trading a couple of extra 2nd or 3rd round picks is nothing. those picks have a better shot of becoming nothing than becoming something. They probably tried to fast track things after they made the playoffs in 2018, which might have been a mistake, but still.
If he had traded multiple firsts for 28 year olds or something, sure I would be all over him too. I was mostly fine with the trades he made. He also got Palmieri, got Hall, etc etc. Also, take a look at the draft picks under him. Hischier, Bratt, Joey Anderson (got us an NHLer for a year+), Boqvist, Zetterlund, ty Smith (got us Marino), Sharangovich (late round pick turned into middle 6 player, got us Toffoli).
High second round picks for a team without prospect pool can bring you NHLers, may be even top-6/top-4 players.
Anderson, Zetterlund, Smith and Sharangovich were traded by Fitz, not by Shero, they were not nhl regulars, really impactfull players in the moment. Sharangovixh and Zeterrlund were good picks, Smith was disaster. Biqvust signed league minimum.
And after Palmieri and Hall there are no etc. He made good Vatanen trade. Like I said his campaign of 2017-2018 was the only good, when he made steps to make his strategy working. His trade of Palmieri was good in vacuum, what he did all around, how he lost assets, was vaste overall. In Halls case too.
Like I said, if he would drafted wrong 1OA, he would be the worst. He was just bad. With a couple of fun trades and right 1oa decision after failed seasons.
Manager is a profession of management, decision making and strategy building. He was in bad place, but noone asked success. He made wrong decision to retool. He made wrong steps or no moves to help with retool. He failed and was lucky to win draft lottery. He made right picks. He hired good scouts(outside from chl scout). He believed in wrong coach, he clearly didn't understand defensive building. But he made a couple of really good trades in vacuum. He had good 2017 2018 campaign for his wrong strategy.
I'm not doing that. The point is that those players held value for other teams and the reason they did that is because they were good draft picks, and the GM is the person who puts the scouts in place to make those picks. The Devils had poor to awful drafting for 10-15 years because they often weren't looking for the right things and by the end of Lou's tenure, they were hardly even looking for players outside of North America.
Yes, the GM has to make the good trade, but you can't swindle everyone.
He wasn't bad. He was given an extremely difficult situation, harder than almost any new GM is given - an old, bad team, with ownership not committed to a full rebuild. Whether he talked them into not doing a full rebuild or whether they told him they weren't ready to do that, we'll never know. We know he tried to trade most of the core in 2017, but most of the core had no-trade clauses and said no. Now was he saved from himself, maybe, is it possible that if Hall stays healthy and Schneider holds up, they trade a 1st round pick at the deadline in 2019, and now we're sitting here in 2022 with a mediocre team? Sure. The job he was hired to do, he was fine.
Again you are trying to cover Shero by failure of the end of Lou era. Again, I didn`t ask success, I asked right strategy and right decisions. Shero picked wrong strategy and made a lot of wrong decisions to provide his wrong strategy. He waste time of his traded players, waste value of picks, could make any right decision with defensive building. And was lucky to win lotteries.
He was bad as general maneger. But he made a couple of good trades and vacuum and the only thing he did really right was hiring good scouts. After 5 years its 5-6 players. And Fitz, who monetized Shero`s muddy work in the best way he could. (and even he isn`t perfect, but it`s a different story).
The road to failure is paved with good intentions.
