I thought Brad Richards' days as a #1 center was over before he put up two solid seasons with Dallas. I'm not going to count him out this time.
I personally think buying out Richards would be a difficult decision and a mistake to do it, especially this summer. The Rangers are not in a terrible cap situation next season and who are they going to replace Richards with? Brassard? A UFA replacement like Ribeiro will likely cost $5M +/- $500K, which is why we are still seeing teams re-sign their own free agents as if the salary cap isn't going down. You need players who can play and replacements aren't going to be cheaper and better. Richards is still a very good player who has been money in the playoffs for most of his career.
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