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

Triumph said:
A single .930+ month is incredible goaltending when league average is .900. Some of you have no idea what a 1st round pick and one cheap year of a marginal player are worth. Should Markstrom be better, absolutely, is it probably because he got hurt, yeah - he was absolutely fine up to that point. The people who are grinding axes about Markstrom are largely the people who never liked the move to begin with, but they were nowhere to be found in January.

Don't attribute opinions to the board. The same people who were shitting on Meier last year are the same people shitting on Markstrom this year.
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No it doesn't when the other months are in the gutter or trash, it's the equivalent of touting an ace pitcher's with a mediocre ERA when he's had 1-2 months of good pitching and getting smoked every other month of the season. I gave Markstrom credit when he was carrying the Devils on this board and wanted him to continue but to say he hasn't been underwhelming is just categorically false. It's probably bargaining you don't have to see the days of Vitek Vanecek or Jon Gillies but there's nothing wrong with having standards with a goalie like Markstrom. Just like how people expect Meier and Bratt to be 30 goal and 80 point guys yearly except Markstrom was touted as the last piece for this team from the fans/media/managament. At the end of the day, goaltending is very fickle and changes on a quick basis but you can easily more from Markstrom and understand he hasn't been good for the totality of his year outside of his January.

Also, the last part is false because I defended Meier most of last year and literally got mocked this year for mentioning his shooting percentage prior to March and look what has happened with him this month.
 
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Bleedred said:
I see it both ways. It is funny how people are quick to scream about Bratt, Meier, even Jack Hughes around here. But only a select few of us (with me at the very top) shred the goalies around here. Yeah, people criticize the goalies and most are in agreement that Markstrom has been syphilis since he returned, but I feel like other than from me, there's more harsh posts about Bratt, Meier, Jack Hughes, etc than goalies. It sure does feel like when those players aren't scoring it's because they suck or they aren't good enough right now. When a goalie isn't performing I think people go further out of their way to rationalize it. ''The defense has been bad, Lindy Ruff sucks, team was turtling, the system is bad, the guy is injured'' etc.

He was good before the injury, but he shouldn't be playing at this point. He either needs to be back on the IR or riding the bench.

The Pens game after the game Allen had against the Oilers was bad enough, but then he has to give him the Flames game (beecuz he used to play there and we need him to get going lolzzzz!) after the game Allen had against the Blue Jackets. We really don't have the luxury to be playing him at this point because he used to play for some team (like Vancouver) and because he was good before he got injured. We're past that now.
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Nah there's been PLENTY of bellyaching about goalies other than 'this' year when although I'm not Markstrom's biggest fan either, he got himself some benefit of the doubt earlier in the year. And Allen was getting crap before he started playing more and upping his level.

There's also been plenty of first and second-guessing around here about the Markstrom trade, even besides the poster(s) who just come here to give themselves props for getting negative opinions right and/or **** on everyone else. The problem with ripping the Markstrom trade is what was the alternative? Allen and Daws in hindsight might have been fine, key word being might. Fitz would have been eviscerated going into the season with one guy who was a #3 in Montreal and another guy who got overwhelmed twice in two callups as his tandem and if that didn't work the team misses the playoffs and he gets fired. He couldn't leave anything to chance.
 
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NJDevs26 said:
Nah there's been PLENTY of bellyaching about goalies other than 'this' year when although I'm not Markstrom's biggest fan either, he got himself some benefit of the doubt earlier in the year. And Allen was getting crap before he started playing more and upping his level.
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I was giving Allen plenty of it for his 5 or 6 game stretch between November and January, but even that wasn’t nearly as bad as Markstrom’s month of March. He was only playing once a week and not every other game like Markstrom has.
 
Allen's month to month breakdown is such a rollercoaster it's actually kind of funny.

Screenshot_20250321_220119_Chrome.jpg


We're on an up month, so ride him until April at least.
 
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ZachaFlockaFlame said:
No it doesn't when the other months are in the gutter or trash, it's the equivalent of touting an ace pitcher's with a mediocre ERA when he's had 1-2 months of good pitching and getting smoked every other month of the season. I gave Markstrom credit when he was carrying the Devils on this board and wanted him to continue but to say he hasn't been underwhelming is just categorically false. It's probably bargaining you don't have to see the days of Vitek Vanecek or Jon Gillies but there's nothing wrong with having standards with a goalie like Markstrom. Just like how people expect Meier and Bratt to be 30 goal and 80 point guys yearly except Markstrom was touted as the last piece for this team from the fans/media/managament. At the end of the day, goaltending is very fickle and changes on a quick basis but you can easily more from Markstrom and understand he hasn't been good for the totality of his year outside of his January.

Also, the last part is false because I defended Meier most of last year and literally got mocked this year for mentioning his shooting percentage prior to March and look what has happened with him this month.
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He has been absolutely underwhelming since coming back from injury. No arguments there. Otherwise, perfectly whelming, and well worth what the Devils traded for him (and then some).

Part of the difficulty of trading a future 1st round pick for a goalie like this is that there's both enormous downside and upside risk (even though the pick is top 10 protected for this year). If Markstrom had had a solidly above-average season (.910+) and the Devils had stayed relatively healthy, they're giving up a pick in the low to mid 20s at worst, which makes it a steal. If he has an .890 type season they are probably giving up a low 10s pick, which makes it a disaster.
 
My3Sons said:
At about $4 mil per Palat would be seen differently I think. it's the top six paycheck that bothers some folks. That and the fact the team has to play him in a top six role too often. if he played third line situations and minutes and was paid accordingly he'd be less polarizing in my view.
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You raise great points here. I could live with Palat on the third line I suppose. He has no business being in the top six. The salary for the production is irritating but it is what it is. Haula, on the other hand….he needs to be jettisoned. Utterly worthless player this year. Ideally, I’d like to see them both off the team but I don’t think we are going to get that.

Lazar, Tatar and Bastian all need to go. That’s 5 of 12 forwards. The forward group needs a complete facelift. Gritsyuk will help a great deal but there are still gaping holes that Fitzgerald must fix.

Trade Nemec before we have a Holtz situation on our hands. His value is diminishing rapidly. Mercer is a JAG and I would not be upset if he’s out of here. He hasn’t elevated his game playing with Nico and Timo. His limited sample size with Bratt has been terrible. It really is a sad indictment on the player. He’s a good enough PK guy but I don’t see anything else he does well. If I have to watch one more breakaway he doesn’t convert, I’m going to lose my mind. Did anyone actually think he was going to convert on that chance against Calgary? He’s not a “problem” per se but he’s the most maddening player for me.

If there ever was a consideration to trading Hamilton in the offseason, I think this injury will prevent it. A guy making 9m coming off an injury isn’t all that appealing. Hopefully Dougie can prove he’s healthy and has a strong 25/26 season. He can then be dealt (what would we even get back?) and with another year of development in Utica, Casey can hopefully seize that spot.

26-27
Hughes-Pesce
Siegenthaler- Kovacevic
Dillon-Casey

Silayev waiting in the wings to replace Dillon, whose contract will be up after this season. Could we see our unicorn in 26-27? I’m thinking the following season would be way more likely and close to a lock.

EDIT- I originally intended to just reply to your thoughts on Palat…haha
 
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I didn't love the Markstrom move at the time, Fitz was dealing from a position with no leverage and there were just simply too many questions about his age and injury history.

That said, the only reason we're 3rd in the division right now is because of him. He was spectacular during the holidays and banked us a ton of points that are keeping us afloat right now. Without Markstrom we'd be in a dogfight with NYR and CBJ right now, instead we have a pretty comfortable cushion.

It's a tough situation because he needs to be better and should not be starting until he's back to form, but he's not going to get back to form unless he gets reps. Sitting on the bench doesn't shake the rust off and it doesn't help his confidence. Allen is the best option right now but inevitably there will be a time where we NEED Markstrom to step in.

Hopefully letting him struggle through it now pays dividends later. If Markstrom is on his game we could absolutely steal a series against Carolina, who is peaking too early IMO.
 
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ZachaFlockaFlame said:
He was also mediocre to bad from October to December, do people have goldfish memories on this board? You don't trade a first for one month of goaltending. If Markstrom stays the same way with this Jekyll and Hyde goaltending, we're on a similar path than we were with Vanecek from 22-23.
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he was not 'mediocre to bad' October to December lol you guys just say things that are easily disputable and expect everyone to go along with it.

1) What should the Devils have given up for Markstrom?

2) what other goalie should they have gotten instead then?
 
Not looking forward to the game tonight. I feel like we dodged a bullet with Rangers and CBJ losing recently, but what happened last game was just discouraging.

A solid win tonight will do wonders for initial morale, but I feel like we've seen way too many backbreakers in the 2nd half of this season. Needs to end.
 
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MadDevil said:
Allen's month to month breakdown is such a rollercoaster it's actually kind of funny.

View attachment 997149

We're on an up month, so ride him until April at least.
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Late November and early January were probably pretty bad, much like his entire December.

Tampa blew him up for 8 goals back in October I think, so that pretty much destroyed that month, despite only allowing 1 goal combined in the two games prior to that.

I do remember not liking one of the goals in the 4-3 OT loss to the Islanders to end that month.
 
Whaddagoal said:
Not looking forward to the game tonight. I feel like we dodged a bullet with Rangers and CBJ losing recently, but what happened last game was just discouraging.

A solid win tonight will do wonders for initial morale, but I feel like we've seen way too many backbreakers in the 2nd half of this season. Needs to end.
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they're 4-2 since the deadline and had not lost a game when leading heading to the third all season....
 
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