Dallas Acquires Langenbrunner

			2010/2011 NHL Statistics
To Dallas	Position	Age	GP	G	A	P	Years	Cap Hit
Jamie Langenbrunner	Forward	35	31	4	10	14	1	$2.8 million
--------------------
To New Jersey	Position	Age	GP	G	A	P	Years	Cap Hit
2011 Conditional Draft Pick

The New Jersey Devils have dealt their captain, Jamie Langenbrunner, to the Dallas Stars for a conditional draft pick on Friday.  The conditions for the draft pick are that if the Dallas Stars make it to the 2nd round of the playoffs or re-sign Langenbrunner before July 1st, the Stars would send the Devils their 2nd round draft pick in the 2011 draft, otherwise, the draft pick will be in the 3rd round.  If the Stars re-sign Langenbrunner after July 1st, the Devils would then send a pick the other way, likely because of Langenbrunner testing the market and likely taking on more money.

As the story goes, Langenbrunner and coach Jacques Lemaire have not had the best of relationships and coupled with a poor season to date, the process of moving the captain became fairly easy.  Langenbrunner agreed to waive his no-trade clause and then Dallas came knocking, just needing some final approval from the ownership situation and the deal was signed, sealed and delivered on Friday morning.

Langenbrunner is now returning to the team to which he started his career with and he should be bringing some good leadership qualities to the Pacific Division leading Stars.  I would imagine that an attitude adjustment will come with the move and there is plenty of hope that he returns to his scoring ways for the stretch run.

Friday marks the halfway point in the season, so the math should work out fairly easily, as the Devils have now shed the remainder of Langenbrunner's $2.8 million annual cap hit, giving it to the Stars, who had a pretty good chunk of space remaining.  With the Devils shedding some cap commitments, they should have a bit more flexibility in their line-up with players coming up and going down, while working their way to a spot where they could possibly activate players that are on the Long-Term Injury Reserve.

In the draft, this could only help the woeful numbers of Clayton C.'s team this season, who was counting on Langenbrunner for almost twice the points that he has thus far in the season, maybe even a few more. Of course, the Devils were nowhere near active enough offensively and now Langenbrunner jumps from the least-offensive team in the league to the middle of the pack, in terms of goals for.  That has to account for something.