Tallinder traded to Buffalo.

[jim777]

I don't get to watch every game because I'm in South Jersey where there's no MSG. But when I did get to see the Devs play, and Tallinder had the puck, it seemed to me as often as not he just coughed it up to the nearest opposing forward. I must have missed the games where he was a good to excellent defenseman, because he was mostly awful when I was watching.

 

I would like to see the kids play as well, to see if any of them has what it takes. We've gotten an upgrade in goal, so NOW is the time.

Edited July 8, 2013 by jim777

[Neb00rs]

As has been said before, this is a move that needed to be made. Like it or not, it was clear that Tallinder was considered expendable last season. His contract is the easiest to get rid of, he still has skill and we need to make room for our young D.

[Pepperkorn]

I liked a lot about Talinder but I did find him frustrating. But I felt like he was sincere. That could be read as weak. I feel the Devils sacrificed value for sure. But it's probably the best all-around option for both teams and players. It's a decent karma move.

I'm far from heaving a deep sigh of relief ill tell you that much, nor am I too cut up. Fair enough is about what I can muster

[Muevelos]

Maybe this also means that there wasn't any thing else out their for Lou other then a crap return. And this doesn't make us any worse.

Edited July 8, 2013 by CarterforPresident

[CarpathianForest]

I was looking at Greene's stats from last season. He actually had a decent amount of assists.

[Ollie McKraut]

I don't pay close enough attention to the games to notice when a defenseman plays well; I only notice when they goof up. This being the case, I'm pretty much a-okay with any moves Lou wants to make on the defensive side with two caveats: I think Volchenkov is big and a positive contributor (I may in the minority on that point) and I think that Mark Fayne greatly improves the team's chances due to the intangible Fayne Factor.

[Sharifijanov2099]

agree with Tri that we are technically worse today than we were yesterday.  any time you subtract a known quantity (who is a competent player), and assume an AHLr with no experience will take his slot, your team is weaker - in the immediate future anyway.

 

that said, i do believe in addition by subtraction sometimes--and subtractions don't always equate as you expect them to.  players regularly step up and transcend their supposed skillsets when pressed.

 

this is a good move and ultimately will benefit this team.  whether that proves true over the first 40 games, we'll see.  my guess though is that it does prove true over the back half, and as people have stated, opens up money to do other things which will be more beneficial than holding a surplus player.  sure, if you could move a player at the trade deadline in-season and get a return, that's more ideal.  but clearly an offer was out there (which is tangible), and lou made it happen.  more power to him.

 

now go sign raymond or brunner and let Zidlicky walk.

[cgb6397]

I don't understand why anyone is against this move. last year defense was far from the problem, and tallinder hardly played, we have a more than suitable blue line.

[SterioDesign]

For all we know any of those youngsters could pull off a henrique and endup on the top pairing and be a calder finalist, who knows? Hockey is that crazy. Lets see what they do at camp

[Sharifijanov2099]

I don't understand why anyone is against this move. last year defense was far from the problem, and tallinder hardly played, we have a more than suitable blue line.

i know i'm not against it.  very happy about it.

[Triumph]

I don't understand why anyone is against this move. last year defense was far from the problem, and tallinder hardly played, we have a more than suitable blue line.

 

we don't.  we have salvador who yanks down anyone he plays with.  i can only imagine how awful he will be over an 82 game season with another year on his body.  then we've got volchenkov, who I still like way more than just about anyone on the board, but he's getting to the age where he can't be counted on 5 on 5.  larsson hasn't proven he's all that good 5 on 5 yet.  i like fayne and greene, but the rest is a bunch of question marks.  and i like the prospects, but anyone expecting them to play at the level tallinder was capable of playing at is engaging in a little wishful thinking.

 

basically without tallinder and zidlicky, what was a strength is now not one.

[thefiestygoat]

I'm happy Tallinder will go somewhere where he won't be jerked around. Does make NJ worse though and I hope they don't use the cap space on Zidlicky. Would've rather have had a 7th round pick coming back instead of Riley Boychuk but oh well. Salvador and Volchenkov are both pretty untradeable so I'm not surprised it was Tallinder.

[Sharifijanov2099]

we don't.  we have salvador who yanks down anyone he plays with.  i can only imagine how awful he will be over an 82 game season with another year on his body.  then we've got volchenkov, who I still like way more than just about anyone on the board, but he's getting to the age where he can't be counted on 5 on 5.  larsson hasn't proven he's all that good 5 on 5 yet.  i like fayne and greene, but the rest is a bunch of question marks.  and i like the prospects, but anyone expecting them to play at the level tallinder was capable of playing at is engaging in a little wishful thinking.

 

basically without tallinder and zidlicky, what was a strength is now not one.

just curious - what evidence is there that zidlicky was a strength?  you're more attuned to advanced stats than i.  is there data (say corsi or otherwise) that shows zidlicky's contributions last season were helpful at even strength?  sure, he had apx 1 power play point every 4 games last season, but only 1 even strength point every 6 games.  while nj had a bad season overall, his -12 +- was worst on the team.  i'd argue the zidlicky was a liability at even strength, and 1p every 4 games on the PP for a player logging top PP minutes isn't entirely impressive.  

 

sure, zidlicky shoots, and as you've said prior, NJ needs shooters who can hit the net.  that's true and meaningful.  but i feel like the assumption that zidlicky makes us "better" is murky at best.  he's old himself.  who's to say larsson (if given the top pair PP duty every single game) can't produce similar #s?  or peter harrold for that matter.  i'm not convinced at this point that signing Zidlicky is better for the team than not signing him.

[mouse]

we don't.  we have salvador who yanks down anyone he plays with.  i can only imagine how awful he will be over an 82 game season with another year on his body.  then we've got volchenkov, who I still like way more than just about anyone on the board, but he's getting to the age where he can't be counted on 5 on 5.  larsson hasn't proven he's all that good 5 on 5 yet.  i like fayne and greene, but the rest is a bunch of question marks.  and i like the prospects, but anyone expecting them to play at the level tallinder was capable of playing at is engaging in a little wishful thinking.

 

basically without tallinder and zidlicky, what was a strength is now not one.

No argument with your points, per se, but I would argue that you're being somewhat shortsighted. I'd agree with you 100% if I thought we had a shot at the Cup this year. I don't think we do. IMO, Schneider needs to get his feet wet, we need another top 6 (preferably top 3) forward, and Larsson needs to reach his potential (which IMO is higher than Tallinder at his best) to have a shot. I think that could happen in the next 2 or 3 years, but I don't think there's any way we're a Cup team this year. With that in mind, I'd rather take a half step back to take a step forward, which opening up this roster space does, IMO. I think getting guys like Urbom and Merrill NHL minutes, and Fayne and Larsson consistent minutes in high pressure situations will make them better players down the line, when the team will hopefully be challenging for the Cup. 

 

Out of interest (and I'm not trying to antagonize you here at all), do you think this team has a shot to make a run this year? I'd love for that to be true, and if it is, losing Tallinder hurts.

[Devil Dan 56]

Losing Tallinder sucks, and losing him for a useless contract sucks as well, but the cap space had to be cleared somehow. No one was going to take Volchenkov or Sal. 

[Triumph]

just curious - what evidence is there that zidlicky was a strength?  you're more attuned to advanced stats than i.  is there data (say corsi or otherwise) that shows zidlicky's contributions last season were helpful at even strength?  sure, he had apx 1 power play point every 4 games last season, but only 1 even strength point every 6 games.  while nj had a bad season overall, his -12 +- was worst on the team.  i'd argue the zidlicky was a liability at even strength, and 1p every 4 games on the PP for a player logging top PP minutes isn't entirely impressive.  

 

sure, zidlicky shoots, and as you've said prior, NJ needs shooters who can hit the net.  that's true and meaningful.  but i feel like the assumption that zidlicky makes us "better" is murky at best.  he's old himself.  who's to say larsson (if given the top pair PP duty every single game) can't produce similar #s?  or peter harrold for that matter.  i'm not convinced at this point that signing Zidlicky is better for the team than not signing him.

 

The goalies couldn't stop anything last year, so throw plus/minus out the window.  Zidlicky's on ice save percentage was 895, NHL average is around 920.  Eric T has found there isn't much year to year correlation with on ice save percentages for defensemen.  Zidlicky was helping control play - NJ got 56.7% of the shot attempts (unblocked) with Zidlicky on the ice, and Zidlicky had to carry around the boat anchor that is Bryce Salvador.  Untethered from the human ballast that is #24, the Devils had 61.1% of the shot attempts with him on the ice.  Now Zidlicky obviously played with great players and started a lot in the offensive zone (and the Devils trailed in a lot of games), but those are good numbers.  I don't know if he'd be able to sustain them, but I do have zero faith in Larsson to work a power play - the Devils should use either Merrill or Gelinas in that spot before they should consider Larsson.

 

No argument with your points, per se, but I would argue that you're being somewhat shortsighted. I'd agree with you 100% if I thought we had a shot at the Cup this year. I don't think we do. IMO, Schneider needs to get his feet wet, we need another top 6 (preferably top 3) forward, and Larsson needs to reach his potential (which IMO is higher than Tallinder at his best) to have a shot. I think that could happen in the next 2 or 3 years, but I don't think there's any way we're a Cup team this year. With that in mind, I'd rather take a half step back to take a step forward, which opening up this roster space does, IMO. I think getting guys like Urbom and Merrill NHL minutes, and Fayne and Larsson consistent minutes in high pressure situations will make them better players down the line, when the team will hopefully be challenging for the Cup. 

 

Out of interest (and I'm not trying to antagonize you here at all), do you think this team has a shot to make a run this year? I'd love for that to be true, and if it is, losing Tallinder hurts.

 

If the Devils aren't going for a Stanley Cup this year, they're making a real weird decision by signing 4 forwards who are 30 and older, 3 of them to contracts of longer than 2 years.  I absolutely think they have a shot, especially with Schneider in net - if you've got a team that can control play like I think NJ can and they get great goaltending, they can go really far.

[njdevsftw]

Definently agree we need someone like Zid, and that we're going for the cup this year.

[cgb6397]

we don't. we have salvador who yanks down anyone he plays with. i can only imagine how awful he will be over an 82 game season with another year on his body. then we've got volchenkov, who I still like way more than just about anyone on the board, but he's getting to the age where he can't be counted on 5 on 5. larsson hasn't proven he's all that good 5 on 5 yet. i like fayne and greene, but the rest is a bunch of question marks. and i like the prospects, but anyone expecting them to play at the level tallinder was capable of playing at is engaging in a little wishful thinking.

basically without tallinder and zidlicky, what was a strength is now not one.

You know we're really not far off base on what we think of our D-Men, but the fact of the matter is last year we lost because we couldn't score. We weren't losing games by three or four goal deficits, they were mostly 2-1 or 1-0 games.

[Muevelos]

You know we're really not far off base on what we think of our D-Men, but the fact of the matter is last year we lost because we couldn't score. We weren't losing games by three or four goal deficits, they were mostly 2-1 or 1-0 games.

and tallinder was barely in the line up. So we are really at a stand still with losing him. Would rather been sal or anton but we knew who was most apt to leave and wa la.

[Derlique]

Lou still has to make roster moves. Looking at the potential 23 man roster:

Kovalchuk

Elias

Zajac

Clowe

Ryder

Zubrus

Henrique

Olesz

Josefson

Loktionov

Bernier

Gionta

Carter

Barch

Tedenby

Larsson

Greene

Fayne

Volchenkov

Salvador

Harrold

Rookie

Schneider

Brodeur

Does Barch get waived or bought out? Can Gionta still get sent down with being out on waivers?

[Devs1965]

Changing of the gaurd, it needed to happen. I too would have loved to seen a pick come back our way. But teams know your situation just as Lams was one up on the draft and stealing a top 5 if not top 10 goalie for what may be pick that will never see the NHL level.

Bring up the kids!!!

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Definently agree we need someone like Zid, and that we're going for the cup this year.

 

Does ANYONE know what's going on with Zidlicky?  I haven't heard a peep, though this link has TG speculating that the trade of Tallinder was to clear money for Zidlicky, who apparently is waiting from an offer from the Devils, but has offers on the table.  Rich Chere claims Lou says the Tallinder trade doesn't inpact Zidlicky's situation at the moment, but that Lou wants to re-sign him:

 

http://www.mynhltraderumors.com/2013/07/08/free-agent-hits-mcdonagh-rangers-brunner-zidlicky-jagr-red-wings-hejduk-and-the-best-of-the-rest/

[MantaRay]

I know Lou is very interested and Zidlicky wants to stay, its all about making a fair deal for him to stay in NJ.

[DJ Eco]

I'm guessing Lou gauged the interest level for Zidlicky around the league as pretty low. The longer this waiting game goes on, the cheaper the deal I think Lou is getting on Zidlicky. Seeing us toughen up the team at offense and in the goal, I can't help but think he and his agent are more likely to bend for a lower contract, Zid needs us more than we may need him at this point.

[MantaRay]

I'm guessing Lou gauged the interest level for Zidlicky around the league as pretty low. The longer this waiting game goes on, the cheaper the deal I think Lou is getting on Zidlicky. Seeing us toughen up the team at offense and in the goal, I can't help but think he and his agent are more likely to bend for a lower contract, Zid needs us more than we may need him at this point.

 

Agreed, but you also don't want to wait too long.   All you need is one team's off-season injury to a key defensemen before Zidlicky comes more into demand.