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Zajac injuries himself in practice


BigZ

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"@TGfireandice: Zajac put very little weight on his right foot when he skated off the ice and exited to locker room. Doesn't look like he'll be back today."

Not the same side as the achillies injury but uh ya that's concerning.

But this sounds about right ...

" @TGfireandice: Very strange. Zajac just kind of fell over. Wasn't skating fast at all. Kind of was almost coasting along the boards and fell over."

Great.

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Well all the people who are down on zajac and clamoring for jj to get a chance to prove something will get their chance now. I guess jj getting an opportunity is a little positive to be taken out of it.

I hope it's not too serious, despite what many think he is a key piece to this team and will be hard to replace.

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Caught an edge, rolled the ankle just a bit, iced it to reduce swelling. Minor, and he'll play tomorrow. That's what I'm assuming until anyone can prove otherwise. Losing Zajac for a long time would be pretty devastating.

just read the same thing from TG.. phew
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Caught an edge, rolled the ankle just a bit, iced it to reduce swelling. Minor, and he'll play tomorrow.

That's what I'm assuming until anyone can prove otherwise. Losing Zajac for a long time would be pretty devastating.

 

Did you seriously predict this just before he came out and said that's what happened? Props man!

 

I'm listening to you from now on. What's the final score gonna be tomorrow?!

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This many years in to Zajac's tenure with the Devils and a big contract later, and "Zajac is good at defense" is getting kind of old. I have been one of the biggest proponents of him over the years but it is quickly becoming necessary that he produce more offense, more consistently.

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This many years in to Zajac's tenure with the Devils and a big contract later, and "Zajac is good at defense" is getting kind of old. I have been one of the biggest proponents of him over the years but it is quickly becoming necessary that he produce more offense, more consistently.

 

I'm inclined to agree. $5.75 mill is a lot to pay for Bobby Carpenter circa 1997.

Edited by NewarkDevil5
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This many years in to Zajac's tenure with the Devils and a big contract later, and "Zajac is good at defense" is getting kind of old. I have been one of the biggest proponents of him over the years but it is quickly becoming necessary that he produce more offense, more consistently.

 

 

I'm inclined to agree. $5.75 mill is a lot to pay for Bobby Carpenter circa 1997.

What part of he's only been playing under that contract for 12 games is hard for you people to get? You're ready to throw Zajac under the bus due a deal that he's only 1/64th of the way through. So many posters here keep projecting his current contract back over his entire career like the rest of his tenure with us was sub-par now because he's been getting top line $$$ for 3 weeks.

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What part of he's only been playing under that contract for 12 games is hard for you people to get? You're ready to throw Zajac under the bus due a deal that he's only 1/64th of the way through. So many posters here keep projecting his current contract back over his entire career like the rest of his tenure with us was sub-par now because he's been getting top line $$$ for 3 weeks.

 

You misunderstand. I'm not projecting at all. He was absolutely worth the lower salary he was getting last year. He was even more worth the lower salary he had gotten three years ago. However, at his current level of production which has been maintained at this level for the better part of a year now is not worth what he is currently being paid for it. He is currently on pace for 7 goals 21 assists over an 82 game season. That is not worth what he is currently being paid.

 

If his last season had been gangbusters (whether on this deal or not), I would be more inclined to cut him slack over it being a slump. It wasn't. The season before that he was out for all but 15 games. The last time we can actually go based off of to consider his offensive numbers is 2010-2011 when he grossed out at 44pts. If you're wanting us to figure on better than that we'll have to look at 2009-2010 which was his high water mark of 67 points. That was his best offensive season. It has all been down hill from there.

 

Even if you wanted to figure last season based on an 82 game season he was still only on pace for 38 points which is not too far off from what he did two seasons before. If he is a 40 point player, that's fine, at $3.5-4million/year. At $5.75 million he needs to be looking at hitting between 60 and 70 points a year. I'm not talking about entering a scoring title race, I'm talking about being involved in the offense a little less than once per game.

 

Very simply he is now being paid more than Patrik Elias and is going to maintain that average salary for the next 8 years. Will that be a bargain for his level of play in 4 years? I don't know. I don't know that his level of play will continue as well as it has given the fact that it's taken such a tumble in the last 4 years. I can only speak for what he's doing now and right now when I see him out on the ice I don't feel confident about the odds of a goal occurring. I'm not saying that I feel concerned about the odds of a goal against either. But I had that same lack of confidence in a goal for and lack of concern about a goal against when Bob Carpenter was playing for us and to me that's not the level of play I consider to be worth that amount of money.

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You misunderstand. I'm not projecting at all. He was absolutely worth the lower salary he was getting last year. He was even more worth the lower salary he had gotten three years ago. However, at his current level of production which has been maintained at this level for the better part of a year now is not worth what he is currently being paid for it. He is currently on pace for 7 goals 21 assists over an 82 game season. That is not worth what he is currently being paid.

 

If his last season had been gangbusters (whether on this deal or not), I would be more inclined to cut him slack over it being a slump. It wasn't. The season before that he was out for all but 15 games. The last time we can actually go based off of to consider his offensive numbers is 2010-2011 when he grossed out at 44pts. If you're wanting us to figure on better than that we'll have to look at 2009-2010 which was his high water mark of 67 points. That was his best offensive season. It has all been down hill from there.

 

Even if you wanted to figure last season based on an 82 game season he was still only on pace for 38 points which is not too far off from what he did two seasons before. If he is a 40 point player, that's fine, at $3.5-4million/year. At $5.75 million he needs to be looking at hitting between 60 and 70 points a year. I'm not talking about entering a scoring title race, I'm talking about being involved in the offense a little less than once per game.

 

Very simply he is now being paid more than Patrik Elias and is going to maintain that average salary for the next 8 years. Will that be a bargain for his level of play in 4 years? I don't know. I don't know that his level of play will continue as well as it has given the fact that it's taken such a tumble in the last 4 years. I can only speak for what he's doing now and right now when I see him out on the ice I don't feel confident about the odds of a goal occurring. I'm not saying that I feel concerned about the odds of a goal against either. But I had that same lack of confidence in a goal for and lack of concern about a goal against when Bob Carpenter was playing for us and to me that's not the level of play I consider to be worth that amount of money.

 

It still doesn't change that you're already making that judgment only 1/64th of the way into the deal. If the cap goes up the way many are predicting, this deal will look fine as top line centers will be getting nearly $8M. If Zajac can be a 50 point player and maintain his level of play defensively, the deal will be fine.

And what tumble the last 4 years? Lets go through them:

There was last year, where everybody looked like garbage. There was the year before that, but he was out the whole season. Then there's 2010-11 where he was 3rd on the team in scoring behind only Elias and Kovalchuk. Then the year before that was his 67 point season.

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You misunderstand. I'm not projecting at all. He was absolutely worth the lower salary he was getting last year. He was even more worth the lower salary he had gotten three years ago. However, at his current level of production which has been maintained at this level for the better part of a year now is not worth what he is currently being paid for it. He is currently on pace for 7 goals 21 assists over an 82 game season. That is not worth what he is currently being paid.

 

If his last season had been gangbusters (whether on this deal or not), I would be more inclined to cut him slack over it being a slump. It wasn't. The season before that he was out for all but 15 games. The last time we can actually go based off of to consider his offensive numbers is 2010-2011 when he grossed out at 44pts. If you're wanting us to figure on better than that we'll have to look at 2009-2010 which was his high water mark of 67 points. That was his best offensive season. It has all been down hill from there.

 

Even if you wanted to figure last season based on an 82 game season he was still only on pace for 38 points which is not too far off from what he did two seasons before. If he is a 40 point player, that's fine, at $3.5-4million/year. At $5.75 million he needs to be looking at hitting between 60 and 70 points a year. I'm not talking about entering a scoring title race, I'm talking about being involved in the offense a little less than once per game.

 

Very simply he is now being paid more than Patrik Elias and is going to maintain that average salary for the next 8 years. Will that be a bargain for his level of play in 4 years? I don't know. I don't know that his level of play will continue as well as it has given the fact that it's taken such a tumble in the last 4 years. I can only speak for what he's doing now and right now when I see him out on the ice I don't feel confident about the odds of a goal occurring. I'm not saying that I feel concerned about the odds of a goal against either. But I had that same lack of confidence in a goal for and lack of concern about a goal against when Bob Carpenter was playing for us and to me that's not the level of play I consider to be worth that amount of money.

 

Patrik Elias is 37.  If Patrik Elias were 29 and coming off the 3 seasons he just had, he'd be paid a lot more than Travis Zajac.  Indeed, he was, when he was Zajac's age, he made $6M a year when the cap was at $46M, which is equal to around $8.4M now.

 

Zajac is running exceptionally bad on the power play, his points are way, way down there than where they were 3 or 4 years ago.  I don't think he's good on the power play, but he's not as bad as his numbers.

Edited by Triumph
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What part of he's only been playing under that contract for 12 games is hard for you people to get? You're ready to throw Zajac under the bus due a deal that he's only 1/64th of the way through. So many posters here keep projecting his current contract back over his entire career like the rest of his tenure with us was sub-par now because he's been getting top line $$$ for 3 weeks.

 

Um, what part of my comment did you take as saying that he has failed this contract? You completely failed to understand what I said. Completely. And even more offensively, you misrepresented what I was saying.

Edited by Neb00rs
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Patrik Elias is 37.  If Patrik Elias were 29 and coming off the 3 seasons he just had, he'd be paid a lot more than Travis Zajac.  Indeed, he was, when he was Zajac's age, he made $6M a year when the cap was at $46M, which is equal to around $8.4M now.

 

When he was Zajac's age he was coming off a season where he'd scored 81 points and then the equivalent of 90+ points in a sickness shortened season. That would be worth $8.4 mill today.  I'm not arguing that because you can't compare Elias' production today to his contract 8 years ago. Zajac is coming off two seasons of around 40 points. That's not worth $5.75 million. Not in today's dollars and certainly not in 2005's dollars. Let's put it this way; was John Madden getting paid $4 million in 2005 to pot 36 points? No, due to a screw-up by Lou that made him a free agent he was signed for $3 million that was considered way more than he should've gotten. But even if you figure that amount. Zajac is getting paid 33% more in 2005 dollars than John Madden was for similar production.

Edited by NewarkDevil5
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Um, what part of my comment did you take as saying that he has failed this contract? You completely failed to understand what I said. Completely. And even more offensively, you misrepresented what I was saying.

No I didn't. You said that the excuse of him being good at defense isn't enough after all these years.

1. It certainly was enough up until this year, so I don't understand your complaint.

2. He doesn't have to really do a whole lot more for him to be worth $5.75. i.e. 50 points per season, which is certainly within reach for him.

That is my rebuttal to your comment.

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