On the New Jersey Devils' opening day spending spree

Tom Fitzgerald wasted no time joining the free agent frenzy, inking three players to multi-year contracts.

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New Jersey Devils GM Tom Fitzgerald is a man of his word. In recent weeks and months, he’s indicated the team is too vanilla up front and that he’d like to add more edge to make the Devils tougher to play against.

His July 1st signings certainly addressed those concerns.

The party started with the highly anticipated signing of Brett Pesce. The veteran right-handed defenseman commanded a six-year contract carrying a lucrative – yet reasonable – $5.5 million annual average value. But the action didn’t stop there.

Fitzgerald also inked Brenden Dillon and Stefan Noesen to three-year contracts, adding some additional sandpaper on defense and the wing.

Add it all up and Fitzgerald made more than $53 million in salary commitments to the three players.

I’ll dive deeper into each signing in the very near future but, for now, I wanted to cover the bases with my initial thoughts.

Brett Pesce

One of the biggest reasons the Devils targeted Pesce was his ability to defend and protect the middle of the ice.

He has excellent defensive instincts, a great stick, and a sturdy frame that can help him take away passing lanes and box out effectively when the puck does get to dangerous areas of the ice. That shows in the numbers.

Of 138 defensemen to play 1,000 minutes at 5v5 this past season, Pesce ranked 31st in both high-danger chances against and high-danger goals against per 60 minutes of play.

The guy he’s replacing, John Marino, didn’t quite fare as well in those categories. Marino ranked 85th in HD chance prevention and 135th in HD goals allowed on a per-60 basis.

Goaltending didn’t help Marino’s cause but he didn’t play as well as he needed to. It was a two-way street.

Pesce can log big minutes against elite competition, kill penalties effectively, and use his stick and sturdier frame to protect the home plate area.

It was too easy to get there last season and Pesce will help change that.

Brenden Dillon