No thanks from NSH. I wouldn't trade Lankinen straight up for Vanecek.

Brannstrom deal could be made but I’m not sure Ottawa would give up Joseph as he’s actually had a decent season to this point.

With NJ at the bottom of the division contenders in goals allowed even before Dougie Hamilton was declared out until the eve of the playoffs, arguably the worst goalie tandem in the league, and approaching the dreaded "5 points every 4 games to make the playoffs" line, the Devils are going to have to do more than slap some band-aids on their problems.

We also don't need a LD back.

Devils are still a young team and are experiencing growing pains on blueline. The loss of Severson and Graves was always going to hurt more than many thought. The goaltending hasn’t been great, but until we clean other things up and protect the puck, get cleaner d-zone exits…any goaltending patch isn’t likely to change much.

If things improve (and with Jack and Nico healthy, they have already started to get better) I could see a trade similar to LAK last year with Gavrikov/Korpisalo. Short-term fix in goal, dman with an extra year or two. Then looking for long-term solution in net over the summer. Like the Kings last year, we are often outshooting, outchancing our opponents. But we need to improve quality of possession first…before we expect such a trade.

Good thing OP is suggesting the Devils trade for Kevin Lankinen then, he is having a very good season so far and kinda outplaying Saros.

We are 9th in the east in points%.

5th and 6th: 1 game in hand on NYI and FLA, 4 points back
7th: 2 games in hand on Car, 3 points back
8th: 3 games in hand on tampa, 1 point back
9th: even with Washington, 2 more games.

"Very good season so far"?!? His 0.900 save percentage and 3.16 goals-against average are microscopically better than Schmid's figures (0.897 and 3.12). Three goals out of one thousand shots is well within the margin of error.

I see that you entirely missed the OP's point that Hamilton's absence is likely to lead to decreased performance, not improved.

Well yes, but there's this much more refined stat called 'Goals Saved Above Expected' (GSAx, for short).
The neat thing about GSAx is that it can control for the difficulty of the shots the goalie has to deal with.
The way that stat controls for difficulty is that it measures the location of where the shot is taken from, which is kinda valuable to look at given that shots from the blueline aren't equivalently dangerous as shots from the slot (makes sense, right?). Some more advanced variations of GSAx can even control for pre shot puck movement and what kinda of shot has actually taken place (slapper, backhand, screened shots etc).
Anyway, these are controls that regular sv% and GAA cannot do and therefore one should be very careful about what conclusion are drawn from those static data points...

As it happens, among goalies playing more than 10 games so far this season Lankinen ranks 14th in GSAx/60mins (at 5v5), which is pretty good!
Gibson is 17th in 5v5 GSAx/60, for reference.


This is fair.
However, OP didn't seem to take into account that the Devils have been playing about one third of the season without Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier.
Any team would struggle to be competitive if they had to play without their top 2 Cs, especially when their number one defender has been taken out of commission within that same time-frame.
Getting Hughes and Hischier back makes it likelier that the Devils will see increased overall performance.

Nemec fills the role.

We’ve gotten caved in when Nico was out and on night 2 of back to backs.

A better goalie than Vanacek even as a stopgap like a Mrazek solves that issues. Because all we need is not horrific goaltending.

Then with the dougie money we can look to fill other holes.

2LD upgrade who can kill penalties and take tough assignments: a Marcus Pettersson would be perfect
Better PK forwards and a little extra depth (because guys like Tierney didn’t cut it): a Trenin or a Dickinson or a Duhaime.

If there’s a hammer goaltender out there at a reasonable price, go for it. I like Gustafsson.

Use the money to go after some expensive guys on 1 year deals without needing retention.

Let timo get healthy and then once you make it in, you’re in.

Backup goalies don’t play in the playoffs (a major struggle for us)
You don’t play back to backs in the playoffs (we’re 1-5-1 on night 2)
We won’t be playing Tierney Willman or Laberge in the playoffs.
And dougie should be back.

Once you get in if you walk in with a roster of
Jack-bratt-Toffoli
Palat-Nico-Mercer
Meier-McLeod-Holtz
Haula-Dickinson-Lazar
Siegs-Hamilton
Pettersson-Marino
Hughes-Nemec
Schmid

Is that a team that anyone wants to play against?

I refuse to accept the static assumption that a shot from the blue line is per se a lower-danger shot than a shot from closer in, even if the shot is taken from the slot.

A shot from the blue line on the power play through a 3- or 4-man screen (from both teams) is, to me, a far more dangerous shot than an unobstructed backhander from 12 or more feet away, for example.

All so-called "analytics" figures are based upon hidden subjective assessments like quality, danger, etc. I don't discount them, but I believe that their value is highly overrated. You can't tell me, for example, that 8 or 10 of the larger number of guys above Vassilevskiy on various GSAx/60 charts are better goalies than he is.

Vasy just got back from injury.

Rest of your comment aside, no I won't tell you that in a smaller sample size that guys like Montembault, DeSmith or Ingram (or Lankinen!) are better goalies than Vasilievsky just cus they so far have better GSAx/60 than Vasi at this point in time.

But I would be a lot more in favour of the Devils trading for any of those three ahead of Gibson, given the way the latter hasn't come close to meeting the expectations of a 6.4m goalie in his prime years over the last 5 years. 20 good games to start the 23/24 season is nowhere near enough to cover for stinking Anaheim's crease up the last 4-5 years.

My point entirely.

You don't REALLY think that that's news to me, do you?