Did the New Jersey Devils have locker room issues? Sure seems like it after what Devils defenseman Brenden Dillon told Don Taylor and Rick Dhaliwal on the Thursday edition of the Donnie and Dhali Show.
Dillon was asked about the trade speculation surrounding Simon Nemec and why it was a difficult season in New Jersey. Dillon was not holding back his feelings about what transpired in the Devils’ locker room this past season.
theDevilsNation.com Transcriptions
Trade Speculation Surrounds Simon Nemec and the New Jersey Devils
Don Taylor: “All right, Brenden, the Devils, 12 points out of a playoff spot. They have a new, the Devils, you have a new general manager, and Sunny Mehta, who’s got an issue on his hands. Simon Nemec, defense partners asked for a trade, but have you have you talked with Sunny at all? And if so, what were your impressions?”
Brenden Dillon: “Yeah, I had a great conversation with Sunny, probably a week or two ago. Just kind of talking hockey, getting to know one another, and I feel for him. It’s been well documented. He’s from Jersey here. He loves the Devils; he’s a big fan of the team and of the pillars we seem to have in place here.
And it was a disappointing season, no matter how you cut it, for the Devils. Individually. As a team. I mean, right on down from forwards to D to goaltending. We just, there’s a reason why we weren’t in the playoffs, and I think that’s the key for us with the roster makeup we do have, is we’re built to win now.
Sunny wants us to win now. Whatever way I mean, we just got to get better in every facet. And I think for us as players we should all have that chip on our shoulder and the mentality of going into your summer training and your summer ice sessions that we got a lot to prove next year. We’re one of those teams that isn’t going to be taken for serious next year, because we weren’t in playoffs, and we’re just one of those 16 that was on the outside looking in. So that should piss us off.
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It should be something that you know, Nemo (Simon Nemec), I enjoy playing with him. He’s got a bright future. He’s a guy that I feel like, between the offensive side of the puck, he wants the puck on a stick, he wants to be running a power play. We’ve got a lot of those guys here, with Dougie Hamilton and Luke Hughes. So that’s above my pay grade, in the sense that it’s about those decisions and how things are going to shake out.
I feel like we had, unfortunately, a lot of those elephants in the room this year. That was just the reality of, is this guy upset because this guy’s got more ice time, or I should be playing where that guy’s playing, or I wish I was playing with that guy as my winger or D partner.
And it’s hard enough to win in this league when you’re healthy and when you’re just trying to beat the other team, let alone having other distractions going on, and we just had way too many of those. That hopefully we’ll get the ship righted and can get back to the winning ways we need to be.”
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The last part is eye-opening. Though not surprising, given how Brenden Dillon was vocal at the end-of-season press availability, talking about how some players thought it might be easy and that they get to the playoffs every year. The team’s mentality has to change.
Forget the beginning, where the trade request about Nemec has been debunked. However, that doesn’t mean the Slovak defenseman doesn’t want a change of scenery, given his development. However, there were too many distractions last year in the Devils locker room.
The New Jersey Devils have been trying to clear cap space since last offseason. The extension talks for Luke Hughes took longer than they should, and he ended up holding out to get a seven-year extension with an AAV of $9 million a year. And when former GM Tom Fitzgerald‘s trade talks became public, things went downhill.
Despite publicly denying he was trading Dougie Hamilton, it was reported that Hamilton rejected a trade to San Jose, which was his right. That just created problems between him and the team. That led the team to scratch him because of poor play. The real reason was that they were trying to force Hamilton to accept a trade somewhere. So there was friction there.
But Hamilton wasn’t the only one performing poorly last season. So, singling him out was an issue, given that a certain $9 million defenseman was just as bad. And it wasn’t a secret that there was a locker room divide between some of the players and the Hughes Brothers. Whether it was an entitlement or accountability issues, some players felt they got away with things others didn’t.
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Now, add in the potential element of a third Hughes brother. Had the Devils acquired Quinn Hughes, what would have happened to the room then? And there was a split in the room, even before a potential trade, with some players on board and others against the move.
So with all the potential distractions out there, with all the trade rumours, real or not, it hurts the locker room. Some players feel unwelcome, and who is the driving force behind it? Adding players who said they deserved to play higher up in the lineup created a disastrous season for the Devils.
So the New Jersey Devils have a lot to clean up heading into this season, and it starts in the locker room.
