The Bruins future is wide open
Today was bitter sweet for the Bruins. This morning we got news that Taylor Hall had all but signed a 4 year deal with a $6 million AAV. By all accounts and in most years that’s a freaking steal. I would offer caution though. This year’s NHL offseason promises to get complicated. I am actually not sure Hall gets much more than that on the market. More on that later.
As the morning moved along NHL insiders continued to ruin the upcoming expansion draft with reports on who was being selected. To the point that we had a full list of the Kraken roster by noon. I wonder how those initial ESPN NHL Draft ratings were? To the greater point we were informed Jeremy Lauzon would be selected by the Kraken, leaving an even bigger hole on the left side of the defense for the B’s that was already quite thin to begin with. This was really a worse case scenario for the Bruins. I was hoping Seattle got duped into Ritchie’s 15 goals and were looking for a 10,000 lb anchor in the playoffs.
But, don’t fret though kids. We don’t have to look far for help. How about just a few miles south, to a little land of fantasy and championships called Foxboro.
I ask, Are the Bruins uniquely positioned to handle free agency similar to the Patriots? Covid has created a Crisis in the professional sports financial world. Earlier this year we saw Bill Belichick in the New England Patriots spend a quarter of $1 billion in free agency. A majority of the teams had a salary structure anticipating the salary cap continually going up and when it didn’t a majority of teams were not in a position to compete with the Patriots offers plus there were several cap “casualties” across the league. Similar to what we are now seeing in the NHL.
This unprecedented offseason — a chaotic confluence of league expansion and salary-cap stagnation — is going to redefine how teams are built, change how assets are valued and set a precedent for offseasons to come.
Salary management is the biggest priority, far bigger than ever before. The cap will be stuck at $81.5 million in 2021-22 for a third consecutive season, a far cry from the $88 million-$90 million many general managers expected when signing stars to large contracts two or three years ago.
Many teams are crunched against the cap with no relief in sight, many players now carry negative trade value because of their cost-inefficient contracts and the rare cap-space chunks that do exist are now almost more valuable vacant than filled with actual players.
Ryan Suton and Keith Yandral are two names that come to mind at this point when considering the Bruins and their need for left shot defenseman especially now with Lauzon suiting up for the Kraken. It has been reported that the Bruins are heavily in on Suton. I’d say do as Bill does and set the market for the guy you want. Because you can.
The Bruins have about $26 million in space which is the 11th most in the NHL. However, if they just trade that bag of dicks, DeBrusk for an airfryer and waffle cone the Bruins can leap frog to a top 5 Cap position with upwards of $30 million dollars available to spend in an upside down market. It’s like NHL Free Agency is taking notes from 2008 housing market.
Clearly, the perceived value of players in the league already has flipped. And that trend is unlikely to change Wednesday because the Kraken are seemingly planning to pass on most of these exposed high-profile stars.
“The one thing we think is extremely valuable in this environment is cap space,” Kraken GM Ron Francis said Sunday. “We’ve got $81.5 million . . . [and] we want to make sure we take advantage of [that].”
The most prominent victims will be the unrestricted free agents hitting the market July 28
That reality will become particularly obvious because the 2021 UFA class is the most loaded in recent history: Dougie Hamilton, Alex Ovechkin, Gabriel Landeskog and Taylor Hall sit at the top, but solid role players such as David Savard, Mike Hoffman, Ryan Murray and Petr Mrazek can’t even crack the top 20. The few teams with substantial space to spare — including the Hawks to an extent and the Kraken most of all — could rake in talent on the cheap.
Taking all this into consideration you have to feel confident in bring back your own guys cheap based on Sweeney’s track record. With their latest signing of Brandon Carlo to an under market deal and now Taylor Hall reportedly watching his proverbial figure, taking a small little sliver of the pie, Don Sweeney continues to be the king of home town deals. Thus, leaving a nice chunk of change to do damage in the open market.
Point being the Bruins are in a position where they have one of the most robust salary caps in the league and a desirable location. The only problem is this free agency class is garbage, hence why the buy out market is becoming so important. It looks like and feels like stars are aligning for them to revamp their team in a way the Patriots did. Aggressively flipping the roster in areas of need
This is what I would like to see. Blow out the low end “talent” on this team and revamp your roster with free agents and buyout candidates for a couple Cup runs in the short term while you revamp your system through the draft. Players should be looking for short deals anticipating the cap moving back up in a couple seasons as soon as those FAT ESPN checks start to clear and the FAT Owners have recouped their “losses”. Take advantage Sweeney. Neely. Do it.
P.S. If this all works out as well as it has in my head, I’d just like to say, Thanks Covid sincerely the Boston Bruins
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