Let’s take a look at the tale of the tape since the Devils moved on from Lou Lamoriello as General Manager way back in 2015.
The Devils have gone through two permanent GMs in Ray Shero and Tom Fitzgerald.
They have gone through three permanent head coaches in John Hynes, Lindy Ruff, and Sheldon Keefe, with Alain Nasreddine and Travis Green serving as interim coach when Hynes and Ruff were dismissed midseason.
Their win-loss record, including this season, is 397-364-91, which is technically above “NHL
.500” but in actuality, the Devils would need to win their next 58 games in a row to get back to REAL .500 over that timeframe. Not expected wins or process wins or hypothetical wins or moral victories, but actual wins and losses. You know, the only stats that actually matter at the end of the day.
They have made the playoffs three times in that timeframe, winning one playoff round against their archrivals. Their only playoff series win since reaching the Stanley Cup Final in 2012, which feels like a lifetime ago at this point, and the closest they have gotten to winning a Stanley Cup was 11 wins away in 2023. Close, but not actually that close.
Yes, the Devils were rebuilding for much of that time frame, but at the end of the day, what do they have to actually show for it?
Well, they did get their first Hart Trophy winner in franchise history with Taylor Hall leading the team to the playoffs in 2017-18, only to get obliterated in five games against the Tampa Bay Lightning. As much fun as that season was, it turned out to be fool’s gold as the team was single-handedly carried by an MVP-caliber performance.
They had what wound up being the greatest regular season in franchise history in 2022-23, in terms of points, with a fun team that looked like this was a potential championship-level club on the rise. They won a playoff series against their archrivals before bowing out in the second round against Carolina, but the sky was seemingly the limit. Unfortunately, that turned out to be fool’s gold as well.
They made the playoffs last season, but let’s be real, the Devils made the playoffs essentially in name only as Carolina made short work of them once again in a non-competitive, best-of-seven series.
They have a roster that is currently capped out with no obvious path towards improvement anytime in the immediate future other than hoping players snap out of it and play better. Except that hoping something happens isn’t an actual plan.
Instead of taking a step forward and looking like a team that is building towards something, they’ve taken several steps backwards and looks like a team that needs to pivot and retool, if not outright tear it all down and start over. Except that’s complicated by the fact there are so many no-move clauses and no-trade clauses on said roster as they were handed out by the GM like Halloween candy.
And that’s about it. After 11 years post-Lou, that’s what these Devils have accomplished. That is what the Devils have to show for all of those years of losing with the promise of a brighter future.
Some rebuild, huh?
I’m writing this in the aftermath of the Devils being emasculated and humiliated against the New York Islanders by a score of 9-0. A game where the Devils once again can’t finish even though the GM told us with a straight face that “I’m not worried about offense with this group” last summer. His words, not mine. A game where Tom Fitzgerald’s hand picked “big game hunting” goaltender who he unnecessarily signed to a contract extension couldn’t stop a beach ball. Again, his words, not mine.
That’s about as appropriate as it gets for THESE Devils that Fitzgerald has assembled. A game where after “Boo-Gate”, THIS was the response by the team in their very next game. A game where the fan who threw a Devils jersey onto the ice showed more passion and fire than anybody on the team.
It’s the type of loss that screams for somebody to be dragged out back and put out of their misery, whether it’s GM Tom Fitzgerald, head coach Sheldon Keefe, the players, or some combination of all of the above. It’s the type of performance where you have to do something because it’s beyond unacceptable. In a lot of ways, its eerily reminiscent of the 7-1 loss to the Sabres back on December 2nd, 2019. Another similarly spineless, gutless, and embarrassing performance by everybody involved. The only difference being the Devils found a way to score a meaningless goal that night, which is more than they did last night.
On a related note, the Devils fired John Hynes the following day. With Ray Shero to follow shortly after.
While all of this has been going on over the last ten and a half years, a surprising number of people have been here in the background the entire time, or close to it.
Tom Fitzgerald was hired as the AGM way back on July 24th, 2015. He’s been here the entire time.
The Devils hired Paul Castron as director of scouting back on July 31st, 2015. He has been here the entire time.
The Devils hired Mark Dennehy to coach the then AHL-Binghamton Devils back on August 1st, 2018. He has since been promoted to Chief Scout of Amateur Scouting.
The Devils hired Matt Cane as Director of Hockey Analytics in May of 2019, and has since been promoted to Vice President of Hockey Analytics and Strategy.
The Devils hired Dave Rogalski as goaltender coach in October of 2020. Rogalski still holds this position today despite making zero goaltenders under his tutelage any better than they were before they got here. In fact, some of those goaltenders have gone on to be better once they got away from him and with a team that actually knows what the hell they’re doing.
Dan MacKinnon has been in the organization since 2016 and is now an AGM. The Devils other AGM, Kate Madigan, has been in the organization since 2017. Chuck Fletcher, who is a senior advisor to Fitzgerald, hasn’t been here nearly as long, but that’s probably because he was too busy being an average at best GM in Minnesota and Philadelphia during that timeframe. As it turns out, average at best might be kind, as Flyers fans were quick to laugh at us for hiring their failed GM. Turns out, they were right to do so.
I could keep going but I think you get the point that I’m building towards.
Eventually, Tom Fitzgerald is going to be fired as general manager of the Devils. If the Devils were a serious organization, it should’ve already happened by the time you read this. Whether you think that is fair or unfair, I’ll leave that up to you to discuss in the comments. But at the end of this day, this is his team. And as I wrote some time ago, this is all on him. I’m not saying the coaches or players don’t deserve blame as well, but Fitzgerald is the one person who has had a hand in everything when it comes to this team. It’s his (capped-out) roster. His hand-picked free agency signings. His trades. His draft classes. His draft busts. His contract extensions. His NMCs and NTCs. His (second) head coach. His staff. His braintrust. This is the mess he created. And sitting here in January of 2026, after nearly six years on the job, the results have not been good enough.
When the Devils make that change, they need to go outside of the organization to find whoever the next GM is going to be. It can’t be anybody currently in place who had a hand in creating this mess. It can’t be anybody with any perceived biases when it comes to the roster or the coach, assuming Keefe somehow survives this.
I don’t care that Dan MacKinnon has worked his way up and paid his dues. He can’t be the next GM. Not of this team.
I don’t care that Kate Madigan has worked her way up and paid her dues. I don’t care that her hire would make for a feel-good story with her becoming the first woman NHL general manager. She can’t be the next GM. Not of this team.
I don’t care that Chuck Fletcher has experience. He’s been a lousy GM in the past. He can’t be the next GM. Not of this team.
I don’t care how smart Matt Cane supposedly is. I want to see the analytics that say that say Juho Lammikko and Dennis Cholowski, just to name two names, are quality NHL players. If he can’t show his work, he should be shown the door. He can’t be the next GM. Not of this team.
Now, I’m saying this with the expectation that one of the aforementioned names will probably be named the interim GM if and when Fitzgerald is fired because somebody has to answer the phone when other teams start circling like vultures. Good luck hiring a quality GM from the outside while in-season. Someone will need to do something to make the team cap compliant once Johnathan Kovacevic is ready to return. Someone will need to take calls if this team shifts to seller mode, which is looking more and more likely with each embarrassing loss.
But none of those people should be given serious consideration to be the next general manager.
If we know anything about the inner workings of the team, it’s that everything is apparently discussed in some sort of committee. It’s a collaborative effort, one that the previous GM Shero reportedly wasn’t comfortable with. Fitzgerald might be making the call at the end of the day when it comes to roster decisions, but he’s not doing it without the input from his top aides. And there are plenty of people on the Devils payroll who probably have a seat at said table to be a voice in his ear.
That’s reason enough for me to not want any of these people involved in the decision-making process going forward. They’ve all had a hand in this mess too, at one point or another.
From an organizational structure standpoint, it’s time to napalm the entire operation and start fresh with people who actually know how to build a winning hockey team. Because what we currently have isn’t it.
The Devils are overdue for a shakeup in the scouting department anyways, as they’ve had plenty of draft misses in the last decade. Obviously, no team is batting 1.000 when it comes to draft picks and nailing each and every one of them, and I acknowledge they did a better job than the end of the Lou Lamoriello/David Conte era did when it comes to finding players who can play in the league. But there’s been enough misses where they need fresh voices and fresh ideas overseeing that part of the operation.
The Devils are long overdue for a shakeup when it comes to player development, especially at the AHL level. Not only is Utica (and Binghamton before them) consistently bad, but the Devils never seem to get a spark from any player when they get a call up with Nico Daws being the lone exception. They need fresh voices and fresh ideas overseeing that too.
And then there’s the actual NHL roster. There’s Sheldon Keefe. There’s the NHL coaching staff.
Eventually, decisions will need to be made on all of those guys. And they will be. The next GM will have his work cut out for him cleaning up the mess he would be inheriting.
It’s all the more reason why they have to go external.
They have to hire a general manager who has no attachment to anyone and anything here.
They have to hire a general manager who is willing to be the bad guy and figure out a way to get the problematic contracts off of the books to give this team the flexibility going forward to make the necessary changes to improve the roster. If it means making life miserable for the players who have said clauses and healthy scratching them, so be it. If it means treating a respected veteran in this manner, so be it. Maybe the Devils got a head start on that by benching Ondrej Palat in game. That only came about two years too late.
They have to hire a general manager who, instead of sitting on his hands in season when things aren’t going well, is willing to do something to try to fix things. Because we’ve seen year after year that Fitzgerald’s “patient” approach isn’t working. Doing nothing and hoping the problem goes away hasn’t worked in the past and isn’t working now. It’s not a plan. And if Fitzgerald is so handicapped where he literally can’t do anything because the team is capped out and 3/5 of the roster have trade protection, that’s all the more reason to get rid of the guy who built said roster.
Do you want to be nice to everyone and be a big happy family? Or do you want to win? Cause I know which one I want.
I don’t know who the next general manager is going to be. I don’t even know who I’d want, although I do have a good idea of who I don’t want if the Peter Chiarellis of the world are mentioned as “top candidates”. That’ll be a hard pass for me.
But it can’t be anybody who had a hand in this mess.
Instead of tinkering around the edges, it’s time to get to the root of the problem. It’s time to remove the rot that has infested this organization for a decade. No half measures. All of it.
Burn down the entire structure and start over with somebody from the outside.
We’ve seen enough from the braintrust that has managed to stick around long past their expiration date to know that this isn’t good enough.
