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The New Jersey Devils started their pivotal off-season with a bang, hiring Sunny Mehta as the team’s new General Manager.
There was a competitive market for Mehta – the resource-heavy Toronto Maple Leafs were rumored to be highly interested – but he opted to rejoin his hometown team.
Whether or not the Devils opt to fill any high-level front office positions, Mehta will serve as the lead decision-maker. It’s his team.
Elliotte Friedman@FriedgeHNIC
Mehta will be the hockey operations decision maker for the Devils. No immediate decisions on head coach Sheldon Keefe or any other staff. He will take time to evaluate. Media conference for introduction on Tuesday.
11:28 PM · Apr 16, 2026 · 172K Views
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To say the Devils are in good hands would be an understatement.
Mehta spent the past six years with the powerhouse Florida Panthers. He served as a VP of Hockey Strategy from 2020-23 before being promoted to assistant GM for the last three years.
The Panthers qualified for the playoffs in five of six seasons, with this injury-plagued year being the only outlier.
Florida won at least one playoff round in four of their five playoff appearances and made it to the Finals three times.
The Panthers are one of the most well-run organizations in the sport so there’s plenty of people who deserve credit for the past handful of years.
Mehta is definitely one of them. Bill Zito did not make a move without running it by Mehta for his thoughts.
We don’t need anyone else to tell you about Mehta’s importance and skillset. Zito will do it himself (via NHL.com).
“We just liked him genuinely, as a person,” Zito said. “And then professionally, I think there’s a lot of bright people, but he has an uncanny ability to digest incredible amounts of information rapidly regurgitate them, simplify them, and then project them back out to whoever his audience is. That’s a remarkable skill there.
“I think there’s probably many people who can see things the way he sees them or calculate the way he calculates, but probably not interact with others, and then subsequently, develop those ideas and refine them. I think one of his greatest strengths.”
Some will rain on the Mehta parade, arguing it doesn’t take a genius or model to know Aleksander Barkov or Matthew Tkachuk are great players you want at the top of your depth chart. And that’s true.
Where Mehta’s progressive and data-driven approach can be especially helpful is finding buy-low opportunities on players or inefficiencies in the draft.