The New Jersey Devils: Ruff's Riders

Alain Nasreddine did a fair job as interim head coach of the New Jersey Devils, but now, they have an official head coach, and it's a good choice: Lindy Ruff.

Nasreddine has not been outright fired, just restored to his previous position as an assistant coach. His chances of getting a head coaching job with another team are probably good.

As for the new man: He's only new to us. He's what they call a "lifer."

Lindy Cameron Ruff (no, "Lindy" is not short for something else) was born on February 17, 1960, in Warburg, Alberta. It's a town of about 800 people, about 55 miles southwest of Edmonton, so it's not quite "in the middle of nowhere."

But Canada is not like America: Aside from the capital of Ottawa, and the 3 biggest cities -- Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver -- their cities don't really have "suburbs," as we understand that term. So once you get as far from downtown as Warburg is, there's really nothing to do, except work in whatever the town's main industry is, and play whatever sport is popular there. In Canada, of course, it's hockey above all others.

Like Jim Schoenfeld, who coached the Devils into their 1st Playoff run, ending in Game 7 of the 1988 Wales Conference Finals, Ruff was a tough defenseman for the Buffalo Sabres. He was chosed by the Sabres in the 2nd round of the 1979 NHL Entry Draft.

During the 1980 Playoffs, the Sabres lost to the eventual Stanley Cup winners, the New York Islanders. But not before a Stanley Cup Semifinals game in which Isles goalie Billy Smith hit Ruff with his stick and knocked him down. Ruff got up and tackled "Battlin' Billy."

In 9 full seasons with the Sabres, they made the Playoffs 7 times, including twice as regular-season Champions of the old Adams Division. But that 1980 run was the closest they got to the Cup, and would remain so until he became their head coach.

He was traded to the New York Rangers at the 1989 trade deadline, and played 2 seasons and change for them. After 2 more seasons in the minors, he was hired as part of the original coaching staff of the Florida Panthers in 1993. He was only 33 years old, and under head coach Doug MacLean, helped them reach the Stanley Cup Finals in 1996, only their 3rd season.

That got his original team's attention, and the Sabres brought him back as head coach in 1997. In just his 1st season, he got them to the Eastern Conference Finals, losing to the Washington Capitals. In the next season, 1998-99, he got them to the Stanley Cup Finals for only the 2nd time in their history. (The 1st was in 1975, losing to the Philadelphia Flyers.) They lost to the Dallas Stars, with a controversial ending.

A corporate scandal led to financial issues for the Sabres' owners, and they missed the Playoffs the next 3 seasons. Then came the 2004-05 lockout. But Ruff, already lasting longer in the job than most coaches who haven't won the Cup (and even some who have) have done, got them back to the Conference Finals in 2006, losing to the Carolina Hurricanes; and again in 2007, losing to the Ottawa Senators. In 2006, he was given the Jack Adams Award for NHL coach of the year. He finished 2nd in the voting the next season. By this point, he was the longest-tenured coach with the same team in the NHL.

But things were already beginning to unravel. In those season, there were multiple incidents where the referees, and the League office, seemed to be taking sides with the Sabres' opponents and against the rules. After a 2007 Playoff game against the Rangers, a game the Rangers won in a series the Sabres won, Ruff criticized the officials and got fined by the League.

In spite of these incidents, he was named an assistant coach for Canada's team at the 2010 and 2014 Winter Olympics, in each case under Mike Babcock, then of the Detroit Red Wings. Canada won the Gold Medal on home ice in Vancouver in 2010, and repeated in Sochi, Russia in 2014.

On January 6, 2011, Ruff became the 16th coach in NHL history to win 500 games. Two nights later, he won his 501st, and that made him the coach with the most wins for a single team, surpassing Toe Blake of the Montreal Canadiens.

But he still couldn't win the Stanley Cup, and in the middle of the 2012-13 season, he was fired. Ironically, his next head coaching job would be with the team that beat him in his only Stanley Cup Finals to that point, the Dallas Stars. In his 1st season, he got them to their 1st Playoff berth in 6 years. But that was as far as he could get them, and he was fired at the end of the 2016-17 season.

He has spent the last 3 seasons as an assistant coach with the Rangers, under head coach David Quinn. Yesterday, after speculation that the new full-time Devils coach could be him, or Peter Laviolette, or Gerard Gallant, Lindy Ruff was hired to coach the Mulberry Street Marauders.

New Jersey Devils head coaches
1982-83 Bill MacMillan (also general manager)
1983-84 Tom McVie
1984-88 Doug Carpenter
1988-89 Jim Schoenfeld (1988 Conference Finals)
1989-91 John Cunniff
1991-92 Tom McVie, 2nd time
1992-93 Herb Brooks (1980 Olympic Gold Medal coach)
1993-98 Jacques Lemaire (1995 Stanley Cup, 1994 Conference Finals)
1998-2000 Robbie Ftorek
2000-02 Larry Robinson (2000 Stanley Cup, 2001 Conference Champions)
2002 Kevin Constantine
2002-05 Pat Burns (2003 Stanley Cup)
2005 Larry Robinson, 2nd time
2005-06 Lou Lamoriello (also general manager)
2006-07 Claude Julien
2007 Lou Lamoriello, 2nd time
2007-09 Brent Sutter
2009-10 Jacques Lemaire, 2nd time
2010 John MacLean (1988 Playoff hero, 1995 Cup winner)
2010-11 Jacques Lemaire, 3rd time
2011-14 Peter DeBoer (2012 Conference Champions)
2014-15 Adam Oates and Scott Stevens, co-coaches
2015-19 John Hynes
2019-20 Alain Nasreddine
2020-present Lindy Ruff

Tom Fitzgerald will remain as general manager.

New Jersey Devils general managers
1982-83 Bill MacMillan (also head coach)
1983-87 Max McNab
1987-2015 Lou Lamoriello (3 Stanley Cups, 2 other Finals)
2015-20 Ray Shero
2020- Tom Fitzgerald

Fire Sale Is the Devils' Only Friend

Wayne Simmonds is not reacting to the news that

the Devils have already traded him. But the confusion is understandable.

Today is the NHL's trading deadline, and my team, the New Jersey Devils, have gone into full "fire sale" mold. The great new era they tried to build didn't happen, so they're tearing it all down and starting all over.

Before the season began, they signed free agent right wing Wayne Simmonds to a 1-year contract, obtained defenseman P.K. Subban in a trade with the Nashville Predators that looked like a steal, and sent 2 draft picks to the Vegas Gold Knights for left wing Nikita Gusev. Things were looking up.

They didn't stay that way. Head coach John Hynes remained clueless, and the team hasn't looked like making the Playoffs at any point during this season. General manager Ray Shero then traded the team's best player, left wing Taylor Hall, as part of a package with the Arizona Coyotes for right wing Nick Merkley, 2 guys who will probably never make it, and 2 conditional draft picks. This was the 1st sign that Shero intended to blow it all up.

On December 3, Hynes was fired, and replaced by Alain Nasreddine, who still hasn't had the "interim" tag taken off him, and hasn't really earned that yet. On January 12, Shero was fired, and replaced with Tom Fitzgerald, a former Islander and the 1st Captain of the Nashville Predators. He's also serving as an assistant coach to Nasreddine, and also awaits the removal of the "interim" tag.

I thought getting rid of Shero and Hynes was the answer. But the owners -- including Josh Harris, also the owner of the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers, whose "Trust the Process" slogan also seems to have stalled -- don't seem to get that a question exists.

Then, last Sunday, Fitzgerald made a pair of trades. Andy Greene, a Devils since 2006, thus the last remaining player from the Meadowlands era, and the team's Captain since 2015, was sent to the Islanders for a 2021 draft pick and David Quenneville -- whose brother John had been traded away at the start of the season, and whose cousin Joel was an original 1982-83 Devil and a 3-time Stanley Cup-winning coach for the Chicago Blackhawks.

I can understand trading Greene. He's 37, and isn't doing us or himself any good by staying. But David Quenneville is far from ready for the NHL, and that draft pick won't help us for over a year, if at all.

The same day, Fitzgerald sent center Blake Coleman to the Tampa Bay Lightning for yet another draft pick, and left wing Nolan Foote, son of former NHL star Adam Foote. He's nowhere near ready, either.

Today, it got worse. The Devils traded Simmonds to the Buffalo Sabres for a conditional 5th round pick in 2021. Someone joked online that both teams lost the trade. Another person joked that Simmons deserved the respect of being traded to "not Buffalo."

It was also announced that defenseman Sami Vatanen had been traded to the Carolina Hurricanes for left wing Janne Kuokkanen, defenseman Frederick Claesson, and a conditional 4th round pick this year. Kuokkanen is doing well at the hockey equivalent of Triple-A ball, but this was a trade of a reasonably good NHL defenseman for 3 guys who are not ready to play in the NHL, and might never be.

The Devils are trading good, proven players for prospects. Seems to me that there's a baseball team not far away that tried this, and it spectacularly failed (never mind the Asstros' cheating), and now the owner has said, "Fuck this, I'm opening the vault."

I know that can't really be done in a league with a salary cap (one of the dumbest inventions in sports history: Socialism for the owners, unregulated capitalism for the fans), but the Devils are no better off than they were when Lou Lamoriello went senile.

Since the trip to the 2012 Stanley Cup Finals, the Devils have made the Playoffs only once, in 2018. In divisional play, they have finished 5th, 6th, 7th, 7th, 8th, 5th and 8th. They are currently 8th and dead last in the NHL Metropolitan Division. Their 58 points put them 16 behind the last Eastern Conference Playoff berth. Only 5 teams have fewer points.

With a roster that started out with a former Hart Trophy (regular season MVP) winner in Hall; plus veteran talent in Subban, Simmonds, center Travis Zajac and right wing Kyle Palmieri; exciting prospects in Gusev, and centers Nico Hischier, Jack Hughes, and Kevin Rooney; and good young goaltender Mackenzie Blackwood, this could have been the season the Devils turned it around.

Nothing has been turned around. To paraphrase Don McLean, "So, come on, Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack Flash sat on a candlestick, 'cause a fire sale is the Devils' only friend."

The Devils Rebuild

The other day, the New Jersey Devils bottomed out, losing 6-3 their most hated rivals, the New York Rangers, a.k.a. The Scum.

They had already fired head coach John Hynes, who had utterly failed. Alain Nesreddine is the interim head coach.

Then they traded away their best player, former Hart Trophy (NHL Most Valuable Player award) winner Taylor Hall.

Now, they have fired general manager Ray Shero, who has also failed. Tom Fitzgerald is the interim GM: Once a fine player, he helped the New York Islanders reach the 1993 Conference Finals, and the Florida Panthers reach the 1996 Stanley Cup Finals, and served as the 1st Captain of the Nashville Predators.

And in their last 2 games, the Devils have gone to Washington and beaten the Cup-contending Capitals (2018 Cup winners, current Metropolitan Division leaders and Eastern Conference co-leaders), and come home, and beaten the Cup-contending Tampa Bay Lightning (2015 Cup Finalists, currently 2nd place in the Atlantic Division).

They've taken it all apart, and beaten 2 of the best teams in the league. Strange how that works sometimes.

There is no indication that a permanent head coach, or a permanent general manager, is about to be hired. Devils owner Josh Harris may be content to let The Nez & Fitz Show finish the season, which seems to be lost, anyway.

But it feels like the Devils' chances to make the Playoffs the next season have gotten a lot better.