GDT: BAMBOOZLED! Devils vs. Golden Knights, 7 PM, MSG+

[Devs3cups]

I dont think he did. He picked some good players for the team (Although some may not be worth where they were picked)

Zacha - Good player not 6th Overall Good
Blackwood - Great pick for the 2nd round.
Bastian / Maltsev / Joey Anderson - 2nd / 3rd /4th round all respectively in the same draft and all of them are good bottom 6 NHLers.
Jesper Bratt - Do I need to say anything?
Studenic - 5th round pick who looks very noticeable out there
Obviously the Nico / Hughes picks were no brainers
Sharangovich - Really good 5th round pick, even if hes struggling this year
Mercer - Incredible pick for the later half of the 1st round.

Mercer was picked by Fitz hehe!

 

[TBF1972]

The Devils will not turn this around until management gets a little aggressive and puts its balls on the line with some big moves to get real proven top 6 talent.

We horde assets to collect the Mukhamadullins, Holtz, Smiths, Bahls, and Stillmans of the world and we’re never willing to part with those guys (or our 1sts) to bring true dynamic talents to support Jack and Nico. Let’s be real, those guys aren’t doing shit to move the needle, and we’re collecting them for what reason?

too bad i can't dislike this message.

young teams (the devils have the youngest roster in the nhl) develop and mature their roster, until those assets you mentioned are ripe to be true dynamic talents. on one side i can understand the lack of patience after so many years with lack of success. but it's still not the time to trade future for present assets. the core of the roster isn't playoff ready, yet. once the devils are a playoff team with a drafted core with some additions (via free agency or trade) to balance the roster, they should look into converting futures into roster improvements. sacrificing futures now most likely lead to early po rounds failures without hope to truely contend.

 

[TBF1972]

The Devils have an organizational problem, and it starts with the ownership. You must spend money to get good people and players, but you need to know who these good people and players are before you spend the money. These owners don't know anything about hockey and hockey organizations. They are learning on the job and doing a lousy job of it. How many head coaches can be this bad? How can many assistant coaches be this bad? How many players can lack hockey talent? Why is Brodeur VP of Uniforms? Was Fitz not ready to be a GM of a team in constant trouble? YES.

These owners need to give up the toy, step back and provide money to some big time hockey gurus and let them run this team and rebuild it top down with quality.

Who might you ask is a big time hockey guru? We had one, Lou Lams in his day.

Meanwhile it is the "bandaid fix" fire coach, fire the GM, fire the coach, fire the GM. BS

who wouldn't trade the devils future against the islanders?

 

[Devils Trap]

Mercer was picked by Fitz hehe!

Ah thats right, forgot when in 2020 Shero was fired and it was mid season.

My bad

 

[Call Me Al]

i thought i was in the acceptance phase but looks like im still stuck in depression

 

[ninetyeight]

Johnsson Mercer Bratt should be our first line, it was a huge mistake to break it and most of us here knew it. Bratt has been fine with other combinations, but Mercer has slowed down a bit and Johnsson is quickly falling back to his last season form.

Johnsson Mercer Bratt
Sharangovich Hughes X
Zacha Hischier X
Bastian McLeod X

Keep cycling guys in the X spot until you find chemistry, call up new guys from Utica if needed.

 

[TBF1972]

You know, maybe put him on a line with the 2 line mates who were the best line on the team??

Just a hunch

maybe consider the competition. with hischier out of line-up, the responsibilities for mercer shifted.

 

[Azathoth]

Johnsson Mercer Bratt should be our first line, it was a huge mistake to break it and most of us here knew it. Bratt has been fine with other combinations, but Mercer has slowed down a bit and Johnsson is quickly falling back to his last season form.

Johnsson Mercer Bratt
Sharangovich Hughes X
Zacha Hischier X
Bastian McLeod X

Keep cycling guys in the X spot until you find chemistry, call up new guys from Utica if needed.

Yea as much as I like how dynamic Hughes and Bratt could be on the same line I think they should be broken up. So far Bratt has been able to bring his unicorn magic to whatever line he’s on. I think Hughes should have no problem carrying whatever line he’s on so it makes sense to separate them. We can’t have just one line capable of scoring.

 

[Triumph]

The question needs to be: Why do all goalies in Utica look like studs and all goalies in NJ look like shit? No, the guys in Utica don't stand on their collective heads. The team plays excellent team defense and the team hardly gives up grade a+++ chances. That is the difference and the reason is coaching.

There is likely a coaching difference but also it is more likely that the majority of the difference between the goals against results in Utica versus here is goalie play/luck. Daws and Schmid are not going to keep this up all year.

 

[Call Me Al]

maybe consider the competition. with hischier out of line-up, the responsibilities for mercer shifted.

eh, hughes was out way longer and he was fine then. the competition should be the same at that point. it's hitting a rookie wall, general team malaise, worse linemates, all that. not terribly worried about the kid but it was expected that he couldn't keep that up all season

 

[Triumph]

Yea as much as I like how dynamic Hughes and Bratt could be on the same line I think they should be broken up. So far Bratt has been able to bring his unicorn magic to whatever line he’s on. I think Hughes should have no problem carrying whatever line he’s on so it makes sense to separate them. We can’t have just one line capable of scoring.

Hughes has not been capable of carrying a line since he got back. I agree that long-term, Bratt makes a lot more sense with someone who isn't Hughes, but Hughes is still not to where he was last season (though last night was a step in that direction)

 

[TBF1972]

eh, hughes was out way longer and he was fine then. the competition should be the same at that point. it's hitting a rookie wall, general team malaise, worse linemates, all that. not terribly worried about the kid but it was expected that he couldn't keep that up all season

i don't think hughes is deployed the same way as hischier

 

[NJ07102]

There is likely a coaching difference but also it is more likely that the majority of the difference between the goals against results in Utica versus here is goalie play/luck. Daws and Schmid are not going to keep this up all year.

Deeply disagree it has anything to do with luck. They may not keep up the numbers, but the team plays a disciplined style that keeps the goals against low. Like I said, these guys don't have to be brilliant every night to help the team win.

 

[NjDevsRR]

They still need to score more, I feel like NJ is the worst scoring nhl team of all time. Even when they were winning in the 90s and early 00s they weren't really scoring that much.

Holy bad take…

97-98 - 9th in goals scored
98-99 - 2nd in goals scored
99-00 - 2nd in goals scored
00-01 - 1st in goals scored

 

[Azathoth]

Hughes has not been capable of carrying a line since he got back. I agree that long-term, Bratt makes a lot more sense with someone who isn't Hughes, but Hughes is still not to where he was last season (though last night was a step in that direction)

Agreed. I’m banking on Jack getting back to form the further get from the shoulder injury. He did look pretty good last night so hopefully that continues.

 

[Bleedred]

The question needs to be: Why do all goalies in Utica look like studs and all goalies in NJ look like shit? No, the guys in Utica don't stand on their collective heads. The team plays excellent team defense and the team hardly gives up grade a+++ chances. That is the difference and the reason is coaching.

I wonder how often they allow goals like the Nick Roy goal last night or the Travis Sanheim goal from last game or the Andy Greene goal from the game before that? Or some of those goals in the Winnipeg and Minnesota games on the road? And that’s just this month.

The goals I mentioned are just terrible softies. I’m not talking goals that the goalie has no chance on. Goalies don’t have a chance on MOST of the goals. Not even the bad ones. Even the worst percentage I’ve counted over a full season is about 40% or in the lower 40’s%. People were saying the same thing about Schneider. It took years and years for people to get on board with the fact that he was shot. Including our own management. I currently have Blackwood down for 17 goals stoppable and he’s allowed 45. This is by far the highest percentage I’ve ever had him at since he’s entered the NHL at just about 38% percent. It’s not the highest percentage in the league, but it certainly seems to be edging closer with every new game he plays.

The AHL guys probably won’t sustain that level of play all year. At least not both of them.


I’m not saying Blackwood is shot, but I am saying he might not be that good. He may be a good backup though. His only run of good play as a starter was for about 3 months right before the first covid pause. He also played great the year before that in a much more sparse role because we still had to give Schneider pity starts because management didn’t wanna come to terms with the fact that he was already long gone by then.

 

[ninetyeight]

98-99 - 2nd in goals scored
99-00 - 2nd in goals scored
00-01 - 1st in goals scored

Really? That's actually surprising, especially that 98-99. I know Elias and Gionta scored a bunch in the early 2000, but was Elias even playing much 98? Where can I see these stats?

I would have imagined that with Sakic and Forsberg+, Kariya and Selänne, Bure Jagr and even Mario etc still playing bunch of teams would have scored more, but I guess it's a depth thing then. I stand corrected.

In the first cup win regular season they definitely didn't score much though.

 

[NJDevs26]

Ftorek and Larry Robinson had a bit more wide open version of the system (and the more offensively skilled rosters) than Lemaire and Burns did although even the ‘94 Devils were up there in goals too.

 

[MadDevil]

Looking at some of those team stats I think I've just depressed myself even more. From 1993-94 to 2011-12 we were top 10 in goals against every year. Now we bleed goals regularly.

 

[Bleedred]

I dont think he did. He picked some good players for the team (Although some may not be worth where they were picked)

Zacha - Good player not 6th Overall Good
Blackwood - Great pick for the 2nd round.
Bastian / Maltsev / Joey Anderson - 2nd / 3rd /4th round all respectively in the same draft and all of them are good bottom 6 NHLers.
Jesper Bratt - Do I need to say anything?
Studenic - 5th round pick who looks very noticeable out there
Obviously the Nico / Hughes picks were no brainers
Sharangovich - Really good 5th round pick, even if hes struggling this year
Mercer - Incredible pick for the later half of the 1st round.

I wouldn't really say Maltsev and Joey Anderson are good bottom 6 NHLers. And I like Maltsev, I like him more than McLeod and Boqvist, but I don't think he's played an NHL game with Colorado this year. Joey Anderson is not a ''Good bottom 6'' NHLer. He's not even an NHLer at all. He's played 3 games for Toronto over the last two seasons since we shipped him out. He played more NHL games in his first year he got a call up (3 years ago) than he has combined in the 3 seasons since then.

I don't disagree with the rest. There were some ugly ones though, McLeod being the biggest one so far. A 4th line center (he's played almost 115 games, no way his ceiling is any higher, the odds are very slim) at 12th overall is pretty bad.

 

[Tao Jersey Jones]

I wouldn't really say Maltsev and Joey Anderson are good bottom 6 NHLers. And I like Maltsev, I like him more than McLeod and Boqvist, but I don't think he's played an NHL game with Colorado this year. Joey Anderson is not a ''Good bottom 6'' NHLer. He's not even an NHLer at all. He's played 3 games for Toronto over the last two seasons since we shipped him out. He played more NHL games in his first year he got a call up (3 years ago) than he has combined in the 3 seasons since then.

I don't disagree with the rest. There were some ugly ones though, McLeod being the biggest one so far. A 4th line center (he's played almost 115 games, no way his ceiling is any higher, the odds are very slim) at 12th overall is pretty bad.

Maltsev has played six games for the Avs. Zero points, 2 PIM, -3.

 

[JK3]

Looking at some of those team stats I think I've just depressed myself even more. From 1993-94 to 2011-12 we were top 10 in goals against every year. Now we bleed goals regularly.

That's why a lot of the old timers here have had it with this garbage. It's hard to watch this team with the way they play now compared to back then, especially in our own zone, it's embarrassing. Sure it's a different game now and we had some absolute studs on those teams but still it's depressing to watch this team stumble around helpless for so long.

I'm lucky and grateful to have witnessed the cups and all the success we had, the team was so good for so long. I feel bad for the young kids or anyone who never got to witness how truly great this team once was.

 

[Bleedred]

Maltsev has played six games for the Avs. Zero points, 2 PIM, -3.

That's too bad that he hasn't been able to contribute.

I really liked him here last year.

 

[Zippy316]

But Blaming geertsen for this game is so pointless. Its not a good angle when you got more than half the top 9 forwards doing literally nothing (zacha, mango, mercer, sharangovich, kuokkanen for games on end including tomight). 1 for whatever (7?) PP with 2 sh goals allowed in 3 games. And the missed saves by blackwood and missed tapin by zacha or the otherwise savable shots on the goalie. Smith not great game either for like 8 games. All these guys are expected and supposed to make a positive impact. They are failing.

The teams problem isnt geertsen.... By far.

The teams problem isn’t solely Geertsen. Part of the issue is that the Devils are carrying Geertsen as the “extra forward and defender” right now in theory. So when situations like this arise, they’re forced to play him on defense.

In reality, he should be nowhere near an NHL team. The second Jaros hit COVID protocol, the Devils should have called up another defender to have an extra body. Instead, they keep Geertsen as the extra defender and you’re now forced to play Siegenthaler for a 2:45 shift on the PK cause you have no other options, overplay your top four defenders, and have to shelter Geertsen every shift.

On a team that struggles to win games on the first place, having a guy like Geertsen on the roster that is a complete liability is inexcusable.

 

[tr83]

3 goats

Zacha
Smith
Kuok

I said Kuok because there comes a point when you contribute nothing, you are probably a net negative