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When the clock struck 3:01 p.m. (OK, maybe a little bit after that), the Boston Bruins did not shed any veteran pending free agents off their books as most expected, or perhaps understanding the value of the longer view versus the present day picture of the club’s state of affairs, had hoped. In fact,
Don Sweeney’s first foray as the general manager of the Black and Gold came and went with the organization adding two veterans in defenseman
J.M. Liles from the Carolina Hurricanes in a four-piece trade and New Jersey winger
Lee Stempniak in a three-piece deal.
To acquire Liles, the Bruins sent a third-round pick (2016), fifth-round pick (2017), and AHL prospect
Anthony Camara (drafted 81st overall by the Bruins back in 2011) to Carolina. And the package sent to New Jersey for Stempniak, a 2017 second-round pick (Boston’s natural pick) and a 2016 fourth-round choice, was obviously a little bit of a steeper price for the Bruins to pay.
And with nothing of note coming off Boston’s NHL roster -- with the exception of demotions to the American Hockey League for Joonas Kemppainen, Zac Rinaldo, and veteran Max Talbot -- it’s clear that Sweeney’s deadline plans never involved ‘selling’, but rather adding depth to the club.
“Clearly we wanted to continue to add to this hockey club,” Sweeney said of the trades, both of which came in as total 3 p.m. buzzer-beaters. “We looked at the number of transactions this past year and the acquisition of picks and prospects that we’ve accumulated and felt that we were in a position to protect our two firsts and our second this year. It’s clear that we gave up some that other teams will use and that’s part of the business especially this time of year. But we talked with a lot of teams about different prospects that they may or may not have been after. I felt that the draft situation and relinquishing some of those in order to acquire a player of Lee’s versatility – the type of year he’s having I think will complement our group very well. He can play in a bunch of different positions for us. And John-Michael Liles is another player that brings a lot of versatility to our group. I think we’ll have the ability to have a guy with experience that can move the puck and complement, again, some of the hard and heavy guys that we have and go in and hopefully play an important role going in. They’re both excited about joining the Boston Bruins and the opportunity to get this team back into the playoffs and move forward.”
With the 35-year-old Liles, a left-shooting defenseman, the Bruins believe that they have acquired a player that can provide a complementary puck-moving element to their top-four. And while Sweeney wouldn’t call Liles a ‘shutdown defenseman’, he did sing some analytic-based praises of his game.
“Shot suppression comes in, but it comes in different ways. If you’re spending more time in the other end, chances are, you’re not giving up at ours, and at times, we haven’t moved the puck as crisply or as cleanly as we would like to,” said Sweeney when pressed as to what Liles will bring to the club. “Hopefully, he’s going to continue to do that because we identified that he had been doing it. Carolina was a team that, we look at analytically – they had not given up as much as we have on particular nights, to tell you the truth. They’ve been a team that hasn’t scored at the level that we have, so hopefully, John-Michael [Liles] has been a part of that. He’s going to continue to bring that.”
Onto his fourth NHL team in his 12-year career, Liles has posted six goals and 15 points (three of which on the power play) along with 64 hits and 96 blocked shots in 64 games for the ‘Canes, and spoke a little bit about his role within the Hurricanes’ (rather underrated) system over the last few years.
“The system that I played the last couple years in Carolina has been a quick puck movement system. It really puts a premium on defensemen getting the pucks to the forwards quickly, but at the same time trying to join the attack and bringing a second wave,” Liles, who has not played in the postseason since 2013’s first-round series with Toronto, said. “That’s been a strength of my game for a long time, that’s what I’ve always tried to focus on. I’m definitely not the biggest guy, but I try and play solid defense at the same time, and hopefully help out on the offensive side. It’s obviously going to be learning on the fly for me, but I’m really looking forward to getting in there and helping out any way I can.”
Liles is far from the sexy, home run pick many wanted the Bruins to nab, but he comes in as a seemingly serviceable, 19-game stopgap on Boston’s defense alongside one of the Bruins’ less mobile defensemen such as
Adam McQuaid or
Dennis Seidenberg. And that’s where you’re likely to see Liles fit in, I’d think, as the left-sided blue-liner skating next to McQuaid or Seidenberg, or whichever guy isn’t skating next to
Zdeno Chara on the B’s top-pairing.
The ‘problem’ with this acquisition in the eyes of many is that Liles, while a potentially solid complementary piece, is not the defenseman that puts you over the top in the Eastern Conference. But the reality of their situation is that that defenseman was not available on this year’s market, and the only one that I think you could make the case for being that guy (Vancouver’s
Dan Hamhuis), had no interest in waiving his no-trade to come to the Bruins (or the Eastern Conference in general).
Spoiler: That’s not the real problem. The real problem is that Liles’ presence likely forces
Joe Morrow, who is playing the best hockey of his young NHL career right now, out of the lineup if/when push comes to shove and
Claude Julien wants to rely on his veteran players. In other words, barring injuries or an outright disastrous showing from Liles, you’re taking meaningful, valuable minutes away from the defensemen you’ve spent nearly 60 games of 2015-16 -- and even more in the case of Morrow and
Zach Trotman -- trying to develop. Now it’s obvious that Morrow, Trotman, and even the recently demoted
Colin Miller, are going to go through their bumps as young NHL defensemen. But if the Bruins truly believed that these guys were a significant part of their future, at a certain point, you have to gamble on giving them legitimate, playoff push minutes to prove their worth to your franchise. Liles’ presence, and the overall experience of the Boston blue line, makes that difficult for more than one of them, too. (Think of Miller now having to leapfrog three guys -- through injuries, inconsistencies or poor play -- just to get a crack at suiting up for a postseason game.)
To take the puck away from these players when it means the most, although expected given Boston’s apparent belief that they can contend deep into the postseason this spring, could lead you down a dark and familiar path that really hurt the overall development of a player like
Matt Bartkowski. Not every player in your system is going to be like
Torey Krug and arrive on the NHL scene and immediately find success, and again, at a certain point, you have to live with the bumps. And if this isn’t the year to live with those bumps, when will it be? ‘Cause the core of your team is not getting younger.
(But that’s not something you can or should hold against Liles. That’s not his department.)
The Stempniak pickup has to come with both positive and negative vibes if you’re the Bruins. The 33-year-old Stempniak, who went into September without a contract, was a regular at the captain’s practices the Bruins put on all over Boston this past fall. He worked out with B’s leader
Patrice Bergeron, and he’s familiar with more than a couple of Bruins. And for less than a million dollars, he could have been yours from the jump. Instead, Stempniak chose the Devs’ professional tryout over the B’s, ultimately signed there, and landed in town at the expense of two draft picks.
“Well clearly if we had known he was going to have 40 points and such and the type of year he’s going to have I would think that 29, 28 other teams would’ve felt the same way – and might not have made acquisitions that they made,” Sweeney said of Stempniak, who was a wonder for the Devils this year prior to the trade to the Hub (he was actually the Devils’ leading scorer). “I think everybody in the league at that point in time had had a previous look at him from, you know, he’s had a long career. That’s nothing to take away from Lee [Stempniak] – he’s had a tremendous season. And that’s why we went out and made the acquisition because he’s going to fit into our group and hopefully continue to do that. And then we’ll get in even closer, you know, to see how he fits and we’ll explore maybe going forward to see how he fits. But for right now it’s most important that we went out and acquired a player that’s had a great year and that can fit into our group because of his versatility.”
But when you move beyond that, the Stempniak addition is a sneakily good one by Sweeney.
The right-wing spot has been a supermassive black hole (I will not give Muse a nickel for borrowing this, by the way) for the Bruins since the start of the season.
David Pastrnak, limited by injuries at times this season, is still just a teenager.
Jimmy Hayes’ net-front game, while noticeable, has not come with the results many anticipated. And
Brett Connolly, though not for a lack of trying, enters the month of March with just four goals on 68 shots over his last 51 games played.
A motivated Stempniak, who was ‘dumbfounded’ that he didn’t have an NHL contract much earlier in the summer, represents a low-risk, high-reward type on Boston’s right side. So long as Stempniak takes advantage of a situation similar to the one he worked his way into during his stint with the Devils.
“I take pride in the fact that I went out and earned the coach’s trust, earned the opportunities that were presented, and got to play in key situations and play a big role on the team,” Stempniak said of his time with New Jersey, which was primarily spent on a line with left-winger
Mike Cammalleri and center
Adam Henrique. “I guess I felt like I trained a little differently this summer — with Matt Nichol, a guy in Toronto who I know well and I trained with one other time, and I’ve never felt better on the ice in terms of my sort of conditioning and just strength and overall physical condition and just lately, I’ve been trying to make more plays — just a willingness to hang onto the puck, extend your time with the puck and allow things to happen, rather than moving it too quickly.”
But the big move, or non-move rather, came with Boston’s decision to hang onto
Loui Eriksson. Although Sweeney noted that the sides have not closed the gap that exists between the two when it came to hammering out a deal to keep the 30-year-old Swede in town, it doesn’t sound as if Sweeney and the Bruins received any offers that made them legitimately consider moving Eriksson.
“I’ll never discuss what packages or players or anything that was presented to us. Again, there was one first rounder exchanged the entire deadline period,” Sweeney said. “So for me the deal didn’t work. And I said before, my preference was to try and explore and to continue to explore signing Loui and indicated to him that he’s an important part of our team as we are right now and hopefully going forward.”
Keeping Eriksson and adding two complementary pieces indicates that the Bruins believe they can compete in the Atlantic Division and simply take their chances with whatever may happen in the third-round and beyond if they get there, and is an undeniable risk for a Bruins franchise that looks ever-so-stuck in the middle of a win-now and look-towards-tomorrow mindset.
But now, with the deadline gone and Eriksson with the Bruins for the remainder of the season, the Bruins have absolutely zero leverage when it comes an Eriksson ultimatum of any sort. It’s also put Sweeney in an ugly situation where you’re basically forced to find the middleground in your negotiations with Eriksson’s camp or come to terms with the fact that you just let one of the trade market’s absolute top pieces leave your organization for absolutely nothing. An endgame that’s doubly painful given Tyler Seguin’s success in Dallas and the then near non-existent return you’d have to show for it in Boston.
Still, that’s not something that’s throwing Sweeney and the rest of the B’s front office into a frenzy.
“Nobody knows what the landscape’s going to look like. There were several players last year that went to free agency and signed on – I know one player signed in September that felt like he was getting a particular deal. I’ll never begrudge a player for asking what he thinks he’s worth or what the market may bear. I was a former player; I have to respect that,” Sweeney said when asked of where the B’s negotiations with Eriksson go from here. “I think the player himself has to respect where the organization is. We’ve made a significant offer; there’s a gap there. I’m not really concerned with leverage. If a player believes between now and the end of the year, this is where he wants to be, and if we find the right deal that fits, then we’re going to be able to find common ground.”
The gap between the Bruins (who offered a reported four-year deal worth around $21 million) and Eriksson is rumored to be between at least one year and perhaps up to $1 million per season.
Ty Anderson has been covering the National Hockey League for HockeyBuzz.com since 2010, has been a member of the Pro Hockey Writers Association's Boston Chapter since 2013, and can be contacted on Twitter, or emailed at Ty.AndersonHB[at]gmail.com.
Boston Bruins Blogger •Bruins Feature Columnist • 
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