Boston Bruins Might Loan David Pastrnak For World Juniors To Condition Him Before Return
Greg M. Cooper-USA TODAY Sports
The Boston Bruins have been without their 2014 first round pick David Pastrnak for the last 19 games, and life has been fairly lonely for the young Czech forward. ”(Being injured) sucked most of the time,” Pastrnak said. “I called my mom. The biggest key was to get back with my brother and sisters and stuff. That’s pretty much what I did, especially the couple of times when guys were on the road. A couple times (I went to Providence to see a couple of guys. It’s hard to kill all the time, but I’m happy to be back on the ice.” David Pastrnak expressed that being injured in the NHL isn’t easy for any player, but for a 19 year old living alone in an entirely different country, he made it clear that it’s even harder. “Especially for guys who don’t have families and stuff, they’re here by themselves,” Pastrnak said. “and when you are injured, you just think of how lonely hockey is. So, it’s tough to be injured. You love the team. You’re with them every day, so it’s kind of something nobody wants to be.”
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With David Pastrnak missing so much time, the general consensus has been that the Bruins are going to likely assign him to Providence for a conditioning stint; but his conditioning stint might be more effective than simply playing in the AHL. General manager of the Boston Bruins Don Sweeney recently stated that the team was contemplating lending David Pastrnak to his home country of the Czech Republic to take part in the World Juniors Championship tournament which gets underway on December 26th.
“There’s a conditioning element that has to come into play on this based on the fact that he’s missed a lot of hockey. He’s been out for six weeks and that has to be a component in the decision.” – Don Sweeney
The priority for the Boston Bruins will ultimately be David Pastrnak’s health, as mentioned by Don Sweeney. “The option is that he’s back to full…that’s first and foremost. He’s closing in on that,” said Sweeney. “The next part is the conditioning element to this, and what’s best to get him back to full speed. The World Juniors are a component to this, but we’re looking at all options as to what’s available between now and when we would have to make a drop-dead decision based on the holiday roster freeze. That will happen over the next day or so.”
Puck Prose
Should David Pastrnak end up skating in the World Junior Championships, he will get an opportunity to not only represent his country at the international level, he’ll also be able to condition himself against the best players of his age group. Playing in the AHL is a good option to get players back into hockey-operation form, but the opportunity for Pastrnak to play in a tournament that involves such talented players from top-to-bottom of each roster, as well as the added pressure of the fact that each player is representing their own country, seems too good to pass up. Pastrnak should gain the most benefit out of playing at the World Juniors as opposed to the AHL, and that would bode well for the Boston Bruins who would gladly welcome David Pastrnak back to the lineup as soon as he’s healthy enough to return and has played some meaningful hockey to get re-assimilated to the workload.
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