After competing for the services of Sunny Mehta, it looks like the New Jersey Devils and Toronto Maple Leafs may be facing off against each other for another front office executive.
After learning he was also a candidate for the job in Toronto, the Devils were not going to let Mehta slip through their fingers.
He immediately fired Tom Fitzgerald and secured Mehta's arrival in New Jersey.
Mehta didn't have to wait long to make changes to his front office and has now relieved former assistant general manager Dan MacKinnon and senior advisor Chuck Fletcher.
Now the Devils GM has a cabinet to build, and he may seek the services of Florida Panthers Director of Player Development Brian McCabe.
“One of the guys I'm curious to see if Mehta will try to add is Brian McCabe.
“Former Maple Leaf defenseman Brian McCabe has a really good reputation for player development,” Elliotte Friedman said on the latest 32 Thoughts podcast. "Mackenzie Weegar is one of those guys who has credited McCabe in the past for really helping him become the player he's become."
However, Friedman noted that although John Chayka and Mats Sundin have not yet made a move, McCabe could also be a candidate in Toronto – where he has played before.
Friedman said, "But I've also wondered if, for whatever reason, if, if, if, if Toronto makes a change, would Sandin commit to him in a player development role as well."
McCabe will be a welcome asset to New Jersey. Given his success in developing players like Weegar, Gustav Forsling and Dmitry Kulikov into vital blueliners, this kind of guidance would prove tremendously helpful to Devils defensemen like Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec.
McCabe isn't the only Panthers executive Mehta may have his eye on.
The Devils GM needs a right-hand man, and Braden Burch is the name being whispered about.
"The other guy I heard might be on Sunny Mehta's radar is a guy named Braden Burch. Now, Burch's official position is this [Florida’s] Director of hockey operations and salary cap management. He played hockey. he was actually drawn by [Chicago] Blackhawks in 2008, and then he moved abroad. “He’s been around hockey his whole life.”
"When we were talking about... how some of these teams felt that some of the guys they were interviewing were very quiet and didn't really have a lot of experience in a lot of different areas, one of the future candidates, because I don't think he's ready yet, some people reached out to me about Burch, and they wondered if he was ultimately going to be Sunny Mehta's right-hand man with the Devils. So just a few names that I pointed out there. Wanted to do.
