As far as expected outcomes, I suppose this free agency weekend was the best-case scenario for the Devils, all things considered. I wasn’t expecting any big moves given the Devils don’t seem to be in any hurry to clear up cap space, albeit a lot of that is out of their control due to the fact that the team had to wait until July 1 for Dougie Hamilton’s bonus to be paid and for his NMC to turn into a 10-team trade list before even realistically fielding offers for him, if they even are given the injury to Jonathan Kovacevic will have him out through the start of the season as least. They don’t seem to be in any hurry to offload Ondrej Palat – or teams aren’t in any hurry to acquire him – so the fact the Devils even did as much as they did on Tuesday is kind of surprising to be honest.

Let’s start with the biggest addition in terms of cap hit – right winger Connor Brown, who signed a four year, $12 million deal and should slot in somewhere in the middle six though it’ll be interesting to see how coach Sheldon Keefe works his lines, given that they already have middle six RW’s in Stefan Noesen and Dawson Mercer – assuming the latter isn’t traded at some point this offseason anyway. Keefe did have Brown when he was in Toronto for the first part of his career so presumably this is a coach-endorsed move and he’ll know what he wants out of him (and the rest of the roster). In the early part of his career, Brown was a top six player but after a major injury in 2022 and struggling mightily in his first season back in 2023-24, Brown improved and had a 13-goal, 30-point season in Edmonton with five goals and nine points in the Oilers’ playoff run this year.

Perhaps the most surprising signing – at least to me – was picking up Evgenii Dadonov from the Stars, not really in terms of the signing itself but more the terms of the deal itself – an incentive-laden one year, $1 million contract. To me it’s kind of stunning a guy who had twenty goals and forty points in the regular season signed for that low on the first day of FA, even if he is 36 years old and had a dreadful playoffs (one goal and four points in sixteen games). Clearly the latter factors kept his price tag down, and if we paid big money for this guy I’d be doing a lot more hand-wringing over the deal. Maybe not having as much cap space as in prior years did make Fitz a smarter GM, heh. Presumably Dadonov will also serve as a bit of a mentor to young Russian Arseny Gritsyuk, who’s expected to finally be in the NHL this year after years in the KHL. He’s listed as a RW on Hockey Reference but shoots lefty so perhaps that’s where he’ll slot in, to an area where we need a bit more depth.

In a way, the Devils’ other big move was a surprise and yet it wasn’t, retaining Jake Allen with a…interesting contract structure, signing the 35-year old to a 5 year, $9 million deal. I was barely listening to the NHLN/Sportsnet show on deadline day (again not expecting much in terms of movement for the Devils, or even league-wide with the depressed FA pool) and I did a double-take when I heard Allen’s contract get described as a five-year deal, unsure if I heard that right.

To be clear, Allen did leave money on the table with this team-friendly deal, or to be more precise he traded up front money for stability and security, which not everyone does in FA. As the top goaltending option with contenders that need upgrades in net – cough Edmonton – I figured he’d get silly money on a short-term deal and given the fact we’ve been selecting goalie after goalie in the draft for years, it was about time to go to one as our backup to Jacob Markstrom. Clearly Fitz and Allen had other plans though, working out this deal even before FA’s official start at noon on Tuesday.

While I do wonder what we start doing with all these goalies we’ve been drafting the last few years presumably to take a 1B role before being entrusted with a 1A role, and have my questions about Allen going forward – his play (like most of the team) did dip late in the season, plus he’s had a bit of a streaky career though he’s been mostly good as a Devil – you can’t help but root for the guy now when you see how much he wanted to stay. You also do think there’s something to the culture aspect Fitz talks about when you see player after player taking less to stay here. Even Allen’s admission after the signing that he’d never been through FA before was stunning, and he’s been in the league a lot of years for three different teams. How many guys go through a career as long as he’s had and never elect to go to FA?

Oh and I almost forgot the Devils’ other move of note, first qualifying then signing deadline acquisition Cody Glass to a two year, $5 million ($2.5 million per) deal. You could even argue Glass left money on the table not going to arbitration since he re-signed for his arb number and could well have gotten awarded higher on a one-year deal. He is what he is, a bottom six center who gets injured but can provide points when he is in the lineup.

At this point while Fitz hasn’t altered the roster quite as much as any of us – or maybe even he – wanted just yet, these are at least good moves on paper, a decent start to the offseason. As of now our only losses from last year’s team (if you want to call them that) are Erik Haula, who was dumped to the old folks’ home in Nashville before the draft and Curtis Lazar, whose personality will be missed but his game clearly suffered after trying to play through his own lower-body issue last year. Perhaps what’s more encouraging than the moves themselves is the tacit admission both with some of these signings and their draft picks that Fitz is correcting course a little bit and prioritizing skill after going overboard adding size and grit last offseason and draft. It was nice not to care about the draft this year with our first pick being in the latter part of the second round as opposed to in the lottery, but it did seem from all accounts Fitz took more upside plays than he did last year. Guess only time will tell which approach of his – if either – works better.