rodney dangerfield
Registered User
- Dec 8, 2015
- 488
- 281
What I Don't Understand About the Devils
- Thread starter rodney dangerfield
- Start date
- Apr 27, 2005
- 33,718
- 30,039
Those guys only account for 120-140 goals per year if they stay healthy. That's only 1.5 goals per game. Without depth or goals from defenseman your not gonna see a ton of goals.
Because almost every team has better goal scorers. And offense is generated from the blueline as well as the forwards. Lots of those 25 G scorers are not consistent 25 G scorers. Even with Hall, they don't have much offensive firepower.
Cammalleri started off the year ice cold and Henrique/Palmieri were streaky last year. Henrique scored at a 20.1% clip last season, so I think most of us figured that wasn't going to be sustainable.
PP (and even strength lines) hasn't had a ton of continuity to it. Can't imagine many would have seen something like the Devils healthy scratching Jacob Josefson one game, then having him be on the #1 unit the next. Last year the Devils were quietly a top 10 PP, this year they dipped to 22nd and endured a really long 0-fer drought last month.
PP (and even strength lines) hasn't had a ton of continuity to it. Can't imagine many would have seen something like the Devils healthy scratching Jacob Josefson one game, then having him be on the #1 unit the next. Last year the Devils were quietly a top 10 PP, this year they dipped to 22nd and endured a really long 0-fer drought last month.
Makar Goes Fast
grocery stick
KarmaPolice
Snack enthusiast
NJ needs top centermen. Hall is a winger. Everyone thought that was such a huge landslide of a victory for NJ. It would've been if Hall was a center. Winger can only do so much to make and impact AND try to control a game. Centers and top Dmen typically have much greater impacts, and that's why they are valued so much more. So while NJ certainly won that trade, it was NOT NEARLY the landslide 'OMG worst trade of ALL TIMEZ' crap that you heard so much of. Part of that is people just love to pile on the Oilers, but to people who actually believed that, well you're just wrong. In order to drive offense you NEED top centers and Dmen. Oilers were the 4th team in the league to hit 100 goals just a night ago. Yeah, they've typically played a few more games than a lot of other teams, but still. That's a fact. NJ is sitting at 74 goals for, and only have played 3 games less than the Oil. Yeah, the Oilers lost SOOOO much offense in losing Hall, and he's put NJ's offense on his back and is scoring like crazy.
That's another thing. Hall is a very good winger. But he's not a pure goal scorer. He's never scored 30 goals in a season. He might end up doing that once or twice, but that would be his ceiling, IMO. But he's just not a pure scorer or sniper, like say oh, Seguin is. Seguin has a LOT more value even though their offensive outputs up to this point are similar. Seguin has multiple 30 goal seasons, and thus is seen as a 'game-breaker' and plus he's a center, and can control the game a lot more than Hall can. Now a Larsson for Seguin -- THAT would've been a landslide victory for the Devils, and it's actually more what they needed -- NOT another winger.
My point in all of this blabber: NJ need a top center offensive center, and should've been dangling Larsson for a center, NOT a winger. But THANK YOU for Larsson. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the trade as an Oiler fan. Larsson has filled a BIG hole for us. We needed a physical defense-first RHD in our top 4. Now we just need a PP QB, but that's another story.
Anyway, good luck to the Devs, and hope they find what they need out there to build the offense they need to compete. -19 Goal differential, which is 4th worst in the league, and only 1 away from Vancouver for 3rd worst, is not going to cut it.
Fourier
Registered User
The Devils lack scoring depth as others have pointed out. Even if you ignore defensemen, which is where a lot of today's offense starts the forwards beyond the top three are not producing. Excluding the top 3 point producing forwards here are the ranks for goals by forwards across the league before last nights games.
Code:
NYR 73
Clb 54
Ana 52
Pit 51
Nas 49
TBL 49
Min 47
Mon 47
Edm 46
Chi 46
Phi 46
Car 46
Van 43
Cal 43
Edet 42
Dal 40
Win 40
NYI 40
Buf 40
StL 39
Was 39
Tor 36
Ott 36
Ari 36
Bos 35
SJS 34
Col 34
LA 33
NJD 31
Flo 31I should say that these numbers were complied by eliminating the top 3 point getters rather than the top three goal scorers since my interest in putting the original list together was points rather than goals. But for the Devils these would be the same in either case. Moreover for the Devils the top three goal scorers have a combined 25 goals. For the Rangers that would be 37 and for the Pens it would be 44.
Of course part of this is the injury to Hall. Anytime your best player is out it has an impact that tends to be felt down the line-up. Cammy has missed games as well. The Devils also have a terrific young player in Zacha who is still feeling out his game at the NHL level.
The Devils defense is not that bad if you are looking purely at goals scored. They have 16 so far. Last year the Oilers defense for example had 21 goals all season.
As a team their combined goals per game is up this year over last.
Goal scoring is an issue but the biggest change seems to be in GA. Devil fans can of course correct me because what I am going to speculate on is without much first hand evidence to back it up since I have only watched the Devils a few times this year. But if I had to guess I would say that two significant factors in this regard are poorer than expected play from Schneider plus the loss of the Larsson-Greene pairing. Together those two were ridiculously successful in shutting down pretty much everyone they faced. Neither player alone is able to duplicate that success in their new situation.
Last edited:
- Oct 10, 2007
- 23,242
- 11,319
You could say the same about the Panthers. Some years, an aggregate of players just doesn't click as a team. Although, not that surprisingly, they are getting goals from the backend.
Sidney the Kidney
One last time
- Jun 29, 2009
- 55,773
- 46,849
That's the problem with the OP's assessment. Henrique's scored over 20 goals only twice in his career, and both times he had a ridiculously high shooting percentage. You could also argue that Palmeiri still has to prove last year wasn't a fluke before he's penciled in as a lock for 25+ goals.
So essentially, the Devils have two "proven" scorers in Hall and Cammalleri, and Cammalleri usually misses 15+ games per season.
They also lack depth scoring, and their scoring from the blueline is pretty poor.
So it's not really a surprise that they're struggling to score goals.
NJDevilsFan21
Trade Everyone!!
- Nov 10, 2006
- 1,472
- 684
We don't have a blue line breakout, we don't have a system in general, and only 1 of those guys (2 if we are lucky) will show up on any given night.
KrisLetAngry
MrJukeBoy
That's really cool.
Yep depth and star power are both needed to score and win the playoffs.
Getting hall was only one step forward for the devils gotta keep getting dem top 9 forwards
Finlandia WOAT
js7.4x8fnmcf5070124
- May 23, 2010
- 24,192
- 23,871
aufheben
#Norris4Fox
Hall looks incredible. No one else does. Except this Miles Wood guy lol. Franchise winger but they simply don't have much else.
Huh? The 2015-16 Devils couldn't shoot the puck into the ocean. That trade is still a slam-dunk value-wise for the Devils, the Oilers are just farther along as a team and have that MacDonald kid or w/e, Idk I heard he's pretty good.
Super Hans
Stats Evangelist
- Oct 9, 2016
- 4,611
- 11,694
The thing I never understood about the Devils in the past is how they were actually able to score any goals with their bargain bin offense depth.
Why are the Kings in the bottom half of the league in goals when they have 40+ goal scorers (Carter, Gaborik) and 30+ goal scorers (Setoguchi, Brown, Kopitar, Toffoli)?
Why are the Kings in the bottom half of the league in goals when they have 40+ goal scorers (Carter, Gaborik) and 30+ goal scorers (Setoguchi, Brown, Kopitar, Toffoli)?
mja
Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt
PlamsUnlimited
Big Church Bells
JT Kreider
FIRE GORDIE CLARK
Nearly every contender's best players are homegrown players. The Devils have been probably the worst drafting team post lockout.
The only legit bonafide NHL'ers they drafted since are Zajac, Parise (and they were both pre-lockout), Larsson, Severson and Henrique. Zacha and Wood are TBD but they both look pretty good.
Between that and losing 2 of their best scorers a few years back, they still have not recovered.
Look at the Islanders. They lost 2 of their 3 best forwards and now a back-to-back 100 point team has been reduced to the worst team in the league.
And Hall, Cammalleri, Zajac, Henrique, PAP and Palmieri is just not enough scoring, considering beyond that they have one player who has broken 30 points in his career.
The only legit bonafide NHL'ers they drafted since are Zajac, Parise (and they were both pre-lockout), Larsson, Severson and Henrique. Zacha and Wood are TBD but they both look pretty good.
Between that and losing 2 of their best scorers a few years back, they still have not recovered.
Look at the Islanders. They lost 2 of their 3 best forwards and now a back-to-back 100 point team has been reduced to the worst team in the league.
And Hall, Cammalleri, Zajac, Henrique, PAP and Palmieri is just not enough scoring, considering beyond that they have one player who has broken 30 points in his career.
Last edited:
Cawz
Registered User
You guys still cant score. You've only improved by 0.1 goals per game this season, even with Hall's contribution.
Not trying to pile on or anything, but the trade isnt as slam dunk as people seem to think. Hall is a fantastic franshise scoring winger, but thats it. Larsson is a great shut-down dman, albeit not as high-level as Hall is in his role. That being said, Hall will help his team get goals. Larsson will help his team get wins.
HockeyThoughts
Delivering The Truth
This post couldn't be farther from the truth. The Devils offense has struggled in spite of Taylor Hall, not because of him.NJ needs top centermen. Hall is a winger. Everyone thought that was such a huge landslide of a victory for NJ. It would've been if Hall was a center. Winger can only do so much to make and impact AND try to control a game. Centers and top Dmen typically have much greater impacts, and that's why they are valued so much more. So while NJ certainly won that trade, it was NOT NEARLY the landslide 'OMG worst trade of ALL TIMEZ' crap that you heard so much of. Part of that is people just love to pile on the Oilers, but to people who actually believed that, well you're just wrong. In order to drive offense you NEED top centers and Dmen. Oilers were the 4th team in the league to hit 100 goals just a night ago. Yeah, they've typically played a few more games than a lot of other teams, but still. That's a fact. NJ is sitting at 74 goals for, and only have played 3 games less than the Oil. Yeah, the Oilers lost SOOOO much offense in losing Hall, and he's put NJ's offense on his back and is scoring like crazy.
That's another thing. Hall is a very good winger. But he's not a pure goal scorer. He's never scored 30 goals in a season. He might end up doing that once or twice, but that would be his ceiling, IMO. But he's just not a pure scorer or sniper, like say oh, Seguin is. Seguin has a LOT more value even though their offensive outputs up to this point are similar. Seguin has multiple 30 goal seasons, and thus is seen as a 'game-breaker' and plus he's a center, and can control the game a lot more than Hall can. Now a Larsson for Seguin -- THAT would've been a landslide victory for the Devils, and it's actually more what they needed -- NOT another winger.
My point in all of this blabber: NJ need a top center offensive center, and should've been dangling Larsson for a center, NOT a winger. But THANK YOU for Larsson. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the trade as an Oiler fan. Larsson has filled a BIG hole for us. We needed a physical defense-first RHD in our top 4. Now we just need a PP QB, but that's another story.
Anyway, good luck to the Devs, and hope they find what they need out there to build the offense they need to compete. -19 Goal differential, which is 4th worst in the league, and only 1 away from Vancouver for 3rd worst, is not going to cut it.
One player isn't going to turn around an entire offense that has little to no depth.
Centers generally score less goals than wingers so that point makes little to no sense. Bringing up Tyler Seguin is irrelevant as he was not on the table and if he was the Dallas Stars would have asked for a lot more than just Adam Larsson.
The Edmonton Oilers were chastised for that trade not because Larsson is a poor player but because a young top 10 winger is worth a lot more than a young defensive defenseman. The fact that the Oilers received no + for a near-PPG player signed long term made it a poor trade made out of desperation.
KarmaPolice
Snack enthusiast
That's a good way to put it. At least for us, and the situation we were in. We needed Larsson more than Hall, period. McDavid and Draisaitl are the highest scoring duo in the league -- even more than Sid and Malkin right now.
- Sep 28, 2014
- 76,737
- 123,287
Passing on Provorov and Werenski for Zacha was a mistake IMO, even if Zacha reaches his 2C ceiling. The former two players have such high ceilings at such a crucial position in todays NHL. I also thought Logan Brown was obviously a better option with their 2016 pick.
They could have started to resemble a team not unlike the 2016-2017 NYR in a year or two had the picked Provorov/Werenski and Brown rather than Zacha and McLeod. NYR doesn't have an elite 1C but they have a ton of depth, a 1D and great goaltending.
They should absolutely get involved in the Duchene sweepstakes.
Hall-Duchene would be a killer combo.
They could have started to resemble a team not unlike the 2016-2017 NYR in a year or two had the picked Provorov/Werenski and Brown rather than Zacha and McLeod. NYR doesn't have an elite 1C but they have a ton of depth, a 1D and great goaltending.
They should absolutely get involved in the Duchene sweepstakes.
Hall-Duchene would be a killer combo.
KarmaPolice
Snack enthusiast
How is it far from the truth? When we traded Hall for Larrson, everyone said our scoring would go down. It didn't. People say we got ripped off. Our team is FURTHER ahead with Larsson being a really big part of that, by helping to fill a HUGE hole we had on the right-side of our defense which teams were previously just using as a turnstyle to get into our zone -- well not anymore. He's been an absolute blessing. We didn't need Hall's scoring from the wing nearly as much as we needed Larsson's ability to help our team actually play some defense. Our offense has been just fine, thank you. So how is that being ripped off? Explain. Our need was met, we are further ahead, we are a better team, we are still scoring at a high pace (higher than WITH Hall). So how did we get ripped off? I brought up Seguin because that's called a "hypothetical". Look it up. IF it was Seguin, THEN it would've been a landslide victory for NJ. They DIDN"T get Seguin (read: a franchise center) so it was not NEARLY as big as a win for NJ as everyone on here was screaming that it was. Look at what YOUR team got for Kessel, and YOU are one to talk about the value of wingers??? Are you being ****ing serious right right!?! Get the hell out of here. Again, all YOU have to look at is the Kessel trade. It's as simple as that. Wingers do NOT have the value as people like you seem to think, and it's been proven to everyone here time and time again in trades. Those are just the facts. Kessel is a MUCH better goal scorer than Hall is, and should be seen as just as much of a "franchise player" as Hall is (I don't think neither are "Franchise Players", for the record), and he got a crap return. Compared to Kessel, we actually made out really good. I would take our return over Kessel's return.
Last edited:
