GDT: Devils vs. Penguins - 7:00 PM MSG+

[MNDevilsfan]

Auvitu has been passed on the depth chart in Albany by Jacob freaking MacDonald.

The infatuation people have over him due to a brief 10-15 game stretch to start the season is mind boggling.

I mostly agree, but I will say that while he often looked bad in the D zone he could make plays. Also generated offense at a pretty decent rate. I never watch Albany games though, so if he's been a mess down there that probably explains why we haven't seen him again.

Speaking of Jacobs, I was glad to hear Fitzgerald boosting him for his development last night.

 

[Bleedred]

I mostly agree, but I will say that while he often looked bad in the D zone he could make plays. Also generated offense at a pretty decent rate. I never watch Albany games though, so if he's been a mess down there that probably explains why we haven't seen him again.

Speaking of Jacobs, I was glad to hear Fitzgerald boosting him for his development last night.

I think his ''Poor defense'' is overblown around here. It's just like the small but vocal faction of people that think Lovejoy is a better defensive defenseman than Severson.

I'm more bummed that Auvitu's play wasn't leading to more offense than anything with his defensive play. Not that his defensive play was great, but we have a complete liability playing 21+ minutes a night for us as it is. So I don't even wanna hear about defensive liabilities for as long as Lovejoy is our #2 defenseman.

 

[Emperoreddy]

I mostly agree, but I will say that while he often looked bad in the D zone he could make plays. Also generated offense at a pretty decent rate. I never watch Albany games though, so if he's been a mess down there that probably explains why we haven't seen him again.

Speaking of Jacobs, I was glad to hear Fitzgerald boosting him for his development last night.

Making a few plays means zip if the majority of your ice time is a disaster.

 

[MichaelJ]

I'll take entertaining regulation losses at this point.

I've been holding fire on the coaching for the most part, because really who cares, but I'm gonna flip a lid if Santini is benched for Prout again. He's a disaster.

Me too...I'd like to see some scoring, solid play from the young guys, and a top draft pick.

 

[VoidCreature]

http://www.northjersey.com/story/sp...auging-how-kinkaid-reacts-more-work/99325692/

“There’s a whole different mentality of being a backup to being a starter, the stress of playing back to back games, the ability to put a win or a loss right away and come back and play really well,” Hynes said. “That’s the challenge for Keith. We’re going to see if he’s grown in that area.”

Throwaway comment, or is the staff thinking about life without Schneider?

 

[Bleedred]

http://www.northjersey.com/story/sp...auging-how-kinkaid-reacts-more-work/99325692/

“There’s a whole different mentality of being a backup to being a starter, the stress of playing back to back games, the ability to put a win or a loss right away and come back and play really well,†Hynes said. “That’s the challenge for Keith. We’re going to see if he’s grown in that area.â€

Throwaway comment, or is the staff thinking about life without Schneider?

It's Hynes being a ******* again.

Honestly, if he wants to play Kinkaid more, that's fine. He shouldn't be playing two nights in a row and neither should Cory at this point in the season. You're setting them up for failure that way and even though he didn't face hardly anything last night, it was obvious he'd have a HEAVY workload tonight. Just like the first 3 times we played Pittsburgh, we allowed 40+ shots again for the fourth time against them.

I don't think we really need to see if he's a starter or not. Re-sign him to be the backup and play him in 3 of the back to backs we have left and maybe 2 other games. The idea that we need to play him to ''See what we have in him'' is really something that needs to die a painful but fast death, if that's what Hynes really wants to see. We shouldn't be playing him at all for the purpose of seeing what we have in him. I think he's earned another contract from us as the backup, I don't think we need to see more from him to confirm that. And we don't need to see more from him to confirm he should be a starter either. Play him because this season is over and there's no reason to ring up Cory's odometer on this joke of a final 3 weeks of a garbage season.

I'll tell you what though, if we play the **** out of him to end the season, I foresee his play dipping and I might actually change my mind on wanting him back, since he might actually finish with last year's numbers if that were to happen. He's shown time and time again that he's not a goaltender that excels with a healthy workload at this level. He's capable of 20-22 starts and giving you a solid backup job, that's about it though.

 

[MadDevil]

http://www.northjersey.com/story/sp...auging-how-kinkaid-reacts-more-work/99325692/

"There’s a whole different mentality of being a backup to being a starter, the stress of playing back to back games, the ability to put a win or a loss right away and come back and play really well,†Hynes said. “That’s the challenge for Keith. We’re going to see if he’s grown in that area.â€


Throwaway comment, or is the staff thinking about life without Schneider?

Probably more of a throwaway comment than anything else. Although I do think they need to ask themselves if Kinkaid is the guy they want as a backup moving forward. The way the league is today you pretty much need a backup that can play 20-25 games (or more in case of injury) without a huge dropoff in performance. I'm not sure Kinkaid is consistent enough to be that kind of player.

 

[Bleedred]

Probably more of a throwaway comment than anything else. Although I do think they need to ask themselves if Kinkaid is the guy they want as a backup moving forward. The way the league is today you pretty much need a backup that can play 20-25 games (or more in case of injury) without a huge dropoff in performance. I'm not sure Kinkaid is consistent enough to be that kind of player.

I think he's done enough to earn another contract from us as a backup, so if we're playing him more down the stretch, it shouldn't be to evaluate his starter potential (because there really isn't any) and it shouldn't be to evaluate his worthiness as a backup because I think he's already shown he's worthy of giving another 1-2 year contract as a backup this year.

If we play him half the remaining games or more, there's some potential for him to end the season with some pretty ugly numbers though. While he's played solid this year as a backup, I think he's been the beneficiary of a smaller sample size of games. As a starter, there's no doubt in my mind he's got uglier numbers than Cory on the season. It was just like when Hedberg looked much better as a backup than Marty did as a starter. It wasn't really that Hedberg was actually a better goaltender than Marty, not even at that point in Marty's career.

So if we're playing him a bunch before the season ends, it shouldn't be to evaluate him, as much as it should be that there's no reason to roll the odometer up any higher on Cory in this garbage waste of a season.

 

[Emperoreddy]

I think Hynes is just in "hot hand" mode.

 

[Bleedred]

I think Hynes is just in "hot hand" mode.

I think that's fine, but I also don't agree with playing either of the goalies two nights in a row again this season. I don't care if they had a 50 save shutout the night before, which would be all the more reason not to bother using them two nights in a row.

I think it's time go back to Cory for Sunday, as it will have been almost 8 days since he played. Keith should get another handful of starts or so, maybe a half a dozen and Cory gets the other 6 or 7. We have 3 more back to backs, which should be split down the middle.

 

[MadDevil]

We play every other night through the 28th too, so Cory will probably get a lot of those starts.

 

[Emperoreddy]

I'm really done complaining about him this year. In my mind he sucks ass, but there is nothing left to play far and the kids are getting ice time so whatever.

 

[NJDevs26]

http://www.northjersey.com/story/sp...auging-how-kinkaid-reacts-more-work/99325692/



Throwaway comment, or is the staff thinking about life without Schneider?

Or option C, auditioning him for Vegas and showing them he can be a #1

That is a weird thing to say though.

 

[Emperoreddy]

Or option C, auditioning him for Vegas and showing them he can be a #1

That is a weird thing to say though.

Why would we showcase someone Vegas can get for free?

 

[Eric Sachs]

Why would we showcase someone Vegas can get for free?

Because from our end, it isn't free. If we would rather Vegas take Kinkaid (who is a UFA to be) than another player, then showcasing him to Vegas would benefit us.

I don't think that's the case at all but it is technically a possibility.

 

[NJDevs26]

Why would we showcase someone Vegas can get for free?

If we don't want them to take say, Merrill (or god forbid Moore/Lovejoy).

Plus Kink isn't a priority long-term - in theory - with Appelby and Blackwood potentially knocking on the door in a year or two anyway.

 

[Bleedred]

With Bennett's recent hot streak and looking like he might finish the season potentially with a 30 point pace or more (obviously he probably won't score 30 or more because he hasn't played nearly every game), it would be our luck that Vegas would take him.

Then we'd be stuck with all the turds that we wanted gone. Lovejoy, Moore, Prout (not sure why Vegas would take him), I'd love to get rid of at least one of Lovejoy and Moore and end the Prout experiment after this year by sending him to Binghamton next year.

 

[Brooklyndevil]

Quenneville is a good player. He's smart, has a good shot, and some nice offensive instincts. I think he could be the next Henrique.

I like that JQ isn't gun shy, he enjoys shooting and isn't afraid to go to the net. We need Zacha to do more of that next season. Zacha for a big kid doesn't assert himself enough in my opinion.

 

[NJRockinRoller]

If we don't want them to take say, Merrill (or god forbid Moore/Lovejoy).

Plus Kink isn't a priority long-term - in theory - with Appelby and Blackwood potentially knocking on the door in a year or two anyway.

The thought of the devils losing Merrill, a young NHL Dman to vegas for nothing is almost lol. How badly managed would you have to be to be a team with no players lose a player in an expansion draft? We are talking about bailing OTHER teams out who can't protect their players oy vey

 

[Better Call Sal]

Hey! Bennett with his first point in 40 games!

Starting to finally get a streak going, good for him. Definitely agree he's worth keeping around.

So happy to see how Palms and Hall are playing, there's chemistry building there. Still cannot get over the biased officiating on Halls breakaway.

 

[NJDevs26]

The thought of the devils losing Merrill, a young NHL Dman to vegas for nothing is almost lol. How badly managed would you have to be to be a team with no players lose a player in an expansion draft? We are talking about bailing OTHER teams out who can't protect their players oy vey

It is pretty unlikely they expose Merrill at this point but he does still have the propensity to get hurt and they do have an unhealthy blind spot for Moore. I'm not as sure the blind spot's there for Lovejoy in the same manner but it could be.

There's also the possibility they trade for a d-man before the expansion draft too and then the protected list becomes Greene-Sevs-new acquisition. I'm pretty sure you have to protect Greene with the NTC or at least need his permission to put him on the unprotected list, which I doubt he gives.

With Bennett's recent hot streak and looking like he might finish the season potentially with a 30 point pace or more (obviously he probably won't score 30 or more because he hasn't played nearly every game), it would be our luck that Vegas would take him.

Then we'd be stuck with all the turds that we wanted gone. Lovejoy, Moore, Prout (not sure why Vegas would take him), I'd love to get rid of at least one of Lovejoy and Moore and end the Prout experiment after this year by sending him to Binghamton next year.

He's got 15 points in 53 games, he'd have to sustain his hot streak for a much longer period to get to a 30-point pace. And if they go 7-3 with the protected list they should have no problem re-signing and picking Bennett as one of the seven. If they go 4-4 that's another story. It's gonna depend on what (if anything) they can get done before the draft.

 

[Brooklyndevil]

Last night was a defensive cluster ****. I definitely see JQ and probably McLeod making the team. However, if we don't fix the defense we will stink again. We need two guys, one who could help with back-end scoring and another to help with actually playing defense. What mess.

 

[Billdo]

I'd be happy resigning Bennett. He's consistently one of our best players possession wise, he's been relatively healthy this year all things considered, and he's played well enough to deserve at least another year. He's a good guy to have a 3rd liner who can step up in spot duty into the top 6.

 

[NJDevils17]

If Bennett can be a 30 point guy and a 3RW, I'll be really happy with that. I liked the trade then and think it was still okay. I've noticed an improvement in his play recently. He's always had good possession numbers but his recent play has been his best all season.

 

[Tundra]

Bottom 6 looks brighter than the top 6. That's for sure.