
“This is 100% false,” he said. “There is no truth to that. And for people to write things like, other people to digest is just wrong. It’s sad, actually. “
The beginning of the end for DeAngelo was apparently his reaction to being scratched in the second and third games of the season. After the player suffered an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for slamming the penalty box in the loss to the Islanders at the opening of the season, coach David Quinn replaced DeAngelo for disciplinary reasons in the 5-0 win in the rematch before maintaining the same lineup in the game following the demons.
“After the first game of the season, obviously, he was told he would not play,” said Gorton. “Tony was not able to move on with this, it was something he was trying to get through. I had spoken to him at the time and said, ‘Listen, if there are any more problems here, the time will come when we will put you on hold and move on. No more problems, if your name is on anything we have to hear, let’s move on, let’s make this move.
“I made that statement to him, something happened and I practically have to stay true to my word here and the organization’s word that it was time to move on. (…) We feel that moving from Tony is the right thing to do. It is a matter of winning, and we feel that this is a change that we had to make in our room to put us on the path to victory ”.
DeAngelo, who signed a $ 9.6 million two-year extension with Rangers this off-season, was also reprimanded by the organization for its presence on social media in recent months. From challenging a fan to a fight outside the MSG to question what happened to the coronavirus pandemic during the recent election, DeAngelo became involved in several conversations with Rangers bosses about how to lower his profile off the ice.
Asked if his antics on social media had anything to do with the organization’s decision to move on, Davidson said there was no correlation.
“There is a fine line to social media, but obviously there is freedom of speech,” he said. “We certainly watch what our players say and do on social media. Tony, we had an informal discussion about this, there is always a ripple effect. “
DeAngelo came to Broadway from the Coyotes on the day of the 2017 draft with the choice of seventh place (Lias Andersson, now with the Kings) in exchange for Derek Stepan and Antti Raanta. He had a history in the Ontario Hockey League, which included being suspended twice for violating the league’s harassment, abuse and diversity policy.
“We did a lot of research, talked to a lot of people about Tony before we got him,” said Gorton. “We did our homework, we were comfortable. If you look at his history with us, I think you know that his season spoke for itself last year.
“There were some things along the way, but really nothing that could suggest anything from his Juniors past, there is nothing like it that has appeared with us.”