No one should be in that position. That Yandle trade was bad.
Thing is even if plans do fail you still have to have one and you have to have a long term one. We were the oldest team in the league with few "Band-aid" not being able to get us even to the playoffs.
A direction shift makes sense in my mind and we are now flush with younger guys who are worth taking a look at (even if odds are none are top 6 guys). We need to take stock with what we have are start getting some forward momentum going.
Even if it means punting the season. I rather punt with a plan then just be old and suck like last year.
And I agree with Shero on cutting ties with older guys. There are only so many spots on the team and it makes more sense to me to let the younger guys we have right for those spots over gifting it to a short term older guy that will in no way help the team when we are good again (because we would still suck if we resigned Gomez and Bernier)
The Yandle trade was probably poor example, since you're right that it really is a bad deal regardless of team position, but I was trying to say that the Devils aren't in a position like NYR where we can think about sacrificing our future to find the missing piece needed to win a Cup. We aren't contenders, so we shouldn't be making those kind of trades. I think everyone agrees on that.
I just feel that people are taking a lot of extreme positions here, because as I said, you can look to improve a team in the present without damaging the future. Those opportunities aren't many, but they do exist. A good example is the Palmieri trade. It helps us now and in the future. The way some people around here are starting to talk, it sounds like they don't want to improve at all now, and expect to just suddenly leap to success in the future without any gradual improvement. I don't think that's really possible. I think we need to take some steps forward every year with the ultimate goal being getting back to contender status. I don't expect Shero to have done more in this regard than he did since he acquired Palmieri and tried to get his hands on Saad, but I expect that he will continue to look for those opportunities to improve the team in the present and in the future, since those objectives don't need to be mutually exclusive.
A direction shift was needed, although I think we have to be careful about not swinging the pendulum too far in the other direction. Youth is an asset, but it shouldn't be the only consideration. For instance, I would have kept Gomez around because he was really the only player on our roster who was a playmaker. I don't know who is going to fill that void on the team now, and the absence of a playmaker could potentially hurt Boucher's development. We still would have sucked with Gomez but not having a playmaker like Gomez could effect the Devils' ability to really evaluate Boucher, since he's the type of player who's not likely to shine without a playmaker, and the Devils don't have one now that Gomez isn't here.
Now if we can bring in a young playmaker who can fill the role Gomez did, that's great. Trouble is, I don't see the young guy who can fill that playmaking void, so we've got a hole in the roster that I don't think will be filled. That's a decision that I think will hurt the team, and potentially stunt someone like Boucher's development at the NHL level. The baby can be thrown out with the dirty bathwater. The Devils are going to have to be careful about that.
Basically, I think Shero has the right idea about things in general, and he was definitely correct to cut a lot of the ties with the old guys that he did, but there are times when I think he has gone too far with relying on youth (especially when there isn't a young player who really looks like they can fill an important role on the roster that the older guy did) and expelling the veterans. However, my argument is more with the people who want to see us do badly in order to do better or who believe that we shouldn't try to improve this team now. I respect what Shero is trying to do because I don't think he is operating that way, even if I don't support everything he's done (nor do I agree with all that Lou did, for the record). My first post on this topic today probably sums up my perspective on what Shero has done best. I think it is pretty moderate (not unquestionably supportive of Shero, but certainly willing to believe in his vision).
A few years from now, we'll see where all this ends up. I'm sure we'd all like for it to end in success.
Glad you agree.
