New Jersey Devils General Manager Tom Fitzgerald took over in the role in an interim role on January 12th, 2020. Since then, the Devils' leader has made a total of 52 trades. With this year's free agent market already incredibly thin, it is widely speculated that a team like New Jersey will need to use the trade market to improve the club.
At the end of the season press briefing, Fitzgerald said that the team "would not be coming back with the same group" due to a lack of production. Six forwards will not be coming back, with four already having moved on. Justin Dowling, Erik Haula, Curtis Lazar, and Tomas Tatar already have new clubs. Nathan Bastian and Daniel Sprong will not be coming back as the Devils have no apparent interest in bringing them back.
Ten forwards from last year's team are slated to return right now, and only Connor Brown, Evgenii Dadonov, and Juho Lammikko are new to the team. Arseni Gritsyuk is slated to fight for a spot, but nothing is certain for him. To improve, Fitzgerald will have to utilize the trade market.
It is noted that in NHL circles, General Managers like to trade with other certain General Managers. Some bring in players in free agency that they drafted before, the team coaches had at one point, among other common threads. Connor Brown had Sheldon Keefe as his coach in Toronto at one point.
If we look at a General Manager's trade history, we can look at who they might trade with next. What is Tom Fitzgerald's trade history? Can we see a pattern? Is there a name out there that is on a team that he has never traded with before?
One note: there are three trades that the New Jersey Devils made that are considered 'minor league deals' that this writer will not count as a Tom Fitzgerald trade. With that said, who has Fitzgerald trade with the most?