Pete DeBoer is not to blame for this Devils mess

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. –

Some of my fellow New Jersey Devils fans are fickle. Some are beyond fickle. Some are embarrassingly fickle.

Perhaps I realized this most after tonight’s loss, a 3-0 dead-effort against the Winnipeg Jets. After the game, the comments on Devils pages – especially on Guilitti’s Fire and Ice blog – were hilarious.

And most of them were calling for Peter DeBoer to be fired – like yesterday.

Yet, here’s the problem: What’s going on right now is not DeBoer’s fault at all – it all rests squarely on someone else's shoulders. And as usual, the coach likely will be shown the door.

This is what has happened countless times since the Devils last won a Stanley Cup in 2003.

At first, it was because the Devils had very good regular-season teams. They’d often have 100-point regular seasons and would go on to lose in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. We called those teams “underachievers.”

Then there was the John MacLean team – a spectacularly talented team that underachieved early and often – and then stormed back, under Jacques Lemaire, to barely miss the post-season.

There were musical coaches. Pat Burns, Claude Julien, Brent Sutter, Jacques Lemaire, MacLean, Lemaire again – and now DeBoer.

And now fans want the only coach to get the Devils to the Finals since 2003 to get the boot, to add on to the long list of coaches who have come here and who have not won a championship.

Peter DeBoer is the only coach of the Devils in the last decade-plus to win three rounds in the post-season. With little talent, he was always on the cusp of making the playoffs in Sunrise, Fla. Now, he’s got less talent than he ever had in Florida – and suddenly, the guy’s to blame for an 0-3-3 start.

No, Peter DeBoer is not to blame. And while I believe more blame rests on the shoulders of Lou Lamoriello, the truth is the Devils are in the mess they’re in now because of years of horrible leadership at the very, very top. That leadership, in Jeff Vanderbeek, is now gone, however.

But it’s not possible to recover from something like that overnight. Or in a year perhaps. It takes substantially longer.

There’s a reason why many experts picked the Devils to finish last in the Metropolitan Division. There’s a reason why many of them picked the Devils to finish 29th or 30^th in the league. It’s because that’s exactly what they are.

One of the worst teams in the NHL.

And one off-season won’t fix that.

Nor will a new coach.

Nor will Lamoriello overnight.

It’s going to be a long season … and perhaps it’ll be even longer than just a year.

Thing is – DeBoer’s not to blame.

And to do so is absolutely disingenuous.