Martin Brodeur has re-signed with the Devils

Because it would have been a crime for the Devils management to chase him off by doing very little to keep their living legend. Brodeur will be around the Prudential Center for two more years at an average of $4.5 million per season.

Good news on a day Devils fans brace for he exit of Zach Parise.

NHL free agency dawns

Well, as much as something can dawn at noon. Zach Parise, Marty Brodeur, Bryce Salvador are the big names in play for the Devils while the Rangers are rumored to be dangling Brandon Dubinsky and Michael Del Zotto and picks for the Blue Jackets' Rick Nash. As a Red Wings fan Johnny is more than interested in today's goings on. Suter, Semin, Doan, all names that could fond new homes today and in the next little while.

What say you hockey fans, who lands where and which if any of their free agents do the Devils re-sign? Tell us your thoughts in comments.

WOW, just WOW, is Martin Brodeur getting ready to leave the Devils come Sunday?

According to TSN.ca's NHL insider Darren Dreger, the Devils have done next to nothing to re-sign, and have had little discussion with unrestricted free agent and team legend and first ballot hall of famer Martin Brodeur. The living legend Devils netminder is said to have hired Pat Brisson to represent him and WILL test the free agent market some Sunday.

Dear Devils management, and this comes from a Red Wings fan, what the hell is wrong with you? To pull this (and even if he did sign why did it take you ANY time to re-sign him?) on Marty Brodeur, the face of your franchise, winner of 3 Stanley Cups and 5 Eastern Conference titles let alone the individual awards and stats is just plain, well, it's bush league. You simply don't treat people whom you KNOW you'll retire their number in such a fashion.

Certainly if Zach Parise had any interest in resigning with New Jersey this will make him feel a little bit discomforted. Unless Roberto Luongo or Tim Thomas come walking in the door at the Prudential Center the Devils will be taking a big step back in net next year.

Free agents come and go and good ones like Parise sometimes do leave. But treating Martin Brodeur this way is disappointing.

Devils vs Rangers, Game 1 tonight!

Sure the Rangers have won 4 of the 5 playoff series between the two clubs. This, however, is a different era of Devils and Rangers team from the ones who have played before. Yes guys like Brodeur and Elias and Sykora were around for the wars but this is the Parise/Kovalchuk vs. Callahan and Lundqvist era.

Johnny is on record saying the Devils will win in six games. Here's how he arrived at that number. The only thing saving the Rangers thus far is how tight they pack their defense around Lundqvist and block shots. The question will then become can the Devils get shots to the net that simply aren't perimeter shots and shots from along the wall. In the last series, Alex Ovechkin, who can move his feet and create shots got quite a few through to Lundqvist. With Parise, Zajac, Kovalchuk and to a lesser extent Adam Henrique can all work free and create good shots. By no means will the Devils offense look as sharp and tic-tac-toe as the Philly series but they have more than enough offense.

If the Rangers can't forecheck their offense can go missing for loooong stretches. The Devils defense has been unheralded all playoffs long for their abilty to clear the zone with no drama. Having a netminder with immaculate puckhandling skills has helped them. The Fyers tried three ways from Sunday to keep the puck in corners on shoot-ins and away from Brodeur but still the Devils defense were up to the task. Which brings us to the point of WHY this series will be won by New Jersey. No team that has played game 7s in the first two rounds has won the Stanley Cup. The Rangers defense are dog tired. Their top three defensemen Marc Staal, Dan Girardi and Ryan McDonagh all have averaged over 25 minutes a game. They have played more playoff hockey than anyone else. Hard minutes. Crash bang minutes. The Devils have been hanging their hats on hard forechecking, bottling up the opposing team in center ice and letting their speed dictate play. This can and will wear the Rangers defense out slowly but surely. The Rangers defense are good, but they are also human.

One advantage Johnny sees right now for the Blueshirts is scoring from the defense. The Devils will have to stay out of the box (or in this series take someone with them) and the forwards MUST KNOW when guys like Del Zotto are jumping into the play. One goal in these games can make the difference, lose your guy for a second and it could be disastrous.

Netminding, the Living Legend vs The King. Marty Brodeur has had a very quiet yet very solid playoffs. His 2.05 GAA isn't Lundqvist's 1.68 but it's in the ballpark. It's within a one shot total. Right now Johnny would have to concede that yeah, if given the choice he'd take Lundqvist but that's it. It doesn't mean Brodeur can't or won't win the series, he most likely will. As mentioned above Brodeur for his age gives the Devils something Lundqvist can't help on shoot ins and play the role of a third defenseman with the puck. Both have their plusses, but it would stand to reason the longer this series goes the less help Lundqvist will be getting from his defense corp as they chase the Devils around with their speed advantage.

Speed, frontline offense, aggressive forechecking and an underrated defense are going to lead the Devils to the Stanley Cup Final in SIX games.

Tonight the Rags may well start out like a house afire, they just got done with another emotional series and it may give them some bounce in the first period. This in fact is a game the Rangers may in fact win. The Devils have been off a few days and the old rule of thumb around hockey is one day away from the rink the players notice, two days away the coaches notice sand three days away the fans notice. In whipping Philadelphia in five games the Devils haven't been playing for their lives. Johnny is confident however the Rangers surge will hit a wall. the Rangers as a team will then slowly hit the wall and in a week and a half the Devils Army can go loot Madison Square Garden for scrap.

Tonight make it a 7 and 7

The Tri-State's remaining two hockey franchises who actually try and compete at the NHL level have their seasons on the line tonight.

First the Devils who are in Homestead Florida (Game 7 in Homestead Florida sounds so bad, Game 7 at Centre Bell or TD Garden or even Joe Louis Arena sounds like it's a BIG 7th game unlike, well, Homestead) tonight hoping to steal a win and advance to the conference semi-final. During the regular season the Devils set an NHL record in success at killing off penalties. During the playoffs the Panthers power play has been nothing short of imposing. They are over 30% on their success rate. So Devils fans, as if you weren't there already let's say the Devils chances tonight grow exponentially if they can keep the Panthers from scoring up a man. We're going to go ahead and call the netminding tonight even. Yes Martin Brodeur is a first ballot hall-of-famer but that does nothing tonight. He's been shaky but for a couple starts in this series. He's no longer the guy you trot out in a huge game and just expect to win. Those days are over. Scott Clemmensen and Jose Theodore don't exactly fill the crease with the hologram of Terry Sawchuk either so do not despair Devils fans. Johnny thinks the Devils have too much pride and enough of an old guard from days of yore they can sneak past Florida tonight. We'd bet one of the Devils vets like Elias or Sykora could have a huge hand in winning tonight. Of course if Parise or Kovalchuk decide to have a three point night who is to quibble?

Why the Devils will win: The Devils have the guys who have been there before and the Panthers don't.
Why the Devils won't win: Marty Brodeur is shaky.

The #1 seeded New York Rangers play their game 7 vs Ottawa tonight at Madison Square Garden. For all the consternation of NY hockey pundits and radio lackeys, the problem with the Rangers is pretty obvious; scoring. Marian Gaborik isn't going to become the playoffs leading scorer anytime soon. It's really great that the Rangers have built their team and reputation on hard work. Fantastic. Hard work gets you so far then you need guys to put pucks in the onion bag. Lundqvist is a very very good goalie who hasn't gotten the offensive support he's needed. TWO Rangers have showed up to play offense against the Senators. Any guesses? Yes, one is Mike Richards who was paid big cash to score big points. Richards has 5 points in 6 games. Who is the other? Captain Ryan Callahan? Former cup winner Ruslan Fedotenko? Regular season 17 goal shooter Derek Stepan? Nope, the Rags second leading playoff scorer is Anton Stralman with FOUR points. Johnny thinks tonight will truly be won or lost by the goalkeeping. Craig Anderson has been very strong for Ottawa. Lundqvist is fast becoming a hard luck goalie come playoffs.

Why the Rangers will win: It's King Henrik in MSG
Why the Rangers won't win: The road team in these playoffs has been winning at an alarming rate, ie see the Boston vs Washington game last night if you'd like to see the blueprint as to how Ottawa will play tonight.

Devils and Rangers win the Devils will play Philadelphia (Ask the New Jersey State Police Commissioner if you too can get a police escort south to Philly for games 1 & 2) and the Rangers will host Washington. If the Devils win and the Rangers lose it'll be the Devils actually HOSTING the Capitals.

So it's a 7 and 7 night with the Rangers puck drop at 7 pm and the Devils starting at 8:30 pm.

Gremlins help sink the Broadway Blueshirts at The Rock last night

Former Detroit Tigers great and television play-by-play man George Kell used to say whenever a ball took a bad hop or the ball did something unexplained that it was the "gremlins" who got hold of the ball. Well last night at the Prudential Center and the Rangers holding a slim 3-2 lead over the Devils the Prudential Center gremlins decided to make an appearance...


After David Clarkson's happy accident the Devils went on to beat the Rangers in a shootout with El Diablo's netminder Martin Brodeur throwing a shootout shutout.

These two teams play again next Tuesday at MSG.

Hey, Marty, they're called pucks, you get paid to stop them

Wow, simply wow. The New Jersey Devils utterly collapsed and pissed their season away in the span of 90 seconds tonight losing game 7 to Carolina 4-3. The Devils gave up goals seconds apart to Jussi Jokinen and Eric Staal and tomorrow after they clean out their lockers, the Devils are golfing. Jokinen scored on a beautiful cross ice pass from Joni Pitkanen (and full marks to Tim Gleason's diving effort to hold the puck in the Devils zone. Gleason could have been the goat by taking a 4:00 minute high sticking penalty in the third period) to tie the game with 1:20 to play. OK, you steel yourself and prepare for the fact that overtime is comin-----OOPS, NOT SO FAST, the Hurricanes just scored AGAIN. New Jersey fans, at some point you are going to HAVE to come to grips that your all world all everything netminder let in two softies tonight. The first goal by Tuomo Ruutu was a soft one as was the series clincher. Brodeur was not the unmovable force in a game 7 as he has been so many times in big games. This was the second time in this series the Devils coughed up a late goal to beat them. Not a good sign. The New Jersey Devils are in dire need of a top two defenseman in the offseason. A 25 minute a game stud. It was apparent they are missing this type of player in this series.

Johnny could analyze this to death but he'd be here until dawn, the fact is, Cam Ward outdueled Brodeur in game 7 and in the last 3 minutes the Hurricanes wanted it more.

Now the next part dovetails nicely. Always hyper-aware of what the Rangers are doing, Devils fans cheered when they saw that the Capitals had gone up 2-1 on a goal by former Red Wing Sergei Fedorov. They cheered loudly. Johnny was quizzical about this development. Wouldn't it be better if the Rangers WON? At the time the Devils were up 3-2, if they win AND the Rangers win the Devils get HOME ICE ADVANTAGE in the next round against Pittsburgh. Do you want the Rangers to lose or do you want the Devils to have a greater chance to win the cup? Tonight you sounded like it was more important to you for the Rangers to lose than the Devils to get home ice in the next round. Strange, that. No pragmatists at the Prudential Center it seems.

So, yes the Devils and Rangers go down in a flaming pile of fail on the same night. No more live hockey games for Johnny this year and that in the words of The Stooges is "No Fun at All"

Here's the crappiest cell phone video you'll ever see of Brian Rolston's goal, the goal that would prove to be New Jersey's last this year...And as always used without the expressed written consent of the National Hockey League

Martin Brodeur tied NHL playoff shutout record last night

With his incredible performance against Carolina last night, Devils netminder Martin Brodeur tied the NHL record for playoff shutouts with 23. Brodeur has never ever looked sharper which is saying something with all the magnificent games in his storied career. Brodeur made 44 saves in New Jersey's heart stopping 1-0 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes.

The Devils must now wait until Sunday night to try to finish off Carolina in Raleigh in the first elimination game of this series. Devils fans have to be feeling confident they can win one of the next two games and advance.

The Devils are really up against it tonight in Raleigh...

Johnny remembers the 2002 Stanley Cup Finals when Detroit played Carolina for the title and had an amazing 3 OT game at the RBC Center in game 3. It's loud. Not just regular loud but dare we say, hillbillies dranking bur all day loud (Johnny remembers a kid who was 13 at the time being interviewed about his Hurricanes--kid's name was Spanky Creech, like we said a hillbilly paradise). All three overtimes it rocked and rocked and got louder and louder. Of course the Wings won that night on a goal by Igor Larionov but the point is, the Devils will need some extra effort to carry them tonight especially with captain Jamie Langenbrunner out for at least both games in Raleigh with the dreaded 'lower body injury'.

So, who steps up? Who is the Devil that will be THE MAN today? Will it have to be Martin Brodeur? Will Zach Parise show his 40+ goal season was no fluke and put a couple in the back of the onion bag? Will Brendan Shanahan show off that veteran leadership and dent the twine on the powerplay? Hard questions await Devils fans, the answers will be known by bedtime.

Here's the Larionov goal by the way, 1:06 AM

Getting booed by the hometown crowd two games before the playoffs start isn't where the Devils wanna be

The Devils played an absolutely lackluster, dull, and plodding game last night vs the Toronto Maple Loafs, er Johnny means the Toronto Maple Laffs, wait, the Toronto Maple Leafs at the Rock and lost 4-1.

The Devils and all-world netminder Martin Brodeur had better begin figuring things out and FAST. This late season tailspin has cost New Jersey's own the #2 seed in the playoffs to Washington. The difference? Well that would mean playing a hot Penguins team in the first round vs a floundering Montreal club.

The problem now facing the Devils is do you really want to rest a few players a game or two in the two remaining regular season games. No doubt they want to head into the playoffs clicking on at least MOST cylinders but by the same token one would think a night off before the end could benefits one or two Devils veterans. Johnny feels it's now more imperative to get some type of cohesive game working then it is to rest players, bumps and bruises be damned.

This is one bad skid heading into the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Johnny got him some Devils playoff tickets for the first round, if they don't wake up he won't need to worry about getting second round seats

Boy howdy, the Devils are playing some lackluster hockey just two weeks before the tournament for Lord Stanley's Cup begins. Head coach Brent Sutter is not normally a drama queen but he sure was last night at the end of the second period walking across the ice towards the Devils dressing room berating any and all officials left on the ice. It cost him a 2 minute bench penalty, and to be fair it didn't factor in the outcome, but also failed in it's attempt to fire up the Devils.

What is REALLY the most troubling is all world netminder Martin Brodeur has looked, well, crappy these last few games. Not seeing pucks well, giving up terrible rebounds and in general just not looking comfortable in net. Since the Devils are a team built from the goal out, this is a huge problem this close to the playoffs. The forwards are not coming back and backchecking as hard as they were a month ago and some seriously bad decisions are being made with the puck in their own end when pressed by opposing forwards. Johnny did warn of this before the trading deadline as you'll recall. He begged Devils GM Lou Lamoriello to add a solid puck moving defenseman and a sandpaper type forward who would add some passion and grit. Lamoriello's answer at the trade deadline was 35-year-old defenseman Niclas Havelid who fit nether category.

Johnny is of the mind the responsibility for this lies with the players who don't seem to be all that into playing NHL hockey right now. Past that, notorious cheapskate Lou Lamoriello had his chance to add to the team and chose to just add a journeyman role player.

The Devils had better snap out of this right quick or they'll be made quick work of by a team that has had to fight hard and play hard just to make it into the playoffs. A team who for all intents and purposes has been playing playoff hockey since February. A team interested in playing hard every night, something the Devils are falling short of.

Devils Martin Brodeur can tie the NHL all time record for wins tonight

Fittingly, in his home town of Montreal, Brodeur can tie the wins record held by former Montreal Canadiens and Colorado Nordilanche netminder Patrick Roy of 551. This is going to be, when he achieves it whether it's tonight or whenever, an amazing feat. Johnny already thinks Brodeur has surpassed Roy in the 'who's better' category. Though being a Wings fan Johnny is partial to Terry Sawchuk in the best ever category they would forever be 1 and 1A. Brodeur has shown class and never waivered in his excellence. A nice piece by Terry Frei on ESPN about who we rank netminders and Johnny thinks by decade is a great idea as the game has changed, so have the styles....

A career retrospective:

Games played: 985
Minutes played: 58194:41
Wins: 550
Losses: 293
OTL: 22
Shots against: 24697
Saves: 22563
Save %: .914
GAA: 2.20
Shutouts: 100

Playoffs:
Games Played:169
Wins: 95
Losses:74
Minutes played: 10,520
Goals against: 344
GAA: 1.96
Shutouts: 22

Stanley Cups: 3

Devils open a can of whoop ass on the Flyers, Brodeur records 100th career shutout

Devils netminder Martin Brodeur recorded his 100th career shutout and 547th career win in New Jersey's 3-0 skunking of the Flyers at The Rock this afternoon. Brodeur's win leaves him only 4 behind Patrick Roy for winningest goalie of all time in NHL history. It will be a well deserved mark when it arrives. Brodeur, unlike Roy, isn't prone to histrionics and poor sportsmanship. He plays the game the way it was meant to be played.

As for the game, the Devils got goals from Jamie Langenbrunner (20th), Brian Gionta (14th) and Johnny Oduya (5th), one in each period. The Devils defense kept Philly off balance and bottled up in the neutral zone allowing only 27 shots. The Devils had an impressive 9 takeaways helping jump start their offense and won the faceoff battle 36-26. If you want a key to the upcoming playoffs for the Devils, keep an eye on the faceoff numbers. If New Jersey can control the play from the beginning, and start with the puck it'll keep the offense fluid and also allow them to get pucks deep in the opponents zone and let their impressive forechecking game go to work. It's an often overlooked stat by fans but coaches and players will tell you, it's a vital part of winning close games.

The Devils travel to Toronto on Tuesday for the next game (and last before the trading deadline), and are out on Long Island next Saturday night.