Nikolai Zherdev returned to Columbus, where he was booed by the crowd every time he touched the puck. Who do they think he is? Sean Avery? But the young right-winger had the last laugh, scoring a goal and assisting on two as he led the Rangers over the Blue Jackets (led by a grizzled, 28-year-old Manny Malhotra), by a score of 3-1.

The Rangers didn’t look good early on. Michal Rozsival coughed the puck up in the first period, but Dmitri Kalinin covered up for his teammate with a nice defensive play. But then it was Kalinin’s turn to screw up. He couldn’t control a bouncing puck, and Jakub Voracek grabbed it, tipped his helmet, said thank you very much and skated in on Henrik Lundqvist all by his lonesome and put the Blue Jackets on the board. The Blueshirts had a five on three soon after that and couldn’t have looked worse. They were caught flat-footed and knocked back on their heels when Columbus attacked and skated …

While the World Series is being played out in “Tampa” and Philly, the New York Yankees are making their offseason plans in Tampa, Florida this week. Yes, their offices are actually in Tampa, unlike the Rays who don’t actually play there, but that’s a story for another day. According to Mike Lupica of the Daily News the Yankees are ready to break the bank open to get back to the promised land. With about $80 million coming off the books this winter, it’s almost certain that they will add that right back and may even surpass that.

“I’m not saying (the huge spending) won’t happen,” Brian Cashman said. “I know people expect us to go crazy. Even when we don’t go crazy, people still look at whatever we do and say, ‘There’s the Yankees being the Yankees.’ We’re the Evil Empire even when we’re not.”

This is true. The one MUST this winter is getting C.C. Sabathia no matter the cost. We learned that not going …