New Jersey Devils Biggest Needs: Defense & Left Wing
By Phil DeHaven
New Jersey Devils new General Manager Ray Shero has his work cut out for him as he steps into his new position. He has a ton of unrestricted free agents to mull over, some key restricted free agents he must re-sign and he has to figure out the Devils scoring issues. He may be able to address some of those needs via the draft, but other than that he will most likely get creative in a trade to acquire what the team needs. From a statistical perspective, perhaps the two areas that are the Devils biggest needs are at defense and left-wing.
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When looking at a breakdown of the team stats by position, it’s pretty clear that defense and left-wing have to be the Devils biggest needs to address this off-season. New Jersey’s left-wingers contributed the least amount of assists (41) and points (84) out of all the positions. A good amount of this may be due to
Patrik Elias‘ regression in production and also because of a lack of depth. Elias is listed as a center, but did shift around to left-wing due to team injuries. Former Devils GM Lou Lamoriello did well when he signed
Mike Cammallerithis off-season, but other who played left-wing this season struggled.
New GM Ray Shero will be looking to address the team’s scoring situation this off-season and he would be wise to try to bring in another left-winger to increase production at that position. It would address two of the Devils biggest needs in arguably one move which would be a best case scenario. The other reason why the production was so low from this position was due to the large amount of injuries this year. Ryane Clowe and Martin Havlat both missed a significant amount of time to injuries this year which forced the coaching staffs to juggle the lineups frequently. Tuomo Ruutu and Dainius Zubrus have also been busts at the position.
The other part of the Devils biggest needs is to shore up the defense. The defense scored the least amount of goals (26), power-play goals (8) and had the worst +/- of any position with -41. A lot of the defense’s struggles can be pegged on their inexperience and the offense’s struggles. Plain and simple, when your offense doesn’t score it puts a hell of a lot more pressure on your defense. The defense’s +/- is a direct result of the offense’s inability to generate offensive chances let alone score. It’s the same reason why Cory Schneider won’t win the Vezina Trophy this season. He faced way too many shots and in the majority of games he played in most of the game was played in the Devils defensive zone.
Ray Shero can address one of the Devils seemingly biggest needs by bringing in another veteran defensive presence on the blue line. The defense had some growing pains (which was expected), but these were highlighted every game by how poor the team’s offense was. By bringing in another veteran d-man, Shero can have someone other than Andy Greene mentoring the young defenseman and further enabling their growth. Adam Larsson has blossomed playing alongside Greene and under Assistant Coach Scott Stevens. Just think of what someone like Jon Merrill or Eric Gelinas could be with another veteran in the defense.
Addressing two of the Devils biggest needs may not be easy, but the team cannot afford to go into next season with the same left-wingers and defensemen they had this year. What do you think? Do you feel these are the Devils biggest needs?