It's a long season and every team has its highs and lows. Nobody dominates the season from end to end. As long as they are playing well in February and start peaking the second half of March, they can make some real noise in the playoffs. I didn't expect them to be as competitive this year so it's a pleasant surprise, like the Yanks were in the summer. Still, defense is the weakness, and my biggest gripe with Shero thus far is still the lack of defense. He is only interested in signing scoring defensemen. We need a couple of stay at home guys. What the Devils always had when successful was three defensive parings that had a defensive minded guy paired with a puck mover, Stevens and Nieds, Daneyko and Rafalski or Albelin and Driver. Just a couple examples off the top of my head. The names and pairings changed over the years, but the fact that every pairing had a stay at home defenseman was always a hallmark of the D in front of Marty.