New Jersey Devils general manager, Tom Fitzgerald, must have a pivot after failing to reel in Quinn Hughes.
The news on Monday morning indicates that the Devils GM is safe, for now. Despite losing out to the Minnesota Wild to bring the third superstar brother to New Jersey, Fitzgerald isn’t going anywhere.
However, the season is slipping away from the Devils. There’s still plenty of time to get the train back on the tracks, but New Jersey needs can ill-afford to be passive.
In addition to revealing Fitzgerald is keeping his job, Elliotte Friedman also revealed on the latest 32 Thoughts the Podcast that the Devils were unable to make the Hughes trade happen as a result of some trade clauses the New Jersey GM handed out.
“I do believe the Devils have had a couple of deals vetoed. Okay? I do believe that. I don’t know who, I don’t know what, but I do believe that’s happened,” Friedman said. “There’s too much noise out there for that not to have occurred.”
As others have pointed out before, Fitzgerald is tied for first in the NHL with the Carolina Hurricanes and Edmonton Oilers with handing out the most no-trade/move clauses in the entire league.
Thus, the Devils have been a bit handcuffed when it comes to making trades.
However, now that Hughes is gone and there’s a bit more clarity with the Devils’ future, Fitzgerald needs to get even more creative, and find some help for New Jersey.
After Sunday’s embarrassment at the hands of the Vancouver Canucks, two things are apparent. The Devils are struggling to score goals. Further, as pointed out by head coach Sheldon Keefe, they lack mental toughness.
In fact, Keefe’s postgame comments about the Devils’ mental toughness sounded like a cry for help.
We don’t know who vetoed deals, but two obvious candidates come to mind. Dougie Hamilton and Ondrej Palat.
Hamilton, of late, has offered next to nothing to New Jersey. As a $9 million player, he’s on pace to maybe reach 20 points this season. Defensively, he’s been no better than a traffic cone, and if you’re looking for any sort of grit in his game, you’ll be searching for eternity.
And to think at this point Palat’s contract is more digestible as a $6 million player is tough to stomach, but it might be true. Regardless, Palat has never reached the potential the Devils had hoped for when signing him in the summer of 2022. He has one year left on his contract after this season, whereas Hamilton has two.
So, what’s the solution to all of this?
Fitzgerald has to get creative and find a way to move out one or both of these contracts that each hold a 10-team trade clause, leaving 22 NHL clubs out of the equation.
That’s going to mean mortgaging some future. The Devils will undoubtedly have to attach futures to one or both of these players in a deal to just clear the cap space. First round picks? Send them. Their best prospects? Sure.
But the Devils don’t have the luxury of waiting around. The Metropolitan Division and Eastern Conference is so tight. The difference between first and last is just 12 points, and the Devils are just seven points removed from first place in the Metro despite being on the outside of the playoff picture.
The injured Devils will return. Jack Hughes will eventually be back. Brett Pesce, too. Add the plethora of other names such as Arseny Gritsyuk and Timo Meier (personal leave), and you could understand why New Jersey is in the hole they’re in right now.
Yet, the Devils had needs coming into the 2025-26 season. Namely, they required a third-line center and a top-six forward.
Those needs will persist even when the injured parties are back in the lineup.
We’ve heard the whispers of Steven Stamkos. We know they’ve been interested in Ryan O’Reilly.
Are those the right players? To be determined. But Keefe was adamant on Sunday the Devils need players who will be mentally tough. Right now, the locker room struggles in that area, and no one is dragging them into the fight.
Perhaps, the Devils need to look elsewhere, such as Calgary for a Nazem Kadri. Or, go back to the well in Vancouver for a Conor Garland. Both players are vocal leaders in a locker room, and play with a certain snarl on the ice the Devils just don’t see consistently.
Whatever it is, the head coach, the fan base, and the injured list all shout “HELP!”
However, the time for trying is over. Fitzgerald must make it happen, otherwise, in the words of Keefe, “You wait, you lose.”
