An offseason checklist for the New Jersey Devils

If someone was to ask who New Jersey’s top scorer was this season, it’d be understandable the first name that came to mind was either Jack Hughes or Nico Hischier, their core building blocks down the middle. But that wouldn’t be the right answer. No, the leading scorer was winger Jesper Bratt, a player who more than doubled his previous career-high in points while putting up 26 goals and 47 assists in 76 games. He picked a perfect time to do so as he’s set to be a restricted free agent this summer with arbitration eligibility. As a result, a new deal for the 23-year-old will be high on Fitzgerald’s to-do list.

It won’t be an easy task, however, when it comes to finding the right number for a contract. Is his 73-point season a sign of things to come or an outlier considering his other four NHL seasons had point totals between 30 and 35? Bratt’s camp will certainly argue the former while the Devils will want to hedge against the latter. Fitzgerald has stated his intention to get Bratt signed to a long-term contract and with only two RFA years remaining, it’s going to take a big number to get the winger to lock down the prime years of his career. He’s coming off a deal that carried a $2.75M AAV and a long-term deal that buys out some UFA seasons will almost certainly cost double that or more.

Add A Goalie

Two years ago, the Devils thought they had the right veteran partner for Mackenzie Blackwood when they signed Corey Crawford to a two-year deal. However, he had a last-minute change of heart, retiring before training camp. New Jersey went down a similar path last summer, inking Jonathan Bernier to a two-year deal. But a hip injury limited him to just ten games this season and he may not be ready to start the 2022-23 season. In the meantime, Blackwood’s stock has fallen considerably from a goalie on the rise to one that couldn’t crack the top 50 in the NHL in SV% among qualifying goaltenders this season.

Generally speaking, carrying three goaltenders isn’t a desirable situation. But for the Devils, it’s basically a necessity to hedge against Bernier’s injury and Blackwood’s struggles. Nico Daws was okay in his first taste of NHL duty but he needs to be in the minors for another season or two so they’ll need to look outside the organization for that third netminder.

The UFA market would be the easiest way to go with players like Jack Campbell and Ville Husso representing upside buys, albeit risky ones with their limited track records. Veterans like Marc-Andre Fleury and Braden Holtby are shorter-term options if their intention is to just shore the position up for now and look for the big fix later. Darcy Kuemper is also available but it’s hard to see the Devils being the winner for his services. With where New Jersey is in terms of still emerging from its rebuild though, will they be appealing to those free agents if they’re looking to win sooner than later?

The trade market is another option although that market won’t materialize for a while. Alexandar Georgiev should be available but is he much of an upgrade and would the Rangers move him to their rival? Washington may move one of their goalies if they can land a more proven veteran but again, they come with question marks. Others will come available over the coming months but will they be considerable upgrades? That’s far from a guarantee.

There aren’t any truly obvious choices here for New Jersey other than the fact they’ll need to add a goalie at some point over the next couple of months.

Add Win-Now Talent

While New Jersey opted to keep Lindy Ruff behind the bench, instead opting to make a couple of changes to their assistants, it’s fair to surmise he’ll be on a short leash to start next season. At some point, they need to go from rebuilding to pushing for a playoff spot; they’ve only made the playoffs once in the last decade. That switch should be flipped this summer.

They have a little over $25M in cap space this summer with Bratt’s deal being the only one that will be a high-priced contract. While they also need to re-sign Miles Wood and Pavel Zacha, they’ll have well above $10M to spend on the open market or in trades which puts them in a much better position than most of the league. While it’s understandable if they want to leave themselves a bit of a cap cushion heading into the season, they should be within a few million of the upper limit so there is definitely room to work with.

They have the ability to outbid teams in free agency as they did for Hamilton last summer. They can take on a bad contract for cheap in a trade that would double as an upgrade on their roster. The options are plentiful but by the time October rolls around, Fitzgerald needs to find a way to add multiple impact veteran players if the Devils are going to have a realistic shot of trying to get into the wild card hunt next season.

Salary figures courtesy of CapFriendly.