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NJ/Albany Minor Transactions Thread (was Thomson/Johnson thread)


Triumph

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According to a TG tweet:  https://twitter.com/TGfireandice/status/468813749160525824

 

Ben Johnson is a speedster who put up 59-28-25-53 this year for Windsor playing in a largely defensive role - he does have a pending trial for sexual assault, TG notes.

 

Ben Thomson is a tough guy who in his overage season put up 55-27-20-47, which isn't half bad - we'll see what he can do in Albany.

 

This means that right now no Devils prospects are eligible to re-enter the draft.

Edited by Triumph
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This means that right now no Devils prospects are eligible to re-enter the draft.

 

Might Kerfoot be, or am I confusing this with free agency? 

 

Also, the 2012 draft has something like 5 out 7 players signed to ELCs.  Is that above normal?

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Might Kerfoot be, or am I confusing this with free agency? 

 

Also, the 2012 draft has something like 5 out 7 players signed to ELCs.  Is that above normal?

 

College players once drafted are not eligible to enter the draft again.

 

That's not really above normal, the Devils just typically don't draft that many junior players.  Players allowed to re-enter draft drafted by NJ over the last ten years:  Ashton Bernard, Matt Delahey, Ryan Molle, Kiril Tulupov, Kyell Henegan, Bill Kinkel.

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Good news. I'm not really high on Thomson but Johnson seems interesting. Looking forward to the roster turnover in Albany next year and seeing how these guys do as pros.

 

The Devils still have to sign Myles Bell by 6/1. I think they have til 8/15 for Joe Faust, Derek Rodwell, and Curtis Gedig but I'd only expect Gedig to get signed. I'd be surprised to see Faust or Rodwell in the organization even on AHL deals.

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Good news. I'm not really high on Thomson but Johnson seems interesting. Looking forward to the roster turnover in Albany next year and seeing how these guys do as pros.

 

The Devils still have to sign Myles Bell by 6/1. I think they have til 8/15 for Joe Faust, Derek Rodwell, and Curtis Gedig but I'd only expect Gedig to get signed. I'd be surprised to see Faust or Rodwell in the organization even on AHL deals.

 

I don't think they have to sign Bell, although it gets very convoluted - they have to make him an offer, otherwise he goes back into the draft.  But they could theoretically make him an offer, tell him not to take it, and then sign him to an AHL deal.  Not sure why he would do that but stranger things have happened.

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If both of them 'make it', I wonder how long it'll take me to tell them apart by name. I already confuse them a fair bit.

 

Well, if that does happen, hopefully Lou at least numbers them slightly differently - the 20 games that Bergfors and Halischuk were numbered 18 and 16 respectively were maddening.  I imagine Johnson's speed would set him apart from Thomson.

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Well, if that does happen, hopefully Lou at least numbers them slightly differently - the 20 games that Bergfors and Halischuk were numbered 18 and 16 respectively were maddening.  I imagine Johnson's speed would set him apart from Thomson.

 

"Erraaa, Johnson you can be 12 and Thomson, here's 21." 

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I don't really know why NJ hasn't signed even one UDFA - then again we don't know if they're going to sign Myles Bell either.  Still, there is definitely room in Albany for another RW or 3, especially if Sislo makes next year's team.  

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  • 1 month later...

Didn't see this posted yet but Mike Hoeffel appears to have signed with the Columbus organization (source). Nice to make room for the new forwards coming into Albany next year (Johnson, Thomson, Black, Bell).

 

Also, Burlon was re-signed to a 2 year NHL deal according to CapGeek. Gets a nice AHL salary raise and his NHL cap hit is peanuts. Though I suppose he's pretty far down the depth chart for D now.

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Look forward to the A Devs coming to Norfolk to play. I usually go down for morning skate (usually back to back games) everyones there, usually hanging out watching Admirals practice.  Everyones friendly. especially coaches.  Spoke to Pesonen & he seemed surprised somebody down here would knew who he was.  

 

Deboer worked with his buddy P. Maurice & Tippett at the worlds. I was wondering if he might tweak his systems at all? Sometimes you pick up pointers from another coach.

 

I guess everything coaching wise will remain the same.  Brylin was a good addition last year.

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Hoeffel was a second round pick I believe. It sucks when you see guys picked that high but make no impact on the team. What was once one of our strengths has really been dismal for a long time now.

 

In 2007.  57th overall, according to Wiki.  Wouldn't consider him a high pick, nor a huge loss imo.

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Hoeffel was a second round pick I believe. It sucks when you see guys picked that high but make no impact on the team. What was once one of our strengths has really been dismal for a long time now.

From 01-07, our scouting as absolutely abysmal.  Aside from Henrique, Parise, Zajac and Fayne, there was absolutely no talent in that 7 year period.  I think it is fair to say that the last five years, they've been much better drafting

 

Edit: if it wasn't for picking up key UDFA like Greene and Clarkson, it would've looked a lot worse

Edited by SMantzas
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From 01-07, our scouting as absolutely abysmal.  Aside from Henrique, Parise, Zajac and Fayne, there was absolutely no talent in that 7 year period.  I think it is fair to say that the last five years, they've been much better drafting

 

Edit: if it wasn't for picking up key UDFA like Greene and Clarkson, it would've looked a lot worse

 

Maybe what we can take from this is that our scouts are much better with North American prospects than they are with Europeans. It's to the point where I'd rather they just draft North Americans. It can't all just be bad luck with the Europeans we've drafted recently.

Edited by Jerzey Devil
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From 01-07, our scouting as absolutely abysmal.  Aside from Henrique, Parise, Zajac and Fayne, there was absolutely no talent in that 7 year period.  I think it is fair to say that the last five years, they've been much better drafting

 

Edit: if it wasn't for picking up key UDFA like Greene and Clarkson, it would've looked a lot worse

 

Where I give credit to scouting staffs is when players look like NHLers all the way up until they actually don't, especially with later-round picks.  So yeah, Hoeffel is a miss - year 2 of his NCAA career and he didn't look like he'd be anything worthwhile.  Still, people like Palmieri and Halischuk have or had NHL careers - they're not bad picks.  Obviously that doesn't win you NHL hockey games to say 'Oh, well Nick Palmieri was a half-decent player until his career fell apart and this year he was 5th in scoring on his German league team', but they identified players with NHL-level talent, which isn't easy to do.

 

Maybe what we can take from this is that our scouts are much better with North American prospects than they are with Europeans. It's to the point where I'd rather they just draft North Americans. It can't all just be bad luck with the Europeans we've drafted recently.

 

The Devils really haven't drafted that many European players overall.  Sticking to North America is a good way to fall behind other organizations who aren't categorically rejecting 25% of the player pool for no good reason.  And again, under the system I outlined above, someone like Urbom is a success.  He skates like an NHLer, he's got an NHLer's body, he just can't play NHL-level defense.  They identified a good player and a lot of stuff happened since he was drafted and he didn't make it all the way there.  I'd say the same thing about Josefson - who knows what he is without all the injury setbacks?  But if you can draft 5 Urboms in the 3rd and 4th round over the course of 5 years and one guy turns out to be Henrik Tallinder and the other 4 wash out in different ways, I think as an organization you'd take that.

Edited by Triumph
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  • 2 weeks later...

Usually wouldn't post something like this but given how slow August is for hockey news...I randomly searched on twitter for Albany Devils and came across this tweet:

https://twitter.com/Migla/status/497893445483388928

"Albany Devils might be moving to Manchester to replace the Monarchs who are moving to Ontario, California. (From a source)"

 

I'm skeptical of the account since he doesn't seem to be affiliated with any media outlet but it doesn't seem that far fetched. The AHL is about to go through some realignment with teams moving out west, the ECHL/CHL are likely to merge in the near future with some ECHL teams perhaps ending up in the AHL, and the Albany Devils are in the last year of their lease and still have attendance issues, highlighted in this article from the Times Union (2/10/14):

 

The American Hockey League team's current per-game average of 3,018 fans is the lowest in the city's 21-year AHL history...Albany has ranked in the bottom 25 percent of league attendance each of the past 14 seasons...The Devils have a full season remaining on a five-year lease with Times Union Center, although they have an escape clause after this year. While there have been no spoken or even implied threats of departure, cities desperate for an AHL team could try to lure away the Devils.

Here's a link on the Manchester Monarchs possibly moving to California. Just something interesting to think about.

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Very interesting and wondering if the devils will do this. I know Lou and past and current coaches and players have said having the team in Albany is convenient due to it being only about a 2-3 hour car ride from Newark. One of the main reasons why they moved from Lowell (devils purchased the loch monsters and renamed them the devils back around 2005ish after the river rats changed affiliations with the Carolina who later moved to Charlotte to be the checkers) to Albany was to bring them closer and make emergency call ups easier. I know if they do move to Manchester it's still not as bad as other teams who have their minor league team on the opposite of the country, it's still reduces their flexibility somewhat in that regard.

I'm still curious to see what is the reason for the Albany devils attendance issues. Is the local economy tough or the locals apathetic? From what I remember the team on the ice have not been great but they haven't been that bad either.

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I don't know anything about Albany's economy but it seems like even when Carolina had the franchise they still struggled with attendance. During those years they were still averaging under 4,000 a game and were towards the bottom of the league in attendance. I know the Devils have gotten some heat from people up there about how they've handled the team since the River Rats days. Plus an Albany season ticket holder told me that a lot of people that did go to games when Carolina had the team stopped once the Devils took it over again. Maybe Albany just isn't that great of a market?

The travel from Newark as you mention isn't ideal but at roughly 4.5 hours I guess it wouldn't make it a stumbling block to relocating. Have to imagine any relocation takes place for the 2015-16 season That seems to be the target date for the whole shake up of minor league hockey to go into effect.

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