{"id":569974,"date":"2026-05-08T13:54:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T13:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/569974\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T13:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T13:54:17","slug":"devils-maple-leafs-could-compete-for-front-office-executive-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/569974\/","title":{"rendered":"Devils & Maple Leafs Could Compete for Front Office Executive, Again"},"content":{"rendered":"

After competing for the services of Sunny Mehta<\/a>, it seems the New Jersey Devils<\/a> and Toronto Maple Leafs could by against each other for another front office executive.<\/p>\n

The Devils weren\u2019t letting Mehta slip through their fingers after learning he was a candidate for the job in Toronto as well.<\/p>\n

They promptly fired Tom Fitzgerald<\/a> and quickly ensured Mehta\u2019s arrival in New Jersey.<\/p>\n

Mehta didn\u2019t wait long to make changes to his front office, relieving now former assistant general manager Dan Mackinnon and senior advisor Chuck Fletcher.<\/p>\n

Now the Devils GM has a cabinet to build, and he could be seeking the services of<\/a> Bryan McCabe\u2014the Florida Panthers<\/a>\u2018 Director of Player Development.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the people I\u2019m curious to see if Mehta will try to add is Bryan McCabe.<\/p>\n

\u201cBryan McCabe, the former Maple Leaf defenseman, has a really good reputation for player development,\u201d Elliotte Friedman said on the latest<\/a> 32 Thoughts Podcast. \u201cMackenzie Weeger is one of the guys that has credited McCabe in the past for really helping him become the player he\u2019s become.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Friedman mentioned that although John Chayka and Mats Sundin haven\u2019t made any changes yet, McCabe could be a candidate in Toronto\u2014where he\u2019s played before\u2013as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I\u2019ve also kind of wondered if for any reason, if, if, if, if Toronto makes any changes, if Sandin would vouch for him too in a player development role,\u201d Friedman said.<\/p>\n

McCabe would be a welcomed asset in New Jersey. Given his success in helping players such as Weegar, Gustav Forsling, and Dmitri Kulikov develop into significant blueliners, that kind of guidence would go a long way for Devils defenders such as Luke Hughes<\/a> and Simon Nemec<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McCabe isn\u2019t the only Panthers executive Mehta could be eyeing. <\/p>\n

The Devils GM needs a right-hand man, and Braden Burch is the name that\u2019s being whispered about.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe other guy I heard could be on Sunny Mehta\u2019s radar is a guy by the name of Braden Burch. Now, Burch\u2019s official position is [Florida\u2019s] Director of Hockey Operations and Salary Cap Management. He played hockey. He was drafted actually by the [Chicago] Blackhawks in 2008, and then he went overseas. He\u2019s kind of been around hockey all his life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we were kind of talking\u2026 about how some of these teams felt that some of the people they were interviewing were too siloed and didn\u2019t really have a lot of experience in a number of different areas, one of the future candidates, because I don\u2019t think he\u2019s ready yet, that a few people reached out to me about was Birch, and they wonder if he\u2019s going to end up being Sunny Mehta\u2019s right-hand guy with the Devils. So just a couple of names I wanted to point out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\"avatar\"<\/p>\n

\t\tJames is a fully credentialed New Jersey Devils beat reporter for New Jersey Hockey Now on Sportsnaut and the … More about James Nichols<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After competing for the services of Sunny Mehta, it seems the New Jersey Devils and Toronto Maple Leafs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":569975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5109],"tags":[63939,62678,201,3723,5,576,151,5185,5184,4,12877,31],"class_list":["post-569974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-jersey-devils","tag-braden-burch","tag-bryan-mccabe","tag-devils","tag-devils-news","tag-hockey","tag-new-jersey","tag-new-jersey-devils","tag-newjersey","tag-newjerseydevils","tag-nhl","tag-sunny-mehta","tag-toronto-maple-leafs"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116539298639486017","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=569974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/569975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}