5 random players you forgot were on the New York Rangers

Dating back to the man whose Montreal exploits reportedly inspired their founding, the New York Rangers have let many notable names come and go in obscurity

The last New York Rangers Stanley Cup championship team all but reunited the Edmonton Oilers dynasty of the 1980s. As MSG’s Stan Fischler recounted last year amidst the banner season’s 25th anniversary, seven players struck silver with both teams.

But unlike Edmonton, the Blueshirts could not build on that title. Not even when other ring-bearing ex-Oilers came to town a little later in the ’90s.

Wayne Gretzky, who arrived in the 1996 offseason, was the quintessential can’t-miss example. But between the seven two-team champions and the Great One, there was another Edmonton alum who barely lasted a month in Manhattan.

The latter counts prominently among those who barely inked a spot on the Rangers’ 94-year-old all-time roster. He is one whose short stay was eclipsed all the more by his achievements with other franchises and by the Blueshirts’ success before or after he left.

Four of the following players won a Cup elsewhere, including two with one of the Rangers’ rivals from Pennsylvania. Another was only in New York for a shortcoming postseason featuring several household-name holdovers from the franchise’s last triumph.

5. Russ Courtnall

Of his six stops in a 16-year career, the Blueshirts were the briefest for Courtnall. And between his preceding accomplishments elsewhere and the myriad established faces in place, they did not exactly give him quality to compensate for such little quantity.

A decade earlier in Toronto, Courtnall fulfilled his first-round draft status by leading the 1986-87 Maple Leafs with 73 points. With a career-high 76 points (including 50 assists), he topped Montreal’s leaderboard in 1990-91.

And in both the final year of the Minnesota North Stars and the inaugural season of the Dallas Stars, Courtnall trailed only Mike Modano. His lone full campaign in Texas yielded a new and permanent career-best 57 assists and 80 points.

While his production had peaked by then, his only start-to-finish year in Vancouver was hardly allergenic (65 points). Ditto his 1995 postseason, where he finished one point behind Pavel Bure for the team lead with 12.

But when the Canucks dealt Courtnall to the Rangers for the 1997 homestretch, the 32-year-old forward was fading. Granted, he mustered seven points in 14 regular season games, then seven more in a three-round playoff run. But he was overshadowed by the more marketable dynamic duo of Gretzky and Mark Messier.

The presence of Luc Robitaille and 1994 playoff MVP Brian Leetch only added to Courtnall’s obscurity at Madison Square Garden. Both of those future Hall of Famers had been with the Rangers since the start of 1995-96 and 1988, respectively. They also each played five or more seasons longer than Courtnall, who retired with Los Angeles in 1999.