Setting the table for the New Jersey Devils at the deadline

What could Tom Fitzgerald do? What should Tom Fitzgerald do? Let's take a closer look.

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The trade deadline is just a day away and the New Jersey Devils find themselves eight points back of the Tampa Bay Lightning, Detroit Red Wings, and Philadelphia Flyers for potential playoff spots.

While teams in their situation would generally sell off any and all pending UFAs, and set their sights on the future, I don’t think that is the route Tom Fitzgerald is going to take.

The playoffs are statistically unlikely but the picture isn’t as bleak as it looks on the surface.

If the Devils win and the Flyers lose tonight (both outcomes are heavily favored to occur), they’d sit six points back of Philadelphia with a game in hand.

That is hardly an insurmountable deficit over a quarter of a season, especially when considering the Flyers are essentially a one goalie operation and are making themselves worse by selling quality players like Sean Walker.

The Flyers probably aren’t going to finish the season as world beaters, lowering the bar the Devils need to clear to make things interesting.

Don’t get me wrong, I do expect Fitzgerald to move one or two rentals – most notably Tyler Toffoli.

He simply carries too much trade value to keep, especially if a contract extension doesn’t appear to be in the cards (rightfully so).

Toffoli is on pace for ~35 goals and has Stanley Cup winning pedigree. With teams like the Rangers, Golden Knights, Canucks, and Hurricanes fighting tooth and nail for the chance to grab Jake Guentzel, it stands to reason several of the disappointed suitors would be quite interested in Toffoli as a Plan B.

The Devils could fetch meaningful assets for Toffoli that they could later flip in effort to land the quality starting goaltender they so desperately need.

And, as I wrote the other day, trading Toffoli hardly means the Devils are a lost cause for the rest of the season.

Timo Meier is a premium goal scorer who is in his best form of the season. It stands to reason he could fill in adequately for Toffoli on the power play while, again, Holtz can replace a lot of the offense lost at 5v5 if he is given more opportunity.

He is only one (1) 5v5 goal behind Toffoli despite spending almost the entirety of the season on the 4th line. And it’s not like Toffoli is a defensive ace providing immense value there that Holtz couldn’t replicate.

I think Toffoli is likely to be traded by the deadline; at least he should be.

With regards to what else the Devils may do, I see two things: