Well folks, it starts tomorrow. Game one of eighty-two. To me, it really feels like Christmas Eve.

A bigger, stronger, and faster Devils team will take the ice tomorrow night at The Rock. Martin Brodeur will don the newly designed mask for the very first time as he resumes his quest to overtake Patrick Roy’s wins record. Brian Rolston & Bobby Holik will make their returns to the Garden State.

I’m drooling. The long off-season is finally over and for the first time in three years, Red & Black will christen the new season on home ice, and against a cross-town rival nonetheless. Home openers are great, but Home season-openers are even better. The Rock will be even louder and more decorated than last season, I’m sure.

I will be in attendance myself — section 122 / Row 12 on the aisle — stop by between periods or before the drop of the puck and we’ll have a beer and talk Devils! It would be great to hear from YOU - the readers - face to face and give me some feedback on what you would like to see more/less of right here at 2MA! While you’re at it, you could print out and bring a copy of THIS with you… I’d be happy to autograph it for you.

Make sure you hunt down Josh as well and tell him how awesome his 90’s Music Blog is and talk live-cap with him!

In all seriousness, tomorrow night can’t get here soon enough. See you all at Fan-Fest!!

Holy quotable Aerosmith, batman! Martin Brodeur has a new mask design!

Breathe…

I was just as shocked as you are. The main design of Marty’s world-famous mask will remain the same, but the devilish “J” that has always graced the upper part of his helmet, has now been changed over into an “MB30″ logo.

The new design relates to the new website Marty will be releasing soon: martinbrodeur30.com.

There are some great quotes and insider info about all of this over at Tom Gulitti’s Fire & Ice Blog.

A new look for a new style, perhaps?

You know what? I think Rangers fans are scared.

A mere two days away from the puck hitting the ice stateside for the first time this season and those Rag loving Wall Street types are torpedoing our economy into oblivion with the hope that maybe, just maybe, the entire country will dissolve in time to put off the hockey season, and as a result their inevitable demise. It’s gotta be that. Or the Russians.. Hmm.

Well I will not be deterred! It’s Devils season preview time baby!

Three days to go before the New (Old) and Improved New Jersey Devils hit the ice against the New York Islanders at the Rock. If you’re like me, you’ve read the 645 other season previews out there who are writing off the Devils as an aging group running an outdated system.

I say eff that.

Marty

Yes Brodeur is a year older. Of course we’ll need to address this in the coming years but I for one am not gonna even pay a passing thought to this considering he won the Vezina for oh, the 4th time in 6 years. Next topic.

The new old guys

I’m actually extremely excited to see what this offense can do this year. On paper I see it as a solid blend of experience and youth, speed and size. I think that in the second year of Sutter’s reign, the boys will come out with a lot more confidence and gusto working in his system that will produce a noticeable increase in goals with the addition of Rolston and Holik.

The retooled front lines could also fall completely flat, but after several lean offensive years and two years of epic collapses from my beloved Mets, I’m prepared to handle everything short of the top three lines tearing up their contracts on the ice and signing with the Rangers, Flyers and Islanders, respectively.

Oduya’s army

Oh the defense.. You know, I’ve got no idea on this one. They were so befuddling last year I’m not going to even try. Maybe someone taught Johnny Oduya to skate backwards. Maybe Paul Martin will step up and show the offensive prowess we saw glimpses off last year. Maybe Annsi Salmela will become the next Scott Niedermayer and alleviate the need for me to start calling him salmonella by mid-November.

Anything’s possible, I suppose. If I were a betting man though, I’d be placing my chips on the guy in net and the offense carrying this team forward.

The Tykes

Speaking of Salmela, the potential youth influx certainly bears watching. I think Lou and Brent made the right choices on Vrana and Salmela for opening night, but I’d also like to see what Matt Halischuk and Niklas Bergfors can do at some point in the season. Who knows, maybe if they take Matt Corrente off suicide watch after his miserable pre-season performance he could even make an appearance. Definitely a wait-and-see approach with the new guys though.

All-in-all, I’m optimistic. If the D steps it up I think we’re a cup contender. If not, we could at least make up for a terrible showing last year by beating up on the Rangers and Islanders in the season series. Friday night’s a great time to start. Go Devils!

P.S. Church claps all around to the Rags fans who will undoubtedly point out that they scraped by with a pair of victories against a Tampa Bay Lightning team that had played together for all of 35 minutes before the first game. Kudos.

I thought it would be another day or two before we saw the roster but Christmas came a little early this year! The Devils have trimmed their roster down to twenty-three, and it looks a little something like this:

You may notice a few surprises such as Petr Vrana & Anssi Salmela grabbing roster spots. Vrana ousted Rod Pelley who was assigned to Lowell of the AHL. To me, Salmela isn’t exactly a surprise… after watching him play live on Long Island last week I had a strong feeling he had earned a spot on the big team — especially after his off-balance rocket that beat Joey MacDonald to put the Devils up 3-0. Salmela’s biggest Achilles seems to be his puck control at the point, but the issue seems to be cleaning up fast and shouldn’t even be a problem once the puck drops on Friday.

Speaking of Friday, the lines figure to look a little something like this:

- FORWARDS -

Elias - Rolston - Gionta
Parise - Zajac - Langenbrunner
Pandolfo - Madden - Clarkson
Rupp (Vrana?) - Holik - Zubrus

- DEFENSE -

White / Salmela
Mottau / Oduya
Martin / Salvador

Brodeur

I should also note that Fedor Fedorov has been placed on waivers. Apparently the Devils gave up on him and it’s not exactly a mystery as to why. The guy has a weak work ethic and that won’t carry you anywhere in this league, especially under Lou Lamoriello.

Although I can be quoted as saying that the team hasn’t done much to improve, I am ready to accept my helping of crow. After reviewing the roster and taking in a live pre-season game, I can see a noticeable difference in this years squad. They are bigger, faster, and a ton more aggressive than any team in recent history.

If pre-season was any indication, I think the Devils style this year will surprise many — players & fans alike.

Pre-season is officially wrapped up, folks, and it was a fun one. Where else would you get to see Brian Gionta go toe-to-toe with Mike Comrie?!

We’re officially 5 days away from the season opener on October 10th, and those 5 days will be the most exciting ones. The roster should be primed in the next few days, and we’ll have a bigger idea of who will be taking the ice next week.

Stick with us as we’ll have analysis from the whole crew here at 2MA, as well as some reader-submitted opinions as well! Details to follow tomorrow.

I can smell the ice!!

It’s been a pretty stellar pre-season for the Devils thus far, despite a 3-2 loss to the Washington Capitals last night at Prudential Center.

The Red ‘n Black roster, consisting mostly of Lowell regulars and a few main-stays, handled the competition pretty well. Considering that competition consisted of guys like Alex Ovechkin, Niklas Backstrom, and Michael Nylander — I’m alright with the loss.

Washington was able to grab a 3-0 lead in the third period, but the Devs were resilient, adding two late tallies thanks to Zach Parise and a Petr Vrana deflection. Kevin Weekes went the distance for New Jersey.

The next tour of duty for the Devils will find them in the Nassau Mausoleum tomorrow night for a 7:00pm faceoff. The contest will be the only home pre-season matchup for the New York Islanders. I’ll be in attendance, Section 325 / Row A for those 2ManAdvantage fans on Long Island

Martin Brodeur is expected to play the full contest tomorrow night.

I’d like to thank everyone who dropped by and hung around for the Live-Cap of the Devils/Rangers game a few nights ago.  As you may have noticed, we’re toying with something new as far as the structure of our Live-Cap is concerned.

Frankly, the maiden voyage has generated some mixed reviews.  It mainly breaks down like this:

But on a serious note…

- Those of you that attended and interacted in the Live-Cap had fun with it and seem to be giving it a thumbs up.

- Readers who checked it out after everything was wrapped up (I happen to fall into this category) are generating the more negative responses.

There are also plenty of readers I’ve spoken to that need to see some more of it before they can form an opinion.

This being the case, I wanted to let all of our readers & fans know that we truly appreciate your feedback on the matter and we assure you that we are listening to your advice and we will be trying different approaches, set-ups, and structures for our Live-Caps for the remainder of the pre-season.  We would love it if as many of you as possible could get involved and be a part of the process.

More or less, we’d like to use the comment-thread for this post as a braindump for you and ourselves to share ideas and explore some possible improvements.  So get to typing!!

I’d also like to point out that there is not necessarily a definite change taking place to the Live-Cap structure.  It’s very possible that we could end up using the original format, thus wasting our time after all. ;)  Hey, change isn’t always a bad thing.  Just ask Larry Robinson.

Thanks again for getting involved, 2MA loves you!

Click Here for tonight’s Devils/Rangers LIVECAP! (LiveCap will launch in new window)

Dear sir or madam,

The gentlemen and lady of www.2manadvantage.com request the honor of your presence the evening of September the 24th, 2008.  The occasion marks the first world-famous 2MA LiveCap of the 2008-09 National Hockey…

Ah screw it, I can’t do high-class.  Let me start again:

YOU!  ME!  LIVECAPPING!  TOMORROW NIGHT!  BE THERE OR BE…ELSEWHERE!

In all seriousness, the first livecap of the season will take place tomorrow night for the Devils home pre-season opener against the Rangers.  Be here around 7ish.  I have intentions on testing out what I believe will be a new, improved LiveCapping format.  What will be so awesome about it?  Well, for one, I’ll see your comments in real-time and will be able to approve them the second you make them.  That’ll speed up the conversation.  Also, everything (should) occur in real-time - no more refreshing the page for updates.  If Steve, Joe, Scott, or maybe even Patty happen to be around, they’ll be able to LiveCap right there with me - literal 2 Man Advantage LiveCap!

In the end though, it’ll be your feedback that will decide whether we move to this new program full-time or revert to the format of years past.  So please, come check it out tomorrow night and let me know what you think.  I’m optimistic that it’s going to be awesome.

See y’all tomorrow night!

Pre-season action begins tonight! Wee!

That’s right ladies and gents, our boys will be suiting up for their preseason opener tonight in Philadelphia, which means we are one gigantic step closer to beginning the season in earnest.

Word on the street is that the Flyers will be streaming the game tonight on their website, which may be the only way any of us will be privy to this contest. If you can’t stomach listening to a pair of radio hosts gush about how fantastic (terrible) an idea it was to sign Mike

Richards for the next three centuries, Tom Gulitti says he’ll be giving period by period updates over on Fire and Ice, so check that out.

Speaking of everyone’s favorite Devils’ beat writer, Gulutti reports that none other than Kevin Weekes will be in net this evening! This of course means three things:

1. We totally have an excuse to use the Weekes laser beam photo.
2. Weekes has completely recovered from the torn bicep muscle he sustained lifting books of crossword puzzles every night on the bench last year.
3. This will be the last time this season the poor dude will see any playing time before March.

In other news, Gulitti also reported this afternoon that one of the line combos will be a trio of youngsters, with Petr Vrana centering a line with Fedor Fedorov and Nicklas Bergfors. Also expected to get substantial time (including some PP action) are Tyler Eckford and Matt Corrente.

Gulitti reports that Mr. Sutter will also try out Brian Rolston on the point during the powerplay (as he should) and Bobby Holik on the top powerplay unit (WHAT…THE…F%*&). No word on if my personal favorite Matt Halischuk will be playing, but i’ve heard he’s been turning heads at camp so I certainly hope so.

At any rate, we’re a mere two and a half weeks from dropping the puck for the start of the season and I can speak for all the 2ma staff when I say it’s about effin’ time. Keep it here for updates as we hurtle towards another New Jersey Devils season.