Category Archives: 2019-20 NHL season

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Dominic Tiano: How the new NHL CBA affects the Bruins

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Dominic Tiano is back with a helpful quick guide to the NHL’s recent extension of the CBA and how it impacts the Boston Bruins (specifically) and league writ large.- KL

The National Hockey League and the Players Association have agreed to a new six-year Collective Bargaining Agreement – a re-negotiation of the remaining 2 years plus 4 additional years. In the end, we have six years of labor peace moving forward.

First of all, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA Head Donald Fehr deserve an endless amount of credit for this accomplishment. They’ve taken their time, and while not everyone is happy, they’ve gone about this in the right way – something we can’t say about other professional sports leagues. The NHL has experience in work stoppages – for other reasons – and the experience to come out of them. And when they do, they come out stronger than ever. And there is nothing to suggest it won’t happen again.

So, what changes affect the Boston Bruins in the immediate future? Here are some thoughts on what that’ll look like:

Minimum Salary

Beginning with the 2021-2022 season, the minimum salary rises from $700,000 to $750,000 and again in 2023-2024 to $775,000. With Connor Clifton and Jeremy Lauzon’s new contracts taking effect next season, it’ll not affect them. The only player this will have an affect on is Kyle Keyser, who will get an automatic raise from his $733,000 in his final year.

35+ Contracts

They are a thing of the past. Under the old CBA, any player that signs a contract at the age of 35 has their cap hit remain if they choose to retire for any reason. This affects Zdeno Chara right away as he is set to become an unrestricted free agent. However, you can not sign a 35+ player to a two-year deal with a lower salary in the second year to lower the cap hit as it must be ascending in year two or beyond. It also comes into play with Jaroslav Halak who’s deal is a 35+ next season. David Krejci will fall under that in 2021 and Patrice Bergeron a year later.

NTC/NMC Trades

Under the old CBA a team acquiring a player with a no trade or no movement clause had the option to extend those clauses after acquiring a player. That is now gone and the clauses will automatically follow the player to his new team, regardless if he waived his clause for the trade.

Arbitration

There have been some tweaks to the arbitration process. Teams still have the walk-away rights they held under the old CBA. But under the new agreement, if a team exercises their walk-away rights, the player can choose to sign a one-year deal with the team at the offer the team submitted under arbitration. The player has 4 days to make his decision. Bruins eligible for salary arbitration this offseason are Anders Bjork, Matt Grzelcyk, Brett Ritchie, Karson Kuhlman, Brendan Gaunce and Wiley Sherman. After the 2020-2021 season, it comes into play for Ondrej Kase, Nick Ritchie, Anton Blidh and Brandon Carlo.

Conditional Draft Picks

While teams will still be able to trade conditional draft picks based on where they finish, conditional draft picks will be a thing of the past when it comes to players re-signing. In other words, you can no longer trade a conditional draft pick for a player on the condition he re-signs.

Free Agent Interviews

Under the old CBA, teams were allowed to negotiate with pending unrestricted free agents five days prior to free agency on July 1st. Remember Matt Beleskey and David Backes? Maybe the NHL has done the Bruins a favor by eliminating that period? It will certainly make free agent frenzy more of a frenzy when there are no pre-negotiations and it’s a free for all at noon on July 1st. This year, free agency will begin 7 days after the cup is awarded.

10% Salary Deferred

Players agreed to defer 10% of their salaries and signing bonuses to the 2023 to 2026 seasons and most of the questions I receive are centered around how it affects the cap. The short and easy answer is it doesn’t. By deferring 10% a year, the contract total remains the same, and hence, the AAV or cap hit remain the same. The only thing that is affected is the player’s share of hockey related revenues. So, no, the teams do not get a 10% break on the cap.

Front Loaded Deals

Ever since the salary cap came into effect, the NHL has tried closing a loophole exploited by general managers, and that is front loading deals – paying more in the first part of the deal and adding years at the end of the deal at a lower salary to lower the cap hit. The NHL has taken steps to reduce that and in the new CBA take it a step further. Under the old CBA, salaries could not drop more then 50% from it’s highest year to it’s lowest year. That is now at 35%. The Bruins typically stay away from such deals however, Brad Marchand’s contract would not be allowed under the new CBA. Marchand’s highest salary was $8 million (in 2017-2018 and 2018-2019) and his lowest is $4 million in 2024-2025. That is allowable with the 50% drop, but under the new CBA, the lowest salary would rise to $5.2 million. No big deal right now as those contracts will be grandfathered, but you have David Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy, Carlo, and Bergeron (among others) coming due under this CBA, so some creative bookkeeping lies ahead for Don Sweeney and Evan Gold. Not to mention it has thrown another wrinkle into possible negotiations with unrestricted defenceman Torey Krug.

One thing of interest here is that because of the uncertainty surrounding revenue and recovery because of the COVID-19 pandemic is that player agents and players may be looking towards backloading deals instead of front loading. With a cap on escrow now, it will greatly affect agents/players thinking here.

European Waivers

Under the previous agreement, players who had played in just one game in Europe would require waivers to sign and play in the NHL once the season starts. That has changed and now the player is exempt from waivers as long as a) he signs before December 15th and b) the team still owns his rights. The Bruins have several players that fall into this including Jakob Forsbacka Karlsson, Alexander Khokhlachev and more.

I must confess, I am not a lawyer but I have studied the CBA extensively over the years. The new legal document is not yet complete and may take months before all the legal language is completed and the actual CBA becomes available. All information comes from the Memorandum of Understanding signed by the NHL and NHLPA and is my interpretation.

2019-20 NHL season, 2020 NHL Entry Draft, Boston Bruins, Boston Bruins prospects, Jack Ahcan, Jack Studnicka, NHL Prospects, Podcasts, Torey Krug , , , , Leave a comment

Happy Independence Day- Random hockey thoughts on July 4 (podcast)

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4thofJuly

Hey, all-

Happy Independence Day aka Insurrection from the Crown Day!

It’s been a slow couple of weeks here with hockey news, so thought I’d throw up a podcast with some thoughts on prospects, free agency and the NHL draft lottery plus some other things about hockey.

It clocks in at around 45 minutes, so hope you’ll give it a listen.

Have a great holiday and we’ll be back with more content soon!

-KL

 

2019-20 NHL season, Boston Bruins, David Pastrnak, Jaroslav Halak, Tuukka Rask , , , Leave a comment

NHL making its way back

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Tuukka_Rask

Tuukka Rask (Photo courtesy of Alison M. Foley)

We’re not a straight-NHL news blog, so we’re leaving the reporting of NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman’s announcement of the league’s way ahead yesterday to others.

We can’t compete with the news sites/blogs who generate far more traffic than this blog does, but here’s the nuts and bolts as far as the Bruins are concerned based on what came out.

  1. They get a bye and will play the other three bye teams in the East (Tampa Bay, Washington and Philadelphia) to determine first-round seeding. Games to be played while the play-in series are ongoing, meaning the bye teams get their needed tuneup.
  2.  Hockey will phase back slowly with training camps not opening up until beginning of July at the earliest, assuming all goes well with the reopening. There will be a brief exhibition contest window before the play-in and seeding games crank up.
  3.  The NHL is figuring out the hub city model where the games will be played. Boston isn’t one of ’em, so where the B’s will end up playing is TBD.
  4.  Because they are not one of the 7 non-playoff teams (Detroit, Ottawa, San Jose/Ottawa, New Jersey, Anaheim, Los Angeles and Buffalo) nor are they one of the 8 losing play-in teams (TBD in terms of lottery winning percentages) not to mention the fact that Anaheim owns Boston’s 1st-round pick as a result of the Ondrej Kases trade, the B’s have zero shot at winning the 2020 NHL draft lottery, which will take place on June 26. The B’s won’t be picking first until the end of the 2nd round at the earliest, barring any trades that happen between now and whenever the NHL actually has the draft, so there’s not much point in speculating about any of this if you’re a B’s fan.

Overall, it’s good that the NHL is putting the plan in place to get things going. It’s a separate debate altogether about whether you believe the plan is going to work and/or it is worth it to go through all of this to crown a 2020 Stanley Cup champion or not- no matter what the league came up with, you weren’t going to get 100% agreement and acceptance. We’d rather have hockey than not, so that’s where we’ll leave it.

On another note- the statistical awards were made official yesterday too: The Bruins won their third President’s Trophy (1990, 2014) in franchise history with 100 points to lead the NHL when everything shut down. David Pastrnak was named co-recipient of the Rocket Richard Trophy as NHL’s top goal scorer along with Alex Ovechkin (48).  He just missed out on becoming the first Bruins 50-goal man since Cam Neely in 1994. Tuukka Rask and Jaroslav Halak took home the William Jennings Trophy, given to the goaltender(s) (25 games minium) with the fewest goals allowed, which used to be the Vezina Trophy criteria before the creation of the Jennings in 1982 as a necessity for the split of duties between two goalies and to allow for a subjective vote of one goaltender each year to receive top goalie honors. This is the third time a Bruins tandem has won the Jennings, joining Andy Moog-Reggie Lemelin (1990) and Tim Thomas-Manny Fernandez (2009). Rask and Chad Johnson just missed out on the Jennings to Jonathan Quick in 2014, but Rask did take home the Vezina hardware that year.

It’s a very superficial take on the news of the past 24 hours, but there it is.

 

"Then & Now" prospect series, 2019-20 NHL season, Boston Bruins prospects, Jeremy Lauzon, Providence Bruins , , , , , , 1 Comment

Jeremy Lauzon: Then & Now

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The Bruins prospects series rolls on with a player who might’ve been on the verge of graduating to NHL regular status when the 2019-20 season was put on pause. He’s an interesting profile to write because he’s finally paying some real dividends at the highest level.- KL

Jeremy Lauzon Then on Scouting Post:

Watch this Guy: Jeremy Lauzon July 24, 2015

So, why might Lauzon be the best between Jakub Zboril (13th overall) and Brandon Carlo (37th overall)? Like Zboril, Lauzon brings similar size and a mix of offense and defense. He’s more of a consistent competitor in my view, despite some reports of Boston’s top choice Zboril being “ultra-competitive” (I wouldn’t go that far based on what I saw in film study). Carlo is a massive rearguard who excels in a shutdown role, but I don’t know that he has the offensive skill/sense to be much of a consistent points producer. That leaves Lauzon as the best combination of the three- not as talented as Zboril or as big/defensively savvy as Carlo, but solid across the board and a gritty, hard-to-play against -d-man.

Prospect deep dive: Jeremy Lauzon March 7, 2016

Though not a truly exceptional player in any key area or specific hockey skill, Lauzon nevertheless is above average and more than capable at just about everything. He’s got good (Lauzon is about 6-1, 195 pounds) if not great (6-4, 220+ pounds or more is what is considered ideal in the modern NHL for D) size, and skates well though doesn’t provide dynamic speed and quickness. He’s a deft passer and effective goal scorer from the blue line, and has the ruggedness and smarts to neutralize opposition rushes and prevent players from getting to the front of his net.

Lauzon is putting up the best offensive numbers of his major junior career with the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies in his third season with them. He’s off his goals pace from a year ago (eight vs the 15 he netted in 2015) but with 44 points in 41 contests, Lauzon has already exceeded his 36 points set last season. He’s had to deal with some nagging lower body injuries that have limited his effectiveness in the new year after injuring himself after returning from Team Canada’s World Jr. Championship training camp in December. As one of the final cuts, Lauzon opened a lot of eyes around the CHL this year after being the 52nd overall selection by Boston last June.

Lauzon is a smart player who often does the little things in terms of maintaining his gaps, keeping the proper stick positioning and forcing opponents into committing early. He likes to go for hits in the open ice and will take every opportunity to finish his checks along the boards and remind guys in the other sweaters that he’s there. Though not a feared fighter, he’s willing to drop the gloves to defend teammates and plays a naturally rugged and aggressive defensive style that will translate well in Boston.

What’s Next For the Bruins- The Young D May 24, 2017

Jeremy Lauzon, LD, Rouyn-Noranda (QMJHL)- Injuries impacted Lauzon’s season and he didn’t put up the kind of regular season numbers in his fourth major junior campaign as he did a year ago. However, when it comes to Lauzon, it’s not so much about the stats as it is the consistency and balance. Besides, he had an outstanding playoffs (albeit an earlier-than-expected exit at the hands of the Chicoutimi Sagueneens in the second round of the Quebec League run), posting 5 goals and 14 points in 13 games with the Huskies.

With Lauzon, less is more- he made Team Canada’s World Jr. Championship squad but wasn’t given as much ice time as some of the other defenders. Still- he scored a big goal in the gold medal game against USA, and seemed to make the most of the opportunities he had. He’s got enough skill to score, but he’s also a tenacious, even nasty competitor on the back end who makes forwards pay for the real estate they try to occupy. He’s not huge, but big enough- he’s got a great stick and impressive vision. We said it back after the 2015 draft, but as a shutdown guy, he’s not as effective as Carlo and as an offensive presence, he’s not quite as talented as Jakub Zboril, but if your idea of success is a player who can thrive over all 200 feet of the ice surface, then Lauzon is your man. He’s been with Providence since his playoffs ended, learning and benefiting from being around the team, but he wasn’t ready to go health-wise after playing hurt against Chicoutimi and the way things have gone for the Baby B’s has meant that he’s on the outside looking in for now. His time will come, though.

Jeremy Lauzon Now-

The now 6-2, 205-pound left-shot defenseman made his NHL debut in 2018-19, playing 16 games as an injury replacement and scoring his first NHL goal against Las Vegas. In 2019-20, he came up in the middle of the season and was just rounding into form, having played his way into the nightly lineup consistently when the season was put on pause.

The numbers- 2 goals and 1 helper in 35 games split between last season and the current one- aren’t anything to write home about, but there is room in his growth and development to be more of a point producer than he has thus far shown at age 22 (he turns 23 on Tuesday). Of course, he’s not been a point-getter in the AHL to date, and isn’t likely going to blossom into a 40-50-point guy in the NHL in his prime. But, like many young players who are in the process of breaking into the NHL while seeing limited minutes in a more specific role to place a priority on playing defense, Lauzon has been fine.

He competes hard, plays with good intelligence and vision, making the right decisions with and without the puck; Lauzon does his job with his mobility, a smart stick and has enjoyed the trust of head coach Bruce Cassidy and assistant coach Kevin Dean for his willingness to keep things simple.

Style analysis: 

Why does one defenseman who seems to have all the major league tools and who was a first-round draft pick have trouble establishing himself as an NHL regular, while another who was drafted later the same year and carries a significantly more modest skill set has leapfrogged the first on an organizational depth chart?

With Lauzon, we think it simply has to do with the fact that he’s a better defender and brings a high hockey IQ to the table, along with a certain poise and ability to do the little things to make plays in his own end.  He’s willing to lay out to block shots and he’ll drop the gloves. He’s not a heavyweight fighter, but he’s tough enough, and in Boston, that matters.

NHL defensemen who can both produce points and effectively defend their own zone are coveted commodities and franchise cornerstones- that’s why there are so few of them available across the NHL. That leaves the rest of the population at the position: players who might bring more offensive abilities to the table, while others are better at taking care of their own end. Gone are the pure specialists: the “offenseman”- a player who lines up behind the forwards to take faceoffs, but is essentially a fourth forward on the ice- taking the puck and rushing it up the ice, but lacking the instincts or wherewithal or both to provide capable defense, or the “shutdown” D- a euphemism for a big, powerful player who lacked the skills to skate and carry pucks out of danger, but could grapple and pin and obstruct players in the defensive zone effectively enough to justify their spot on an NHL roster.

Now, if you expect to play defense in the NHL and stay there, you had best be a hybrid 2-way defender or at least be an exceptional enough player in your own end with the mobility to angle, retrieve and win foot races to loose pucks. The modern NHL defenseman has to be able to skate, think, pass and understand how to play within his team’s structure and systems, or he won’t be long on the roster.

Lauzon isn’t fancy, but he’s just tough- able to get up and down the ice, make the first pass and brings a tenacity and competitiveness that endears him to the coaches and teammates he plays with. His best junior season was a 50-point campaign, so his offensive numbers at the highest level will be modest at best, but Lauzon’s value transcends pure point production. He’s going to eventually develop into a player who can play a good chunk of minutes as a steadying influence on the back end.

In hindsight, it looks like we were overly optimistic in thinking he could be the best of the three D Boston took in 2015, and to Brandon Carlo’s credit, he’s taken the bull by the horns to establish himself as an anchor on the B’s blueline, while coming off his best offensive season to date with 19 points in 67 games. But Carlo is also a physical specimen at 6-5 whose mobility opened the door for him earlier in Boston than most, and he took full advantage. Lauzon, on the other hand, has been on a longer (and expected) developmental path. He can’t match Carlo’s physical gifts in terms of pure size, strength and reach, but he’s not far off at being able to contain opponents and neutralize scoring chances.

Outlook:

Lauzon’s persistence has paid off, not only in the form of an increased role with the big club, but with a two-year contract extension at a bargain rate of $850k per that will take him through the 21-22 season. He might even be in danger of being the one Bruin that new NHL franchise Seattle could walk away with in next June’s expansion draft. That might be putting the cart before the horse, but with his experience, cap hit and potential, Lauzon just might be the kind of player who makes perfect sense for GM Ron Francis and Co. if he plays at least 40 games for the B’s in 20-21.

If not, then he’s on the up and up as a player who should be able to slot into Boston’s top-6 going forward. He’s got just enough skill, a good amount of smarts and plenty of ruggedness to make it as a solid role player and maybe something more. It’s not overly complicated when it comes to figuring out if players will earn more NHL ice time or not- if the coaches trust them, then they’ll play.

It might not always make sense to media and fans who will look at other shiny, flashier objects in the system and say, “Why not him?”  Well, because if the flashy guy turns pucks over and can’t establish a solid level of the t-word with the team’s coaches, he’s not going into the game.

Lauzon won’t win a lot of style contests, but in the end, style doesn’t always win hockey games. As the season abruptly ended in March, the coaches trusted him because he proved that he is trustworthy.

Sometimes, that’s really all you need.

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First NHL goal on former B’s 1st-rounder & prospect Malcolm Subban from late 2018

Squares off vs Matthew Tkachuk- noogie time:

 

A preseason fight vs the NJ Devils’ Nathan Bastian

 

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Tribute to Colby Cave 1994-2020

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Boston Bruins graphic courtesy of BostonBruins.com

Colby Cave

Today came the devastating news that days after emergency surgery for a brain bleed, Edmonton Oilers forward and former Boston Bruin Colby Cave passed away at age 25.

Words can’t even begin to convey the depth of loss and tragedy that the player affectionately known as “Caver” meant to his family, friends, fans and all who were touched by him in one way or another.

I didn’t know him all that well or cover him closely during his time in the Bruins organization, but the times I did interact with him were indicative of a former junior team captain and underdog who worked and willed himself to the big show after being passed over in the NHL draft. Despite modest expectations, Cave achieved far more than so many players drafted in 2013 and 2014, the two years any one of the NHL’s 30 clubs could have selected him. Here are a few honest observations and anecdotes about a player who is gone well before his time.

Continue reading →

2019-20 NHL season, Anthony Kwetkowski, Boston Bruins prospects, Cooper Zech, Jack Ahcan, Jake DeBrusk, Jakub Zboril, Jeremy Lauzon, John Beecher, Karson Kuhlman, Nick Wolff, Noel Acciari, Podcasts, Providence Bruins, Quinn Olson, Torey Krug, Trent Frederic, Victor Berglund, Zachary Senyshyn , , , , , , , , , , , , , 6 Comments

Podcast: Anthony Kwetkowski/Bruins Network breaks down B’s prospects

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The Scouting Post is pleased to present a 2-hour and change discussion with Anthony Kwetkowski– Bruins Network on his excellent work as a Boston Bruins prospect analyst.

You can follow his work and observations on Twitter at: @BruinsNetwork

In the podcast, we cover a lot of topics, starting out with a look back at the 2010 NHL draft, where Anthony caught the B’s prospects bug with the Tyler Seguin draft. We then  take a macro look at the Boston Bruins’ ability to draft (Jake DeBrusk) and sign impact players as undrafted free agents (Torey Krug, Noel Acciari, Karson Kuhlman), following up with an assessment of the 2019-20 AHL Providence Bruins. We then drill down to key AHL prospects, with AK breaking down detailed notes on Providence players  Jack Studnicka, Trent Frederic, Jakub Zboril, Jeremy Lauzon and Zach Senyshyn.

We also talk about organizational rankings around the NHL- how they are done and why the Bruins are consistently down near the bottom of rankings from the last two years.

Players also covered/analyzed in the podcast: John Beecher, Nick Wolff, Jack Ahcan, Cooper Zech, Victor Berglund and Quinn Olson.

It was a fun discussion and we’ll have him back again- thanks again to him for coming on and providing such depth of knowledge of these players. Here’s the file:

BruinsNetwork

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Red Line Report 2014 flashback: Nick Ritchie

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Six years after being a top-10 pick by the Anaheim Ducks, the Boston Bruins acquired Nick Ritchie at the trade deadline.

With hockey on hold, we thought it was a good time to go back and look at what independent scouting service Red Line Report had to say about Ritchie in his draft season (2013-14). Every month/issue of Red Line features an in-depth profile scouting report/hybrid background article, and this appeared in the Mar. 2014 issue. It includes grades on his hockey attributes and interviews with him and his Peterborough Petes head coach, Jody Hull.

Ritchie Profile RLR

Some highlights:

Big, bruising and intimidating winger…

The premier power forward in this draft and one of the toughest fighters in the OHL…

“I think he’s going to be a prototypical power forward along the lines of a Milan Lucic. Ritchie does a lot of things people may not know about. I don’t think it’s well known just how tough he is, and when you add his skill and offensive ability, he’s someone who can do it all.”- Hull

The profile also touches on Ritchie’s areas of improvement such as consistency and conditioning. These are the things that have dogged him in his pro career to date, and why the B’s were able to pry him out of Anaheim (albeit for a very good young player in Danton Heinen). Bottom line- if Ritchie was a Lucic (the Bruins version), there’s no way the Ducks would’ve traded him.

For more on the Red Line Report, the website is www.redlinereport.com and the service will publish its annual NHL Draft Guide in June, even with the postponement of the draft and uncertainty surrounding it.

As an interesting aside, the Ducks drafted Ritchie 10th overall in 2014, the B’s got Heinen 116th, so that’s an interesting spread between two completely different players and pedigrees.

It’s tough to see a versatile, consistent Swiss Army Knife-type player like Heinen go, but Ritchie fits the Bruins mold and he was showing off some of the better parts of his game/package when everything came to a screeching halt.

We’ll see what the future holds for Ritchie, but he makes sense as a reclamation project-type who is signed beyond this season, is young enough to get his NHL career going into a higher gear and represents the kind of physical attributes the Bruins organization places a premium on. He’ll need to prove that he can put in the work and avoid the conditioning pitfalls that this extended work stoppage poses for him.

But overall- again- if Ritchie had been exactly the player envisioned to be worth a top pick, he would’ve been untouchable in Anaheim. That was not the case, so the Bruins now get a chance to see if they can make him into a more impactful NHLer than he’s shown thus far.

And of course, he can do this: