For anyone who didn’t know, Zach Parise got injured. He was forced to have surgery to repair torn meniscus in his right knee. This injury will keep him out of competition for the next three months. As one of the top scorers on a struggling New Jersey Devils squad, how is this going to affect the team?
Well, in the worst case scenario, the Devils continue tumbling over the next three months and basically sit rock bottom in the standings when Parise returns. After playing 15 games already and only gathering nine points, this seems likely. They’re currently second to last in the Eastern Conference as it is. The Devils and their fans will pretty much call it a season, and begin thinking about next year.
But what if this is exactly what the team needs? What if this is exactly what a guy like Ilya Kovalchuk needs to really break loose and start scoring in bunches. Maybe guys like Jason Arnott and Jamie Langenbrunner need this added responsibility to turn up their scoring too.
Kovalchuk was always ‘the guy’ in Atlanta. Coming to an already productive team, it hasn’t been necessary for him to do all of the scoring, and perhaps thats thrown him off. Just the same, his addition to the Devils roster has taken scoring pressure off of the aforementioned Arnott and Langenbrunner. But now as point per game player Zach Parise is out for the next three months, the pressure has returned more than ever.
With solid goaltending in Martin Brodeur, and some potent scorers, perhaps this injury is just what the Devils need to get going. Kovalchuk will regain his scoring touch and dominate on the top power play unit, secondary scorers like Travis Zajac will carry their share of the workload, and overall the people who should be scoring, will be scoring. By the time Parise returns, we could be looking at a hot Devils team that is once again near the top of the Atlantic Devision.
What do you think will happen? Is the Devils season salvageable? Or should they just begin thinking about year two of the Ilya Kovalchuk mega contract?
I’m thinking that this is the year for them to sink. The defense has gotten worse every year. They have never replaced losses over the years of scott niedermayer or rafalski and they have been able to plug in developing players to get by. This year they lost more defense durring the off season and the team seems to have run out of serviceable replacements. The new focus on a more offensive style has put additional pressure on the weak defense and aging goal tending. Broder is still a beast but he is not use to stopping over 30 shots a night and playing as many games as he does in a season is asking too much. There is too much in flux for this team to recover and it is clear they now have no money to fix anything in free agency this year. Looks like they might be sharing the basement with the Islanders this year.
I’m thinking that this is the year for them to sink. The defense has gotten worse every year. They have never replaced losses over the years of scott niedermayer or rafalski and they have been able to plug in developing players to get by. This year they lost more defense during the off season and the team seems to have run out of serviceable replacements. The new focus on a more offensive style has put additional pressure on the weak defense and aging goal tending. Broder is still a beast but he is not use to stopping over 30 shots a night and playing as many games as he does in a season is asking too much. There is too much in flux for this team to recover and it is clear they now have no money to fix anything in free agency this year. Looks like they might be sharing the basement with the Islanders this year.
So who do the Devils dump at the trade deadline to free up cap space? Arnott and Langenbrunner are free agents after this season, Parise is a restricted free agent. The only have about $8 million to spend for next season, and will have a number of players to sign. Those three guys alone are making about $10 million this season, and Parise is guaranteed a nice raise. Lou Lamoriello has done a great job during his time with the Devils, but he made a mistake with Kovalchuk and definitely should have walked away.
They are defiantly in a tough spot. I think all they can do is follow the rest of the league’s blue print. They need to trade away Arnott and Langenbrunner to stock up draft picks and win with young, fast, hungry players. The way the money is spent there they can only have two scoring lines and they will have to roll two lines of grinders and hope they chip in. The real problem with the team is their defense. They can’t afford free agents so they just have to watch the waiver wire and hope some stacked teams have to drop them (like Kyle Quincy a few years back) and get lucky in the draft. I bet Kovy didn’t think he was walking into a rebuilding situation but he forced it. The other shoe drops when Broder hangs it up or gets injured.
[…] New Jersey Devils and winger Zach Parise have come to terms. After what seemed to be a a guaranteed arbitration hearing, both sides have […]