A Plan To Try To Right The Ship (For Next Year)

[Triumph]

I'm not sure there is any salvaging the Devils' season this year.  There's too many holes on the team, and spending a bunch of draft picks to patch them isn't the right idea.  I thought losing Salvador and Clowe to injury would help the team, but Havlat and Ryder have emerged as players who simply cannot be playing on a good hockey team, and Zajac's offense has fallen off even more than last year.  I don't think Lou should be considering any trade that isn't made with an eye towards next year.  The Devils could start winning - some timely goal scoring and Schneider playing .930 hockey could certainly get the Devils ahead, probably, but not far enough.  So here's what I would do to try to get the team going again:

 

1.  Trade Eric Gelinas ASAP.  He's being healthy scratched despite there being 2 injuries on defense.  He's a specialty item on a team that can no longer afford that luxury.  If you had the kind of forward group that can carry along an Eric Gelinas at even strength, then great, but the Devils won't, and they won't for some time.  I'm afraid of what the Devils might lose if Gelinas somehow gets good, but if they wait another year, there may be no market at all for Gelinas.  Get what you can for him, kid's got a hell of a shot and if he figures out the defensive zone even a little bit he'll be a player worth having.  I'd be willing to get a 2nd round pick for him if that pick were to be shopped for upgrades at forward.

 

2.  Try to set up an Andrei Loktionov sort of trade.  The Loktionov trade didn't work out, but Loktionov was 90% of the way to being a pretty good player.  Bad defense and some bad shooting luck by his line were his undoing last year.  The Devils need a center badly - Patrik Elias isn't going to be the answer for very long if he is now, and Jacob Josefson is not good enough to do even what Patrik is doing now.  I'd be willing to deal the Devils' 2nd round pick this year for a young center who isn't getting an opportunity where he is now.  I'm not sure right now who that is or where that player exists, but the Devils will have plenty of picks in this year's draft if they continue down the road they're on now, so I don't mind giving one up for a shot at this kind of player.

 

3.  Buy out Dainius Zubrus at season's end.  I have always liked Zubrus's game, but the Devils did not see the warning signs in 2012-13 and wishcasted themselves into a 3 year deal with a player who has rapidly declining skills.  His contract is not that expensive but 3 years for him was quite simply a dumb move - much dumber than the 3 years on Elias's deal.  Zubrus is a defense-only player at this point - he's a smart enough player on offense that he fools you into thinking he might have something to give there, but he just doesn't.

 

4.  Keep Jaromir Jagr.  If Jagr wants out, fine, but if he doesn't, it's hard not to keep him because he is the only player above water right now.  The Devils simply aren't going to do better than him next year on the free agent market and they still need right wings, even if they trade Gelinas for one.

 

5.  Stop thinking that Adam Henrique is 'ready to break out' - He's a decent 2nd line wing or good 3rd line center, and that's what he is.  A good player to have, but not the cornerstone of a franchise.

 

So my ideal Devils team next year looks something like:

 

Cammalleri-Zajac-X

Boucher-Y-Jagr

Elias-Henrique-Z

Ruutu-Josefson-Gionta

 

Greene-Severson

Merrill-Larsson

A-B

Helgeson

 

Schneider

Kinkaid

 

Where Z is a player acquired for Gelinas, Y is a player acquired for a 2nd round pick, and X - maybe X is someone we drafted in the top 8 of next year's draft.  It does figure to be deep.  A and B I'm not so sure of.

 

[William D'Aquila]

Any idea that does not involve JVR, Kessel, or Wheeler is destined for failure.

[BostonNala370]

I'm not sure there is any salvaging the Devils' season this year.  There's too many holes on the team, and spending a bunch of draft picks to patch them isn't the right idea.  I thought losing Salvador and Clowe to injury would help the team, but Havlat and Ryder have emerged as players who simply cannot be playing on a good hockey team, and Zajac's offense has fallen off even more than last year.  I don't think Lou should be considering any trade that isn't made with an eye towards next year.  The Devils could start winning - some timely goal scoring and Schneider playing .930 hockey could certainly get the Devils ahead, probably, but not far enough.  So here's what I would do to try to get the team going again:

 

1.  Trade Eric Gelinas ASAP.  He's being healthy scratched despite there being 2 injuries on defense.  He's a specialty item on a team that can no longer afford that luxury.  If you had the kind of forward group that can carry along an Eric Gelinas at even strength, then great, but the Devils won't, and they won't for some time.  I'm afraid of what the Devils might lose if Gelinas somehow gets good, but if they wait another year, there may be no market at all for Gelinas.  Get what you can for him, kid's got a hell of a shot and if he figures out the defensive zone even a little bit he'll be a player worth having.  I'd be willing to get a 2nd round pick for him if that pick were to be shopped for upgrades at forward.

 

2.  Try to set up an Andrei Loktionov sort of trade.  The Loktionov trade didn't work out, but Loktionov was 90% of the way to being a pretty good player.  Bad defense and some bad shooting luck by his line were his undoing last year.  The Devils need a center badly - Patrik Elias isn't going to be the answer for very long if he is now, and Jacob Josefson is not good enough to do even what Patrik is doing now.  I'd be willing to deal the Devils' 2nd round pick this year for a young center who isn't getting an opportunity where he is now.  I'm not sure right now who that is or where that player exists, but the Devils will have plenty of picks in this year's draft if they continue down the road they're on now, so I don't mind giving one up for a shot at this kind of player.

 

3.  Buy out Dainius Zubrus at season's end.  I have always liked Zubrus's game, but the Devils did not see the warning signs in 2012-13 and wishcasted themselves into a 3 year deal with a player who has rapidly declining skills.  His contract is not that expensive but 3 years for him was quite simply a dumb move - much dumber than the 3 years on Elias's deal.  Zubrus is a defense-only player at this point - he's a smart enough player on offense that he fools you into thinking he might have something to give there, but he just doesn't.

 

4.  Keep Jaromir Jagr.  If Jagr wants out, fine, but if he doesn't, it's hard not to keep him because he is the only player above water right now.  The Devils simply aren't going to do better than him next year on the free agent market and they still need right wings, even if they trade Gelinas for one.

 

5.  Stop thinking that Adam Henrique is 'ready to break out' - He's a decent 2nd line wing or good 3rd line center, and that's what he is.  A good player to have, but not the cornerstone of a franchise.

 

So my ideal Devils team next year looks something like:

 

Cammalleri-Zajac-X

Boucher-Y-Jagr

Elias-Henrique-Z

Ruutu-Josefson-Gionta

 

Greene-Severson

Merrill-Larsson

A-B

Helgeson

 

Schneider

Kinkaid

 

Where Z is a player acquired for Gelinas, Y is a player acquired for a 2nd round pick, and X - maybe X is someone we drafted in the top 8 of next year's draft.  It does figure to be deep.  A and B I'm not so sure of.

I can accept this plan because it is a plan not patch work

[HellOnICE]

Also, Matteau will be waiver eligible next year yeah? Can he start the season in the minors or will have to be on the big club?

[Mike Brown]

Also, Matteau will be waiver eligible next year yeah? Can he start the season in the minors or will have to be on the big club?

 

I hope Lou finds a team to take two of our forwards so we can bring Boucher and Matteau up.  And hopefully Pete gives them real minutes.

[Triumph]

Also, Matteau will be waiver eligible next year yeah? Can he start the season in the minors or will have to be on the big club?

 

He'll have to be on the big club but I think he's an extra forward if everyone's healthy.  I also wouldn't mind dealing him for Brett Connolly or Jeremy Morin but I doubt that Tampa or Chicago does that sort of trade.  

[HellOnICE]

The way things are going this season, I'd rather get Matteau up here towards the end of the season as an audition.

[sundstrom]

i am absolutely on board with this. as i wrote in the gomez thread, all lou's gambles other than cammalleri have been abject failures the last several years.

 

by the end of december, feisty's work on upcoming prospects for 2015 draft are going to become must-reads.

[EdgeControl]

OK good conversation starter

 

how does the buy out work?, zub is bad but hes only 3 mil, is that worth it? he can be buried on the 4th again. they've been holding their own this year

what do we pay larsson?  hopefully he re-signs cheap

going forward is zajac a first line centerman, kid is a hell of a skater but if he cant buy a goal....???

jagr ??? hmmmm  what would someone offer us this year???

whats going to happen with clowe

you're right about henrique but its all we have on a goal starved team

honestly Im looking past next year, I'll suffer through a bad but youth-filled year next year,,, rather than a patchwork effort

[BostonNala370]

I hope Lou finds a team to take two of our forwards so we can bring Boucher and Matteau up.  And hopefully Pete gives them real minutes.

 

 

They (Boucher & Matteau) won't be better than what we send out so it is Status Quo

[HellOnICE]

Zubrus buy out, correct me if I am wrong - 2/3 speed over two years?

[Chuck the Duck]

Any idea that does not involve JVR, Kessel, or Wheeler is destined for failure.

 

I would love to have JVR or Wheeler on this team, but what are we trading to get any of those 3 players?  Every proposal will likely start with the names Merrill and Severson, both of which we aren't trading.  Other than that, we don't have much to trade outside of our 2015 first, which is looking to be a lottery pick at this point.

[NewarkDevil5]

I have to question keeping Jagr seeing as how he's our most tradeable asset in a lot of ways. I understand that trading him opens up a can of worms in filling his spot offensively, but keeping him limits what we can bring in toward a better future. In the long run I see a better future by trading Jagr sometime around the deadline. Also, you don't mention it, but I assume you're trading Zidlicky around the deadline as well.

Edited December 1, 2014 by NewarkDevil5

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Lou is taking his fair share of hits among this fanbase, and the last couple of seasons haven't been his finest (though he's still done some good things, like bringing in Schneider), but it is not uncommon for GMs to eventually find themselves in this predicament.  Lou obviously did everything he could to avoid a rebuild, right up to this season...he doesn't re-sign Schneider long-term and he doesn't go after a "win now" kind of player like Cammalleri otherwise.  Some will say that Lou should've just gone for a rebuild a while ago, but if you look at the overall record from the middle of the 2010-11 season to the end of the 2012 playoffs, I could see why Lou thought the team still had some good years left.  2013-14 was tricky because I'm sure Lou and others thought "We were an 88-point team with replacement-level goaltending for 40% of the season, and we went 0-for-the-season in the playoffs...no way we'll be this bad in the shootout again."  He tried to address some needs in the offseason (I think a lot of fans like the Cammalleri signing and thought taking a cheap flyer on Havlat made sense), and clearly thought he had built a team capable of challenging for a playoff spot.  We knew with the age of some of the players the Devils were relying on, it could conceivably crash and burn.  And it looks like it's going to.  So count me among the "no more trying to stave off a downturn" fans.  Lou tried, but there's simply no more fighting it off.

 

Anyway, what I like about Tri's post is that it's realistic, and this is where Tri is usually ahead of a lot of other fans, in that he's not proposing ridiculous "fleece-the-other-team-with-a-bunch-of-guys-who-I-don't-want-for-your-very-good-to-great-player" instant-fix scenarios.  Like I said, I understood what Lou was trying to do (rebuilds should be a last-resort, as there's no guarantee the losing won't be long-term, and especially since much of our fanbase doesn't have the patience to sit through one...as soon as Lou shows that he's committed to tearing it down, this team will draw less than 10k routinely, especially since it's to take multiple years to build through drafting).  But yeah, it's time to start taking some steps towards deconstructing this roster. 

 

Agree on Gelinas...if you can get a second-rounder for him that is then flipped for another need, sure. 

 

Stating the obvious here, but until all of the aging/underperforming forwards either leave on their own via UFA or are shown the door, it's kind of hard to visualize what happens next.  We know six forwards are going to be UFA at the end of this year Jagr, Ryder, Brunner, Havlat, Bernier, and Tootoo), and there's a strong chance none of them will be back (including Jagr, who may decide he simply wants a different challenge or to play elsewhere).  But until the bodies actually start moving, it's just too difficult to speculate what might be coming.

[redruM]

the 1 thing i did not see you discuss was Zajak, he has been a bust as a #1 center, jagr, Kovy & Parise made him look much better than he is.  IMHO Hanrique is better than Z and you call Henrique a 2nd liner at best.

 

If you can trade Z get him out of here, his contract is crazy.

 

Gelinas trade is a good idea, and the DEVS ned to find some 24 to 28 year old forwards... not sure if we have any thing interesting to trade other than Merrill or Severson, , but we need a player like Kane here, and I'd be willing to put together a package that included Larsson if that would get it done, just not sure what else it would take.

[NewarkDevil5]

the 1 thing i did not see you discuss was Zajak, he has been a bust as a #1 center, jagr, Kovy & Parise made him look much better than he is.  IMHO Hanrique is better than Z and you call Henrique a 2nd liner at best.

 

If you can trade Z get him out of here, his contract is crazy.

 

Gelinas trade is a good idea, and the DEVS ned to find some 24 to 28 year old forwards... not sure if we have any thing interesting to trade other than Merrill or Severson, , but we need a player like Kane here, and I'd be willing to put together a package that included Larsson if that would get it done, just not sure what else it would take.

 

I don't think you're going to get anyone to trade for Zajac for any real value. He needs to start working towards a Bobby Carpenter/Bobby Holik type role of second line shut-down center because that is what he is best at. If we get some offense from him, great, but I'm not going to count on him to put 60+ points in a year again.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

the 1 thing i did not see you discuss was Zajak, he has been a bust as a #1 center, jagr, Kovy & Parise made him look much better than he is.  IMHO Hanrique is better than Z and you call Henrique a 2nd liner at best.

 

If you can trade Z get him out of here, his contract is crazy.

 

Gelinas trade is a good idea, and the DEVS ned to find some 24 to 28 year old forwards... not sure if we have any thing interesting to trade other than Merrill or Severson, , but we need a player like Kane here, and I'd be willing to put together a package that included Larsson if that would get it done, just not sure what else it would take.

 

Tri mentioned that Zajac's offense has fallen off (again).  What's sad about that is he really was producing over the last half of the 2013-14 season...at about a 60-65 point pace over a full season. 

 

Contract is prohibitive at this point...simply too many years...you're taking a questionable one back more than likely. 

Edited December 1, 2014 by Colorado Rockies 1976

[Triumph]

The Devils cannot afford to lose Travis Zajac for the same reason they signed him in the first place to such a deal - there's just no centers available in free agency.  No, Zajac is not a 1st line center at this juncture, but they don't have many other options - they have to feel their way along until they can draft a potential guy or somehow trade for one somewhere.  Trading him for e.g. Mike Richards would be a disaster.  Someone described the Zajac deal as Horcoffian when it was signed and I think that's kinda accurate.  I have no idea where his shots on goal went this year though.

[redruM]

The contract has certainly shaded my opinion of him, LL has just lost his mind on some of these deals, Zajak would need to put up parise #s for that deal to be good, I'm just not sure wher the Devils are going to get forwards from over the next few years, and most of our have to go, clearly this formula is not working...

[NJDevs4978]

Also, Matteau will be waiver eligible next year yeah? Can he start the season in the minors or will have to be on the big club?

 

 

He'll have to be on the big club but I think he's an extra forward if everyone's healthy.  I also wouldn't mind dealing him for Brett Connolly or Jeremy Morin but I doubt that Tampa or Chicago does that sort of trade.  

 

How is Matteau not waiver-exempt?  He's 21 at the end of this year and has only been with the organization three seasons.  He has another couple years left I'd think?

[HellOnICE]

It has to do with entry level deals. Once it's over you become waiver eligible.

[ATLL765]

How is Matteau not waiver-exempt?  He's 21 at the end of this year and has only been with the organization three seasons.  He has another couple years left I'd think?

I think the way the rules work, it's because we started the clock in his first year by bringing him up to play just over the max before the contract could slide as an 18 year old.

[coldply123]

I'm not sure there is any salvaging the Devils' season this year.  There's too many holes on the team, and spending a bunch of draft picks to patch them isn't the right idea.  I thought losing Salvador and Clowe to injury would help the team, but Havlat and Ryder have emerged as players who simply cannot be playing on a good hockey team, and Zajac's offense has fallen off even more than last year.  I don't think Lou should be considering any trade that isn't made with an eye towards next year.  The Devils could start winning - some timely goal scoring and Schneider playing .930 hockey could certainly get the Devils ahead, probably, but not far enough.  So here's what I would do to try to get the team going again:

 

1.  Trade Eric Gelinas ASAP.  He's being healthy scratched despite there being 2 injuries on defense.  He's a specialty item on a team that can no longer afford that luxury.  If you had the kind of forward group that can carry along an Eric Gelinas at even strength, then great, but the Devils won't, and they won't for some time.  I'm afraid of what the Devils might lose if Gelinas somehow gets good, but if they wait another year, there may be no market at all for Gelinas.  Get what you can for him, kid's got a hell of a shot and if he figures out the defensive zone even a little bit he'll be a player worth having.  I'd be willing to get a 2nd round pick for him if that pick were to be shopped for upgrades at forward.

 

2.  Try to set up an Andrei Loktionov sort of trade.  The Loktionov trade didn't work out, but Loktionov was 90% of the way to being a pretty good player.  Bad defense and some bad shooting luck by his line were his undoing last year.  The Devils need a center badly - Patrik Elias isn't going to be the answer for very long if he is now, and Jacob Josefson is not good enough to do even what Patrik is doing now.  I'd be willing to deal the Devils' 2nd round pick this year for a young center who isn't getting an opportunity where he is now.  I'm not sure right now who that is or where that player exists, but the Devils will have plenty of picks in this year's draft if they continue down the road they're on now, so I don't mind giving one up for a shot at this kind of player.

 

3.  Buy out Dainius Zubrus at season's end.  I have always liked Zubrus's game, but the Devils did not see the warning signs in 2012-13 and wishcasted themselves into a 3 year deal with a player who has rapidly declining skills.  His contract is not that expensive but 3 years for him was quite simply a dumb move - much dumber than the 3 years on Elias's deal.  Zubrus is a defense-only player at this point - he's a smart enough player on offense that he fools you into thinking he might have something to give there, but he just doesn't.

 

4.  Keep Jaromir Jagr.  If Jagr wants out, fine, but if he doesn't, it's hard not to keep him because he is the only player above water right now.  The Devils simply aren't going to do better than him next year on the free agent market and they still need right wings, even if they trade Gelinas for one.

 

5.  Stop thinking that Adam Henrique is 'ready to break out' - He's a decent 2nd line wing or good 3rd line center, and that's what he is.  A good player to have, but not the cornerstone of a franchise.

 

So my ideal Devils team next year looks something like:

 

Cammalleri-Zajac-X

Boucher-Y-Jagr

Elias-Henrique-Z

Ruutu-Josefson-Gionta

 

Greene-Severson

Merrill-Larsson

A-B

Helgeson

 

Schneider

Kinkaid

 

Where Z is a player acquired for Gelinas, Y is a player acquired for a 2nd round pick, and X - maybe X is someone we drafted in the top 8 of next year's draft.  It does figure to be deep.  A and B I'm not so sure of.

 

In an ideal world, I really don't want Jagr back next season.  But, I'm struggling to find how we come up with a passable group of forwards for one more year without that.

[NJDevs4978]

I think the way the rules work, it's because we started the clock in his first year by bringing him up to play just over the max before the contract could slide as an 18 year old.

 

The clock thing only applies to when he becomes UFA I thought?

[Mike Brown]

I'm all for doing whatever it takes to making this team a playoff team again.  AND I MEAN WHATEVER IT TAKES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!