Ahead of tomorrow’s multi-part season preview of the New Jersey Devils, this is a post looking at the Devils in a bigger picture. In short: The pressure is on Tom Fitzgerald to succeed.
Tomorrow begins our traditional and annual multi-part season preview of the New Jersey Devils. As we did last season, we will have posts focusing on previews of the forwards, the goaltenders, the defensemen, the special teams, the coaching & management, and end it with our predictions. I have made the executive decision to add a part ahead of this season’s multi-part preview. It is all a big picture of the organization. What I hope is a bigger-picture view of the team that should flow into the more detailed posts to come about our favorite team. It is certainly a lot more meaningful than a review of last season’s predictions where we – a literal we – were wrong.
The Recent Story So Far
Way back in January 2020, GM Ray Shero was fired and replaced by interim GM Tom Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald was given the job full time in the same announcement that brought in Lindy Ruff as a head coach. It was seen then that Fitzgerald would oversee a rebuild of what his former boss, Shero, put together. One that already started as Shero dealt Taylor Hall, the lone Hart Trophy winner in Devils history, was already dealt by Shero before he was axed. Not to mention the 2018-19 was bad enough and lucky enough to win the lottery for The Big Deal, Jack Hughes, for the 2019 NHL Draft. Fitzgerald continued this with trades that saw Blake Coleman, Andy Greene, and Sami Vatanen go elsewhere. in February 2020 during the interim era of Fitzgerald. With Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier and the surprising emergence of Jesper Bratt, the plan was to build around those three.
And so Fitzgerald did. Transactions ranged from massive, such as signing Dougie Hamilton to a seven-season contract worth $63 million, to mid-range adds like Tomas Tatar and acquiring Erik Haula. He swung a deal for Jonas Siegenthaler, turned Ty Smith into John Marino. He was in on Johnny Gaudreau and settled for Ondrej Palat. Poor performances yielded high draft picks of Alexander Holtz, Luke Hughes, and Simon Nemec – two out of three look like successes. As well as Dawson Mercer. Goaltending was in flux but with increasing moves such as a draft-time deal to bring in Vitek Vanecek. Way back at the start of his official tenure, Fitzgerald hired Lindy Ruff to lead the team on. All as The Big Deal, Hischier, and Bratt grew in importance and impact on the team.
In 2022-23, the rebuilding was effectively over. The team set a franchise record for wins. They went on a heater and never fully cooled off save for a couple of weeks in December. They fell just behind a stupidly-good Carolina team for the division, prevailed over Our Hated Rivals with crucial performances by Akira Schmid, and fell only to that stupid-good Carolina team in the second round of the playoffs. All was good. Fitzgerald hit big with a huge trade for Timo Meier – which further cemented that the team’s window to contend was open. Which made total sense. After years of maintaining cap flexibility and amid seasons of struggle, a core was set. All while Jack Hughes was 21, Jesper Bratt was 24, and Nico Hischier was 24. Prime ages for the team’s stars. Again, further cemented when Bratt (8 seasons, $63 million) and Meier (8 seasons, $70.4 million) signed huge contracts in the 2023 offseason to remain with the Devils.
Of course, all turned out to be not good in 2023-24. Lindy Ruff, extended in October 2023, was fired in March 2024 due to the team’s poor performances and a strategy most of the league figured out. Interim head coach Travis Green did little to prevent the season fading into oblivion. Vitek Vanecek’s and Akira Schmid’s performances careened off a cliff and the Devils could not stop it. They were replaced at the trade deadline by Jake Allen and Kaapo Kahkonen. Jack Hughes got injured. Timo Meier got injured. Both, perhaps unwisely, played through their injuries. Dougie Hamilton got injured and missed about 70% of the season. Dawson Mercer got cold and struggled. Jonas Siegenthaler and John Marino played like shells of their 2022-23 selves. The positives of Luke Hughes’ first full season and Bratt putting up an 83-point season were overshadowed by a season full of the team failing to get out of second gear. There was a lot of one step forward, one and a half steps backwards. This is not even including the serious charges brought against Michael McLeod and Cal Foote. The 2023-24 Devils won 38 games and earned 81 points following a 52-win, 112-point campaign a season ago. Disappointment is not even the word for a team expected to battle into April and May. Whether you like it or not, as Fitzgerald got credit for 2022-23, he is at least partially to blame for 2023-24.
This is The Team – Mostly For Another Two Seasons After This
Shero lasted a bit over four and a half years with the Devils. If you include his time as interim GM, Fitzgerald has lasted longer than the boss he served as assistant GM by six days and counting. The Devils under Shero made the playoffs once; a five-game series against Tampa Bay in 2018. The Devils under Fitzgerald made the playoffs once – and won a series. In that sense, Fitzgerald has surpassed his predecessor.
In the big picture, Fitzgerald has to be under pressure to prove that last season was an error. It is easy to write it off with injuries. It is also not fully accurate. Every team in the NHL deals with injuries to a degree. The other problems of the team were by players and personnel Fitzgerald brought in. Problems made worse by his actions or, rather, his lack of timely actions. Ruff being fired as late as early March comes to mind. As much as he built this team and correctly gets the credit for 2022-23, he correctly gets blame for 2023-24. And the situation with the team as a whole is a lot different. Not only have the expectations raised, Fitzgerald has committed quite a lot to this roster.
Look at the Devils’ roster at PuckPedia as of this morning. Eight forwards are signed through 2026-27, which is two seasons after next. Those eight are Timo Meier, Jack Hughes, Jesper Bratt, Nico Hischier, Ondrej Palat, the recently re-signed Dawson Mercer, and 2024 offseason signing Stefan Noesen, and the disappointingly re-signed Kurtis MacDermid. The first five of that group of eight are committed to at least $6 million to the cap. No one making more than $3.15 million is coming out of contract until 2027 when Hischier’s, Palat’s, and Mercer’s contracts end. Outside of MacDermid, Fitzgerald is going to have to maneuver to upgrade the position either with bargain additions or bold trades that could upset this core.
The defense is even more locked in. Hamilton and Siegenthaler are signed beyond 2027. As is 2024 signing Brett Pesce. Another 2024 signing, Brenden Dillon, is signed until 2027. That is four out of six defensemen spots already committed for two seasons beyond this one. Three committed to 2028 and beyond too. The remaining spots are spoken for, though. The entry level contracts – which are less than a million each – of Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec end after this season and next season, respectively. Both can and should get huge extensions. They are on the path to being great players for a long time. Unless the salary cap is going to rise a lot, Fitzgerald may have to sacrifice a larger contract to make room for both. This is not even considering anyone emerging like, say, Seamus Casey. Again, any changes to the defense will either require a significant move to make room or lean on cheaper moves. Like it or not, the defense likely is going to be some combination of Hamilton, Pesce, Dillon, Siegenthaler, Hughes, and Nemec for the next two seasons after this one coming up. That is six defensemen; again, it is a crowded blueline.
The only flexibility position-wise is at the one that Fitzgerald has yet to get a long-time answer for: goaltender. He sought out Jacob Markstrom during the 2023-24 season. He was close to making a deal before Calgary backed out late. Whether that would have salvaged that campaign is unknown. The hope is that he will be better than Vanecek-Schmid-Daws. The issue is that he is 34 and signed for just one season after this one. Jake Allen is set to be the #2 goalie and is a free agent after this coming season. The Devils have committed so much to skaters, have two big extensions to figure out, and may need to get goaltenders again. Knowing that this position, more than the others, sunk last season shows how important it is to get right. Fitzgerald has either suffered bad luck or bad choices for all but one season – and even 2022-23 had to rise above and move past Mackenzie Blackwood.
Cap-wise, this team that you will see start in Prague next week is largely going to be the team for the next two seasons short of a substantial move. The big spending plus the Markstrom trade bore this out after Fitzgerald correctly treating this as a win-now team. This also means that Fitzgerald will have to undo some of his work if he needs to remake or even dramatically improve the team after this coming season. Again, this is the team for now and the near future.
Beyond the roster, Fitzgerald swung for former Toronto head coach Sheldon Keefe to take over for Ruff and Green. Keefe was successful for Toronto and relatively successful in the postseason given the Leafs’ playoff woes since 2002. He has to bring something different from Ruff and get the players to perform more consistently successful hockey. Which makes the decision to keep the assistants the same save for Jeremy Cotillon a strange one. This change is a significant one and is outside of the cap. But it also needs to work with the team that Fitzgerald has committed for the foreseeable future. Keefe is by all means safe, but he has to work with them. It is not going to go the other way around.
The Next Steps
Ultimately, the goal is crystal clear in Newark. Make the playoffs. Ideally, win in the playoffs, but they have to be back there as a minimum. The Devils are sitting with a $87.023 million cap roster in a league where the ceiling is $88 million. This is a cap-ceiling team. Yes, free agents Pesce, Dillon, and Noesen wanted to join a successful team. Now they need to be one. The key word is need.
Yes, Fitzgerald can claim to be more successful than Shero but the goal was never just to be a bit better. The goal for Fitzgerald to build a team that can contend and make the playoffs regularly. Just like in the golden days of the franchise. A team that did not have two #1 draft picks or multiple top #10 draft picks to find success. Last season is exactly that: last season. But a second straight failure will have to bring some kind of change. I doubt it will be as simple as another player trade or another change behind the bench.
The real tough questions will then be asked of Fitzgerald. Why this core? Why these supporting players around this core? Why not act sooner when it was warranted? Why all these swings and misses at the goaltending position? To admit that he got one of these big contracts wrong may please some of the People Who Matter but ownership will not be pleased. An admission is not going to put points on the board, wins in the standings, playoff games on the schedule, and fans in the seats for it all. Injuries and such are not going to be good answers to explain away another lost season. Something that is possible as the NHL remains a super-competitive league. This a results-oriented business. Fitzgerald can claim he has got more results than Shero, but it is still not enough. Here is a bitter pill: that Islander team some of the People Who Matter like to scoff at? They have made the playoffs five out of the last six seasons. How they can do it and the Devils have not is another one of those tough questions that will be asked of Fitzgerald should 2024-25 go bad like last season.
Is it fair? Is life fair? Before you write, but it’ll be on the players, I do not agree. The players did not put the team together, hire the coach, hire the staff, and make the signings. If a successful team cannot win with the sheer talent of the Hughes Bros., Hischier, Bratt, Meier, Hamilton, and Nemec, then that is absolutely on management.
The pressure to succeed is on. Hopefully for Fitzgerald’s sake and the People Who Matter who like what he has put together – which I am one of, I think this team on paper is really good – the results are earned in 2024-25. Otherwise, the picture is going to get ugly once again. We may see one or more of those core players move on. Because they do not fit someone else’s plan for how they would effectively re-build and re-tool an unsuccessful Devils team. That will likely mean more lean years. Even if it is your guy that you do not like so much that gets moved. And, as we see with teams like Buffalo and Detroit, there is no set length for how long that can last.
And it will be a challenge, yes. There are no doormat teams in the East. Even the teams expected to finish last will have some things or some components to their games that will make them a challenge. The whole point of building a contending team is to rise above them. Again, the 2024-25 Devils have to prove it by getting results.
Good luck. May you have it this time, Devils. With that, please enjoy our multi-part season preview that begins tomorrow with Alex covering the forwards.