Boston Bruins David Pastrnak sends strong message to 2024 free agents
After the Bruins were eliminated by the Panthers in the second round, David Pastrnak began the recruiting part of free agency early with a message to free agents this summer.
It is no secret that this is a huge offseason for the Boston Bruins. GM Don Sweeney has had this summer circled on his calendar for some time with the amount of cap space he will have at his disposal. He has some contracts coming off the book and he has some huge decisions on some players, to say the least, for the 2024-25 season.
Just who stays, who goes, and who comes in from outside the organization remains to be seen as it's going to be a fascinating month and a half until free agency starts. With limited cap space last summer and after Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci announced their retirements, 2023-24 was seen as a bridge year for the Black and Gold. What a bridge year it was.
Signing low-risk and what turned out to be high-reward free agents, the Bruins surpassed a lot of people's expectations and finished in second place in the Atlantic Division, one point behind the Florida Panthers. They took down the Toronto Maple Leafs in seven games on a David Pastrnak goal in overtime of Game 7 but fell in six games to a much more talented Panthers team.
Sweeney is going to have to pitch the future to any potential free agents, but Sunday morning at the Bruins exit session with the media, Pastrnak started planting the seeds in free agents about playing in Boston.
David Pastrnak begins offseason recruiting pitch
Sunday, Pastrnak, who said he played through reoccurring groin trouble this season, said that players should be excited to play for the Bruins.
People should be excited to come play for an organization like the Boston Bruins.
First of all, it's not surprising to hear that he played through an injury as he just didn't look. right at times, but his recruiting pitch to free agents is something that he's not wrong about. People talk about culture and the Bruins have it. You saw how big it was last season when Tyler Bertuzzi and Dmitry Orlov talked about it after the season came to a stunning end in the first round of the playoffs in seven games to Florida.
The Bruins have a young core to build around with Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy, and Jeremy Swayman and now it's just about surrounding them with talent with the cap space available. A top center, a goal-scoring winger, and another defenseman should be at the top of Sweeney's list. If he needs any help recruiting, Pastrnak has started and would gladly help out leading into free agency.
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