Boston Bruins: Three internal options that deserve Alex Petrovic’s chance
The Boston Bruins have inked Alex Petrovic to a professional try-out contract. However, in doing so, I’d argue that they’re overlooking internal options on defense.
Now, you could make a strong case that the Boston Bruins management team are not overlooking their own drafted and developed guys at all, but rather attempting to stoke their fires by bringing added competition into the upcoming training camp.
A combination of that and requiring some contingency should there not be new deals for Brandon Carlo and Charlie McAvoy by that time. By contingency, we’re talking a player with more than a half-season of NHL experience; a comparative veteran instead of a rookie.
It’s fair to see it both ways; that the likes of Boston Bruins General Manager Don Sweeney are both protecting the team from potentially unsigned RFA deals, protecting the youngsters from being thrown in the deep end and also extended a branch to a player that has rightfully or wrongfully found himself on the proverbial NHL scrapheap at just 27 years old.
Taking nothing away from Alex Petrovic; he proved himself a perfectly capable third-pairing defenseman with the Florida Panthers and then found himself massively over-his-head when he initially arrived with the Edmonton Oilers – he plays his role as a fifth or sixth guy.
Unfortunately, you can use that exact same statement to justify why he shouldn’t be offered any sort of full-time deal, unless of course you can ship out either John Moore or Kevan Miller and secure him for a league-minimum salary.
Internally, the Boston Bruins have options that they should be turning to and offering reward for their hard work working through the ranks of the Boston Bruins organisation.
Jakub Zboril
Should he return to the AHL and not win a promotion this year, Jakub Zboril will mark his third season honing his craft with the Providence Bruins.
In year’s gone by, you’d say that he no longer had a shot, however these days when over-ripening prospects is almost the norm, you can safely bet that he will likely still one day make the Boston Bruins line-up regularly.
He did earn a two-game NHL call-up, making his big-league debut in doing so, last season but wasn’t able to make it stick; instead, Connor Clifton bypassed him and all of the other names on this list in winning a roster spot.
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As a first round (13th overall) pick in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, it’s clear that the Boston Bruins saw (and hopefully still see) Zboril as a real potential talent.
By delaying him from graduating to the NHL, they’re actually making him more well-rounded with his minutes in Providence typically erring more towards shut-down work as opposed to offensive zone starts.
You can make great claim that he could easily do the job on the Boston Bruins third pairing already, but giving him bigger minutes in the American Hockey League is going to make him fundamentally better in the long run.
As for deserving the spot more than Alex Petrovic, it’s a fair comment to make not only given his first round status but also as he has been developing his skills and improving in all of the areas the Boston Bruins have asked him to target.
You could write him off as a bust, but that’s unfair. He’s only four years post-draft year and the Boston Bruins have a ridiculously strong blue-line, provided of course that their two restricted free agents ink their new deals soon.
Jeremy Lauzon
Where Jeremy Lauzon really stands out is his ability to kill penalties; that alone could well put him in line for a call-up to the Boston Bruins sooner than any of the alternate options.
It’s also a role he’ll likely be competing directly with Alex Petrovic for as the former Florida Panthers defenseman has been known to play on the penalty-kill too.
Lauzon has improved his game over the past few years, defensively. He’s not about to blow the world away with huge points totals from the blue line, but equally he’s not about to make big mistakes and that, along with the special team role, could be his ticket to the Boston Bruins third pairing.
He actually earned, in part due to injuries, a solid 16-game stint in the NHL last season and didn’t look too out of place. He tallied a goal, only gave up a single minor penalty in that time and came out of it all with a minus-2 plus/minus score. Not bad for a 22 year-old experiencing the big-time for the very first time.
Jeremy also stands out for his leadership qualities; his final season of junior hockey he was given the captaincy of the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies and also was given an ‘A’ in his first campaign with the Providence Bruins.
Having only been around the American Hockey League for a season and a bit, you could make solid reasoning that he needs to continue to do what he’s doing and he’ll eventually rise up to the NHL, but if he has a strong training camp, there’s no reason he can’t win out in the battle with Petrovic for a spot in the Boston Bruins opening night line-up.
Urho Vaakanainen
It’s fair to say that Urho Vaakanainen is ready to take the next step, but he could actually find it challenging to step into the role that is available.
The smooth-skating Finn looks more likely to eventually be a number-three, if not number-two defenseman; starting as a number-six might actually be detrimental to him, especially when he can spend another term dominating as a number-one guy in the American Hockey League.
Like some many of his countrymen, he plays an incredibly smart transition game and is more than comfortable moving the puck. He adapted incredibly well to North American ice in his first season with the Providence Bruins and also earned a two-game spell in the NHL.
Debuting in the NHL in his first year in the United States would’ve been unexpected but now he needs to step up to another level at training camp and try to force his way into the top four spots.
You could make a strong argument to limit Boston Bruins captain, Zdeno Chara‘s ice-time and that’d open up space albeit a re-shuffle of the defensive pairings would be in order. Or maybe, you actually see value in partnering him with Chara as a third pairing that can handle minutes akin to a first or second pair.
Vaakanainen may well have the inside track on winning a roster spot this summer; hopefully he takes the arrival of Alex Petrovic on a PTO as a challenge and not as a sign of the team offering rewards to those that haven’t worked hard for the organisation.
All three of these guys deserve the chance; whether they deserve it more or less than Alex Petrovic will be determined when we see how they perform at camp.
Next. Could they use the Atlanta Gladiators as a viable pathway?. dark
If they shine and earn a roster spot, you can argue it’s because of Petrovic’s presence, likewise if they crack and flop under the pressure. Either way, it’s really up to the individual to seize their chance, whether they’re 21 or 27 years old, whether they have prior NHL experience or not.