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The New Jersey Devils plan on revamping their defense this off-season, and it appears we know who the first casualty of change will be.

Devils GM, Lou Lamoriello, has had one quick discussion, but no actual contract negotiations with veteran defenseman, Marek Zidlicky, according to Devils beat writer Rich Chere.

The Devils defense in large part is old, and immobile so letting Zidlicky walk rather than paying a 36-year-old on the decline makes sense to me. Zidlicky's point per game averages have been on decline for a couple years and his defensive zone play went from mediocre to becoming a huge liability.

New Jersey has options with what they want to do on the backend because of their depth and rich pipeline of NHL-ready, or near NHL-ready defenseman, and it looks like they'll use them.

As I wrote a couple days back, it's smart for the Devils to get younger on the backend and give the likes of Adam Larsson an expanded role, so they know what they have going forward, rather than re-signing fringe NHL veterans and trying to protect Larsson.

It should be a busy and entertaining off-season in New Jersey, and this will likely be the first change of many.

**

In case you missed it, why signing Andrei Loktionov to a one-year extension makes sense for both teams.

I posted a scouting report on draft eligible forward, Ryan Kujawinski, at TheHockeyGuys. You can view the report here.

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