When former New Jersey Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur retired two weeks ago as a member of the St. Louis Blues, there was plenty of reminiscing about his days with the Devils and president Lou Lamoriello. Brodeur and Lamoriello were the key components in New Jersey winning three Stanley Cup titles from 1995 through 2003. But while the Devils became perennial contenders with Brodeur in goal and Lamoriello building his own personal fiefdom, they were also initiating the most dreadful era in National Hockey League history.
The Dead Puck Era remains a disgrace that the NHL has not yet fully recovered from and Lamoriello was its grand architect. Lamoriello has currently taken over as interim head coach of a Devils team that has proven to be unable to keep up in today’s faster and more skillful NHL. Whatever success the Devils have had this year has been based on that old Dead Puck Era formula of trapping the neutral zone. It has also opened eyes to where Lamoriello has been most effective and where he has fallen far short. It also puts into question the legitimacy for his 2009 Hall of Fame induction.
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An Iconoclastic and Effective Leader
To his credit, Lamoriello is, in fact, one of the greatest leaders in pro sports history. He took over a joke of a franchise in 1987 that had made the playoffs just one time since its berth as the Kansas City Scouts in 1974. Lamoriello quickly made the Devils into a perennial playoff contender and eventual three-time Stanley Cup champion. But he did so with tactics that helped damage the game and its national appeal with fans just at a time when the league began a crucial point in its history. The NHL would expand from 21 to 30 teams from 1992 through 2000 just as Lamoriello was perfecting his godforsaken neutral zone trap strategy. This eye sore bore style of play illustrates Lamoriello’s ineffectiveness at building a legitimately good team of skill and talent.
Lamoriello is celebrated as a genius, in the ever insular culture of the NHL, for having five guys stand in the neutral zone while clutching and grabbing the opposition. Such tactics did win the Devils three Stanley Cups. But those tactics also cost the league its TV deal with ESPN. The Dead Puck Era also stifled growth in the new Sun Belt markets where paint dry hockey was never going to be an effective sell, especially on television. While the league has since cracked down on obstruction and has since allowed the two line pass, it has not yet fully banished the trap. As a result, fans and TV networks that pay top dollar for NHL games can still be put to sleep, not to mention disgracefully ripped off, by the trap.
It is also worth noting that Lamoriello built his suffocating system with defenseman Scott Stevens as his top shut down defenseman. Yet, it is important to keep in mind that Stevens arrived to the Devils by accident due to arbitration, not because Lamoriello actually used any skill to trade for him.
Lamoriello has built a unique and interesting culture in New Jersey, but has also built a bastardized record that was built on a system that stifled creativity, choked off the skills and talent of the NHL’s superstars, and cost the league fans that still have not returned because of that unwatchable era of hockey.
The Real Genius of Lamoriello
Lamoriello is not to be considered a genius for the teams he built or tactics that he employed. Instead, Lamoriello should be celebrated for the true genius of knowing the insular clods that he was dealing with in the NHL leadership structure. Even as scoring dropped from 7.50 goals per game at the start of the 1990s to less than five goals per game in 2004, the clueless NHL sat around in befuddled bewilderment, even as TV ratings plummeted and games became unwatchable.
ESPN was thrilled to get the NHL contract rights in 1992 with such superstar scorers as Mario Lemieux, Brett Hull, Eric Lindros, and Wayne Gretzky. It was the dawn of a new and promising era that was instead surrendered to shutdown coaches and goaltenders such as Brodeur, who were allowed to wear king size XXL equipment and jerseys to vastly cut down on available net to shoot at.
By 2004, ESPN dropped the NHL like a hot potato and rightfully so. Finally, the NHL did wake up and smell the coffee after its lost season of 2004-05 with its rule changes that helped turn the tide and bring skill back to the game. It’s also no accident that the Devils are on pace to miss the playoffs for the fourth time in five years as the game continues to open up with more offense. Lamoriello has failed to consistently win in an era of offensive legitimacy.
Lamoriello Legacy
Lamoriello built a winning culture and ruthlessly exploited the cement headed leadership of the NHL to win three cups. But his actual ability to win legitimately is becoming a bigger question with each season that passes. Lamoriello is a Hall of Fame culture builder. He is far from a Hall of Fame builder of the game itself.
