| Lou Lamoriello put his team together through all avenues. (Getty Images) |
The New Jersey Devils are a pretty interesting story in that with very close to the same roster as last season they have gone from being in the top five spots of the draft to being back in the Stanley Cup Final. It's the same cast of characters -- with a couple of new parts here and there -- producing two completely different results.
Put another way, this isn't a team GM Lou Lamoriello just threw together. A lot of the guys the Devils have on the roster have been there for a long time. There's probably no better franchise than New Jersey at holding onto players they get.
Just go up and down the lineup to see the guys who have been in New Jersey for years now. The most obvious is Martin Brodeur, who has been with the franchise since he was drafted by them in the first round back in 1990. Patrik Elias made his debut in 1995-96 and hasn't left the franchise in that time.
But if you were Lamoriello, why would you break up the gang? It's been an awfully successful few decades for the Devils. It's like my dad always advised: Find a good one and hang on to them. Of course that was in reference to girls, but you get the point.
And Lamoriello has found them, in a variety of ways. Of course he's found key cogs in the draft and through trades, but it's the under-the-radar moves that really jump out to me. The undrafted free agents, the waiver wire pickups. It's pretty impressive to see the haul that they have brought in through those channels.
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Ryan Carter, who has had a strong postseason on a Devils fourth line that has been very strong, was picked up off waivers at the beginning of the season from the Panthers. Another one of those fourth-liners, Stephen Gionta, was signed to an AHL contract after going undrafted and has earned his spot on the team. The third guy on that last line, Steve Bernier, was brought in on a tryout this summer and signed to a two-way contract.
That's pretty much the definition of a scrap-heap line and really, it's turned other people's junk into their treasure. Every game it has seemed that the fourth line for the Devils has been very impactful at one point or another.
Then there are a couple of undrafted free-agent signings that really stand out. David Clarkson was given a shot by the Devils in 2005 with a deal and, well, that's working out pretty well. At 27, Clarkson enjoyed a breakthrough season this year reaching the 30-goal plateau.
Lamoriello also signed defenseman Andy Greene after going undrafted. Again, that's a pretty good eye for talent on that signing. Greene has been seeing his role expand in the last couple of seasons to the point that the Devils made him a rich man with a new contract that pays Greene an average of $3 million per season.
But that's not the only way the Devils were built, of course.
Draft
Lou has had some pretty good picks over the years here, hasn't he? As already mentioned there are Brodeur and Elias, of course there is Zach Parise taken in 2003. Petr Sykora was drafted by the Devils in 1995, took a tour around the NHL starting in 2002 and is now back where he began. Travis Zajac was another first-round selection by New Jersey.
Then there is a host of younger talent that the Devils have taken in recent years making contributions already, some bigger than others. Adam Henrique, Mark Fayne, Jacob Josefson and Adam Larsson have all been picked in the draft by the Devils and figure to be big parts moving forward, if not now. Of course Henrique has made his presence felt this season.
Like any good franchise, the Devils have built the core of their team largely around the draft, and that has been with years of picking at the back ends of the draft with so many successful seasons.
Free agents
Despite the fact that the Devils have won three Stanley Cups in the last 20 years and play a stone's throw from New York City, they haven't been a hot destination for free agents over the years, at least top-tier guys.
On the more traditional free-agent market, i.e. the one in the summer with players whose contracts ran out, the Devils grabbed guys like Dainius Zubrus, Peter Harrold and Anton Volchenkov. As you can see, it's a nice group of players surely but they aren't the bedrocks of the franchise. It's not like the Rangers having Marian Gaborik and Brad Richards, two prime free agents they signed playing big roles on the team.
I don't want to diminish the parts the free agents have played, they have clearly been nice and welcome additions, it's just not how the team has been built, it's where the team has been supplemented. Look at the mythical GM's handbook and you'll see that's the best way to do it.
Then again, I suppose you could consider coach Peter DeBoer a free agent this past summer when Lamoriello brought him onboard. The Devils players couldn't sing DeBoer's praises enough after winning the Eastern Conference finals.
Trades
Ah yes, trades. Lamoriello hasn't built his team all that much through free agency but trades have been another conversation.
That's because he found his biggest fish, Ilya Kovalchuk, through this channel. There's no way you can forget the trade that sent Kovalchuk and Anssi Salmela to New Jersey in exchange for Johnny Oduya, Niclas Bergfors, Patrice Cormier and a first- and second-round draft choice. How has that one worked out for the parties involved, huh?
The answer wasn't as clear cut a year ago as it is now for the Devils. After trading for Kovalchuk and then signing him to a long-term extension, the Devils weren't exactly clicking. It took some time to get things together, that includes the payroll. But now? Now things are rolling for the Devils and Kovalchuk, who has seen his game evolve a lot in New Jersey to become a much better two-way player.
As for Atlanta? Well let's just say it was one of many regrettable trades that ended in the NHL trading the Thrashers for the Jets.
It doesn't end with Kovalchuk, though. This season Lamoriello also picked up Alexei Ponikarovsky and Marek Zidlicky at the deadline.
Zidlicky is particularly interesting to me in that he was a player with the Wild who wasn't seeing the ice any more. Nobody appeared to want him and Minnesota was trading him away for next to nothing in return. But in New Jersey he has been a good fit and has been quarterbacking the power play. This postseason he has one goal and seven assists while playing more than 24 minutes per game. Really, another "under-the-radar" move that has worked out pretty well for Lou.
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