Bruins And Pavel Zacha Making Progress On Contract Talks
While Pavel Zacha filed for arbitration earlier this month, it appears that there’s a good chance that his case won’t come to a hearing. The center’s agent – Darren Ferris of Quartexx – told Steve Conroy of the Boston Herald (Twitter link) that a new deal for his client “should be completed in short order”.
Boston acquired the 25-year-old from New Jersey just hours before free agency opened up earlier this month in exchange for Erik Haula. Zacha hasn’t been able to live up to his draft billing as the sixth-overall selection in 2015 but he has shown improvement over the last couple of seasons and is coming off a year that saw him collect 15 goals and 21 assists in 70 games with New Jersey; his 36 points were a career-high.
That was good enough for Boston to acquire and qualify him at a $3MM cost although that number is likely going to go higher on his next contract. Zacha is in his final season of RFA eligibility since he already has six seasons of service time under his belt so it stands to reason that the sides are working on a multi-year agreement at this point which would at least give them a bit of depth down the middle.
It would also give them the cost certainty needed to move forward with the rest of their offseason planning. The Bruins have stated their interest in re-signing Patrice Bergeron if the soon-to-be 37-year-old is open to returning for a 19th NHL season. They’ve also been in talks with David Krejci about bringing him back to North America. But until Zacha’s deal gets done, GM Don Sweeney won’t know what exactly he has left in cap space.
Either way, it won’t be much. CapFriendly currently projects Boston to have $4.758MM in cap room, the bulk of which will go to Zacha. Not surprisingly, Sweeney acknowledged earlier this month that if Bergeron and Krejci return, it will need to be on a low-salary deal with performance bonuses. They will likely need to clear out a contract as well, even with several veterans (Brad Marchand, Charlie McAvoy, and Matt Grzelcyk) likely to start the year on LTIR. Ferris also told Conroy that there’s “lots going on” so a Zacha contract may be the domino that gets things going on the rest of their offseason moves.
Bruins Re-Sign Jack Studnicka
The Bruins didn’t reach an agreement with Jack Studnicka by the time that qualifying offers lapsed on Friday but they didn’t need much time after that to sign him as the team announced that they’ve signed the forward to a two-year contract. The deal carries an AAV of $762.5K and is a two-way agreement for 2022-23 and a one-year pact for 2023-24.
The 23-year-old was a second-round pick of the Bruins back in 2017 (53rd overall) and has seen some NHL action in each of his first three professional campaigns. Last season, Studnicka played in 15 games with Boston, picking up three assists while averaging 12:35 per game. He was, however, more productive in the minors with AHL Providence, notching 10 goals and 25 assists in 41 contests, the best points-per-game rate of his three professional seasons.
Studnicka will have to pass through waivers next season to make it back to Providence and while he hasn’t had a lot of NHL success just yet with just a goal and six assists in 37 career contests, the fact he’s a young center with some experience would make him a candidate to be claimed off waivers if they tried to send him back down. Instead, it seems likely that Studnicka will be able to collect his NHL salary for both years – $750K next season and $775K in 2023-24 – by hanging on to a spot at the back of Boston’s roster while hoping to land a full-time spot in their lineup.
John Matisz of The Score was the first to report the contract.
Boston Bruins Hire John Gruden
The Boston Bruins have hired John Gruden (no, not Jon Gruden) as an assistant coach for the upcoming season, adding to Jim Montgomery‘s staff. He spent the last four seasons with the New York Islanders but was fired along with Jim Hiller (who joined the Los Angeles Kings staff yesterday) in June, after the team moved Lane Lambert into the head coaching position.
Gruden, 52, should be a familiar name to Bruins fans, who may remember his short stint with the team during his playing days. Drafted 168th overall by Boston in 1990, he played parts of three seasons with the team and was a star for the Providence Bruins of the AHL for a short period. Overall, his playing days resulted in just 92 regular season NHL games.
His coaching career though has been much more successful. As head coach of the Hamilton Bulldogs of the OHL, Gruden won the league championship and took the club to the Memorial Cup, before falling to Sam Steel and the Regina Pats in the semifinal. He parlayed that junior success into a role with Barry Trotz, where he was partly responsible for the huge defensive turnaround the Islanders experienced.
Now, as the Bruins move forward with a different staff, Gruden joins Joe Sacco and Chris Kelly as assistants under Montgomery.
Boston Bruins Sign Three Players
The Boston Bruins have signed three players, starting with Jack Ahcan, whose one-year, two-way contract was reported over the weekend. He’ll be joined by Matt Filipe, who has agreed to a one-year two-way contract with an NHL salary of $787.5K, and Ryan Mast, who has inked his three-year entry-level deal that comes with a cap hit of $850K.
Filipe, 24, was a third-round pick of the Carolina Hurricanes back in 2016 but never signed with the team, leading to an entry-level contract with his hometown Bruins after he finished his college career at Northeastern. This season, he scored seven goals and 17 points in 59 games for the Providence Bruins, not exactly the kind of numbers that inspire confidence in a future NHL career.
The 6’2″ forward did enough to earn a qualifying offer though, which is what he is signing today. The $787.5K may actually hurt his chances–if only slightly–of playing in the NHL next season, as he’ll take up more cap space than the average minor league call-up. Still, he’ll continue his development with Providence and improve on his numbers in year three of professional hockey.
Mast meanwhile was a sixth-round pick of the Bruins in 2021 and will be headed back to the OHL to continue his junior career with the Sarnia Sting. The 6’5″ defenseman has quite a few holes in his game but has shown enough–31 points in 59 games this season–that his size offers at least a bit of intrigue as a future professional.
Pavel Zacha Files For Salary Arbitration
The National Hockey League Players Association (NHLPA) announced that 24 players have filed for player-elected salary arbitration, the deadline for which came this afternoon. This list is not necessarily the final and complete list of players headed for arbitration, with clubs now eligible to elect salary arbitration until tomorrow, July 18th at 5:00 pm ET.
Mason Appleton (WPG)
Ethan Bear (CAR)
Jesper Bratt (NJD)
Lawson Crouse (ARI)
Morgan Geekie (SEA)
Mathieu Joseph (OTT)
Kaapo Kahkonen (SJS)
Kasperi Kapanen (PIT)
Keegan Kolesar (VGK)
Oliver Kylington (CGY)
Maxime Lajoie (CAR)
Steven Lorentz (SJS)
Isac Lundestrom (ANA)
Zack MacEwen (PHI)
Niko Mikkola (STL)
Andrew Mangiapane (CGY)
Matthew Phillips (CGY)
Jesse Puljujarvi (EDM)
Tyce Thompson (NJD)
Yakov Trenin (NSH)
Vitek Vanecek (NJD)
Jake Walman (DET)
Kailer Yamamoto (EDM)
Pavel Zacha (BOS)
Notably out of this list, Mikkola had previously filed for arbitration, but the two sides were able to settle on a one-year, $1.9MM contract that will leave the defenseman an UFA after next season.
A key distinction to add is that any player who has filed for arbitration is no longer eligible to sign an offer sheet, effectively taking the players on this list off the market. Three notable names that did not file for arbitration are Winnipeg Jets forward Pierre-Luc Dubois, Calgary Flames forward Matthew Tkachuk and Columbus Blue Jackets forward Patrik Laine. Though contract talks have been quiet on Dubois and Tkachuck, word of amicable discussions between Laine’s camp and Columbus has been made known. Once tomorrow’s club-elected salary arbitration deadline passes, teams and players will have time to prepare their cases before hearings begin, running from July 27th through August 11th.
Boston Bruins Extend Jack Ahcan
As reported by PuckPedia, the Boston Bruins have re-signed defenseman Jack Ahcan to a one-year, $750K deal. The contract carries a $115K AHL salary and a $125K total guarantee.
Ahcan, 25, is an undrafted defenseman who turned pro with the Bruins organization in 2020-21 after a successful college career at St. Cloud State. An undersized blueliner, Ahcan’s calling card has always been his offense. In college, Ahcan was a productive offensive player. Ahcan finished his college career with 103 points in 144 games and even captained St. Cloud State during his senior season.
Ahcan’s transition to professional hockey has been an up-and-down affair. He’s shown some promise at the AHL level, scoring 33 points in 65 games across two seasons as well as handling a top-of-the-lineup role in Providence this season that required him to weather time on the penalty kill as well as anchor the team’s power play.
But Ahcan’s size is an issue, as he stands just five-foot-nine and weighs 180 pounds, meaning he’s a risk to be too frequently outmuscled for pucks and position by stronger players. As a result, his NHL impact has been limited, and he found himself a Bruins healthy scratch this season. The coaching staff in Providence clearly trusts him, though, meaning there’s more to his game than there might seem to be if one looks just at his size and production.
Ahcan will head to training camp in the fall and have an opportunity to battle other defenders for an NHL job. Ahcan’s one-year deal is an indication that 2022-23 is a make-or-break year for the 25-year-old to show that still has the potential to be a full-time NHLer.
Boston Bruins Sign Four Players
The Boston Bruins have added some organizational depth, signing A.J. Greer to a two-year contract, according to Renaud Lavoie of TVA Sports. The deal will pay him $750K in 2022-23 and $775K in 2023-24, the league minimum in both years. The Athletic’s Michael Russo also reports the team’s agreed to terms on a “lucrative” two-way contract with Vinni Lettieri, one of the better skill forwards in the minors. The team also announced the signings of defenseman Connor Carrick and goalie Keith Kinkaid to one-year, two-way contracts worth $750K.
This deal should help the Providence Bruins more than the Boston Bruins, in all likelihood. Greer, 25, is an accomplished AHL scorer who has had very limited success at the NHL level. This past season, Greer scored 22 goals and 52 points in 53 games on the Utica Comets, good for third on the team. Greer is a big forward, standing at six-foot-three, 210 pounds, and uses that big frame to create space at the AHL level. At the NHL level, Greer has only played in limited-minutes, depth roles and as a result, doesn’t have a similar level of production there as he does at the AHL level.
The Bruins value their AHL affiliate and this signing is proof of that. Greer will have a chance to make Jim Montgomery‘s Bruins squad but will in all likelihood be sent to the AHL and be one of the AHL Bruins’ most important players.
Lettieri split the 2021-22 season between the NHL and AHL with the Anaheim Ducks. He finished the year with five goals and 10 points in 31 games, showing flashes of NHL reliability, and he also had 22 points in 24 AHL games. 27 years old now, the Minnesota native is building a long history of producing well in the minors.
Carrick and Kinkaid both bring NHL experience to the table and are valuable options in the case of injury-related recalls. Kinkaid takes the reigns as the likely starting goalie in AHL Providence, serving as solid insurance for an injury to either Jeremy Swayman or Linus Ullmark.
Boston Bruins Expected To Sign Dan Renouf
The Boston Bruins are getting some AHL depth on defense, according to Bally Sports’ Andy Strickland. They’re bringing in Dan Renouf on a two-year, two-way deal.
While Renouf’s a name most NHL fans aren’t going to be familiar with, fans of the Grand Rapids Griffins are certainly going to know his name. The 28-year-old undrafted player returns to New England for the first time since he manned the blueline for the University of Maine from 2013-14 to 2015-16.
Since turning pro, Renouf has been a steady, reliable defensive specialist at the AHL level. Last season, Renouf played 63 games for the Griffins, scoring 14 points. More importantly, Renouf played over 20 minutes per night and anchored the Griffins’ penalty kill. The Griffins’ shorthanded unit ranked 29th out of 31 AHL teams, but one has to consider the inconsistent goaltending the team received before pinning that all on Renouf.
Renouf has 23 career NHL games to his name and heads to Providence after a year where he played in four NHL games. He’ll likely be down on the list of defensemen GM Don Sweeney will call up when he needs to fill in for an injured Bruins defenseman, though that won’t stop him from likely playing a valuable role as a top-four defenseman and penalty killer on the Providence Bruins.
Boston Bruins Acquire Pavel Zacha
The Boston Bruins have made a move but it isn’t an unrestricted free agent coming to town. Darren Dreger of TSN reports that the Bruins have acquired Pavel Zacha from the New Jersey Devils. Zacha is a pending restricted free agent, and eligible for salary arbitration after his current three-year, $6.75MM (total) contract expires. Erik Haula is headed back the other way.
With another double-digit goal season under his belt–Zacha scored 15 goals this season after 17 in 2020-21–that potential arbitration award would have been rather pricey, and any multi-year deal would have been buying out UFA years.
Haula, on the other hand, has just one year remaining on his contract and carries a cap hit of $2.375MM. The Devils, who are in the mix for one (or more) of the biggest free agents available, will now have more money and more roster flexibility to use.
Boston, meanwhile, has now found another young(ish) forward to slot into the middle-six that can provide some secondary scoring and a strong defensive presence. Zacha does have plenty of experience at center, though he was deployed as a winger for much of this season.
It certainly doesn’t hurt that he hails from Czechia, just like David Pastrnak and the returning David Krejci. While that doesn’t mean he’ll find a new level, it will at least present some familiarity as he makes the transition to a new team.
Now the question is how much Zacha will cost for the Bruins, and where they find the cap space for all of the pending contracts. Patrice Bergeron and Krejci are both expected to finalize deals in the coming days, meaning this will only further limit the cap space available for general manager Don Sweeney today.
Free Agent Focus: Boston Bruins
Free agency is almost upon us. There will be several prominent players set to hit the open market while many teams have key restricted free agents to re-sign as well. Next up is a look at the Boston Bruins.
Key Restricted Free Agent
F Jack Studnicka – We’re using the term ‘key’ here loosely but that’s simply because Boston doesn’t have any pending restricted free agents that were full-timers in the NHL last season. Or were even in the NHL for a quarter of the games. The closest is Studnicka who got into 15 games in 2021-22 and 20 the years before but the 2017 second-round pick hasn’t been able to establish himself yet as a full-time NHL regular. Now waiver-eligible, Boston could look to make Studnicka an offer for the league minimum but on a higher AHL salary or even a one-way deal in exchange for keeping the cap hit down. Those deals are quite common for players in his situation and it should play out like that here as well.
Other RFAs: D Jack Ahcan, F Matt Filipe
Key Unrestricted Free Agents
F Patrice Bergeron – The soon-to-be 37-year-old has been a fixture in Boston’s lineup for the last 18 years, spending many of those as an elite two-way center. While he’s getting up there in age, Bergeron was still quite productive last season, finishing third on the team in scoring with 65 points in 73 games while winning the Selke Trophy for the fifth time in his career. If he was to test the market, he’d have no shortage of interest and could command a raise on the $6.875MM he made on his expiring deal. Of course, Bergeron won’t be testing the market and has made that clear already with his options either being re-signing with Boston or retiring; RDS’ Francois Gagnon reports (Twitter link) a deal has been agreed to and will be announced soon. With the Bruins having limited cap space and a desire to bring David Krejci back from the Czech league, Bergeron will need to take less than market value or an incentive-laden deal to work around their cap situation.
F Curtis Lazar – The other player Boston picked up in the Taylor Hall trade, Lazar had one of his best NHL seasons in 2021-22, collecting 16 points while recording a career-high 186 hits. He can kill penalties and has been close to a 50% player at the faceoff dot over the last three seasons. Gritty fourth liners always generate some interest on the open market and the 27-year-old should be no exception as he’ll get a contract that’s above the $800K he made in each of the last two years.
D Josh Brown – After having a limited role in Ottawa, the Bruins picked up the 28-year-old at the trade deadline to give them some extra depth for the playoffs. He rarely played the rest of the way, suiting up in just six games down the stretch and once in the postseason. While that doesn’t help his cause heading into free agency, Brown has shown over his four seasons that he’s a serviceable depth defender that can bring some physicality into the mix. He’ll have a bit of interest as a result.
Other UFAs: F Anton Blidh, G Callum Booth, D Kodie Curran, F Steven Fogarty, F Jesper Froden, G Troy Grosenick, F Cameron Hughes
Projected Cap Space
At the moment, Boston has just over $2.3MM in cap space which certainly doesn’t give them any room to work with while Bergeron and Krejci would need to take contracts that are well below market value. Accordingly, GM Don Sweeney will need to be active on the trade front to create some space if they’re going to be active in adding to their roster this summer.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images. Contract information courtesy of CapFriendly.