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

[NJDevs26]

A line can only put one puck in the net at a time. If Bratt was scoring more goals over the past 20 games, given his point production, it likely means someone else would be scoring less goals over that time.

Unless you think Bratt should be a 100-120 point player.

That someone else being Jack since Palat's clearly the third wheel on that line

Maybe Keefe should have tried putting them on different lines by now, but he probably won't get to at this point. He does seem a bit stubborn when it comes to breaking up d-pairings or top lines.

 

[Killing Joke]

Mercer not improving, Haula falling off a cliff and Meier being snakebitten for quite some time really didn’t help Fitz. This needs to be adressed.

Fitz didn't help himself. The last two seasons he traded in speed for unskilled slugs. MacDermid was traded for and given another contract for 1.15 million a year for I think the next 2 seasons. He has been given 21 games of ice time over guys like Halonen who has 41 goals in 80 AHL games and can actually skate and contribute up here if given a shot.

Bastian is still getting ice time though he is trash.

Tom's talent evaluation is also beyond suspect from some of what is stated above in this post, and also his drafting.

 

[JrFischer54]

I’m not worried that this is going to be a yearly occurrence. These have been kind of freak plays. I am worried about whether all these injuries have a compounding effect of limiting his ceiling of what he can be as a player.

you should be worried about it happening yearly because i believes hes only played a full season once? so definitely pencil him in to miss 10-20 games next year esp considering the Olympics and condensed schedule.

 

[Zippy316]

If Hughes is out long-term, now is definitely the time for the Devils to use extra cap space to push to add some non-rental scoring talent

McCann would be a dream fit. He’s a better fit as a winger but could give him a run at 2C behind Hischier too. Long term he’d be a terrific option with Hughes and Bratt.

One of the biggest issues with this team and that people continue to overlook is there is not much shooting talent on this team. There’s no clinical finishers, but just a lot of volume shooters. It’s definitely a huge area that needs to be addressed for that added threat up and down the lineup.

 

[Edmonton East]

View attachment 985771

Like, losing him is a bigger loss than when we lost Nico, especially since it’s going to be for longer.

Luke was also apparently pretty emotional after the game to the point they had to ask the media to give him some privacy, which does not suggest it’s a good outcome for Jack right now.

This team with a healthy Jack the last few months has only managed to win 2 games or more 2 times. Last time Jan 22-25 (only two games in a row) and prior to that the last time in late December, the rangers game before the break than the first Carolina game on Dec 27th.

The last 12 games have literally been win one, lose one, win one lose one. And that’s with Jack, who as you can see is about as important to a team as his brother is with Vancouver, MacKinnon is for the Avs, Quinn is for the Canucks.

Not gonna debate your overall point, even if I disagree, because there are fair arguments on both sides (I'd say Nico is more valuable to THIS team than Jack).

Just wanted to point out though that the data you presented is pointless to the argument you are trying to make. Need to strip out powerplay production. Only reasonable exception would be if it's an elite shooter that changes the entire face of the PP. I mean you can just look at your list and then relative PP points shares for each player within their team, and it's obvious all this list shows is mostly good players on decent+ teams with strong PP 1s that they heavily rely on. Should also be focusing on goal differential.

Most people would say Hughes and Bratt are this team's top 2 offensive players. They also get the softer matchup usually, since the Nico line goes against the top offensive opponents. Yet at ES, Nico and Timo both have a better goal differential than Jack. Plus Nico can actually win faceoffs, play pk, and has track record of consistently elevating the play of whoever is on his wing. Ok...I kinda debated it lol, but the main point is you committed a data crime.

Fun fact: at ES, Hischier has an insanely high defensive zone start at 17%. This is very rare for your top C...pretty much double the league average for top 6 players. While Jack is a crazy outlier in the opposite direction. At ES, out of the top 65 point scorers, only THREE players are below 6% in defensive zone starts. Pasta at 5.6%, Jack Hughes 3.5% (!!!!), Bratt 4.2%. Yea yea yea, obviously 60% of shifts start on the fly, but this is still very indicative of team usage and matchups with context.

 

[MB3]

I’m not worried that this is going to be a yearly occurrence. These have been kind of freak plays. I am worried about whether all these injuries have a compounding effect of limiting his ceiling of what he can be as a player.

what do you call a freak accident that happens 5 years in a 6 year stretch?

Idk a good punchline but probably not "freak accident"

 

[Cheddabombs]

Losing Jack could give Fitz the room he needed to finally work out a deal for McDavid

 

[longislanddevil]

Mercer for Mittlestadt. Would you make this trade? I’m not sure if this would even be appealing to Colorado.

Mercer is under team cost control longer at 23 and signed through 26-27. He makes 4m. Mittlestadt is 26 and signed through 25-26. He makes 5.75m.

 

[guitarguyvic]

Part of it is probably overrated, but some guys are also having down years compared to even last year. Timo's numbers are down, Lazar's numbers are shockingly down (though he's had injury troubles), Mercer's are about on par to last year which is sad and he's probably our most overrated forward, Haula stinks.

Noesen is the one forward addition that's doing well. We also didn't know what we were really getting with Dougie after a season ending injury. His production has been fine, a step back from 2 seasons ago and his shot doesn't look as dangerous as it once was.

Has anyone considered the fact that prior to this year they were playing shit Lindy pond hockey and that helped inflate their offensive numbers? Perhaps they simply aren’t good enough scorers to be anything more than middle of the pack when they actually have to be responsible in all zones?

Certain posters love citing the stats over the last few seasons but we have witnessed first hand large stretches even under Lindy when they had trouble converting on their chances. In the rangers series, they didn’t score very much. Timo and Bratt had pedestrian productivity. This isn’t the first time we have seen this happen.

Again I’ll point to previous successful core as point of reference. Guys like Kovy, Elias, Parise could be counted on to produce regularly and consistently. There’s a limit to how much you can pump up forwards who can’t score for shit across double digit number of games.

 

[Zippy316]

Mercer for Mittlestadt. Would you make this trade? I’m not sure if this would even be appealing to Colorado.

Mercer is under team cost control longer at 23 and signed through 26-27. He makes 4m. Mittlestadt is 26 and signed through 25-26. He makes 5.75m.

Nope. Colorado wants to move Mittlestadt because he’s a slower more methodical player versus their high tempo game.

I guess Fitzgerald is slowly erasing the Devils speed factor so maybe Mittlestadt could be a target, but I’d prefer not.

 

[NjDevsRR]

Sign me up for Mccann as well

 

[JrFischer54]

team still has bratt nico timo mercer to a lesser extent palat with some veteran leadership a really solid blue line and great goaltending.

 

[Call Me Al]

A line can only put one puck in the net at a time. If Bratt was scoring more goals over the past 20 games, given his point production, it likely means someone else would be scoring less goals over that time.

Unless you think Bratt should be a 100-120 point player.

i don't agree with this - we get shut out a lot. we have explosions every few games, but we're middling in the games in between. the idea that we can't score any more because we're already scoring so much just doesn't make any sense. especially 5v5 where they haven't really been getting it done all season. tell kucherov or mcdavid or mackinnon that they can't score any more because they're maxed out

 

[BostonDevil]

Losing Jack could give Fitz the room he needed to finally work out a deal for McDavid

Imagine the complaints in here when McDavid drags his sorry-ass, worse than Haula, faceoff % into the circles.

"We need to stop relying on McDavid!!! He's a liability!!!"

 

[TheBeerNerd]

One of the biggest issues with this team and that people continue to overlook is there is not much shooting talent on this team. There’s no clinical finishers, but just a lot of volume shooters. It’s definitely a huge area that needs to be addressed for that added threat up and down the lineup.

Carolina without the record of recent play to fall back on.

 

[bossram]

Damon Severson has the same amount of goals (6) as Pesce, Kovacevic, Dillon & Siegenthaler combined. The Devils need some goals from those 4 (Siegs is hurt obviously). The bottom 6 hasn't been chipping in enough but we aren't getting enough goals from our defense either. Can't really on Dougie and Luke. Granted those 4 defensman are all good at playing actual defense. Something I would not trust Severson at but still... A game like tonight could of had a much different result if one of those 4 managed to get a goal.

So you didn't really answer the question.

Yeah, I am aware they need to score more. I'm not saying they've been playing great.

I'm saying I don't think they're in a disaster situation unless Jack is done for the year.

I've also wanted Fitz to go after some different players and was very critical of the Palat and Dillon signings at at the time they were signed - and caught a lot of flak from this board for those opinions. I wanted the cap space allocated differently. I was correct.

 

[Devs3cups]

team still has bratt nico timo mercer to a lesser extent palat with some veteran leadership a really solid blue line and great goaltending.

While I agree, the team as a whole hasn’t done a whole lot with its best offensive weapon (Jack) in the lineup since the new year. It’s difficult to be super confident they’ll turn it around with him out of the lineup. It’s possible, but it’s doubtful.

 

[Call Me Al]

If Hughes is out long-term, now is definitely the time for the Devils to use extra cap space to push to add some non-rental scoring talent

McCann would be a dream fit. He’s a better fit as a winger but could give him a run at 2C behind Hischier too. Long term he’d be a terrific option with Hughes and Bratt.

One of the biggest issues with this team and that people continue to overlook is there is not much shooting talent on this team. There’s no clinical finishers, but just a lot of volume shooters. It’s definitely a huge area that needs to be addressed for that added threat up and down the lineup.

people don't overlook that we just get shouted down that it's due to bad luck and they'll eventually regress to mean, not like shooting is an actual skill that different players possess at varying levels

 

[JrFischer54]

dang saw someone mention severson name first time i've thought about him in a long time. would be amazingly funny if he and the jackets make the playoffs over us lol

 

[Zajacs Bowl Cut]

Has anyone considered the fact that prior to this year they were playing shit Lindy pond hockey and that helped inflate their offensive numbers? Perhaps they simply aren’t good enough scorers to be anything more than middle of the pack when they actually have to be responsible in all zones?

Certain posters love citing the stats over the last few seasons but we have witnessed first hand large stretches even under Lindy when they had trouble converting on their chances. In the rangers series, they didn’t score very much. Timo and Bratt had pedestrian productivity. This isn’t the first time we have seen this happen.

Again I’ll point to previous successful core as point of reference. Guys like Kovy, Elias, Parise could be counted on to produce regularly and consistently. There’s a limit to how much you can pump up forwards who can’t score for shit across double digit number of games.

What was the end result of that Rangers series?

I pointed out long stretches of play in one season (I'll go get more if you want) from both Zajac and Parise. Elias in the playoffs in 2012 had 8 pts in 24 games. This notion that some of those guys never had poor stretches of play is again just flat out wrong. You can't just say these things without expecting to be checked on them.

 

[JrFischer54]

While I agree, the team as a whole hasn’t done a whole lot with its best offensive weapon (Jack) in the lineup since the new year. It’s difficult to be super confident they’ll turn it around with him out of the lineup. It’s possible, but it’s doubtful.

i agree but thats the players fault they have the skill there so i'm not sure what else they need. they've been through however many coaches and still play mentally soft uninspired hockey esp if the deck is stacked against them they just fold.

 

[Killing Joke]

Mercer for Mittlestadt. Would you make this trade? I’m not sure if this would even be appealing to Colorado.

Mercer is under team cost control longer at 23 and signed through 26-27. He makes 4m. Mittlestadt is 26 and signed through 25-26. He makes 5.75m.

Yes, Mittlestadt is a better player than Mercer and fits a positional need.

 

[JimEIV]

If Hughes is out long-term, now is definitely the time for the Devils to use extra cap space to push to add some non-rental scoring talent

McCann would be a dream fit. He’s a better fit as a winger but could give him a run at 2C behind Hischier too. Long term he’d be a terrific option with Hughes and Bratt.

One of the biggest issues with this team and that people continue to overlook is there is not much shooting talent on this team. There’s no clinical finishers, but just a lot of volume shooters. It’s definitely a huge area that needs to be addressed for that added threat up and down the lineup.

I don't know if adding a non-rental more permanent piece is the right thing to do...no matter how bad Jack is injured he'll be back and we will have deal with cap issues...

But on your point about "shooting talent" I think you are spot on. We don't really have any pure shooters... I suppose Meier is the closest thing we have. He does have the ability to shoot through a goaltender but even still he is much more of a volume shooter.

I do believe we need more shooting talent in the top 6. I think that's the kind of forward we all hoping for before this season started when we all knew that Palat wasn't a serious solution for that top 6 spot.

I'm not sure how you add a player like that in our cap structure... with the big money already paid out to the top 4 forwards we've seem to have little options for another impact player?

 

[bossram]

.500 hockey is 92 points, that is not a lock to make the playoffs.


This ownership group is cleaning out anything.

The playoff cut line is projected to be very low right now.

If they play .500 hockey the last 20 games, they'd get 20 points which would put them at 92.

Ottawa is the first team out right now with 64 pts in 59 games. They are on pace for 88.5 points. NYR is on pace for 87 and their best player is hurt. I don't think you understand HOW BAD the East bubble actually is this year.

Yep. This is what I'm getting at. Rags aren't getting in. And for teams like Detroit and CBJ, I would actually bet that their point pace is more likely to fall off.

 

[Nocashstyle]

There are times that teams rally around injuries to their best player and go on a run. For my own sanity, I’m just going to think about it this way.