It gets more difficult when we start talking about the expansion draft. Assuming Merkley makes the team and plays the requisite number of games, that gives you only 6 qualifying forwards and 3 qualifying defensemen.

Good luck this season.

I heard Nico may be ready by opening night but they shouldn't rush him. I think the best option for the Devils is playing Hughes at wing with Nico and Palms. Even though it didn't work last year, it doesn't hurt to try.

I'm not entirely opposed to that if he continues to have faceoff struggles, but I think that would be a bad move to look at him as a wing in the long term. hes truly gifted when it comes to neutral zone play, and carrying pucks into the offensive zone. you want that to be happening from the middle of the ice, or you sort of squander the advantage since it typically means cutting the ice in half rather than 3rds when defenses have to assess and triage scoring threats. for example, thats was a big factor whenever hall (and therefore the entire top line) got into bad dryspells.

in part, that is also why miles wood is practically useless, unless the rare situation arises where he actually converts on a breakaway or manages to make a decent pass back to the middle of the ice. conversely i dont think it is a coincidence that mcdavid and barzal are almost irreplaceable when it comes to their ability to generate offense off of clean entries.

Agreed, I think Hughes could excel at center but for the Devils, he would fit on the wing, especially with Nico at center and Palms at wing. He played center his whole career but could do better at wing due to his poor defense and faceoffs. Speaking of Wood, we should pay a fourth for Seattle to take him.

thanks brother, you too. although the isles probably dont need as much luck!

I would hope that they are less worried about the expansion draft and more worried about adhering to their rebuild plan. seems they have a weird situation and I worry that their rebuild may culminate in building a mediocre squad rather than a contending squad. they dont really have that great of a team as far as 20-21 looks, but there seems to be a log-jam amognst the 'good but not great' prospects in the system. at some point you have to stop stockpiling those kinds of assets and package them as a part of a bonafide roster upgrade. Of the guys i listed in the scratches/taxi section there are about 9 of them that should clearly be full-time nhlers at some point. always good to keep the cupboards stocked, but its mathmatically impossible that the devils will be able to maximize the value of them over the next 2 or 3 years if they intend to keep them all in our system forever.

If you look at the expansion simulator a lot of the Devils (Bastian, Merkley, Mcleod, Kuokkanen, Sharangovich, Jacobs, White) need to play 27 more games to no longer be exempt from the expansion draft. So my guess is the Devils are going to be sellers after 30 games (56 game season) to keep most of those players are exempt; then trade vets to make room in the lineup, let the younger guys play. and basically tank the rest of the season.

Per the minimum Expansion exposure Requirements (2F/ 1D/ 1 G) I have: Wood & (preferably a cap dump like T. Johnson)/ Pk Subban/ Crawford