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New Jersey Devils: 5 Huge Offseason Moves To Get Jack Hughes A Winger

By Nick Villano

Feb 21, 2021; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; New Jersey Devils center Jack Hughes (86) celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal against the Washington Capitals in the second period at Capital One Arena. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 21, 2021; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; New Jersey Devils center Jack Hughes (86) celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal against the Washington Capitals in the second period at Capital One Arena. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports /
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New Jersey Devils
Reilly Smith #19 of the Vegas Golden Knights (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images) /

Reilly Smith

People have been mocking trades of Reilly Smith for two years, but the Vegas Golden Knights have not budged. Either, he’s incredibly valuable to them in terms of trade value, or they have no plans to move him at all. The Golden Knights are always up against the salary cap, and a flat cap will not help.

However, the Knights have always found a way to make one or two moves to get out of trouble. They traded Nate Schmidt to the Vancouver Canucks last offseason to get some breathing room. They also moved Paul Statsny to the Winnipeg Jets. The issue is teams are less willing to take on salary this offseason after they didn’t get full capacity all season. Maybe the ESPN deal changes their mindset, but we can get into that in a future piece.

The Golden Knights only have $3 million in cap space. The Seattle Kraken aren’t eligible to take anyone from Vegas, so they aren’t capable to make room that way. The good news is they can add Jack Dugan to the forward group without having to re-sign anyone.

Smith only has one year remaining on his contract, so the Golden Knights only have one more year to move him. He only has nine points this season, but the Devils should be looking to buy low on former consistent 20-goal scorers since the pandemic might be having an effect on these players. Smith shouldn’t be on the top of the Devils’ list, but for the right price, he should absolutely be an option.

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