Boston Bruins: 3 reasons Anders Bjork deserved to make the roster

The Boston Bruins have trimmed down their roster ahead of their opening night clash with the Dallas Stars and Anders Bjork is inexplicably missing.

Here’s a guy that has literally put his blood, sweat and tears into making the Boston Bruins roster and really looked the part in the pre-season. Of the guys sent back down to Providence, I think Anders Bjork possibly was the most surprising.

A tally of two assists in four games and seven shots might not scream game-changer, but the constant peskiness on the fore-check, forcing turnovers from the opposition suggested he was at least a chance of making the Boston Bruins opening night roster, potentially in a third or fourth-line role.

However, the decision has been made to sent him back for more time with the Providence Bruins as he hasn’t, to paraphrase Bruce Cassidy, managed to score consistently enough at the professional level and that was what he was drafted as; a scoring winger.

This could straight up be the management sticking to their guns on the guy and giving him a little ‘tough love’ so he can come back and hopefully give them what they want from him.

Or it could actually be quite a foolish move to not see that maybe his professional game is an fore-checking bottom-six guy, not a second-line scoring type.

Whether they’re right or wrong, I guess we’ll find out in due course, but here are three really strong reasons that Anders Bjork deserved a spot on the roster from the day one and not as an injury call-up later on.

Anders Bjork has persevered

Here’s an individual that has suffered some really significant injuries in his young career, and yet Anders Bjork dusts himself off each time and re-commits wholly to his goal of making the NHL full-time with the Boston Bruins.

In January 2018, Anders Bjork injured his shoulder in the Boston Bruins’ clash with the Anaheim Ducks; that injury would take six months to heal after surgical repair work. This occurred having missed numerous games the season prior due to another shoulder injury.

Now, you could argue that he doesn’t make the team because he’s shown himself to be prone to shoulder injuries, but fact is he showed up at the Prospects Challenge and now in pre-season for the Boston Bruins and hasn’t shown an inkling of the injuries lingering.

In fact, Boston Bruins head coach, Bruce Cassidy is quoted as saying, “he had a good training camp, good preseason, he’s healthy, bigger, stronger.”

For the coach to see that he’s not only stronger but also healthier suggests that surely this isn’t an issue and isn’t the reason for missing the cut.

If you’re Anders Bjork, you’ve got to see the demotion to the American Hockey League as another test of that perseverance. If he can jump this hurdle, the NHL is right there.

Given that in two seasons, he’s managed just 50 NHL games and 22 AHL games; it’s safe to say if he can persevere and manage a full 82 game schedule, the Boston Bruins are going to come calling next year, if not before.

It’s not like they go through whole seasons without needing injury call-ups after all!

Anders Bjork is the younger option

Given you can make arguments that Brett Ritchie and David Backes are stealing the roster spots from someone like Anders Bjork; you can make a very fair claim that the younger option might’ve been the best.

However, we all know that coaches across the league do love the balance, especially in the locker-room, that a figure like David Backes gives them. Here’s a guy that has been around the league a significant amount of time and has also been a team captain.

That sort of leadership is hard to replicate, despite the fact we know the Boston Bruins have plenty of leaders in their room; not least team captain Zdeno Chara and Patrice Bergeron, to name two.

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At 23 years old and able to play both the left and right wing, you have to question whether it would’ve been wiser to retain Bjork; however, it’s likely the sheer fact he isn’t a center that means he was moved down.

Backes, although not as good as he used to be, can fill-in at center in a fix. Bjork can’t really.

Brett Ritchie most likely made the team in light of his lack of injury history. Comparing his past two campaigns to Bjork, he’s played in 52 more games over the past two years and all at the NHL level.

Experience wins the day, even when you only tally the one assist in four pre-season games.

Given a little more time, Anders Bjork will surely be able to gain a greater level of trust from the coaching staff, but right now, it’d seem that he hasn’t quite done enough for his youthful exuberance to trump the tried-and-tested options.