Boston Bruins: Expect A Totally New Roster In October.
The Boston Bruins have played very inconsistent hockey this year. They’ve been the most Jekyll-and-Hyde team out there in the NHL (the rare exception being the Ottawa Senators who are just being Dr. Jekyll at the moment.) They’re hovering on the edge of playoff oblivion. With the talent the B’s have, that’s totally unacceptable.
The Bruins aren’t out of it. (At least not yet.) If they win against the New York Rangers (which is totally possible for the Black and Gold), and the Ottawa Senators lose against Toronto (which is a little less likely), then the Bruins kick the Senators out of the final spot in the East. Detroit’s five point lead isn’t insurmountable either, even with only eight games left in the regular season.
No matter how the final point totals end up, the 2015-16 Boston Bruins are going to look totally different then this year’s team. If the Bruins fail to get a playoff spot, the changes will be certainly more radical.
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“This is a team where we’re expected to win every year. It’s been that way for a while,” said Bruins forward Brad Marchand on the possible changing of the guard. “There’s a lot of pressure on this group, but with that comes pressure that you need to live up to it, and if not you’re forced to deal with the consequences. We understand that this is a big situation. If we don’t pull together then this is going to be a much different group next year, I’m sure. I don’t think anybody wants that. Hopefully we realize that, come together and allow this group to stay together.”
Marchand has been one of the few players that has played rather consistent hockey for the team this season. So it’s safe to say he’s staying. David Krejci, Patrice Bergeron are guaranteed locks to remain in Boston as well. Most of the no-trade clause squad will be sticking around (no matter how bad we may want one or two of them to go).
Currently, there are nine players that the Bruins still haven’t signed for next season. With nearly sixty-two and a half million dollars signed against a rapidly declining salary cap, the Bruins are going to have to let several players go by the way side. Gregory Campbell, Daniel Paille, and Adam McQuaid are members of the 2011 Cup team, they’ve all had rough seasons, and none of them have been signed yet. Unless they’re willing to take salary hits to remain in Boston, they’ll be among the early casualties to the Bruins roster.
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Ryan Spooner and Dougie Hamilton are future stars for the Bruins. Both of them will be expecting raises next year, and the Bruins will need to come up with the one million plus for Ryan Spooner and the high two-low three million for Dougie Hamilton. Unless they can get talked into taking the kind of contract that Reilly Smith and Torey Krug took before the start of this season. If the Bruins commit that kind of cash to these two players (and it’s in their best interest to do so), they’ll really be tight signing a few other players.
With so little money left, the Bruins will also have to let recent fan favorite Carl Soderberg go. The same with back-up goaltender Niklas Svedberg. Not enough cash, and the Bruins won’t be able to pawn off enough talent to clear the cap space.
If Matt Bartkowski is playing here in October, I’ll certainly be surprised. He’s had another season of struggles, and I’m willing to bet the Bruins front office’s memory is long enough to remember how he took them to arbitration at the beginning of the year. He’s gotten better, but he still has those games that you have to wonder what possessed Peter Chiarelli to ever trade away Johnny Boychuk.
The last player on the left is Brett Connolly. He doesn’t have a contract for next year. The Bruins put up two second round draft picks for a player who got hurt on his second day of the job. Earlier in the year, I predicted that the Bruins wouldn’t resign him. If the Bruins can get him signed for 750-800 thousand, then they will. Otherwise, he’ll be just another reason for the Jacobs family to start looking around for a new general manager.
After that, it comes down what Peter Chiarelli (if he still has a job) can wrangle out of other teams, and which players he can talk into waiving their no-trade clauses. Dennis Seidenberg said he was willing to go if the Bruins could move him. The only problem with that is if we lose Seidenberg, the trade team will hit the panic button and keep Bartkowski. With so few quality defensemen left in Boston, the Bruins may keep Bartkowski or McQuaid just to have enough to field a roster on opening night.
Changes will be made in Boston. Hopefully, they will be for the better.