Taylor Hall to make Coyotes debut Tuesday vs. Sharks

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Taylor Hall, traded from the New Jersey Devils to the Arizona Coyotes on Monday afternoon, joined his new team in San Jose on Tuesday morning and will play against the Sharks.

Hall flew to California in a private plane sent by team owner Alex Meruelo and participated in the morning skate. He will play on a line with center Christian Dvorak and winger Phil Kessel against the Sharks. He is also slated to join the first power-play unit with Dvorak and Derek Stepan.

Hall had a quick media availability after the morning skate and confirmed that there was never a contract offer from Devils general manager Ray Shero before the trade.

"Ray is a patient guy and wanted to see how the year went," Hall said. "I was in the same boat."

The Coyotes sent a conditional 2020 first-round pick, a conditional third-round pick, AHL centers Nate Schnarr and Nick Merkley, and junior defenseman Kevin Bahl to New Jersey for Hall and AHL center Blake Speers.

The Devils are retaining 50 percent of Hall's $6 million cap hit for the Coyotes to fit him in. Shero said the rush to trade Hall, who was a healthy scratch in the Devils' last two games leading up to the deal, was due to the size of the market for him now vs. at the trade deadline, when more teams might have fallen out of the playoff race.

"It was the right time. For Taylor's standpoint, it's important for clarity and important for clarity for us," Shero said. "But if the right deal wasn't there, we would have waited."