What do you think of this?

Leave the forward lines intact.

I think all we need now is to trade Paul Martin for Tom Preissing.
Preissing is a power play specialist and I would leave the details to you but the main part of the trade would be Paul Martin for Preissing.

Tom makes smart decisions with the puck, is capable of putting up good offensive numbers, especially if given regular ice time with the man advantage.
His stats: 2 goals and 14 assists in 33 games played!

I'd trade Rafalski before Martin. Yeah, he's been shaky this year, but he's younger and makes less money.

Preissing is an UFA after this year. Not trading Martin for him. And he's not that good, maybe a #4 guy at best. Now if we're talking someone like Brad Stuart I would be more open to discussion.

I'd like to see how Preissing would do with Martin's ice time and responsibility.

I'd trade Rafalski before Martin. Yeah, he's been shaky this year, but he's younger and makes less money.

Rafalski has arguably been the Devils best defenseman this year (again). Why on earth would you want to trade him? Maybe he's a bit overpaid, but dealing him would leave a tremendous void on our backline.

Rafalski has arguably been the Devils best defenseman this year (again). Why on earth would you want to trade him? Maybe he's a bit overpaid, but dealing him would leave a tremendous void on our backline.

I don't think he's overpaid, and when GMs start bombarding #3 and #4 defenseman with much more money than their worth in the offseason he'll look like a bargain.

I don't think he's overpaid, and when GMs start bombarding #3 and #4 defenseman with much more money than their worth in the offseason he'll look like a bargain.

I don't really either, but a lot of people here seem to think so. Hopefully Lou can extend him.

Rafalski has arguably been the Devils best defenseman this year (again). Why on earth would you want to trade him? Maybe he's a bit overpaid, but dealing him would leave a tremendous void on our backline.

I didn't say I wanted to trade Rafalski. But if I had to choose, he'd go over Martin.

Dont trade Martin, just take him off the power play

Paul Martin has not looked like himself this whole year. He looked like an all-star his rookie season. What happened? The Devils are going to be getting back Matvichuck around December 28th and the lines would eventually look like this if Lou got Preissing:

Rafalski-Matvichuck
Oduya-White
Hale-Preissing

Tom is the right handed shot that we need for a more balance of righties and lefties on defense. And yes that does matter.
go to nhl.com and check out his highlights.

Paul Martin has not looked like himself this whole year. He looked like an all-star his rookie season. What happened? The Devils are going to be getting back Matvichuck around December 28th and the lines would eventually look like this if Lou got Preissing:

Rafalski-Matvichuck
Oduya-White
Hale-Preissing

Tom is the right handed shot that we need for a more balance of righties and lefties on defense. And yes that does matter.
go to nhl.com and check out his highlights.

This is a terrible trade. I'm actually in support of acquiring Preissing, but not at the price of Martin.

Martin also was splendid in the last 50 or so games of last season. He's 25 years old. The Devils won't be trading him because of a subpar 30 games. Unless of course the trade is good enough to where it forces them to.

I did not mean that the Devils should trade Martin for Preissing straight up.
Martin for Priessing and a second round draft pick or a prospect. That is a fair trade and realistic.

I did not mean that the Devils should trade Martin for Preissing straight up.
Martin for Priessing and a second round draft pick or a prospect. That is a fair trade and realistic.

That is still not fair. Preissing is not nearly as good as Martin and Martin is 3 years younger and will not be an UFA for at least another season.

Trading away young players because they are in a funk is one the most common mistakes teams make and one the Devils never make. No way we start here.

What about a trade


NJD Get: Stuart
BOS Get: Martin, & 3rd rounder

Trading away young players because they are in a funk is one the most common mistakes teams make and one the Devils never make. No way we start here.

But Martin has been bad for 15 WHOLE GAMES!!! Hopefully WHEN we trade him we can manage to get a 2nd round pick for him!

:sarcasm:

Martin for Preissing and a first round draft pick.
You are honestly saying that you would not do that trade?

:biglaugh: :biglaugh: :biglaugh:

Martin for Preissing and a first round draft pick.
You are honestly saying that you would not do that trade?

:biglaugh: :biglaugh: :biglaugh:

Ottawa would never go for it. I would stop laughing

I love Paul Martin. But I can't believe people think he is better than Tom Preissing.

Preissing is a +40 over the last season and a half. Someone called him a 4th D-man at best, thats crazy. He is good for 40 points every year, and is always a + player. Unfortunatly, we can't say the same for Martin.

On top of that he's a huge bargain at 600k. Why would Ottawa trade him?

keep in mind that most GM's around the league are not as intelligent as Lou.

Here are a few examples:
-Jay Feaster signing Richards to 7.8 million dollars per season
-The Islanders signing Dipietro to 15yrs-4.5 million
-The Bruins trading away Thornton for nothing special in return.
-1992: The Quebec Nordiques traded Eric Lindros to Philadelphia for Ron Hextall, --Mike Ricci, Peter Forsberg, Steve Duchesne, Kerry Huffman and a first-round draft pick
-Pittsburgh Penguins traded Markus Naslund to the Vancouver Canucks for Alek Stojanov (He is now a firefighter)
-Trevor Linden to Long Island when in return the Canucks received Todd Bertuzzi, Bryan McCabe and a draft pick that ended up being Jarko Ruutu

I love Paul Martin. But I can't believe people think he is better than Tom Preissing.

Preissing is a +40 over the last season and a half. Someone called him a 4th D-man at best, thats crazy. He is good for 40 points every year, and is always a + player. Unfortunatly, we can't say the same for Martin.

On top of that he's a huge bargain at 600k. Why would Ottawa trade him?

Lol, +/- isn't an indicator of anything.

Preissing has been playing #5-6 minutes in Ottawa and has been facing the lesser opponents. Over the past season and a half Martin has been tasked with stopping the best players from the other team and he is currently the Devils leader in ice time. He is easily better than Tom Preissing.

Ha ha, 14 minutes of ice time a game and he's better than Paul Martin.

keep in mind that most GM's around the league are not as intelligent as Lou.

Here are a few examples:
-Jay Feaster signing Richards to 7.8 million dollars per season
-The Islanders signing Dipietro to 15yrs-4.5 million
-The Bruins trading away Thornton for nothing special in return.
-1992: The Quebec Nordiques traded Eric Lindros to Philadelphia for Ron Hextall, --Mike Ricci, Peter Forsberg, Steve Duchesne, Kerry Huffman and a first-round draft pick
-Pittsburgh Penguins traded Markus Naslund to the Vancouver Canucks for Alek Stojanov (He is now a firefighter)
-Trevor Linden to Long Island when in return the Canucks received Todd Bertuzzi, Bryan McCabe and a draft pick that ended up being Jarko Ruutu


Oh, you forgot trading Luongo & Jokinen for Parrish & Kavasha:biglaugh: ...or getting Cashin' Yashin by giving up Chara and a #1 pick that turned out to be a nobody named Jason Spezza:shakehead ...or selecting Wayne Redden and then trading him away for Bryan Berrard.:amazed:

Did I leave anyone out?

Lol, +/- isn't an indicator of anything.

Preissing has been playing #5-6 minutes in Ottawa and has been facing the lesser opponents. Over the past season and a half Martin has been tasked with stopping the best players from the other team and he is currently the Devils leader in ice time. He is easily better than Tom Preissing.

Ha ha, 14 minutes of ice time a game and he's better than Paul Martin.

I can't believe you were LOL at my using +/- as an idicator of how someone is playing. Just wondering, Scott Stevens +393 or Nicklas Lidstrom's +319... that's not an indicator of how good they are. Of course I'm not comparing Tom Preissing to either of them, but I am pretty sure that +/- is a solid indicator of quality of play.

Of course Preissing doesn't play against the opponents top forwards(neither does Martin). Ottowa doesn't need him to. Neither would we. That doesn't make him any less valuable. In fact it's quite impressive that he is a +23 while only playing 15 mins a night.

I can't believe you were LOL at my using +/- as an idicator of how someone is playing. Just wondering, Scott Stevens +393 or Nicklas Lidstrom's +319... that's not an indicator of how good they are. Of course I'm not comparing Tom Preissing to either of them, but I am pretty sure that +/- is a solid indicator of quality of play.

Of course Preissing doesn't play against the opponents top forwards(neither does Martin). Ottowa doesn't need him to. Neither would we. That doesn't make him any less valuable. In fact it's quite impressive that he is a +23 while only playing 15 mins a night.

No it isn't. All it's an indicator of is the linemates you play with and the opponents you play against.

Lol, what are you talking about? Martin does play against the opponents top forwards. Last year and about 20 games into this year he was on the shutdown pairing with White that had the job of stopping the Jagr's and company. Last year he played extremely well and did a good job in that role. He is now on a pairing with Oduya that routinely faces the opponents better players.

Paul Martin blows and i would make the trade for stuart or preissing in a heartbeat

Paul Martin blows and i would make the trade for stuart or preissing in a heartbeat

Which is precisely why you have absolutely no say in the matter.

Which is precisely why you have absolutely no say in the matter.

Stuart yes. Preissing no.

Stuart yes. Preissing no.

As I said earlier, Stuart would be something I could deal with. But he's an impending UFA, and when Martin is on his game, Stuart really isn't much better than him. I think people should really be more patient with Martin. He's 25 years old, and really, for his first two seasons, played far beyond what a lot of people expected.

Paul Martin has not looked like himself this whole year. He looked like an all-star his rookie season. What happened?

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=2124267

Probably the reason Francois Beachemin went from AHL defenseman to solid NHL defender seemingly overnight.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=2124267

Probably the reason Francois Beachemin went from AHL defenseman to solid NHL defender seemingly overnight.

Which of course explains why he was so solid the last 50 games of last season...

A little too much hatred on this thread... At least Voros is keeping things somewhat sane.

Martin has serious upside and played like a star right out of the gate (look at all the health troubles and AHL ups and downs of Hale's career, who was from the same draft class...)

He logs major minutes and has nowhere to go but back into top form, eventually. We have a team made up of "second half" players (Gomez, Elias), so maybe Martin is of the same breed.

That 2 mil pay day might have taken some of his fire, and he is playing with less confidence than ever (maybe the coaching), but he is far from a lost cause. This isn't Dan McGillis or Sean Brown or Ken Klee here... This is a young player with tons left in the tank.

Martin has serious upside and played like a star right out of the gate (look at all the health troubles and AHL ups and downs of Hale's career, who was from the same draft class...)

He logs major minutes and has nowhere to go but back into top form, eventually. We have a team made up of "second half" players (Gomez, Elias), so maybe Martin is of the same breed.

That 2 mil pay day might have taken some of his fire, and he is playing with less confidence than ever (maybe the coaching), but he is far from a lost cause. This isn't Dan McGillis or Sean Brown or Ken Klee here... This is a young player with tons left in the tank.

That's another thing. I hate how much of a break Hale gets on these boards. He usually doesn't play very well, and can NEVER get the puck out of his own end, but people never berate him like they do Martin. I would seriously love to see how Hale would fair with Martin's ice time and responsibility.

Good post btw.

Which of course explains why he was so solid the last 50 games of last season...

Yeah, I know I was just being a prickly jerk :)

Martin has serious upside and played like a star right out of the gate (look at all the health troubles and AHL ups and downs of Hale's career, who was from the same draft class...)

If anybody has any doubt about Martin's ability only has to go back and watch the 2004 WC when he was arguably the best defenseman on Team USA.

He and Rafalski - his partner in the WC - were never on the ice for a even strength goal against.

Paul Martin has not looked like himself this whole year. He looked like an all-star his rookie season. What happened?

I still stand by the fact that after he was hit by Hollweg and really hurt by it that he hasn't been the same player. Not looking for an argument about Hollweg (let's not go there again), but I sincerely think that that is what happened. He had a decent concussion from that hit and he just has never looked remotely as good since. Just my two cents on why. Hopefully he can revert to his old self, but maybe there is just something serious that happened with his head that effected his play and judgment making?

I still stand by the fact that after he was hit by Hollweg and really hurt by it that he hasn't been the same player. Not looking for an argument about Hollweg (let's not go there again), but I sincerely think that that is what happened. He had a decent concussion from that hit and he just has never looked remotely as good since. Just my two cents on why. Hopefully he can revert to his old self, but maybe there is just something serious that happened with his head that effected his play and judgment making?

When was that hit?

I still stand by the fact that after he was hit by Hollweg and really hurt by it that he hasn't been the same player. Not looking for an argument about Hollweg (let's not go there again), but I sincerely think that that is what happened. He had a decent concussion from that hit and he just has never looked remotely as good since. Just my two cents on why. Hopefully he can revert to his old self, but maybe there is just something serious that happened with his head that effected his play and judgment making?

Paul Martin got a concussion from Hollweg? I don't remember him getting a concussion. But I vaguely recall something, perhaps a hard check along the boards early last seaon? Not sure.

Hollweg boarded Martin in the begining of 2005. It wasn't a clean hit, but they happen all the time.

I still stand by the fact that after he was hit by Hollweg and really hurt by it that he hasn't been the same player. Not looking for an argument about Hollweg (let's not go there again), but I sincerely think that that is what happened. He had a decent concussion from that hit and he just has never looked remotely as good since. Just my two cents on why. Hopefully he can revert to his old self, but maybe there is just something serious that happened with his head that effected his play and judgment making?

The Hollweg hit was either in preseason or very very very early 2005. Martin looked his best in the second half of hte 05-06 season, so this is clearly not the case.

Paul Martin blows and i would make the trade for stuart or preissing in a heartbeat

I wouldn't mind getting Stuart, but only on the condition that the Devils can try to work out a contract with him for next season and beyond.

But I also agree with Lou is God, you just don't move a young player who has showed promise and is now in a slump. We still have more then half a season to go.