GDT: COYOTES @ DEVILS 1/19/22 7pm MSG+

[Jerrydevil]

13 minutes ago, NJDevils1214 said:

Amanda challenged both Nico and Blackwood tonight in her questions. Kind of nice to hear.

The Devils are gonna have to speak to her about that.

[Jerrydevil]

1 hour ago, ilzz89 said:

Ever since blackwood got vaccinated he's been  awful 

Blackwood is as leaky as the vaccine.

[slasher72]

3 hours ago, ajsgolf said:

Ok, start thinking and let me know by morning.  Hate waiting around for this loser of a franchise.  I’ll forever hate Gretzky for calling them a Mickey Mouse franchise but he is definitely onto something.

This current franchise definitely fits Mickey Mouse. Fitz will likely make zero changes because I think he's in over his head. At least Lou shows up to Islander games to assess the team. Fitz is MIA. Do I want Lou back? Hell no and not in a million years. But a competant GM who can assemble a true NHL roster and coaching staff would be a welcome change. 

[Chimaira_Devil_#9]

6 hours ago, slasher72 said:

I sort of enjoyed watching Zacha coast around the ice with his "fvck it" attitude. He really epitomizes bad first round selection 

He is falling further and further behind in terms of points by players from that class. That draft haunts me to this day. 

Barzal was just clearly better, Konecny was clearly better. 

Anyway nothing you can really do now. After this year I am happy to package him for someone else. 

Time to start the 2022 draft thread and look at wingers and goalies. 

Edited January 20, 2022 by Chimaira_Devil_#9

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

3 hours ago, MB3 said:

“the team made mistakes”, followed by “it was weird” (whatever that means) followed by “yeah i mean it’s my first game back and i felt really sh!tty”. 

cut him 

Deadwood’s first two seasons were quite solid, and pointed to good things ahead…sucks how it’s gone since then.  If I’m the Devils, no way I’m locking myself into him as the future.  And though the Devils have been awful at this for decades now, they have to explore drafting a goalie…and as the Rangers have shown again and again, it doesn’t always take a high-end pick to find a good one.  

[jagknife]

1 hour ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

Deadwood’s first two seasons were quite solid, and pointed to good things ahead…sucks how it’s gone since then.  If I’m the Devils, no way I’m locking myself into him as the future.  And though the Devils have been awful at this for decades now, they have to explore drafting a goalie…and as the Rangers have shown again and again, it doesn’t always take a high-end pick to find a good one.  

At this point nevermind just drafting a goalie and hoping they’ll develop, they need to seriously consider an aggressive move to bring in an established one.

Who’s available? I haven’t a freakin clue, but we made another guy off the street look amazing all while giving up more rebounds than a youth basketball game, and Mr Excuses now has both COVID, a vax he “didn’t want” and his precious little heel to fall back on and will use.

Maybe after the Olympics, Moe will finally fire Schemp and could call Julien? With Lou gone maybe a reunion is in order? At this point I don’t care if the next coach is great with young guys or could be the most abrasive piece of sh!t imaginable. If he holds them accountable and calls them out on their bullsh!t, they’ll be forced to play better and accidentally win more games

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

That’s the thing Jag…who is actually available and do the Devils have the right pieces to go get him?  

[Guadana]

2 hours ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

Deadwood’s 

Blackweed

[Fansinz88]

19 minutes ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

That’s the thing Jag…who is actually available and do the Devils have the right pieces to go get him?  

That’s what I’ve been saying we all want these garbage guys moved and get good a good player. Who will take the garbage and give us what? Hard ask. 

[vadvlfan]

7 hours ago, Nicomo said:

Has he though? Off the top of my head he’s played with the corpse of Wayne Simmonds, Miles Wood (nice player but a bottom 6 guy let’s be honest), Kyle Palmieri who has a total of 11 goals since the 2019-20 season, Yegor Sharongovich, Janne Kuokkanen, and ofc the stretch where Ruff brilliantly played him out of position on Nico’s wing…

I’d argue this season with Bratt is the first time he’s actually been given a good winger to play with. And to no one’s surprise they complement each other’s styles really well. Bratt is one of the only players on the team who can keep up with Jack’s skating. 

You're pumping Bratts tires quite a bit.  Let's everyone calm down. Players salaries have a "range". Whoa to the team that overpays hoping he'll play to that salary. 

[MadDog2020]

7 hours ago, NJDevils1214 said:

Amanda challenged both Nico and Blackwood tonight in her questions. Kind of nice to hear.

What did she ask?

[Nicomo]

Just now, vadvlfan said:

You're pumping Bratts tires quite a bit.  Let's everyone calm down. Players salaries have a "range". Whoa to the team that overpays hoping he'll play to that salary. 

Ok…

[Chimaira_Devil_#9]

2 hours ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

Deadwood’s first two seasons were quite solid, and pointed to good things ahead…sucks how it’s gone since then.  If I’m the Devils, no way I’m locking myself into him as the future.  And though the Devils have been awful at this for decades now, they have to explore drafting a goalie…and as the Rangers have shown again and again, it doesn’t always take a high-end pick to find a good one.  

Having looked at this year's goalie class there is some potential for some late round steals. Will post some good articles in the draft thread. 

Also Jacob Malek in our own system is having quite a year in the Czech league. But we need to get him facing a higher level of competition next year. 

[Nicomo]

2 minutes ago, MadDog2020 said:

What did she ask?

Not sure on Nico, but I linked the Blackwood part in this thread last night. Don’t watch it unless you want your opinion of him to plummet even lower. 

[MadDog2020]

6 hours ago, slasher72 said:

This current franchise definitely fits Mickey Mouse. Fitz will likely make zero changes because I think he's in over his head. At least Lou shows up to Islander games to assess the team. Fitz is MIA. Do I want Lou back? Hell no and not in a million years. But a competant GM who can assemble a true NHL roster and coaching staff would be a welcome change. 

I’m beginning to have my doubts on Fitz too. He’s too content. A GM should never be content.

Edited January 20, 2022 by MadDog2020

[MadDog2020]

11 minutes ago, Nicomo said:

Not sure on Nico, but I linked the Blackwood part in this thread last night. Don’t watch it unless you want your opinion of him to plummet even lower. 

Yeah I just watched it. He made all kinds of excuses before finally admitting he needs to play better. He kind of buried the lead there.

[DevsMan84]

Not much to say about the game last night.  We saw how it went and that's the type of game that gets coaches and GM's fired.  However, not in the New Jersey Devils Country Club!

Anyways, I wanted to listen to the post-game presser to see how the team reacted to it and decided to focus on three of them.

Nico - Gave the most honest assessment of the game.  Liked that he was angry and what he saw matched what we all saw.  Good on him.

Ruff - What a complete moron.  He has no clue what he is doing.  The best example is how he singled out Johnsson (who hasn't played well lately) at the end for his poor play meanwhile saying nothing about the Czech Wonder who has 1 goal in his last 18 games and playing with Hischier and Tatar.  At this point this idiot is not being fired during the season.  Owners don't want to pay for 2 coaches since they will have to pay Ruff if they "fire" him now and get a replacement.  Owners wanted bargain-basement coach and they are getting bargain-basement coaching out of this guy.  He even makes Nas look far more competent as a HC which is frankly quite amazing.

Blackwood - I've had enough of his imbecile.  Get this fvcking loser off the team already.  This guy is a never-ending stream of excuses.  He blames re-directions as if he is the first goalie to ever face them.  His puck/rebound control is dog sh!t where every shot turns into 2-3 chances.  He also blames how he didn't get much action in the first period as another reason for his piss-poor performance.  This is the same guy where for 2 seasons in a row we have to go out and get a 1B because we are worried about over-working this idiot.  If it is his precious heel that is bothering him then I would rather ride Gillies for an extended stretch.  At least he looks competent right now compared to our Joe Rogan on Ice.

 

Regarding Fitz, I have little confidence in him anymore.  Once again it's looking more and more likely he will awaken from his hibernation at around trade deadline time where we will once again be sellers.  In the off-season, I do not see any UFA that have the Hamilton-type personality to sign with us (like it away from the spotlight) so we will likely once again be trading spare parts for other team's most expendable players or UFA who have no place else to go.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

36 minutes ago, vadvlfan said:

You're pumping Bratts tires quite a bit.  Let's everyone calm down. Players salaries have a "range". Whoa to the team that overpays hoping he'll play to that salary. 

He’s not a UFA, he’s an RFA who’s arbitration-eligible.  

[RunninWithTheDevil]

8 hours ago, Nicomo said:

https://www.nhl.com/devils/video/blackwood--post-raw-11922/t-277437418/c-10274606

Amanda actually put Blackwood on the spot and this fvcking loser had nothing but excuses and a lack of accountability. 

ZERO self-awareness

[Nicomo]

3 minutes ago, RunninWithTheDevil said:

ZERO self-awareness

So much of goaltending is between the ears. And he ain’t got it…

he’s made it this far by being 6’4 and somewhat talented. That’s not enough to succeed in the top league in the world. 

[NJDevils1214]

2 hours ago, MadDog2020 said:

What did she ask?

With respect to Nico - - I don't remember exactly off the top of my head but she challenged Nico on an answer about learning to either play, win, something... And she jumped on him and was like "but when you say that what does that mean exactly? Because we've heard it before". She made him elaborate.

[NJDevils1214]

2 hours ago, Nicomo said:

So much of goaltending is between the ears. And he ain’t got it…

he’s made it this far by being 6’4 and somewhat talented. That’s not enough to succeed in the top league in the world. 

How can Fitz say the answer is in the room with responses like that? Lol

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

2 hours ago, DevsMan84 said:

Not much to say about the game last night.  We saw how it went and that's the type of game that gets coaches and GM's fired.  However, not in the New Jersey Devils Country Club!

Anyways, I wanted to listen to the post-game presser to see how the team reacted to it and decided to focus on three of them.

Nico - Gave the most honest assessment of the game.  Liked that he was angry and what he saw matched what we all saw.  Good on him.

Ruff - What a complete moron.  He has no clue what he is doing.  The best example is how he singled out Johnsson (who hasn't played well lately) at the end for his poor play meanwhile saying nothing about the Czech Wonder who has 1 goal in his last 18 games and playing with Hischier and Tatar.  At this point this idiot is not being fired during the season.  Owners don't want to pay for 2 coaches since they will have to pay Ruff if they "fire" him now and get a replacement.  Owners wanted bargain-basement coach and they are getting bargain-basement coaching out of this guy.  He even makes Nas look far more competent as a HC which is frankly quite amazing.

Blackwood - I've had enough of his imbecile.  Get this fvcking loser off the team already.  This guy is a never-ending stream of excuses.  He blames re-directions as if he is the first goalie to ever face them.  His puck/rebound control is dog sh!t where every shot turns into 2-3 chances.  He also blames how he didn't get much action in the first period as another reason for his piss-poor performance.  This is the same guy where for 2 seasons in a row we have to go out and get a 1B because we are worried about over-working this idiot.  If it is his precious heel that is bothering him then I would rather ride Gillies for an extended stretch.  At least he looks competent right now compared to our Joe Rogan on Ice.

 

Regarding Fitz, I have little confidence in him anymore.  Once again it's looking more and more likely he will awaken from his hibernation at around trade deadline time where we will once again be sellers.  In the off-season, I do not see any UFA that have the Hamilton-type personality to sign with us (like it away from the spotlight) so we will likely once again be trading spare parts for other team's most expendable players or UFA who have no place else to go.

Fitz really is starting to look like Shero Part Deux...like Shero, he's capable of making good moves.  Like Shero, once seasons go awry, he doesn't seem to have any ability to do anything to address it.  In Shero's case, I understand it to an extent, in that it's not like he had a lot of pieces to try to move for something worthwhile.  But Fitz just sticking with this coaching staff that has basically shown next to nothing (one week of practice and a god-awful team waltzed into your building and wins by THREE GOALS?!), and not even attempting any kind of shakeup...it's a horrible look.

Blackwood is now a sub-.900 goalie over his last 60 GP or so.  Sucks when a prospect doesn't work out...yes, the D and the moron who's in charge of them can make life difficult for a goalie, but was the D all that much better when Blackwood first got the callup?  He put up .918 and .915 save%s in his first two seasons with the big club...and looked a hell of a lot better in doing it.  And yeah, I try not to over-analyze player quotes (and he may simply not be able to articulate well), but everything about him just screams "Needs to go as part of the loser purge" right now.

Last night was the end of my "patience rope".  I'm out of it.  Outside of the obvious guys who I think will and should be part of the plan going forward, everyone else can GTFO.  

[ilzz89]

Zacha needs to be benched for a game, how's he getting a pass?

 

[DevsMan84]

6 minutes ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

Fitz really is starting to look like Shero Part Deux...like Shero, he's capable of making good moves.  Like Shero, once seasons go awry, he doesn't seem to have any ability to do anything to address it.  In Shero's case, I understand it to an extent, in that it's not like he had a lot of pieces to try to move for something worthwhile.  But Fitz just sticking with this coaching staff that has basically shown next to nothing (one week of practice and a god-awful team waltzed into your building and wins by THREE GOALS?!), and not even attempting any kind of shakeup...it's a horrible look.

Blackwood is now a sub-.900 goalie over his last 60 GP or so.  Sucks when a prospect doesn't work out...yes, the D and the moron who's in charge of them can make life difficult for a goalie, but was the D all that much better when Blackwood first got the callup?  He put up .918 and .915 save%s in his first two seasons with the big club...and looked a hell of a lot better in doing it.  And yeah, I try not to over-analyze player quotes (and he may simply not be able to articulate well), but everything about him just screams "Needs to go as part of the loser purge" right now.

Last night was the end of my "patience rope".  I'm out of it.  Outside of the obvious guys who I think will and should be part of the plan going forward, everyone else can GTFO.  

Yes, it's hindsight, but were a lot of the moves "good"?  Larsson for Hall was good for sure.  The Subban trade looks to have been a wash at best.  Gusev was good for about 1/2 a season before falling off the face of the Earth.  If it wasn't for Mercer falling to us in the 2020 Draft, the Hall to Arizona trade would have been a bust.  As for Fitz, the Coleman trade has yielded us Foote who doesn't appear to be a full-time NHL player and our hopes are pinned on a young Russian D-man working out.  The Palmieri/Zajac trade is still up in the air with Chase Stillman (yeah there were other parts but those are inconsequential).

It's a lot of alright moves, but nothing great.  I won't hold my breath for a Gomez for McDonaugh or a Brassard for Zibanejad kind of trade anytime soon from Fitz.

As for Blackwood, I agree.  There are games where good goalies have to steal it for them, and Blackwood hasn't done that in over 2 seasons.  Both his glamour numbers and his advanced numbers are showing a downward trajectory for him and it doesn't look like he will be crawling out of that anytime soon.