The New Jersey Devils are coming to the end of their offseason "spending spree." Of course, it wasn't as exciting an offseason as most expected. The lack of good free agents really hampered movement. Every good player got signed before July 1st, and it left a lot of teams wondering where to find upgrades.
The Devils still have their most important contract to get done. Luke Hughes hasn't signed yet, and the Devils have just over $6 million in cap space, depending on who you think makes the roster right now. That's really not a lot of money to work with. Even if the Devils put Johnny Kovacevic on long-term injured reserve, they are setting themselves up for future problems.
So the thought of adding to this roster might be far away from Tom Fitzgerald’s mind until the Luke Hughes deal gets done, but that shouldn’t be the order of operations. Teams are already looking at PTOs to round out their training camp rosters, and the Devils should be doing the same thing.
There are a few former Devils who could make sense as a PTO. Jon Merrill is an interesting depth defenseman option who would provide more NHL experience than Dennis Cholowski, who the Devils re-signed this offseason. Nathan Bastian is still out there, and he could come back on a PTO since there doesn’t seem to be much interest on the open market.
Another former Devils player who actually makes a lot of sense as a PTO is Jimmy Vesey. If you recall, Vesey came to the Devils in 2021 after a failed tenure in New York and a few disastrous stops in Buffalo, Vancouver, and Toronto. Vesey was looking to reinvigorate his career, and the Devils were interested in changing the way he played.
The Devils viewed Vesey as a fourth liner with scoring potential. And he was really good in that role. He only had 15 points in 68 games, but he learned how to play on the penalty kill, and those skills evolved into another contract with the Rangers the next offseason.
Vesey would find his scoring stride, putting up 11 and 13 goals over the next two seasons. Then, the Rangers cut bait in the only way they can. Very disrespectfully.
Now, after he was sent to the Dallas Stars and didn’t play much, Vesey is considering options outside of the NHL.
A report from RG says that Vesey is receiving interest from multiple KHL clubs, including SKA St. Petersburg. It’s not surprising, as many former top prospects are looking overseas to make the most out of their careers.
However, if the right opportunity came to Vesey, he might delay his trip to Russia. Just like the Devils came calling four years ago when he needed them, Vesey on a PTO makes sense. For one, he’s the type of player who could easily replace someone on the fourth line. He still has the right set of skills to thrive in that role.
He also seems like a player that Sheldon Keefe would really like. Yes, we know he failed once with Sheldon Keefe, but that was before Lindy Ruff fixed him (we can’t believe we said it, either).
The Keefe-Vesey relationship wasn’t great, and there are multiple reports that neither liked how it was depicted on the Amazon series “All or Nothing” where Keefe was seen telling Vesey his game was “very vanilla.”
That relationship would need to be fixed for this to work, but Vesey might be back in a mindset where his back is against the wall, and the Devils liked what they saw last time that was the case for Vesey.