The team-building portion of the NHL offseason shifts into high gear on Wednesday, with free agency set to begin at noon.
The Bruins begin the day with just $2.38 million in cap space, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be a quiet one for general manager Don Sweeney.
Here are some of the key things to keep an eye on from the Bruins' perspective:
Finalizing Bergeron and Krejci
All signs point to both Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci returning to the Bruins, likely on one-year deals. Bergeron reportedly made his decision to return weeks ago, and the Bruins' front office have acknowledged they've gotten "positive" updates from him. WEEI's Lou Merloni reported on Monday that Krejci was "in negotiations" to return to the Bruins, a report that was backed up by ESPN's Kevin Weekes.
However, nothing has been officially announced on either front yet. Bruins fans will hope to see something official by early Wednesday afternoon. If things get dragged out and there's still nothing announced for one or both of them into the mid- or late afternoon, it would be understandable if some fans start to worry.
The Bruins can afford to wait on making things official as long as they know the signings are, in fact, happening. It's hard to imagine them not having clear answers prior to free agency beginning.
Whenever the new contracts do get finalized, it will be interesting to see what kind of cap hit they carry. Both will almost certainly be team-friendly compared to what they could get on the open market, but how team-friendly remains to be seen. Unless Bergeron and Krejci sign for only $1 million apiece or something, the Bruins will have to free up some money, which brings us to…
How do they free up money?
The Bruins would probably have to open up some cap space just to fit Bergeron in. They definitely will to fit both Bergeron and Krejci, never mind any other tweaks to the roster Sweeny might want to make.
The Bruins have a few options. One would be to just temporarily go over the cap. Teams are allowed to go 10% (or $8.25 million) over the cap during the offseason, but they need to be cap-compliant by opening night. That would at least buy the Bruins more time to explore their cost-cutting options.
The second also kicks the can down the road, and that would be using long-term injured reserve. With Brad Marchand, Charlie McAvoy and Matt Grzelcyk all set to miss time to start the season, the Bruins could put any or all of them on long-term IR, which would remove their cap hits from the books for the time being.
The catch, of course, is that the Bruins must be cap-compliant and able to fit their salaries back in once they're ready to return. All of them will be back during the season, so the Bruins won't have the funny business option of holding them out until the playoffs like the Lightning did in 2021.
The most immediate solution would be to move salary out via trade. Buyouts were also on the table, but that window came to an end Tuesday at 5 p.m. Nick Foligno would have been the most likely buyout candidate for the Bruins, but they opted against it and will be hanging onto Foligno for the time being.
So, who could they trade? Foligno might still be an option there, but it's unlikely any team would take on his $3.8 million salary after a miserable season that saw him score just two goals. The Bruins could also bury Foligno in the minors to start the season and save $1.1 million against the cap.
Jake DeBrusk (two years left, $4 million average annual value), Craig Smith (one year, $3.1 million), Erik Haula (one year, $2.375 million), Matt Grzelcyk (two years, $3.69 million AAV), Mike Reilly (two years, $3 million AAV) and Derek Forbort (two years, $3 million AAV) all have fairly tradeable contracts.
Moving a defenseman is complicated by the slew of offseason surgeries on the Bruins' blue line, including for each of Grzelcyk and Reilly. DeBrusk has rescinded his trade request and wants to stay now. The Bruins probably want him to stay as well, especially if he's penciled onto a line with Bergeron and Brad Marchand again.
Will a Pastrnak extension get done?
Along with being the first day of free agency, Wednesday is also the first day that players entering the final year of their contract can sign an extension.
For the Bruins, that means it's the first day David Pastrnak, whose current deal expires after the 2022-23 season, could sign a long-term extension. That would be the Bruins' preference.
Sweeney met with Pastrnak's agent, J.P. Barry, during the draft in Montreal last week and said he "strongly indicated" that the team wants Pastrnak "to be a lifelong Bruin." Team president Cam Neely said he felt "very positive" about how the discussions with Pastrnak and his camp would go.
The Bruins know that in order to make that happen, they're probably looking at something along the lines of what they gave Charlie McAvoy last year: eight years, $9.5 million per year.
They don't need Pastrnak to put ink to paper this week or even in the next couple weeks. But they do at least need an indication that he wants to stay and that there's a deal to be reached, ideally at some point this summer.
If the Bruins don't get that assurance, or if they get an indication that he wants to test unrestricted free agency next summer, then -- as much as they don't want to -- they will have to seriously consider trading him before the season, rather than risk losing him for nothing after it.
Will they go after anyone else?
For all the financial reasons laid out above, it feels almost pointless to put together a list of free agents the Bruins could target. If Bergeron and Krejci are both back, it's hard to see how they add anyone else beyond that.
The Bruins have been linked to centers like Nazem Kadri and Vincent Trocheck in recent weeks, but they were presumably only ever options if at least one of Bergeron or Krejci didn't return. We can talk about how a forward like Andrew Copp, Ondrej Palat, Nino Niederreiter, Andre Burakovsky or Mason Marchment would look good in this lineup, but again… where's the money coming from?
Maybe Sweeney gets creative and finds a way to start shedding contracts left and right if he really wants to target someone like that, but we're going to classify that as "unlikely" until proven otherwise.
