Sympathy For the Devils

At the beginning of the 2006 season, hockey lost some all-time great defensemen who immediately were donned "Hall of Fame shoe-ins." One of those defensemen, Scott Stevens, has been sorely missed by the New Jersey Devils, one of the most successful sports franchises in the last 15 years.

Since Stevens retirement after the 2005 lockout season and emergence of rule changes made to assist offenses, the once-proud Devils have been 1-3 in playoff series, and were just trumped by their cross-river rivals that they used to own like property. Losing to the New York Rangers in five games marks the sign of the times for a team whose standard is to compete for the Stanley Cup year after year.

Truth is, nobody is afraid of the Devils anymore.

Lou Lamoriello, considered earlier this decade as the best general manager in sports thanks to his systematic farming of young talent, put together Stanley Cup title teams in strike-shortened 1995, 2000, and 2003, and were runner-ups in 2001 to a loaded Avalanche squadron.

These teams featured long-time veterans such as Stevens, Ken Daneyko, Bruce Driver, Martin Brodeur (who won the '95 Cup as a rookie), Scott Niedermayer, and Brian Rolston. The 2000 squad that upset the defending champion Stars displayed successful journeymen Claude Lemieux, Peter Sykora, Alexander Mogilny, and introduced Scott Gomez to the pro hockey scene.

However, of late, the only pieces to those Stanley Cup teams include Brodeur, Patrick Elias (forever known for his centering pass in double overtime to Jason Arnott to sink the Stars in Game 6 of the finals), Sergei Brylin, and defenseman Colin White.

Otherwise, the Devils have only given up and not gotten anything "star-like" in return.

It's a credit to the franchise who used to don red and olive green back in the '80s to have been so successful in the regular season in the past three seasons, making the playoffs each of the three years as a top-four seed.

The Devils from 2000-03 were known as blue-line bruisers that would shut down a team's stud offensemen i.e. Eric Lindros (2000), Mike Modano and Brett Hull (2000), Mats Sundin (2001), Paul Kariya (2003), and now the superstars are sending the Devils into quandaries and leaving them questioning their own trapping system. Stars of recent seasons have had their way with the Devils: Sean Avery (2008), Daniel Alfredsson (2007), Eric Staal (2006), and Mark Recchi (2004).

Not only are the Devils missing their toughness between the blue lines, but their offense has not been up to par. They've relied too heavily on Elias, John Madden, and Zach Parise. The strength of the Stanley Cup Devils teams was to get up 1-0 or 2-1 and use the trapping defense to force opponents to retreat their style and fall prey. More often than not, the Devils are behind in games, forced to play catch-up, and they never do. It's never been their style, so they become doomed and appear offensively meager in comparison to their opponents who choose to hit the free agent market in the offseason that eventually pays off in the offseason. Losing long-time Scott Gomez to, of all the teams the Rangers, was the ultimate slapshot in the face, and has left a welt the size of Newark on Lou Lamoriello's bald dome.

Which brings up the unfortunate move the Devils made this year from sports haven East Rutherford to Newark. As was detected by loyalists from Jersey, the Devils lost their initial fan base (yes, those who still wear the red and olive jerseys) to a more city-like area that showed its lack of hometown punch needed for a playoff series. The Devils were 0-3 at "hometown" Newark this postseason, with the feeling left of more Rangers fans than Devils fans in Jersey's own building. Ouch.

Sitting in the net for 13 seasons, Martin Brodeur has witnessed major accomplishments, and the future Hall of Famer from Ontario must know in the back of his helmeted head that his best days as a Devil are in the past, especially now that he's mocked the gods of lore by not shaking Sean Avery's hand during the traditional handshake after Game 5, and also creating issues by admitting to "putting his puck into his sister-in-law's five hole," only making matter worse for himself.

If you listen closely, you can hear "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" echoing in the Lincoln Tunnel heading towards hockey's Hall of Fame, whispered from the once-proud Marty Brodeur to ex-teammate Scott Stevens.

Not in Newark, that's for sure.