The negative influence of the Devils' "neutral zone trap" in the 1990s is really a myth -- along with the notion that it "made the game so slow that it was nearly unwatchable." The Devils simply executed a trapping (and counter-attacking) system that had been perfected two decades earlier by the Montreal Canadiens. It's no coincidence that the Devils adopted this system in 1993-94 when they hired Canadiens' Hall of Famers Jacques Lemaire and Larry Robinson as head coach and assistant coach, respectively.
Nobody ever thought the Canadians were a slow, dull, excessively defensive team back in their heydey -- and the reality is that the Devils weren't, either. Let's take a look at the Devils' track record during their dominance of the 1990s . . .
1. 1993-94 was the first year of the Lemaire/Robinson regime. The Devils finished second in the Eastern Conference and made it to the conference finals before losing to the eventual Stanley Cup champion Rangers in a seven-game conference final that may have been the best playoff series ever played. New Jersey scored 306 goals that year . . . which was #2 in the NHL behind Detroit, and seven more than the Rangers -- who supposedly played an "exciting, offensive, wide-open" system that (for some reason) was described as an exciting contrast to the "dull, defensive, stifling" system of the Devils. Go figure. The Devils had 14 players with 10 or more goals that season -- an indication of just how much emphasis the team placed on solid depth instead of high-priced superstars. That lack of superstar offensive talent over the last 15 years is probably the major reason why the myth of a "slow, boring" Devils team has perpetuated for so long.
2. The Devils struggled offensively in the strike-shortened 1995 season, but that was mainly due to the offensive problems of three key forwards: John MacLean, Stephane Richer, and Claude Lemieux. They played the season with their 1993-94 roster largely intact, with a couple of key exceptions: (a) center Bernie Nicholls was no longer on the team, and (b) Scott Stevens was no longer expected to play an offensive-oriented style of play as a defenseman (he had been the team's leading scorer in 1993-94). In 1995, a trade for playmaking center Neal Broten (from Dallas) brought their slumping wingers to life, and a trade-deadline deal for Shawn Chambers gave them the third "offensive" defenseman they had been missing all season long. The rest is history . . . in the Stanley Cup finals they walked all over the heavily-favored Detroit Red Wings in a series that was so one-sided that Detroit only had two leads in the four-game sweep. The Devils scored 16 goals in the finals that year -- hardly a case of "dull, boring hockey."
3. The Devils certainly played a lot of dull, boring hockey for several years after that -- and they weren't very successful, either. They missed the playoffs in 1996 (the last time they failed to make the playoffs, to this day), then lost in the first or second round to teams that seemed vastly inferior (on paper, at least) for several seasons.
4. 1999-2000 brought their second Stanley Cup championship in six years. The team scored 251 goals that year -- #2 in the NHL (behind Detroit again). This was the first year of the "A-Line" -- with Jason Arnott playing center between Patrik Elias and Petr Sykora. After the Devils beat the Dallas Stars 7-3 in Game 1 of the Finals (New Jersey would eventually win in six games), Dallas coach Ken Hitchcock was shocked at how fast the Devils were as a team . . . "This is the fastest team we've played all year," he said in the post-game interview -- which was all the more remarkable not only because of New Jersey's reputation as a slow, plodding team but because Dallas had already beaten free-wheeling teams like Edmonton and Colorado to advance to the Finals.
5. The Devils lost to Colorado in a seven-game Finals in 2000-01 -- a year in which New Jersey led the NHL with 295 goals. This was Year 2 of the "A-Line," in which Patrik Elias finished as the league's third-leading scorer (the closest a Devil has ever come to winning a scoring title, I believe). That team had as deep a corps of centers as I've ever seen (Jason Arnott, Scott Gomez, Bobby Holik and Selke Trophy winner John Madden), which was a major factor in their offensive success ("You can't match up against all of them," one coach said, "so Gomez or Holik usually plays against air.").
So I don't know where all that nonsense about "slow, unwatchable" hockey comes from as far as the Devils are concerned. Scoring declined league-wide throughout the 1990s for a number of reasons, and the neutral-zone trap wasn't even a big reason. A number of teams around the league adopted the trap mainly to compensate for their lack of talent, which was REALLY one of the main factors (along with superior goaltending and the shrinking size of the ice surface as players got bigger) in the lack of scoring during that era.
Are you trying to say the negative influence of the neutral zone trap as it pertains to the Devils only is a myth? Even if that is your argument, I would tend to disagree as the Devils obviously were the “best” at using the trap. Due to the success of the Devils with its use, every team began to run a form of it, and you cannot tell me that the game on the whole did not slow down considerably. I believe overall viewership dropped as well during this time period because hockey, all of a sudden, became boring. And if it weren't such a problem, then why did the NHL remove the two line pass rule and begin implementing obstruction penalties to a greater extent? Obviously, the NHL was tipped off that the game had changed substantially to the detriment of the fan base. Otherwise, why open the game up as they did?
And in regards to the lock out season, I didn't say that the lockout itself was not a necessity. I was pointing out that it wasn't a particular high point in the life of the NHL when Roenick told the fans - the actual people who pay their outrageous ticket prices - to “kiss his A$S.” Further, I believe that the fact that ticket prices didn't come down after the lockout - notwithstanding the implementation of salary caps - is another black eye for the league.
But not to get away from my main point, all of these problems and the Flyers’ Cups in the 70s were the low point of the NHL? Sorry, I do not buy that one.