[Gambatese] Tom Fitzgerald’s Devils Tenure is a Case Study on Reactive vs. Proactive Decision-Making
March 27, 2026
[Gambatese] Tom Fitzgerald’s Devils Tenure is a Case Study on Reactive vs. Proactive Decision-Making
6 comments
Would be interested in a deep dive of our post-olympic performance from the perspective of:
1) is it sustainable?
2) is the change of system the strongest correlate to our success. Or is it a mix of it’s working and our opponents consistently have under performed
3) did Keefe do enough to save his job and a change of GM and upper management will allow for continued success
There’s a few issues here with what you wrote
Goaltending:
Fitz is on record saying he tried trading for Allen prior to the deadline and Allen didn’t want to be part of a 3 way rotation with him, Daws, and Schmid. I have no idea why it wasn’t properly communicated that he’d be the starter for the rest of his time in 23-24 or who that ultimately falls on, but this has been discussed quite extensively. He also was in on Markstrom in 23-24 and the deal was all but done until Calgary changed their mind and upped the price, pissing off Markstrom in the meantime. So to say that Fitz should’ve made these moves sooner is disingenuous
McLeod/4C:
I’m under the belief that Fitz took McLeod at his word that he wasn’t involved and was hedging his bets on not needing to deal with it, but protected against too much exposure by only giving him the 1 year deal. Yes, having a backup option would’ve been ideal, but I don’t think it was that much of an issue in 23-24 alone because that season was lost from December. There were ultimately too many holes from injuries to patch up. The bigger issue is not addressing it sooner which I agree with. However, Glendening 100% earned his spot coming out of training camp this year. He looked fantastic in preseason, way better than Lammikko, and started the season fine as best as I can remember. No idea why he fell off a cliff, but let’s not act like Fitz signed a random dude off the street
23-24:
I’ve always hated the “too small/too soft” accusations, but there was absolutely a need for more physicality on our team. Being fast and elusive is great. Whenever someone complains about Jack or Mercer avoiding contact, I always say “best way avoid punch, no be there” in the words of the late great Mr Miyagi. But Carolina completely obliterated us in 22-23 round 2 and there was absolutely a need to add more beef. MacDermid was a panic move to deal with Rempe, but Dillon and Pesce have been great additions. Kov has been a mixed bag but he gets a pass from me this year after his knee getting reconstructed. Let’s see how he is next year. Noesen is great to have when he’s healthy and it isn’t Fitz’s fault that he refused to get offseason surgery until it was too late to not affect his game. I’d love to see more out of Cotter, but he’s a low cost grinder with fantastic hands
Drafting/players traded/misc:
I find it interesting that you call out trading away “skilled players” like Holtz when it’s abundantly clear now that he’s a bust. Also calling out Nemec over Wright is interesting considering how unproductive Wright has been. Picking Nemec also meant we had a potential stud RD in the wings for when Dougie is eventually off the team, which is proactive drafting and is a situation we’re seeing play out in front of us right now. Silayev might’ve been the pick because BIG, but he skates like a dream even if his offensive output has dropped. There’s absolutely a need for a big body defenseman who can skate like he’s 5ft10
I’ll end this by once again saying I’ve never said Fitz and everything he does is perfect. Just presenting a counterpoint to all the vitriol around here because it really has gotten out of hand
lol, can we see the transcript of the conversation between Fitz, Allen and his agent? You people claim to know what wasn’t said, so let’s see the proof. All you have is conjecture, opinions and speculation based on what was said to the media and obviously anything said in the media is 100% true because players and management never lie or couch previous statements to avoid controversy because fans never hold grudges against players when they turn down trades….
Reacting too late is a problem throughout the entire org. At least one of Keefe/Fitz should’ve been fired months ago, but obviously Fitz’s boss (bob myers) is also a hand sitter so of course the FO was going to end up wasting everybody’s time this season.
>The reality is that picking for need over picking BPA is almost always the wrong choice — by the time X player is ready to play meaningfully in the NHL, *you simply do not know what your team will “need.”*
Yea not sure why the FO keeps doing this. Last year’s draft really shows why this is a problem because we ended drafting guys that were by pretty much every single metric worse than their counterparts on the same junior teams (e.g. picking Fondrk over Moore). As a side note, I don’t know if the rest of you watch college hockey but if you ever watched a BU game with Conrad Fondrk playing, it’s like pulling your teeth out because this mf consistently just gives up on backchecking and puts like 0% effort in trying to make a second read on a pass.
Rempe coming up and head hunting some of our guys really broke Fitz’s brain. Last years massive pivot turned out to be wrong, but we didn’t know it at the time because most of the players we got worked out. It wasn’t until January when the sides started popping up but in February we lost Dougie, Jack and Siegs and then lost more guys in the playoffs so we just blamed injuries. Shifting the entire team to be defense first and physical sunk the team this year. Of course Fitz realized too late this season but couldn’t do anything because of the trade clauses he handed out like crazy. In hindsight we should’ve just kept Marino and Bahl, traded for Logan Thompson, and either extended Toffoli or trade Mercer for Necas. The way this season was completely wasted should get Fitz fired
6 comments
Would be interested in a deep dive of our post-olympic performance from the perspective of:
1) is it sustainable?
2) is the change of system the strongest correlate to our success. Or is it a mix of it’s working and our opponents consistently have under performed
3) did Keefe do enough to save his job and a change of GM and upper management will allow for continued success
There’s a few issues here with what you wrote
Goaltending:
Fitz is on record saying he tried trading for Allen prior to the deadline and Allen didn’t want to be part of a 3 way rotation with him, Daws, and Schmid. I have no idea why it wasn’t properly communicated that he’d be the starter for the rest of his time in 23-24 or who that ultimately falls on, but this has been discussed quite extensively. He also was in on Markstrom in 23-24 and the deal was all but done until Calgary changed their mind and upped the price, pissing off Markstrom in the meantime. So to say that Fitz should’ve made these moves sooner is disingenuous
McLeod/4C:
I’m under the belief that Fitz took McLeod at his word that he wasn’t involved and was hedging his bets on not needing to deal with it, but protected against too much exposure by only giving him the 1 year deal. Yes, having a backup option would’ve been ideal, but I don’t think it was that much of an issue in 23-24 alone because that season was lost from December. There were ultimately too many holes from injuries to patch up. The bigger issue is not addressing it sooner which I agree with. However, Glendening 100% earned his spot coming out of training camp this year. He looked fantastic in preseason, way better than Lammikko, and started the season fine as best as I can remember. No idea why he fell off a cliff, but let’s not act like Fitz signed a random dude off the street
23-24:
I’ve always hated the “too small/too soft” accusations, but there was absolutely a need for more physicality on our team. Being fast and elusive is great. Whenever someone complains about Jack or Mercer avoiding contact, I always say “best way avoid punch, no be there” in the words of the late great Mr Miyagi. But Carolina completely obliterated us in 22-23 round 2 and there was absolutely a need to add more beef. MacDermid was a panic move to deal with Rempe, but Dillon and Pesce have been great additions. Kov has been a mixed bag but he gets a pass from me this year after his knee getting reconstructed. Let’s see how he is next year. Noesen is great to have when he’s healthy and it isn’t Fitz’s fault that he refused to get offseason surgery until it was too late to not affect his game. I’d love to see more out of Cotter, but he’s a low cost grinder with fantastic hands
Drafting/players traded/misc:
I find it interesting that you call out trading away “skilled players” like Holtz when it’s abundantly clear now that he’s a bust. Also calling out Nemec over Wright is interesting considering how unproductive Wright has been. Picking Nemec also meant we had a potential stud RD in the wings for when Dougie is eventually off the team, which is proactive drafting and is a situation we’re seeing play out in front of us right now. Silayev might’ve been the pick because BIG, but he skates like a dream even if his offensive output has dropped. There’s absolutely a need for a big body defenseman who can skate like he’s 5ft10
I’ll end this by once again saying I’ve never said Fitz and everything he does is perfect. Just presenting a counterpoint to all the vitriol around here because it really has gotten out of hand
lol, can we see the transcript of the conversation between Fitz, Allen and his agent? You people claim to know what wasn’t said, so let’s see the proof. All you have is conjecture, opinions and speculation based on what was said to the media and obviously anything said in the media is 100% true because players and management never lie or couch previous statements to avoid controversy because fans never hold grudges against players when they turn down trades….
Reacting too late is a problem throughout the entire org. At least one of Keefe/Fitz should’ve been fired months ago, but obviously Fitz’s boss (bob myers) is also a hand sitter so of course the FO was going to end up wasting everybody’s time this season.
>The reality is that picking for need over picking BPA is almost always the wrong choice — by the time X player is ready to play meaningfully in the NHL, *you simply do not know what your team will “need.”*
Yea not sure why the FO keeps doing this. Last year’s draft really shows why this is a problem because we ended drafting guys that were by pretty much every single metric worse than their counterparts on the same junior teams (e.g. picking Fondrk over Moore). As a side note, I don’t know if the rest of you watch college hockey but if you ever watched a BU game with Conrad Fondrk playing, it’s like pulling your teeth out because this mf consistently just gives up on backchecking and puts like 0% effort in trying to make a second read on a pass.
Rempe coming up and head hunting some of our guys really broke Fitz’s brain. Last years massive pivot turned out to be wrong, but we didn’t know it at the time because most of the players we got worked out. It wasn’t until January when the sides started popping up but in February we lost Dougie, Jack and Siegs and then lost more guys in the playoffs so we just blamed injuries. Shifting the entire team to be defense first and physical sunk the team this year. Of course Fitz realized too late this season but couldn’t do anything because of the trade clauses he handed out like crazy. In hindsight we should’ve just kept Marino and Bahl, traded for Logan Thompson, and either extended Toffoli or trade Mercer for Necas. The way this season was completely wasted should get Fitz fired
