With Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci officially back and Pavel Zacha signed to a new contract as well, there is only one contract situation left for the Bruins to try to resolve this summer. But it’s a big one: David Pastrnak.
Technically, they don’t NEED to get Pastrnak signed right now. He is still under contract for this coming season, after all. But they would certainly strongly prefer to get a new deal done sooner rather than later.
Skate Pod: What comes next with Pastrnak?
General manager Don Sweeney played things cool two weeks ago when he was asked if he can risk going into the season without having Pastrnak signed to a new contract, saying that it’s “part of the business” and “not a problem.”
That’s fine to say. You don’t want to project panic in this situation. But it’s hard to imagine Sweeney wouldn’t feel at least some level of concern if talks with Pastrnak really do drag into the season. And based on one recent report, it seems like there’s a chance that’s what happens.
Andy & Rono, a pair of pretty plugged-in, Czech-based hockey data analysts, tweeted earlier this week that, according to their source, while the Bruins would like to extend Pastrnak before the season, Pastrnak “is in no rush to sign an extension” and “wants to know if the Bruins still will have a chance to win the Stanley Cup in those next years when Bergeron and Krejci retire.”
Assuming that's accurate, that is a completely reasonable stance for Pastrnak to take. Those questions about what comes after Bergeron and Krejci, specifically at the center position, are very real and are shared by Bruins fans everywhere.
They’re also questions Sweeney is going to have a hard time answering with actions at this time. The roster -- and the center position -- is pretty much set for this season. It’s not like Sweeney is going to go out and acquire a stud No. 1 center of the future right now.
Sweeney can try to win Pastrnak over with words and promises and a vision of the future where the team remains competitive in the post-Bergeron/Krejci era and Pastrnak gets to play with Talented Center X, who will either be developed from within or acquired from elsewhere. New coach Jim Montgomery seems to be sold on such a vision based on his comments on Gresh & Keefe this week.
“The one thing that was clear right away made by everybody, including ownership, was the Bruins are expected to win and the Bruins are expected to compete,” Montgomery said. “…I think that some of the questions that I asked [in my interviews] was, what's the vision for the next two years? And then what's the plan after Bergeron and Krejci and maybe some other players have moved on? I left that meeting very confident that the Bruins are, because of their vision and their plans, that we're going to be in a good situation no matter what moving forward.”
Maybe Pastrnak can be similarly convinced and the two sides can hammer out a deal when they meet in person at some point before or during training camp next month. But what are the Bruins’ options if Pastrnak isn’t sold and decides he wants to play out the season without signing a new contract?
One would be to try to trade Pastrnak before opening night. In theory, that would maximize his trade value as much as the Bruins can between now and next summer. It also seems extremely unlikely.
For one, Sweeney has already said he’d be OK with going into the season without a new deal. Secondly, the Bruins are in win-now mode. That was the whole point of Bergeron and Krejci returning. Trading Pastrnak would be a reversal of direction, unless the Bruins could land a star of a similar level in return, a la the Matthew Tkachuk-Jonathan Huberdeau trade earlier this summer.
Trades like that are rare, though, and there’s no obvious swap option as far as a star in a similar situation (one year left on his contract). Patrick Kane might be on the trade block, but the rebuilding Blackhawks would probably want prospects and picks instead, and Pastrnak would probably block a move to a hollowed-out non-contender anyways (he can submit a 10-team no-trade list).
The Bruins have been linked to Canucks center/wing J.T. Miller, who had a career-high 99 points last season, before. The 29-year-old’s future in Vancouver remains unclear, so perhaps there could be something there. Again, it all seems pretty unlikely at this time, though.
A second option would be to do nothing right now and revisit the situation before the trade deadline. If things go south and the Bruins aren’t looking like a contender, and Pastrnak is still unwilling to commit to an extension, then trading him at that time would have to be on the table. They might not get quite as much for him as they would right now, but they’d still get a haul. Pastrnak would almost certainly be the best player on the market, and he would significantly improve a contender’s Stanley Cup chances.
But what if the Bruins are playing well and looking like one of those contenders themselves? That brings us to the third option: Keeping Pastrnak for the whole season and hoping and praying that he re-signs after it. This, of course, also risks losing Pastrnak for nothing in free agency.
There is, understandably, a line of thought among a lot of Bruins fans and media that losing a 26-year-old star for nothing would be a complete and total disaster -- asset mismanagement of epic proportions. That might not necessarily be true, though.
Again, we’re only talking about going down this path if the Bruins look like a legitimate Cup contender. If they don’t, and Sweeney hangs onto Pastrnak and loses him for nothing anyways, then sure: Fire away.
But if they are looking good, then you’re not trading away one of your best players midseason, contract situation be damned. There would be even more backlash if Sweeney threw away Bergeron’s last chance to win another Cup like that. Nope. You hang on to Pastrnak, tell yourself he’s your own rental if you must, and try to win it all.
Obviously the Bruins’ preference remains to get an extension done with Pastrnak as soon as possible. But if that doesn’t happen over the next month and a half, it doesn’t necessarily mean that Sweeney’s only choice is to trade him.
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