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

[Lou Bloom]

A forward group that had no reason to being tweaked as hard as he did post 2023? Yes, he deserves absurd amounts of blame for that. And now he has to go back in the trade market or UFA to fix it again when there was no need besides figuring out what to do with the 4C post McLeod Team Canada thing. And the poor drafting plays into ELC's not being readily available up front so he had even more reason to dip into UFA for plugs/grinders. Stillman over Stankoven is one example I thought of within 2 mins of this post, I'm sure there's others in various drafts under his regime that have been equally bad.

The only major tweak he made was bringing in Toffoli for Sharangovich who was a healthy scratch for the majority of the playoffs and due for a raise as an RFA and not re-signing Miles Wood and Tatar (both of whom weren't worth their respective contracts anyway). Toffoli ended up being a bad fit and he traded him.

The big reason why the forward depth crated is because:
1. McLeod situation
2. Mercer turning from solid player to barely making an impact.
3. Having faith in Holtz to break onto the team as a high draft pick.
4. Haula declining.

And mix those situations with not having any good forward prospects to supplement ended up cratering the forward depth on the roster. It wasn't about making making major changes post 2023, If Mercer and Holtz progressed like he hoped (and how many on this forum wanted him to give the young players a chance) and the McLeod situation didn't occur then the forward depth concern wouldn't even be an issue.

I think the lack of forward talent being drafted under him and the inability to find steals in UFA/trade market forward wise is a valid criticism. But completely ignoring the fact that he completely overhauled the defense and goaltending in one offseason while also building up the future depth in both with Silayev and Yegorov in favor of just constantly complaining about the lack of forward depth in an over the top way is just ridiculous.

He completely fixed the defense and goaltending in one offseason, can we at least give him the next trade deadline and offseason to try and fix the forward depth before we start with the over the top complaints.

 

[Lou Bloom]

The bottom line is that this team is not that well constructed. Most of our forwards have little to no chemistry with each other, Bratt and Jack notwithstanding. You see this in their lack of clean passes regularly. We have zero snipers on the team, you see evidence of this regularly as well with their shot selection and wild fluctuations with finishing. The guys we have who have some snarl or grit pretty much suck at everything else. We are generally no longer a fast team. The defense is pretty good in their own end but there’s only one and a half guys who can transition well and contribute offensively regularly. The goaltending has been fine but it’s certainly not solved long term and could go off the deep end at any moment given their ages.

It’s not clear to me what kind of team Fitz is trying to build. It’s a less severe strain of Shero syndrome.

The problem with the forwards was due to Mercer and Holtz failing to live up to expectations, McLeod situation, Palat and Haula both being bad contracts and poor forward drafting. It has little to do with chemistry and much more to do with a lack of talent outside of Bratt, Hughes, Hischier and Meier.

How many teams in the NHL have players like Hughes and Hamilton to bring offense from the backend. The unit has been one of the top ones in the NHL this season and still have Casey, Nemec and Silayev as prospects/depth.

How many teams have a better goaltending situation right now? a year and half of Markstrom at $4.125M with Yegorov a recent 2nd round pick looking very good at Boston is a better situation than the majority of NHL teams are in right now.

The forward depth is a very fair criticism but you would think with how well Fitz did reworking the defense and goaltending over the past year that he'd at least get a little leeway in trying to fix this situation before everyone started to freak out.

 

[theoptimist]

Good morning. Thank you Fitz.

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

So depressing that we are being treated to yet another season where it appears expectations will not be met.

WE DESERVE THIS!!!

what if they beat a Carolina team playing similar hockey to them in the first round? would we DESERVE this then?

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

Blake Coleman is another example. Would be the exact type of player we need right now. He trades him away befause we won’t be signing him because we don’t want to give big contracts to a player like that…only to turn around and pay similar amount to an older, worse version in Palat. What was the point of trading him? Where’s the vision in that kind of move? I don’t see it.

are you seriously questioning why they traded a ~29 year old middle 6 winger that needed a fat new contract for big assets?

you guys love playing revisionist history on here. Really weird stuff.

 

[Billdo]

Lumbus is only four back now. Yikes.