Brad Marchand said he wanted to stay in Boston. Bruins general manager Don Sweeney said he wanted to keep his captain. Yet, Marchand is now a Florida Panther, having been traded for a conditional second-round pick just before Friday’s trade deadline.
So, what the heck happened? Why weren’t the two sides able to work out a contract extension to keep this relationship going?
Well, after a lot of smoke and confusion in the immediate aftermath of the trade, including some inaccurate information that went viral, we’re starting to get a clearer idea.
There had been a report on Friday that the Bruins had offered Marchand $3 million per year. That didn’t sound right, to be completely honest, and sure enough, sources indicated to WEEI.com that it was not right.
ESPN’s Emily Kaplan reported during Saturday’s Bruins-Lightning game that while term (how many years the contract would be for) was an initial sticking point, Sweeney and the Bruins, with the approval of team ownership, did eventually offer a three-year contract at some point in February, and that Marchand would have been OK with a three-year deal. That has since been confirmed by other reports.
Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman then reported on Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday that the Bruins had not asked Marchand to take a pay cut, presumably meaning they were willing to offer him at least $6.125 million per year, which is his currently salary. As I alluded to on WEEI’s Sunday Skate, sources indicated that was much closer to the reality of the Bruins’ offer than the initial $3 million figure.
Friedman clarified and added to his initial report on Monday morning’s “32 Thoughts” podcast.
“The other thing I do believe, at the end, and nobody has disputed this to me, I do not believe the Bruins were offering a pay cut,” Friedman said. “His current AAV is 6.125 [million]. I'm certain the offer was not below that. Now, how much more than that it was, I don't know, but I am certain the offer was not below that. Marchand was not being asked to take a pay cut. However, there was a gap. There was a sizable gap. Nobody out there would confirm to me what the gap was, but I think that the Bruins reached the line. It's kind of the same thing as the Lightning with [Steven] Stamkos. They reached a line and they said, ‘This is as far as we're going to go.’
“There's two things here. I think Marchand felt that it was below what he was willing to accept. And I had some people tell me that, based on the way they think Marchand will play, especially if he's healthy enough for the playoffs, it's something he could get in the open market. Now, I think ultimately, he probably would have taken a little bit less to stay in Boston, but not where the Bruins were. So, that's kind of where we were as this approached. And like I said, I heard that he reached out and asked for an in-person meeting, and it was granted. … I have it on good authority, from a lot of places, that he offered a compromise. He said, ‘Look, I'll compromise a bit, I'll bend a bit, you guys bend a bit, and let's get this done.’ And I think he really thought that was going to work. … I really think that he believed that going in in-person, it was going to work, and it didn't. The Bruins had just decided they were going as far as they were going to go.”
I have no reason to doubt anything Friedman said there. In fact, it aligns very closely with what I heard from a couple sources over the weekend.
What’s still unknown is what Marchand’s ask was. Everyone seems to be in agreement that both sides, eventually, were OK with a three-year deal. So, if the Bruins were willing to offer at least his current salary of $6.125 million per year, but there was still a “sizable gap,” according to Friedman, you’d have to think that Marchand was asking for something more like $7 million a year.
If that seems crazy, it’s really not unreasonable to think Marchand might get that on the open market. The Athletic, for instance, currently projects Marchand’s market value as $7.1 million. Before his injury, Marchand was on pace for 28 goals and 63 points this season. That’s still a really good second-line wing in the NHL. And he was doing that after undergoing three surgeries last summer and missing most of training camp.
Basically, it seems like Marchand, after years of being on one of the most team-friendly contracts in the NHL (one that he signed right before his career really reached new levels with an 85-point season in 2016-17), wanted to be paid market value and wasn’t really interested in much of a hometown discount. That is well within his rights.
It’s also well within the Bruins’ rights to decide they didn’t want to do that for a soon-to-be 37-year-old, especially when this team is beginning a much-needed retool or rebuild or whatever you want to call this, and no longer in a position to be going all-in for the short term.
Marchand, for his part, made it clear during his introductory press conference in Florida Monday morning that he holds no ill will towards Sweeney, Bruins president Cam Neely, or CEO Charlie Jacobs.
“The biggest thing for me is I have a tremendous amount of respect for Cam and Sweens and Charlie, the guys in there that are making the decisions,” Marchand said. “I’ve obviously been there a long time. I've gotten to know them very well, not just on a business relationship, but as personal relationships as well. We have very great friendships, and it's very tough when you have to deal with the business side of things. We made an agreement, or we had a conversation when things started, that we weren't going to make it public at all. Nothing good comes in these situations when you start talking about the details of the behind the scenes of how these things go down. So, I'm really going to try to stay away from it. We obviously were working to try to get an extension done, and Sweens said it the other day, there was a gap.”
Marchand said the two sides continued to talk until Thursday night, the night before the trade deadline, and that it was only then that they walked away from the negotiating table and a trade became the more likely direction.
“We both felt that we had a position, and ultimately we didn't get it done,” a visibly emotional Marchand continued. “But I do want to kind of clean up, because I've seen the last few days, just the narrative that's been going around. I want to kind of set the record straight, like I don't have any ill will towards the management group, towards Sweens, Cam or Charlie. I've had an incredible run in that organization, and I'm extremely proud just how things went there. So yeah, it was very disappointing that things didn't get done, just because obviously I love the organization. I wanted to stay there. But at the end of the day, I also know that business is business, and every player has a shelf life, regardless if that's when we want it to be or not.”