New Jersey Devils: 5 Players Who Should Be On Taxi Squad
Which New Jersey Devils players should be on their taxi squad?
The NHL and NHL Player’s Association came to an agreement Friday night to return to the ice. Things got a little hairy for a couple of weeks, but everything seems to be moving towards a January 13th start. There are a few extras in this year’s start thanks to the pandemic. The league will shorten the season to 56 games, eliminate all preseason games, and calls for what’s essentially a taxi squad.
What a taxi squad is would be a team of four to six players who won’t have any contact with the current team but will be practicing so they are ready to play at any time. This is especially important in hockey. This isn’t like football where they can separate players by position. Hockey players have to learn to play as a unit, with all five players holding an important role that works in sync with the rest of the team. That means a very contagious virus complicates things.
So, this taxi squad will always be available. To make the best of a taxi squad, the New Jersey Devils need to have players of many different skill sets. These players would be otherwise playing in the AHL, so don’t expect anyone like Nolan Foote or Alexander Holtz to sit out over playing in their respective full-season teams.
To get the most unbiased opinions on who might be on the roster to start, we will use Daily Faceoff’s version of the lines. That means that Jesper Boqvist, Michael McLeod, and Janne Kuokkanen are regulars on the roster. For argument’s sake, the extras will be Connor Carrick, Nick Merkley, and Brett Seney. That leaves five of the rest to build our taxi squad.
The Devils need to get a little bit of everything in just five players. How will they be able to do that? Should they load up on forwards, or should they try to make it as even as possible? Should they put all scorers on the taxi squad, or should they focus on two-way players who can fill most roles? There are a lot of questions with this squad. Building it will be fun.
Yegor Sharangovich
Yegor Sharangovich has been phenomenal in the KHL to start the year. He has 25 points in 34 games with Dinamo Minsk. That includes 17 goals, good for fourth in the league. He leads his team in goals, which includes players like Brandon Kozun, former 2nd-round pick Shane Prince, and Vadim Shipaychov, who had a tumultuous NHL career before returning to Russia.
Sharangovich already matched his point output in the AHL last season. It’s clear he made a huge jump during the offseason. His shot has improved as much as any Devils player we’ve seen playing anywhere.
There’s one problem, Sharangovich hasn’t returned to the NHL yet. He’s still technically with Dinamo. So, even if he returns today (Sunday), he’d have to quarantine to make sure he’s healthy, then he’d probably join training camp a little late. He could still make the roster, but it likely makes a little more sense for him to start on the taxi squad. He doesn’t need to make it through waivers like other players.
Sharangovich definitely deserves a shot to make this roster after how he played in Russia, but it makes more sense for him to be a great shot coming off the taxi squad. He can play center or wing, so if someone like Jack Hughes or Kyle Palmieri goes down, he can replace both of them.
Colton White
The Devils obviously need defensemen, but there is always going to be a major drop off with how the team is built right now. If nobody gets injured or sick ever, the defense will be average. If someone is out of the line, especially if it’s someone like P.K. Subban or Damon Severson, things get rough. Right now, the most likely taxi squad defenseman is Colton White.
He got a short look with the Devils last season, playing six games in the NHL. He was fine, but nothing to go home about. White has not played in any other league during the pause, so he’s going to be one of the players who hasn’t seen competitive hockey for more than nine months.
The 2015 3rd-round draft pick has looked better than he has during his development in his stint in Binghamton. He’s a player that focuses on positioning and plays well with his stick. With players like Will Butcher and Ty Smith on the roster on top of Severson and Subban, the Devils won’t need a taxi squad player who can add to the offense. They need someone who can stop the puck from going into the net. White has shown he’s at least decent at doing that.
Honestly, this pick is between Josh Jacobs and White, and White just has shown more over the past 18 months. Things could change when the teams hit training camp, but Jacobs struggled to make it past the third line in Binghamton last season. He also looked lost when he made his NHL debut. White looked a lot more polished, which probably has something to do with his age. White would be at least someone who could keep the Devils defense at the “average” moniker.
Kevin Bahl
This might be hoping since it feels like a Devils move to add Matt Tennyson to the squad over someone like Kevin Bahl or Reilly Walsh. Bahl would be a better option, especially since he hasn’t been able to play defense for a similar nine to ten months. He needs reps, and the Devils need to make sure these young defensemen get them.
Bahl is spending his first season in the pros, and the Devils should start it as early as possible. Unlike Walsh, Bahl still needs to figure out who he is as a player. This is thinking long term, getting Bahl as much practice and game reps as possible. Walsh is an offensive defenseman that is going to be able to replace Smith or Butcher, but the Devils don’t need that immediately.
Three defensemen would need to get hurt/sick for Bahl to play. It’s possible, so the Devils have to prepare him to play in the games. Bahl can at least bring NHL size and strength to the equation. He hits people and gets in the way of shots. His positioning isn’t great and he has a lot to work on, but Bahl can at least bring something different to the table for now.
This is thinking more about the future, but he can at least be a serviceable defenseman if the worst-case scenario unfolds. We’ve seen in other sports that are playing outside of a bubble that those scenarios happen, so Bahl might play. It would at least be a decent fit in terms of play style. It would actually be fun to watch a young Bahl play a couple of shifts with Subban, although it has a chance of going very wrong.
Nathan Bastian
This one might seem strange on the surface, but look at who is left among the Devils forwards that they actually have access to. If Boqvist, McLeod, Kuokkanen, Seney, and Merkley make the roster, then it leaves Nathan Bastian, Marian Studenic, Mikhail Maltsev, and Fabian Zetterlund as options. Of those, only Bastian has any NHL experience, and he was pretty good when he got called up.
Bastian has NHL size and scoring ability. He’s now had three full seasons in the AHL, and he has some skills that would work in Lindy Ruff’s system. There’s one problem. The former 2nd-round pick is no longer waiver exempt. The Devils would have to put him through waivers just to get him to the taxi squad. Would another team be looking to grab Bastian? Probably not, but do the Devils really want to take that chance?
It’s going to be very weird to see what teams do with these waiver-ineligible players that aren’t good enough to make the NHL roster yet. The Devils actually have quite a few. Merkley and Kuokkanen are the two that are extremely worrisome. That’s why the Devils will likely keep them on the roster. They might actually keep Bastian as part of the 23-man roster and leave Seney off since he can still get to the taxi squad without waivers.
Scott Wedgewood
The Devils need a goalie on their taxi squad, and they added Scott Wedgewood this offseason in order to have someone with NHL experience available if Corey Crawford or Mackenzie Blackwood went down. He is coming off time in the NHL bubble, actually winning the Stanley Cup Championship with the Tampa Bay Lightning. He didn’t play obviously, but he did get to travel with the team as they won it all. He at least has practice time in the past 10 months.
The Devils could add Gilles Senn to the squad, but they brought Wedgewood here to be the extra. Senn will get his chances soon enough, but it makes more sense for him to get ready for the AHL season. How that will work hasn’t been figured out yet, but it will be worked out somehow.
Wedgewood has some NHL experience, including a few seasons in the Devils organization in the past. He’s someone who understands the process of playing the second the team calls on him. If anyone is going to be used to long layoffs, it’s Wedgewood.
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If he’s playing, it would be a problem, but that goes for any goalie that’s not Blackwood or Crawford. He’s an emergency option for a reason. However, the Devils need an emergency option. Crawford has an injury history, and Blackwood is still very young. Wedgewood is at least a decent option in a pinch.