Speculation: New Jersey Offseason VIII - Summer Heat Edition

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Bleedred

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All the Warsofsky hate is pure groupthink. He was a more than capable depth defenseman that can move the puck and retain possession. Helgeson doesn't even come close to Warsofsky. Helgeson stinks.

Meh.

I didn't see this at all with the Devils, though his corsi numbers look with the Pens and it was only 10 games that he played with us.

He was okay at moving the puck with us and wasn't by any means the grenade handler that Helgeson was. Which is why I say he has more upside and it probably better.
 

StnTwnDevil

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Helgeson lacks skills to be a full time player at least as it stands now. For spot starts/injury filling, yeah sure. He's not reliable for full time duty even as a #7.

I know Helgeson isn't the sexy mobile offensive defensemen, but the guy can fill a role on defense. An every game role that is still used by many teams. Though the league is faster, there is still a need for the strong defensive defensemen type. The guy is willing to sacrifice the body and is extremely tough to play against when on the wall. Though not fast, he moves well for his build and can move the puck pretty well. I'm also not sure why this is being missed, but he is pretty consistent and reliable defensively.

If Santini can step in and bring a better offensive game with his physical presence, maybe Helgeson isn't necessary, but otherwise I think the Devils will need to make use of him. Without Larsson, we lose a bit of that physical edge in the d-zone.
 

Billdo

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I'd rather Warsofsky than Helgeson for the sole fact that Helgeson has hands of stone and Warsofsky could at least move the puck competently.
 

StnTwnDevil

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I'd rather Warsofsky than Helgeson for the sole fact that Helgeson has hands of stone and Warsofsky could at least move the puck competently.

Everyone has a right to their opinion. Some GM's probably share your opinion. But Helgeson will be a regular defensemen in the NHL. Maybe it doesn't happen on the Devils with Shero, but he does have upside. He's not anywhere as bad as the small group of HFboarders here think.

For Warsofsky, he might have more more potential if he was an offense-men, at tops he'll be a Harold.
 

NJDevils17

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Helgeson is going to be 26 at the start of the season..he's only played 41 games so far. Not that he can't make an impact but he's still a year away from being an NHL regular at best. I think his ship has sailed to be a good NHLer.
 

Bleedred

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I'd rather Warsofsky than Helgeson for the sole fact that Helgeson has hands of stone and Warsofsky could at least move the puck competently.
I absolutely agree with this. Warsofsky can move the puck and has some offensive potential. Helgeson does not.
Everyone has a right to their opinion. Some GM's probably share your opinion. But Helgeson will be a regular defensemen in the NHL. Maybe it doesn't happen on the Devils with Shero, but he does have upside. He's not anywhere as bad as the small group of HFboarders here think.

For Warsofsky, he might have more more potential if he was an offense-men, at tops he'll be a Harold.

I respectfully disagree. He will not be an NHL regular, though it depends on what you're definition of an NHL regular is.

A full time spot on the top 6 in the NHL? I think he's every bit as bad as I make him out to be.

Warsofsky might not be, but Helgeson certainly is. I would almost guarantee he is never an NHL regular, at least not for more than a year or two. I've been wrong before plenty of times, but this I am confident of. I wanna know what kind of upside you think he has? Please tell me, I don't see any at all. I'm gonna say at tops that he'll be a Mark Fraser. Now he isn't as bad as Mark Fraser, that doesn't say too much though. That doesn't exactly mean he's good.
 

Bleedred

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I don't think Harrold was terrible as a #7. Perhaps Helgeson isn't a terrible option for a #7 either. Worse defensemen get call ups every year, though there aren't many worse ones that have a full time spot in any teams top 6. Unless they're heavily injury depleted.

And I don't think Harrold was awful, it wasn't his fault that DeBoer saw him as a top 5-6 defenseman for a lot of the time. But he wasn't the worst #7 options by any means.
 

StnTwnDevil

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I absolutely agree with this. Warsofsky can move the puck and has some offensive potential. Helgeson does not.


I respectfully disagree. He will not be an NHL regular, though it depends on what you're definition of an NHL regular is.

A full time spot on the top 6 in the NHL? I think he's every bit as bad as I make him out to be.

Warsofsky might not be, but Helgeson certainly is. I would almost guarantee he is never an NHL regular, at least not for more than a year or two. I've been wrong before plenty of times, but this I am confident of. I wanna know what kind of upside you think he has? Please tell me, I don't see any at all.

Sure, I'll expand. First of all, you seem to be judging a defensemen like an offense men, which is confusing. Warsofsky is small with pretty good hands and puck moving ability. He is easily knocked off the puck and will not be getting better at that anytime soon. If he was an offense men, maybe he'd have some upside.

Helgeson on the other hand is solid defensively, strong in front of the net and as I mentioned earlier, good on the boards. He doesn't make many mistakes, he keeps his game simple. His offensive ability is not his upside. Weird thing is, I've never heard someone say that a defensemen with no offensive ability has no upside just because of that. If he was small like Warsofsky, or didn't use his size, than you'd have a point. But Helgeson does use his size and moves around pretty well. His upside is where it counts, in the defensive zone.
 

Bleedred

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Sure, I'll expand. First of all, you seem to be judging a defensemen like an offense men, which is confusing. Warsofsky is small with pretty good hands and puck moving ability. He is easily knocked off the puck and will not be getting better at that anytime soon. If he was an offense men, maybe he'd have some upside.

Helgeson on the other hand is solid defensively, strong in front of the net and as I mentioned earlier, good on the boards. He doesn't make many mistakes, he keeps his game simple. His offensive ability is not his upside. Weird thing is, I've never heard someone say that a defensemen with no offensive ability has no upside just because of that. If he was small like Warsofsky, or didn't use his size, than you'd have a point. But Helgeson does use his size and moves around pretty well. His upside is where it counts, in the defensive zone.

I knew it would come down to his physicality or something.

He's not that good defensively, he's as good defensively as Gionta. Both look good defensively because you don't see them make many blatant mistakes like you see out of Merrill or Gelinas or maybe Tootoo on forward. But they both get killed and pinned in the D zone when they're out there.

Helgeson also handles the puck like your typical grenade handler.

Look, I don't put much into corsi and fenwick on our current team, because everyone has a terrible reading. Except for Josefson among the few names. They all have negatives because how terrible the team was at offense last year. Even Larsson and Greene have bad corsi ratings, and we know they're as steady as they come.

But Helgeson managed to have the worst corsi and fenwick ratings on the team, out of anyone that played more than 10 games AND I was surprised to see he had almost 60% offensive zone starts. Which is like the opposite of Larsson and Greene almost. Those ratings are TERRIBLE.
 

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Harrold was competent. Warsofsky isn't. It's not group think. He's a terrible player. As I've said before, Corey Murphy 2.0.
 

Bleedred

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What was the deal on Warsofsky's free agency status? Did he fall into some group whatever UFA category or something? Believe me, you know I'm fine with him being gone.

But he's only 25 and I didn't think was UFA eligible yet, and I never heard about us qualifying or not qualifying him as an RFA.
 

StnTwnDevil

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I knew it would come down to his physicality or something.

He's not that good defensively, he's as good defensively as Gionta. Both look good defensively because you don't see them make many blatant mistakes like you see out of Merrill or Gelinas or maybe Tootoo on forward. But they both get killed and pinned in the D zone when they're out there.

Helgeson also handles the puck like your typical grenade handler.

Look, I don't put much into corsi and fenwick on our current team, because everyone has a terrible reading. Except for Josefson among the few names. They all have negatives because how terrible the team was at offense last year. Even Larsson and Greene have bad corsi ratings, and we know they're as steady as they come.

But Helgeson managed to have the worst corsi and fenwick ratings on the team, out of anyone that played more than 10 games AND I was surprised to see he had almost 60% offensive zone starts. Which is like the opposite of Larsson and Greene almost. Those ratings are TERRIBLE.

Of course, why wouldn't I mention his physicality, is that not relevant? I don't put much weight into anything that there is only small sample size of. His advanced stats could easily mean nothing. This is more than likely the case, but I won't be able to convince you being that what you're seeing in game is different than what I'm seeing. He's nothing special and the guy is at best a 6th d-man, but he pretty much is at that point now.
 

NjDevsRR

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What was the deal on Warsofsky's free agency status? Did he fall into some group whatever UFA category or something? Believe me, you know I'm fine with him being gone.

But he's only 25 and I didn't think was UFA eligible yet, and I never heard about us qualifying or not qualifying him as an RFA.
Pittsburgh re-signed him yesterday.
 

MadDevil

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Helgeson just isn't quick enough with the puck in his own end. More often than not he's just going up the boards with it, which may be the "safe" play, but often just results in being stuck in our own end. Maybe if he played with a more surehanded partner it would alleviate some of that, but I just don't think he fits how this team wants to play. He's fine as a depth defenseman, but that's it.
 

Bleedred

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Pittsburgh re-signed him yesterday.

I saw Pittsburgh signed him again, but was he an RFA or UFA?

I remember the other day, they listed the RFA's we qualified (Josefson, Kalinin, Palmieri) and the one's we didn't (Bennett, Merrill, DSP) and he wasn't even mentioned one way or the other.

I know he's 25, so he should be RFA. But I understand that there's stipulations that allow certain players of that age to be UFA eligible.

Was he a UFA because of one of those stipulations? Or did we choose to not qualify him and thus he became a UFA?
 

Billdo

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I saw Pittsburgh signed him again, but was he an RFA or UFA?

I remember the other day, they listed the RFA's we qualified (Josefson, Kalinin, Palmieri) and the one's we didn't (Bennett, Merrill, DSP) and he wasn't even mentioned one way or the other.

I know he's 25, so he should be RFA. But I understand that there's stipulations that allow certain players of that age to be UFA eligible.

Was he a UFA because of one of those stipulations? Or did we choose to not qualify him and thus he became a UFA?

Pretty sure he met whatever qualifications to become UFA.
 

Bleedred

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Pretty sure he met whatever qualifications to become UFA.

Thanks.

That explains that. We've been fairly in the dark with little coverage and no beat writers. Well the Ledger did assign that one guy. :shakehead

And we've had Gross doing double duty from the Rangers.
 

Emperoreddy

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Hulk brings a quality that our D really lacked last year in physicality. We really didn't have anyone that would lay people out.

Hulk still wasn't good at it, but it was something we really needed. The hope is Santini becomes the big physical Dman we really need to make us tough to play against.
 

ghdi

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Hulk brings a quality that our D really lacked last year in physicality. We really didn't have anyone that would lay people out.

Hulk still wasn't good at it, but it was something we really needed. The hope is Santini becomes the big physical Dman we really need to make us tough to play against.

I don't think this is largely even necessary in today's game. Who does Pittsburgh have that does this? Chicago? LA?

A hulk (pun intended) is largely not needed if the unit plays sound defensively. Sure, on occcasion as a spot starter/7th, but its a style of play that has largely disappeared. If Helgeson is on the team full time we've got deeper problems on the blueline than anyone knew.
 

Emperoreddy

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I don't think this is largely even necessary in today's game. Who does Pittsburgh have that does this? Chicago? LA?

A hulk (pun intended) is largely not needed if the unit plays sound defensively. Sure, on occcasion as a spot starter/7th, but its a style of play that has largely disappeared. If Helgeson is on the team full time we've got deeper problems on the blueline than anyone knew.

LA won their cups by hitting and grinding teams into the dust. Chicago had Oduya doing this as well.

I'm not convinced the way Pitt won this year is a full long term model of success. Don't get me wrong. Talented speed is really useful, but I think that if they faced a good team that would hit them in the mouth, they would of had trouble.

I think you need a solid mix of size and speed to have year in and year out success.
 

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Hall-Henrique-Palmieri still has me beyond stoked.

I need to start wearing diapers.

Dont think you pair Palmieri with them, that leaves our second line pretty thin; plus Cammalleri-Zajac and Zajac-Palmieri have both shown chemistry.

Put Bennett or Zacha up with Hall-Henrique.
 
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