New Jersey Devils: 5 burning questions heading into the 2019-20 season
The New Jersey Devils have a lot of questions to answer as the 2019-20 NHL season approaches.
The New Jersey Devils are heading into one of the most crucial seasons of their franchise’s history with elite left wing Taylor Hall having one year left on his contract and not many scorers coming up to replace his output.
With that in mind, the club has made quite a few additions this offseason that could propel them back into the playoffs. This could quite possibly lead Hall to sign a long-term deal. While those are big issues for the present and future of this club, fans who have been around this team for a long time remember the glory days of the Devils’ and the wait to have a contender again couldn’t come sooner.
Here are five burning questions Devils fans may be asking heading into the season.
5. Will Cory Schneider ever be Cory Schneider again?
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It wasn’t that long ago when Cory Schneider was considered one of the best goalies in the world. After posting a .924% save percentage and a 2.15 GAA in the 2015/16 season, he regressed to a .908% save percentage and a 2.82 GAA the very next season. This trend has continued.
Something happened with Schenider where his stats fell off the map and he looked like a shell of his former self. Turns out that “something” was a hip injury that wasn’t taken care of by surgery until almost a year and a half after it was injured.
According to the On the Devils’ All-Access Podcast, Schneider said the issue dated back to the 2016-17 season, and he played through it until the end of 2017-18.
"“It was something that had kind of cropped maybe a year and a half ago, a season and a half ago. It’s just something that nags and it there, but you don’t ever feel like it’s bad enough that you need to sit out for six months, because there’s no real good time to do it, unfortunately.”"
The injury that plagued him even to this day with Cory only playing 26 games while getting pulled three times.
While it does seem to be the end for Cory Schneider as an elite goalie in the NHL rankings, maybe a healthy season is all it will take to bring him back to even half of what he was. In a tandem with Mackenzie Blackwood this year, there could be a 44-38 game split between the two netminders which could prove to be the rest and perfect workload for Schneider.
For comparison look at Ben Bishop and Anton Khudobin or Robin Lehner and Thomas Greiss. At the age of 33, it gets harder for players to have a comeback season as they get older, but who doesn’t like a good comeback story.
With a healthy hip and a lowered workload, look for Schneider to put up league average numbers while helping rookie netminder Blackwood out by pushing him to become better. Sort of like Roberto Luongo did from Schneider’s Vancouver days.