Offseason checklist for the New Jersey Devils

The filing sets a firmer timeline for signing him.  Arbitration hearings are held between July 20 and Aug. 4 with awards typically coming a couple of days after the hearing if no agreement is reached by then.  Instead of allowing for the potential for a later agreement, the filing locks in his contract timing by the first week of August. Fitzgerald indicated yesterday that Meier has a desire to sign a max-term deal and they’ll have basically a month and a half to get one done, less if he winds up going early on the hearing schedule.

How much might that deal cost? Certainly more than Bratt’s $7.875M.  He scored 40 goals this season after putting up 35 the year before and scoring prowess certainly matters in these talks.  He’s a power forward and those players tend to wind up with contracts that seem above market value relative strictly to their production.  The track record isn’t there for a deal that’s at or past the $10M mark—few wingers have reached that threshold—but it would be surprising to see him lock in for anything below $9M per year.

New Jersey will need to come to the table with an offer that’s good enough to make Meier forego the right to arbitration where he could legitimately wind up with an award close to $9M on its own for one season.  In a contract market that’s expected to start inflating once again if the Upper Limit starts to go up quicker than it has in recent years, the price tag will only go higher if he makes it to unrestricted free agency.  There’s room to make it work on the books but he will quite likely become their highest-paid player in the process, surpassing Dougie Hamilton’s $9M AAV.

Mercer extension talks

Dawson Mercer has certainly had a nice start to his NHL career, quickly earning a spot in the top six. His sophomore year was a strong one, notching 27 goals and 29 assists while playing all 82 games for the second straight year. Going back to that idea of a bigger cap increase in 2024-25, it stands to reason that it would be in New Jersey’s best interest to try to get him locked up now.

Mercer will have four seasons of RFA eligibility remaining when his contract expires in 2024 so the two viable options are either a short-term bridge deal or a long-term one that buys some extra years of team control. Once in a while, a team will do an early bridge extension but that doesn’t feel like the type of move that makes a lot of sense for the Devils right now so let’s look at the longer-term options.

With a max-term agreement, the AAV is probably going to come in higher than his current value now with both sides forecasting an improvement in his production.  That, coupled with the expectation of a higher cap, could push the AAV well past the $6M mark. The other option is a six-year contract that provides some extra club control but would set him up for another long-term contract entering his age-30 campaign.  The price tag would be a bit lower as a result, potentially in the mid-$5.5M area and could be a reasonable compromise considering the big tickets they already have on the books (plus potentially another to come with Meier.)

The Devils historically have tried to sign some of their core young players to early extensions. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Fitzgerald continue that trend with Mercer in the coming months.

Re-sign or replace Haula

When the Devils moved out Pavel Zacha last summer, they picked up Erik Haula in a swap of players that both teams felt the newcomers would fit in better than they were on their old squad.  Zacha certainly did, eventually signing a long-term extension with Boston.  Haula also fared well, notching at least 40 points for the second straight year and only the third time in his 10-year career.  He’s set to hit the open market this summer and while he isn’t a high-end producer, he’s still one of the better options available in what is a fairly thin class.

At a minimum, the 32-year-old is in for a nice raise on the $2.375M AAV he had this past season. Haula should be in line to land a contract of at least three years if not four (which would be the longest of his career).  With Jack Hughes and Nico Hischier entrenched as the top two middlemen for the long haul, Haula’s role is pretty much set as a third-line center with the Devils. Is that a role they want to lock in for that long at a price tag that’s going to check in somewhere around the $3.5M mark? Haula has made it clear that he wants to stay in New Jersey but as the roster becomes more top-heavy in terms of salaries, it becomes harder to fit a mid-tier player on the books.

Internally, after a season that saw him score just four goals, Michael McLeod isn’t quite ready yet to step into Haula’s spot on the depth chart so they’d likely have to turn outside the roster to fill that spot, preferably on a short-term agreement. That’s easier said than done in this free-agent class.  Sometimes, it’s better to go with the devil you know and that could be the case here for Fitzgerald.  Accordingly, expect talks to pick up in the coming days on this front to try to keep Haula from hitting the open market.