Three players to avoid on TSN's trade bait board

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On Wednesday I combed through the first edition of TSN’s off-season trade bait board and looked at a few players the New Jersey Devils could, or should, be interested in.

Today I’m going to do the opposite, examining some players they should not get involved with.

W - Alex Killorn

Contract status: Three years at $4.45 million per

Tampa Bay looks prime for the picking of a team with cap space. They’d no doubt prefer to move Killorn, or another veteran, as opposed to one of their younger players – and they may very well be able to. I don’t think the Devils should have any interest in that type of deal, though.

Don’t get me wrong; Killorn is a solid player. But he’s now on the wrong side of 30 and there are already some red flags in his game. Red flags that were masked by him shooting nearly double his career average at 5v5.

This was Killorn’s most efficient goal scoring season to date and yet he generated fewer shot attempts, scoring chances, and expected goals per 60 than in any year of his career.

He had never hit the 20-goal plateau prior to this season and, factoring in regression and potential decline, I doubt he will anytime soon.

If the Devils were ready to contend I could see them jumping on Killorn as a solid, two-way complimentary piece in the middle-6. They’re not and adding Killorn wouldn’t change that.

Erik Cernak (or Mikhail Sergachev, but I think that’s a stretch) or bust.

RD - Rasmus Ristolainen

Contract status: Two years at $5.4 million per

Rasmus Ristolainen is a defenseman. The list of reasons the Devils should have any interest ends there.

This guy is a disaster on skates. He doesn’t move the puck well and is prone to ending possessions for his team before they really start. He is awful at generating zone entries. His in-zone offensive play is poor. He takes a lot of low percentage shots. He can’t hold his line in the neutral zone and is a mess in his own zone.

Ristolainen has put up solid offensive numbers in the past because a) he’s played a ton of minutes and; b) benefited from passing the puck to Jack Eichel on the power play. He is not efficient. He is not good.

I don’t care that he is 25 years old. No, that’s not young for a defenseman and, no, there’s not plenty of room to grow.

The guy has been in the NHL for seven seasons and played nearly 500 NHL games. His play has been horrendous the whole way along.

Do we really need to see more before writing him off? I don’t think so.

Pass on Ristolainen and his ludicrous $5.4 million cap hit.

LD - Oliver Ekman-Larsson

Contract status: Seven years at $8.25 million per

There was a time Ekman-Larsson very much looked the part of an elite defenseman. I mean, he was worth 25.4 Goals Above Replacement back in 2015-16. That’s insane.

The days of that OEL are long gone. His defensive game can be questionable at times and his offensive impact isn’t strong enough to justify close to what he’s making.

Over the last two seasons, he ranks 6/7 Arizona defenders in both goal differential and Expected Goals For%.

During that time he’s produced 5v5 points at the same clip as *checks notes* Troy Stecher, Mike Matheson, and Jake Gardiner.

I just don’t see OEL as a high-end player anymore and he’s paid like one for seven more years. He’s 29 now, too, so it’s more likely things get worse than better.

There is a P.K. Subban element in any OEL trade in that you’d be paying more for the name, and past, than actual on-ice performance.

I don’t think the Devils should be heavily dipping into their war chest of assets on an expensive defenseman already showing real signs of decline.

numbers via Evolving-Hockey.com and NaturalStatTrick.com