New Jersey Devils could face cap trouble
The New Jersey Devils have gotten out to a terrible start in 2010-11, struggling to stay out of the Eastern Conference basement. Unfortunately, things are not likely to get any easier for the Devils at the end of the season.
The Devils have not been able to find their game this year and much of that has been attributed to their inability to move the puck from the defence up to the forwards. The club is in desperate need of a puck-moving defender.
The squad is stacked with strong stay-at-home defenceman, such as Anton Volchenkov, Colin White and Bryce Salvador. But the team’s problems are not in the defensive end. Instead, New Jersey struggles to put the puck in the net, averaging a League low 1.91
goals per game.
At the moment, the Devils best offensive defenceman is Andy Greene, who has 10 points in 22 games. The next closest defender is 24-year-old Matt Taormina with five points. But despite their obvious lack of skilled defenceman, the Devils elected to sign sniper
Ilya Kovalchuk to a 15-year $100 million contract during the off-season.
The Kovalchuk signing may not have only kept the Devils from signing another defenceman over the summer, but it may also keep them from signing star-winger Zach Parise to a long-term contract.
Parise has been incredible for the Devils in recent years, leading the team in scoring in both 2008-09 and 2009-10. The Minnesota native registered 45 goals and 94 points in 2008-09 and then followed it up with a 38 goal 82 point performance in 2009-10.
Over the last two seasons, Parise has actually scored more goals than Kovalchuk, making one wonder how much it will cost New Jersey to re-sign him.
Unfortunately, the Devils are currently locked into four bad contracts up front and do not have very much cap space to work with. At the moment, the Devils have $9 million to spend in the 2011 off-season.
New Jersey has four players with expiring contracts, who will become unrestricted free agents, and another eight players currently on their National Hockey League roster, who become restricted free agents at the end of the year.
The unrestricted free agents are Jason Arnott, Jamie Langenbrunner, Adam Mair and Andy Greene. While the Devils are not likely to re-sign an aging Arnott or a replaceable Mair, they are likely to offer contracts to both Greene and Langenbrunner.
Langenbrunner currently makes $2.8 million and can be expected to get a slight raise, while Greene is in line for a significant pay-raise. The 28-year-old led the Devils in scoring from the blue line last season and is set to do it again in 2010-11. Greene
currently earns under $1 million and can be expected to see at least $2.5 next season.
The Langenbrunner and Greene signings bring the Devils cap space down to roughly $3.5 million and that is before signing six restricted free agents, perhaps picking up a new puck-moving defenceman and locking Parise up to a long-term deal.
In order to sign Parise, the Devils will need to move one of Brian Rolston or Patrik Elias’ contracts. However, with both significantly overpaid (Rolston makes $5.1 million and Elias makes $6 million), it will be near impossible to move them, especially
considering the fact that Rolston has a no-trade clause and Elias has a no-movement clause.
The Kovalchuk contract has painted the Devils into a corner. They have essentially chosen the Russian sniper over Parise, who has been an offensive weapon for them for three seasons. The pressure will certainly be on the New Jersey front office at the end
of the year, especially if they end up at the bottom of the Eastern Conference.
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