Devils discussion (news, notes and speculation) - part II

[billingtons ghost]

Most teams knock on the door a little while before they get in. It's usually a progression....

While you're in that progression I don't believe you are elite or upper echelon...I think without proof, without receipts you don't get any benefit of the doubt.

Win a playoff round. Win two. Get to the ECF this year or next. Then we can talk.

This has been an impressive streak, and getting through the pre-christmas blahs is especially promising.

Here's a West Coast trip. Historically a challenge. At least Blackwood can't shut us out in SJ anymore but Vitek might.

When we were a good team a couple of years ago we went into a monster January tailspin.

Please don't do that this year.

 

[My3Sons]

Tampa is looking real good actually, they’re on a finishing/PDO bender, but they’re crushing teams under a pile of goals right now.

View attachment 952944

Carolina is fast, arguably faster than anyone, and has better forward depth. Goaltending has been hurting them quite a bit. That and their defense depth took a hit after the major losses, but that top pair has been pretty dominant. But I would prefer any other 1st round matchup.

It’s hard to say any team that relies so much on Sasquatch is fast.

 

[billingtons ghost]

Tampa is looking real good actually, they’re on a finishing/PDO bender, but they’re crushing teams under a pile of goals right now.

View attachment 952944

Carolina is fast, arguably faster than anyone, and has better forward depth. Goaltending has been hurting them quite a bit. That and their defense depth took a hit after the major losses, but that top pair has been pretty dominant. But I would prefer any other 1st round matchup.

^this.

I will never like us against Washington as they put us into that hesitant small guy mode and get us off our game and I don't want to fight Ovi history game mgmt by the refs.

 

[Satans Hockey]

Just want to brag that Timo and my son are besties now View attachment 952293

Your kid got lucky here, Timo clearly has his eyes dead set on him while leading with his elbow!

 

[Guttersniped]

There's a complex explanation that involves salary cap, motivation and lockerroom stuff there so it's tough to defend that particular cherry that you've picked.

Ok, how about the team that didn’t start making the playoffs until 2019-20 (with an incredible .565% that year) and never won a playoff round until 2022?

Florida became an upper echelon team pretty quickly. The only started to become good when Quenneville took over.

I personally don’t care at all if people think we’re upper echelon, I just want to enjoy things like making the playoffs two years in a row.

Does our team have flaws? Sure.

Our team has strength, defense, that doesn’t get you goals. Goals wins you games. This is why you don’t want to spend too much on defense, or “intangibles”. So you can spend more on offense.

We need both more secondary scoring and real defensive forwards/center, so the Nico line can be buried less in defensive starts.

It’s hard to say any team that relies so much on Sasquatch is fast.

They definitely got faster at forward.

 

[KovalchukFistPump]

Win a playoff round. Win two. Get to the ECF this year or next. Then we can talk.

This has been an impressive streak, and getting through the pre-christmas blahs is especially promising.

Here's a West Coast trip. Historically a challenge. At least Blackwood can't shut us out in SJ anymore but Vitek might.

When we were a good team a couple of years ago we went into a monster January tailspin.

Please don't do that this year.

Hawks had one playoff run before winning the Cup. pens had one brief appearance before going to the Finals. It's different when you have First Overall picks.

Devils are built to be a Cup contender this year. Top players on value contracts. A defense with highly paid vets that are in the part of the contract before falling off a cliff combined with young guys who are still on their ELC but have experience and can probably be trusted in the playoffs (I'm including Nemec in this if someone gets hurt).

Missing pieces are bottom-6 depth which can be easily acquired. This team should be gunning for it now before Hischier needs a huge raise and we potentially lose Mercer. The only question will be if Nemec gets pissed off that Luke gets a huge deal while he is stuck in the AHL (the team can't really afford to pay him before getting rid of Dillon, Palat, and maybe Hamilton so hopefully he's okay with a bridge year or two).

 

[Emperoreddy]

^this.

I will never like us against Washington as they put us into that hesitant small guy mode and get us off our game and I don't want to fight Ovi history game mgmt by the refs.

That didn't happen against them this year when we played them though

 

[JimEIV]

I'm positive Fitz sees the same flaws in the lineup.

I don't think anything drastic needs to be done...but a move like adding a Patrick Maroon in 2018 would have a big impact on this particular team I believe.

 

[forceten]

Carolina has made the playoffs 6 out of the last 6 years.

They've won the Division 3 out of the last 6 years.

They've gotten to the 2nd round of the playoffs 5 of the last 6 years

They've gotten to ECF twice in the last 6 years.

We don't have this track record. In fact we've haven't had this much success in 20 years ....we aren't in this class.

I was comparing our team to them THIS YEAR. I was replying to several topics.

 

[njdevil26]

Your kid got lucky here, Timo clearly has his eyes dead set on him while leading with his elbow!

Going to have to keep an eye on his knees now too!

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

No, he's kinda correct. We've got the talent and we've shown we can put it together for five game stretches.

We've seen this before tho, where the team goes bonkers, looks unbearable, we chant Sorry Lindy, then goes in the tank for twenty games.

Keefe and the rebuilt D are the big difference to think otherwise this year.

We are still one injury away from completely destabilizing in about six different spots and I think that lack of depth keeps us temporarily out of the conversation as a truly elite team at this point.

we're literally 2nd in the league?

we've put it togehter for 40 games so far?

why is it so hard for you boomers to admit this team is really good?

 

[Brooklyndevil]

Carolina has made the playoffs 6 out of the last 6 years.

They've won the Division 3 out of the last 6 years.

They've gotten to the 2nd round of the playoffs 5 of the last 6 years

They've gotten to ECF twice in the last 6 years.

We don't have this track record. In fact we've haven't had this much success in 20 years ....we aren't in this class.

You’re correct about us not having Carolina’s track record. However, for a team that’s made the playoffs the last six years, they haven’t made it to the promise land or even the finals. They remind me of the Sens, of the early two thousand that had a great team but could never make it over the finish line.

 

[JimEIV]

You’re correct about us not having Carolina’s track record. However, for a team that’s made the playoffs the last six years, they haven’t made it to the promise land or even the finals. They remind me of the Sens, of the early two thousand that had a great team but could never make it over the finish line.

Yeah, we've lived though a lot of that here in NJ post 2005 lockout.

Sucks to not win a championship but I don't think that diminishes the team success that was had by Ottawa, us or Carolina.

 

[billingtons ghost]

we're literally 2nd in the league?

we've put it togehter for 40 games so far?

why is it so hard for you boomers to admit this team is really good?

Jim and I are both GenXers man, so take your ageist hate elsewhere.

We've also seen a good team or two. Not sure you have.

The last few games have been clinical dismantling of other teams and I love it. Elite teams do that for 85% of their games.

They haven't been elite for forty games. They've been good for about twenty five.

There is literally no forward depth and little balance in our scoring. You don't even have to point at what might happen if Jack or Bratt or Nico went down. There is literally no replacement for Kovacevic or Dillon, and I think 12 shots against Markstrom is a different goalie than 40 shots against Markstrom, as we've seen earlier in the season. We could go back to being an average team.

If we lost Luke, Casey if healthy or Nemec could step in. We lose a top six forward or other defenseman and we are a different team.

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

ahh, the old "if our 3 best players get hurt, we're doomed!" as if that isn't true for literally every team in the NHL.

 

[Bleedred]

Win a playoff round. Win two. Get to the ECF this year or next. Then we can talk.

This has been an impressive streak, and getting through the pre-christmas blahs is especially promising.

Here's a West Coast trip. Historically a challenge. At least Blackwood can't shut us out in SJ anymore but Vitek might.

When we were a good team a couple of years ago we went into a monster January tailspin.

Please don't do that this year.

Vitek has been hurt for a few weeks. So it'll probably be Georgiev or Askaraov, unless Vitek is back by Saturday.

I don't know, we've done well some years on these west coast trips, even when we weren't good and before Anaheim and San Jose were humpty teams. We didn't do well on it last year though, but we had a blowout win over San Jose and somehow couldn't beat Anaheim despite outplaying them. The last game in LA was a ''We want Lindy fired'' game and that's what happened right after lol.

You have to be thinking of December when we had a monster tailspin a couple of years ago. January we had a really good record if I'm not mistaken? I think we had the California trip in January that year and it was a sweep. We somehow even won a shootout in San Jose.

I think we had a tailspin in January of last year though.

 

[My3Sons]

Jim and I are both GenXers man, so take your ageist hate elsewhere.

We've also seen a good team or two. Not sure you have.

The last few games have been clinical dismantling of other teams and I love it. Elite teams do that for 85% of their games.

They haven't been elite for forty games. They've been good for about twenty five.

There is literally no forward depth and little balance in our scoring. You don't even have to point at what might happen if Jack or Bratt or Nico went down. There is literally no replacement for Kovacevic or Dillon, and I think 12 shots against Markstrom is a different goalie than 40 shots against Markstrom, as we've seen earlier in the season. We could go back to being an average team.

If we lost Luke, Casey if healthy or Nemec could step in. We lose a top six forward or other defenseman and we are a different team.

You old people make me sick. You shouldn’t be allowed to post on the internet grandpa. I think those are your dentures in the sink.

 

[NJDevs26]

While I don’t blame anyone for being skeptical of the Devils being elite, can we at least have an honest discussion of how many ‘proven’ elite teams there are in the NHL atm? Five…if that? Colorado and Tampa aren’t the same teams who won Cups, even the Caps have changed over a lot. Regular season teams like Carolina and Toronto also have a lot to prove in the playoffs. Boston and Pittsburgh have certainly changed over and aged.

 

[devilsfan950003]

We are not an upper echelon team. Can't do that in a half of a season or even one year.

You need a proven track record to be upper echelon team. Making the playoffs twice in the previous 11 years is the exact opposite of upper echelon.

"Up and comer"...dark horse? Maybe?

One thing though is a lot of the upper echelon teams in the East seem to be on a steep down turn like Boston Pittsburgh and even Tampa....so there is a void in the East.

I'd be afraid of the Caps and Hurricanes in the playoffs.

 

[My3Sons]

I'd be afraid of the Caps and Hurricanes in the playoffs.

I think those two teams are already playing playoff games. They don’t really have an extra reservoir of coaching or effort to turn to.

 

[TrufleShufle]

While I don’t blame anyone for being skeptical of the Devils being ‘elite’ can we at least have an honest discussion of how many ‘proven’ elite teams there are in the NHL atm? Five…if that? Colorado and Tampa aren’t the same teams who won Cups, even the Caps have changed over a lot. Regular season teams like Carolina and Toronto also have a lot to prove in the playoffs. Boston and Pittsburgh have certainly changed over and aged.

I think we are in a bit of a transition year, but will probably have a clearer picture post trade deadline in my opinion, if at all. Teams are starting to rise and teams are starting to fall, that can be true of any year but I think this year more so than others.

But also "honest discussion" would involve a discussion while not acting like every opinion not aligned with your own is a direct attack on your core beliefs and taken as an insult. So no, we can't.

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

While I don’t blame anyone for being skeptical of the Devils being elite, can we at least have an honest discussion of how many ‘proven’ elite teams there are in the NHL atm? Five…if that? Colorado and Tampa aren’t the same teams who won Cups, even the Caps have changed over a lot. Regular season teams like Carolina and Toronto also have a lot to prove in the playoffs. Boston and Pittsburgh have certainly changed over and aged.

the entire point is that previous seasons are meaningless. There is no one way to win a Cup. Some teams are in the playoffs for years and years then finally break through. Some teams suck shit for years and years then win one within 1-2 years. Some teams are consistently good but never win shit ala NYR and CAR.

this season has nothing to do with last season let alone a season 11 years ago.

 

[TrufleShufle]

"the entire point"

You made that the entire point because someone had a different definition of "upper echelon." Not one person has said this team is bad.

 

[Emperoreddy]

 

[JimEIV]

While I don’t blame anyone for being skeptical of the Devils being elite, can we at least have an honest discussion of how many ‘proven’ elite teams there are in the NHL atm? Five…if that? Colorado and Tampa aren’t the same teams who won Cups, even the Caps have changed over a lot. Regular season teams like Carolina and Toronto also have a lot to prove in the playoffs. Boston and Pittsburgh have certainly changed over and aged.

Florida, Carolina, Tampa.... Washington and Toronto strike me as pretenders.

We are the new kid....the exchange student from some unknown Eastern European country that no one has heard of and doesn't know what to make of us ..so everyone just stares at us for the first week of school....until we get naked on dance on the table at the first party we get invited to nobody really knows.