The New Jersey Devils season ended in disappointment with an overtime loss to the Carolina Hurricanes. Now, GM Tom Fitzgerald has a lot of questions to answer as this franchise deals with new expectations.
The New Jersey Devils are coming off one of the most fun seasons in its history. Not only did they break a bunch of franchise records, but they were one of the most exciting teams in the NHL. They led the league with the most comeback wins, turning deficits into two points 26 times. Everything about this season, short of the playoff series with the Carolina Hurricanes, was great.
If you told Devils fans in October that this team would not only make the playoffs but they would beat the New York Rangers in Game 7 for their first series win in more than a decade, every single gan would be on board.
Now, the Devils are a true contender. There will be analysts picking them to win the Stanley Cup next season based on the moves they make in the offseason. This team needs to answer some very important questions, and some need to happen sooner rather than later.
1. What Do Timo Meier and Jesper Bratt Contracts Look Like?
We won’t spend much time on this one since we’ll be doing multiple full articles on this. For now, let’s focus on the importance of this question. There were some absolutely insane opinions, including pushing to trade Timo Meier and some actually thinking it’s smart to make Jesper Bratt an unrestricted free agent. We don’t care about the monetary demands. Those opinions are preposterous.
Fitzgerald has to find great contracts for both players. He’s negotiated an insane deal for Jack Hughes, locking up an NHL superstar for $8 million per season. He also put together a great long-term contract for Jonas Siegenthaler. Those are the two internal contracts Fitzgerald dealt with (some might forget Ray Shero negotiated the Nico Hischier deal). Now, he has two at the same time.
So much could happen here. They might both sign eight-year deals for massive money. Fitzgerald might sign one to a bridge deal just to save on the cap space. They might both get to arbitration just to stress every Devils fan out. One thing we do know is both Meier and Bratt will be on the team on opening night.