New Jersey Devils President and General Manager Tom Fitzgerald has been under significant scrutiny over the last couple of seasons for his inability to add to the roster in key areas, despite the injuries and cap space to make his team contenders in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Addressing a select group of local media, the Devils’ President and General Manager opened the roundtable and took full responsibility for the team’s current state.
“This is on me. Where we are at is on me. I’m one to take accountability on myself,” Fitzgerald told the local media in attendance. “This is on me, but I will say this is a collaborative organization, and we are all in this together.”
Currently, the Devils are 13th in the Eastern Conference with a 24-21-2 record and 50 points in 47 games. However, they are 4-5-1 over their last 10 games. 12-17-1 over their last 30 games. They started out 13-4-1, even with the injuries to Johnathan Kovacevic, Evgenii Dadonov, Jack Hughes, Brett Pesce, and Simon Nemec.
New Jersey Devils Scratch Dougie Hamilton, Trade Incoming?
Now everyone is back in the lineup, and the Devils played their most complete game in months, defeating the Minnesota Wild 5-2 on Monday night. However, the pressure remains on the organization to perform and meet established standards. Those standards are being a consistent playoff team.
As captain Nico Hischier told Sirius XM NHL Network Radio during the European Player Tour, the Devils have expectations to meet a deep playoff run and play to a high standard. He talked about playing consistently for 60 minutes. The players have not met those standards or goals.
While consistency is hard to find, the team is underperforming. The players, coaches, and management are not living up to the expectations and standards they set. As Fitzgerald told the gathered media, its just not on the players or the coaches on why the team is underperforming or in this spot, it’s a collaborative effort.
“We are a collaborative organization and we are in this together,” Fitzgerald said.”One thing I’m trying to do is find solutions to help this team move forward and become the team we believe it can be. We are all in this together. But I’m the leader of the group and this isn’t good enough.”
Fitzgerald believes in the core that he has established, and what he put around them, to be a consistent Stanley Cup contender each year. But he did say the team has to play differently when Jack Hughes is out of the lineup. There is no replacing a player like that. But that goes back to structure and how the team is constructed, and if the team can’t survive when a player goes out of the lineup, then maybe it is built wrong.
The New Jersey Devils Must Embrace the Hard
Fitzgerald believes he can be the one who can help find the solutions and solve the problems. As it has been reported through Darren Dreger of TSN and Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, Fitzgerald reiterated that he is not worried about his job security. In addition, he stated that he and head coach Sheldon Keefe are in lock step.
Despite where the New Jersey Devils are in the standings, there is a belief they can turn it around and not sell off pieces. General Manager Tom Fitzgerald believes he can be the man who can solve the problems that he created, which led to the Devils being in this position.
