The New Jersey Devils season is spiraling fast, and it seems more and more likely that a Taylor Hall trade is coming. There aren’t a lot of prospects that would be worth building a trade around, but there are a few.
If we told you that the New Jersey Devils were building a Taylor Hall trade around a prospect, most people wouldn’t be happy with that situation. Hall might be the best asset for the Devils in a long time, and one they are going to look at trading since it seems almost impossible to get him to re-sign.
Now, the conversation turns into what the Devils are going to get in return. The ideal return would bring a defenseman that’s going to step in as a top-line player right now. However, teams that are going to want Taylor Hall, especially if he’s not immediately signed to an extension, aren’t going to give up an NHL defenseman able to play on the top pair. It’s been terrible, but this once again has got to breed patience.
It’s more than likely that the Devils are going to have to settle for a top prospect that will be ready to go next season. At least, as someone to build the trade around. The Devils need to get a prospect who’s as close to a sure thing as humanly possible. Of course, nothing is a sure thing entirely.
We’ve seen first-overall picks fail. We’ve seen sure things fall on their face. The Devils themselves have seen prospects completely fail. Reid Boucher, Alex Urbom and Mattias Tedenby are just a few names that come to mind about the failures of Devils past.
Still, the best way to get better is to do it through youth. Nobody is trading the likes of Cal Makar, Leon Draisaitl or Elias Petterson, so you have to take a chance on a player who’s yet to make it to the NHL.
There are a lot of really good prospects out there for the Devils to choose from, but most aren’t worth building a trade around. Still, there are some worth making the centerpiece of a Hall trade, because they’d make us great in the near future.