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Boston Signs Brian Ferlin To Two-Way Deal

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According to Cap Friendly, the Boston Bruins have signed their final restricted free agent Brian Ferlin to a one-year, two-way deal that will pay the winger $725K at the NHL level.

Ferlin, a fourth-round pick who attended Cornell University for three seasons, made his professional debut in 2014-15, spending most of the season with the Providence Bruins.  He got into seven NHL games that season, but was limited to the AHL in 2015-16.

Not an offensive force, the 24-year old has 17 goals and 35 points in 83 professional games. He’ll look to improve on his all-around game in Providence this season, and try to crack Boston’s bottom-six at some point during the year.

Haggerty: Bruins Unlikely To Sign Vesey

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CSN New England’s Bruins beat writer, Joe Haggerty, wrote today that sources have informed him that Boston is no longer considered to be a top contender for college phenom and impending free agent Jimmy Vesey. While the Bruins remain one of the teams that Vesey has previously said he will speak with on August 15th when he can officially explore his free agency options, Haggerty does not believe that the B’s are a likely to sign him.

When Vesey announced that he would not sign with the Nashville Predators, the team that drafted him, and even after his rights were traded to the Buffalo Sabres, the Bruins were considered one of the most likely destinations for the reigning Hobey Baker winner. A hometown kid, Vesey grew up in the Boston suburb of Charlestown, and his father briefly played for the Bruins during his short NHL career. Vesey played his prep school hockey at Belmont Hill in the Boston suburb of Belmont, and then attended Harvard University during the past four years in the Boston suburb of Cambridge. Noticing a trend? Vesey himself has not been shy about his attachment to the city as well, stating that he is a lifelong fan of the Bruins and wears #19 as a tribute to Joe Thornton. However, what many don’t realize is not only the city of Boston familiar to Vesey, but the future of the Bruins is as well. Within the Bruins system currently is forward Ryan Fitzgerald, a childhood friend of Vesey’s from Charlestown who is entering his senior year at Boston College, defenseman Rob O’Gara, Matt Grzelcyk, and Matt Benning, who Vesey squared off against at local New England NCAA schools over the past four years, goalie Zane McIntyre, a fellow Hobey Baker runner-up in 2015, and even Harvard teammates Ryan Donato and Wiley Sherman. Harvard coach and former Bruin Ted Donato has also been rumored to be a top candidate for the Bruins head coaching job during hot seat periods for Claude Julien. Add in that Vesey is friends with Torey Krug and Jimmy Hayes and idolized the Bruins 2011 Stanley Cup team, which included current Bruins Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand, David Krejci, Adam McQuaid, and Tuukka Rask, and it seems as if the past, present, and future would lead many to assume that Boston has always been Vesey’s preferred destination.

However, if Haggerty’s sources are correct, that is not true and all of those connections to the Bruins are not enough to sway Vesey. He believes that the Chicago Blackhawks, New York Rangers, and New Jersey Devils have all passed up the Bruins, as well as the Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo Sabres, as the most likely destination for Vesey’s services. Since all of the teams can essentially only pay Vesey the same amount, his decision is all about fit and opportunity. Haggerty believes that the draw of playing alongside Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane in Chicago or Taylor Hall and the upstart Devils in New Jersey may be too much for Vesey to instead stay with his comfortable choice of sticking around in Boston.

The Bruins certainly have space for Vesey to play on the left side in Boston, with only 2017 potential free agent Marchand as a bona-fide top six player at left wing. Both Krejci and Ryan Spooner would love to have the Harvard star on their wing. Should Vesey choose to sign elsewhere though, the Bruins will not be out of luck. The team was happy with the production from Matt Beleskey last season, and was very excited by the play of AHL top goal scorer Frank Vatrano. It would also open up opportunities for the AHL’s second-best scorer, Seth Griffith, 2015 first rounder Jake DeBrusk and another NCAA dominant force, Danton Heinen, to make the team.

Regardless, Vesey is certainly a player that any NHL team would like on their roster and there is no doubt that the Bruins will make a strong push to sign him next week. Even Haggerty acknowledged to his Twitter followers that there has been little indication surrounding the eventual landing place of Vesey, and no team can be taken out of the equation before the courting process even starts. The “sources” surrounding the Vesey camp have been pegged by many as unreliable and inconsistent as well, so the Vesey saga will continue until the ink has dried on his contract. Keep an eye on this summer’s biggest story right here at Pro Hockey Rumors when Vesey hits free agency on Monday, August 15th.

Roster Crunch: Atlantic Division

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Over the past few days, we’ve looked at the final few spots on the roster for both the Pacific and Central divisions. This time, we’ll turn our attention to the East starting with the Atlantic.  This division will be in turmoil over the next few years, with clubs like the Buffalo Sabres and Toronto Maple Leafs going through slow, deliberate rebuilds, and perennial contending squads like the Detroit Red Wings finally starting to slow down.

Florida Panthers – While the Panthers have pretty much accomplished everything they set out to do this off-season – improving the blueline with Keith Yandle and Jason Demers, getting a capable replacement for Roberto Luongo in James Reimer, and locking up their young core – they failed in one, big $5.5MM way. Dave Bolland failed his physical and therefor couldn’t be bought out. He’ll try to prove he deserves some playing time this season, but may find himself buried in the AHL to make room for Jared McCann, the prize Florida received when they dealt Erik Gudbranson to the Canucks.

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Minor Transactions: 8/9/16

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Some news and notes throughout the hockey world:

  • Renaud Lavoie tweets that the Bruins have to come to terms with defenseman Chris Casto. Lavoie writes that the  deal is worth $650K and is a two-way deal. Last season, Casto spent the season with the AHL’s Providence Bruins, registering 23 points (7-16).
  • The Lake Erie Monsters are now the Cleveland Monsters according to the team’s official Twitter account. The Monsters are the defending Calder Cup champions, and are the affiliate of the Columbus Blue Jackets. The Jackets also released a statement via their website.

Bruins Notes: Junior Showcase, Hardy, Vatrano, Vesey

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Joe Haggerty relayed his thoughts on the impressive performance by the Boston Bruins’ prospects who took part in the National Junior Evaluation Showcase last week, including the three Americans that the Bruins selected early in the draft this past June. Defenseman Charlie McAvoy, the 14th overall pick who played in the United States National Development Program and is now a rising sophomore at Boston University, in particular caught Haggerty’s eye and continues to impress this summer, first at Bruins camp and now against even tougher competition, displaying both offensive skill and surprising physicality. Fellow first rounder Trent Frederic showed outstanding face-off ability and two-way presence, and second round defenseman Ryan Lindgren put on a solid performance. Over on Team Canada, 2015 first round winger Zach Senyshyn, who will try his best to crack the Boston Bruins lineup this fall, and 2015 second round blue liner Jeremy Lauzon, both looked good. Surprise addition to the Swedish team, 2016 sixth rounder Oskar Steen, was also flying around the ice all week. Haggerty opines that McAvoy may already be the Bruins top prospect, and that this Junior Showcase crew, as well as top prospects like Jakub Zboril, Jake DeBrusk, Jakob Forsbacka-Karlsson, Brandon Carlo, Danton Heinen, and more represent a very bright future for a Boston team that has had its fair share of struggles of late.

  • The Director of Player Personnel for the U.S. National Development Program who worked with McAvoy, Frederic, and Lindgren is now joining them as a member of the Bruins organization. Ryan Hardy, who has also worked in the USHL, NAHL, and NCAA, was primarily in charge of recruiting and evaluating young talent for the USNTDP and will be asked to put those tools to work as a scout for Boston. His New England roots, having grown up in Connecticut and worked as an assistant coach for Sacred Heart University, seem to have made his link to the Bruins an inevitability as he rose through the ranks of the hockey world
  • Another local kid who worked his way on to the Bruins is Frank Vatrano, who was recently profiled by the Professional Hockey Player’s Association. A native of Longmeadow, Massachusetts who played his youth hockey for the Boston Jr. Bruins, played in the USNTDP, and then attended Massachusetts’ flagship school at UMass – Amherst, Vatrano predictably is a lifelong Bruins fan. The article goes into detail on his excitement to be signed by Boston after his first full season in Amherst, and the Bruins could not be more excited with how Vatrano has developed. In his first pro season, Vatrano led the American Hockey League with 36 goals, and amazingly he did it in 36 games. He finished 19th in AHL scoring, despite playing in half as many games as the majority of players who finished in the top 20. His presence helped Providence Bruins teammates Seth Griffith, Alexander Khokhlachev, and Austin Czarnik finish alongside him in the top 20 as well. When Vatrano wasn’t lighting the AHL on fire in 2015-16, he was contributing at the NHL level, with eight goals and three assists in 39 contests with the big Bruins. Now in 2016-17, Vatrano will be given every chance to earn a full-time role and a full 82 games in Boston, where they hope that his impeccable scoring ability continues.
  • The Boston Globe’s Fluto Shinzawa suggests several local possibilities to replace the recently departed Keith Gretzky as the Bruins’ Director of Amateur Scouting. From Cape Cod to the Berkshires, amateur scouts from around the NHL reside in Massachusetts and may be up for a promotion and more convenient commute to Boston. The most interesting candidate he mentions though is Jim Vesey, a former Bruin who is currently an amateur scout for the Toronto Maple Leafs, and yes, of course, is the father of Harvard star and impending free agent Jimmy Vesey.

Week In Review: 8/1/16 – 8/7/16

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August is generally the quietest month of the entire calendar year for hockey news stories. The first week certainly reinforced that notion with little in the way of compelling story lines. Nonetheless, here’s your roundup of the week’s news.

Notable UFA Signings

Sam Gagner (Blue Jackets) – One year, $650K

Key Prospect Signings

Olli Juolevi (Canucks) – ELC – Three Years, $925K AAV with $850K in Schedule A bonuses available and $600K in Schedule B bonuses for the 2017-18 season.

Coaching/Management Hires

Former NHL players Jay Leach and Trent Whitfield were added to the coaching staff of the AHL Providence Bruins.

Las Vegas made a number of hires as they fill out their front office. Kelly McCrimmon becomes the team’s assistant GM, while Wil Nichol, formerly a scout in the Washington organization, was hired as the club’s director of player development.

Overseas Transactions

Marc-Andre Bergeron, who appeared in 490 NHL regular season games and tallied 253 points primarily filling the role of power play specialist for seven NHL clubs, was released from his contract with Zurich in the Swiss League.

Questions On Four Players On Expiring Contracts

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It’s just under eleven months until the 2017 free agent period, but the concerns about players on expiring deals should already be starting. Many bigger names sign quickly once they’re eligible to, a year in advance. This year, we’ve already seen Lightning defenseman Victor Hedman and Stars forward Jamie Benn signed to long-term extensions.

Those are contending teams extending superstars who are obviously in their prime. Not every good player on an expiring contract is such an obvious case. Here are four players whose contracts will expire after this season, and what their teams might think about them.

  • Brad Marchand – Marchand is a great player, who scores goals, agitates, and plays well defensively. Coming off a 37 goal season, he’s in line for a pretty big contract. Still, he’ll be 29 when his contract expires next July, and the Bruins are going to have to reckon with where they are as a franchise. They have plenty of cap room, but should they miss the playoffs for a third straight year, it might be time to rebuild. Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron, and Tuukka Rask aren’t getting any younger. It’s not that Marchand is old, or has to be moved. The question is whether to give the kind of term that will likely be demanded from a player who will be well into his thirties at the end of a rebuilding effort.
  • Ben Bishop – Bishop has been the subject of trade speculation all summer. The Lightning are serious contenders, winning five playoff rounds in two years, and aren’t looking to give away key players off their roster. The dilemma is about his salary, and the expectations around backup Andrei Vasilevskiy. The Lightning will probably give Vasilevskiy every opportunity to win the job, and if he does, trade Bishop at the deadline. Should Vasilevskiy be unable to demand the starting job, Tampa Bay could be forced to try to re-sign Bishop at the last minute.
  • Brent Burns – Burns has probably the fewest question marks of anyone on this list. The Sharks have managed to keep bringing back other stars, like Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau, despite their age, and continue to contend. Burns can play on the wing or defense, scores at a ridiculous rate, and was arguably their best player during their Stanley Cup run this year. The question comes down to price tag, and how much Burns wants to stay in San Jose. Given his teammates, their success, and the California weather, if they can make room, Burns should be in San Jose for a long time.
  • Kevin Shattenkirk – Another subject of trade discussion all summer, it’s looking less likely he’ll be a Blue this time next year. It’s just rare for a team to shop a player of his caliber if the team thinks they can keep him. Still, the Blues are really good, and it’s hard to see him being moved for prospects or draft picks. If Shattenkirk is traded before his contract expires, St. Louis will want back a scoring forward. There’s been speculation about Rick Nash and Taylor Hall, but the latter has already been dealt. Of all the players here, Shattenkirk looks most likely to hit free agency in 2017.

Snapshots: Hudler, Pirri, Vesey, Ward

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Much has been written about the best free agents available and Ian McLaren reports that of the top three teams should look at, one isn’t available until August 15th. Add McLaren to the Jimmy Vesey fan club as he lists him behind Jiri Hudler and Brandon Pirri as the three best potential additions to teams still kicking the tires. Hudler, McLaren writes, will come at a significant discount from the $4MM he made last season. He also notes that despite a fall off, Hudler still brings value to any team willing to invest in him. McLaren believes that Pirri is one of the more under appreciated players available. Pirri scored goals on limited ice time, and if given a bigger role, could show flashes of brilliance while also coming dirt cheap.

McLaren saves Vesey for last, listing the Maple Leafs, Bruins and Blackhawks as three of the top suitors for the 23-year-old Hobey Baker winner. The buzz continues to rise as August 15th approaches–the date that Vesey can meet with teams and make his final decision. McLaren writes that should Vesey’s college production continue into the pros, one NHL team will be rewarded handsomely.

In other NHL news:

  • Cam Ward’s best season may have been when he was 21-years-old writes NBC’s Adam Gretz. Ward, Gretz argues, played to a peak and rode a two month hot streak back in 2006 that backstopped the Hurricanes to their first–and only–Stanley Cup championship. Since then, Ward has held the Hurricanes back on more than one occasion, and last season, along with Eddie Lack, Ward was a prime reason the Hurricanes underachieved. Gretz writes that despite being a top 1o possession team, the ’Canes sputtered due to poor goaltending. He further points out that Ward’s numbers have been in the bottom third of the league for the past few seasons. It’s Ward’s year, he continues, to prove the Hurricanes right for their loyalty. Should Ward have even an average year, Carolina could be looking at a playoff appearance. But another substandard season could spell doom for both the Hurricanes playoff hopes and Ward’s playing time.

Salary Cap Report: Atlantic Division

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As the hockey world takes its collective breath before the World Cup, training camps, and the regular season begins, most teams have checked off their boxes and marked their ledgers. There are some teams not finished, as trades or financial meandering will be necessary due to cap crunches. Others have plenty of room.

We’ll start with the Atlantic Division, which houses the team with the greatest amount of red ink in terms of cap space–the Detroit Red Wings. Some interesting notes:

The specifics are below:

Snap Shots: Vermette, Havlat, Oilers, Vegas

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Yesterday, Arizona Coyotes GM John Chayka made the somewhat surprising decision to place veteran center Antoine Vermette on waivers for the purpose of buying out the final year of his contract. By all accounts Vermette didn’t have his best season in 2015-16 but still netted 38 points, including 16 on the power play, in 76 games. But in the club’s release announcing the move, Chayka cited the desire to give opportunities to some of the organization’s young players, including perhaps top prospects Christian Dvorak and Dylan Strome.

Regardless of why he’s now available, a player with Vermette’s track record is likely going to draw a fair amount of interest from other clubs. However, the Boston Bruins should not be among those teams, at least that’s the opinion of Joe Haggerty writing for CSNNE.com.

Haggerty argues that signing the 34-year-old Vermette doesn’t mesh with the Bruins’ desire to get younger. I’d argue there isn’t much of a fit in Bean Town since the Bruins already boast Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci at the center position. The team also added David Backes as a free agent and he comes with plenty of experience in the middle. Even if they decided to play Backes on the wing, Boston lists 24-year-old Ryan Spooner as a center and he is coming off a career high 49-point season. There just doesn’t seem to be room for Vermette on this roster.

Now, more from around the league.

  • The list of available free agents may increase by one as Allan Walsh, the agent for former NHLer Martin Havlat, has indicated via tweet his client is currently training with HC Kometa Brno in the Czech League with the intent of returning to the NHL next season. Havlat appeared in just two contests for the St. Louis Blues in 2015-16 before leaving the club for “personal reasons.” He had earned a job with the team after signing a PTO in October. Prior to his abbreviated stint with St. Louis, Havlat had skated in 788 NHL games, spending time with Ottawa, Chicago, Minnesota, San Jose and New Jersey. At one point Havlat was one of the league’s top young offensive players, tallying 31 goals and 37 assists for the Senators in 2003-04, playing most of the season as a 22-year-old. Those prolific scoring days are long gone and in recent seasons Havlat has produced roughly 0.5 Pts/Game. That doesn’t mean a team won’t take a flier on the talented Czech in hopes he can produce even at that level and hold down a regular spot in their top-nine on the cheap.
  • The expansion Las Vegas franchise continues to assemble its front office staff with the club announcing the hiring of Kelly McCrimmon as assistant general manager. McCrimmon, has been the majority owner, GM and head coach of the Brandon Wheat Kings of the WHL. He has won the WHL’s Executive of the Year award three times since 1995. It was reported earlier this summer that Las Vegas had requested permission from Washington to interview their assistant GM, Ross Mahoney, for the same role. Of course GM George McPhee knows Mahoney well from their days together in the Capitals front office so the potential fit was obvious. It’s not known whether Washington refused permission for Vegas to speak with Mahoney or if the club just elected to go in a different direction.
  • In other management news, the Edmonton Oilers are expected to name Keith Gretzky as an assistant GM, a recent rumor all but confirmed via tweet from Bob McKenzie of TSN. Gretzky is of course the brother of Wayne and has served as the director of amateur scouting for the Boston Bruins, where he worked under current Oilers GM Peter Chiarelli. Obviously Gretzky made a good impression on Chiarelli during their time together in Boston.

 

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