The Vancouver Canucks traded Quinn Hughes to the Minnesota Wild on Friday. This deal stunned the hockey world, especially the teams that were believed to be in on him. Out of nowhere, the Wild were the team to get it done. Count the New Jersey Devils as one of the teams to fail at landing their target.
There are a lot of reasons that the Devils were unable to make this trade. Cap space is a big one, but none may be bigger than the fact that they couldn't come up with the package that Minnesota did.
Minnesota traded Zeev Buium, Marco Rossi, Liam Ohgren, and a first-round pick to Vancouver in exchange for Quinn Hughes. The Devils were willing to part ways with players like Dawson Mercer and Simon Nemec, along with draft picks, but that doesn't compete with the deal that Minnesota was able to formulate.
Drafting has not been a strong suit for the New Jersey Devils recently
What makes it sting for the Devils is the fact that they took Alexander Holtz over Marco Rossi because they felt that they needed a wing more than a center at the time. New Jersey also took Anton Silayev over Zeev Buium, which is proving to be a monumental mistake.
If Tom Fitzgerald and his scouting team were better at their jobs in this regard, the Devils may have had a better chance of adding Quinn Hughes to their lineup.
Do the Devils still have a chance to sign Quinn Hughes in 16 months without giving up anything but money and cap space? Yes, they do. As long as Jack Hughes and Luke Hughes are still on the team, that posibility will remain.
With that said, a Quinn Hughes extension in Minnesota would then open the door for his brothers to join him in 2030 and 2032, respectively. This is all fluid right now, and the New Jersey Devils aren't as much of a lock to end up with Quinn as they once were.
Whether it's Tom Fitzgerald or his replacement, the drafting for this organization has to be better. Outside of the Hughes brothers, Nico Hischier, and Dawson Mercer, there hasn't been much good early-round drafting in the last ten years.
When an NHL team drafts well, two good things come from it. For one, it has the opportunity to improve your team. It also gives you other assets besides draft picks that can help make the team better via trades. That has simply not been good enough for New Jersey in recent memory.
They have built up a nice core, but supplementing it with depth has been a legit issue, and it is causing them to struggle taking that next step.
Let's say that Jack Hughes, Brett Pesce, and Jonathan Kovacevic all come back and play well to get this team into the playoffs. Then what? Are they good enough to go deep? It's possible, but it would go from possible to likely if they were to make another big addition or two. As of now, they missed.