Here’s One Number To Keep In Mind After Bruins’ Roster Turnover

Don Sweeney was remarkably accurate and honest about one thing: The 2023-24 Bruins will look far different than the history-making roster that preceded them.

Boston’s general manager braced the fans for major roster turnover, especially from a team that finished the season far too early, bowing out in the first round of the playoffs after a record-setting regular season. The Bruins’ salary cap situation was complicated, and the number was unlikely to go up to a point where Sweeney could comfortably fit in high-priced veterans set to hit the market.

Add all that to a Taylor Hall trade, and yeah, the roster turnover is real. Someone needs to play, though, so Sweeney took the limited amount of cap space he did have and spent it judiciously over the weekend as NHL free agency began.

Sweeney and the Bruins did all they could to thread the needle, clearly putting a priority on low-cost veteran players who could fill roles while giving the club financial flexibility to re-sign restricted free agents.

Just how successful the Bruins can be in 2023-24 comes down to how effective aging veterans like Milan Lucic, Kevin Shattenkirk and James van Riemsdyk can be. At the very least, though, they are adult veterans in the room who can have a positive impact on the club’s younger players. Those roles could be especially important if and when Patrice Bergeron and/or David Krejci announce their retirements.

Calling it a “bridge year” probably isn’t fair because the Bruins do have a lot of talent on their roster. A collection headlined by David Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy, Brad Marchand, Hampus Lindholm and the two-headed goalie tandem of Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman should be in playoff contention almost no matter what. If the newly added veterans play anywhere near their level, the Bruins aren’t going to fall into the draft lottery or anything like that.

That being said, it’s safe to assume the Bruins’ weekend moves have been made with an eye toward next summer. This cap crunch won’t be long-lasting. Early projections have the salary cap making a jump of about $4 million. That’s a pretty good player. From a Bruins standpoint, there’s a bit of a reset coming that should clear some space. The bonuses owed to Bergeron and Krejci are due on this year’s cap, which is the literal price to pay for the team-friendly deals signed for this past go-for-broke, all-in season.

Assuming the cap goes up $4 million paired with money coming off the books following this season, CapFriendly projects the Bruins to have $30 million in cap space next summer.

That’s obviously a lot of money. It’s not like the Bruins can just go out and give it all to free-agent-to-be Auston Matthews next summer, though. In addition to a lot of the one-year veteran deals given out this weekend, the B’s will have to re-sign Jake DeBrusk and Matt Grzelcyk, to name a few. They have just 10 NHL skaters in the fold after next season, so the money has to go somewhere.

But that’s a lot of freedom. The free agent class next summer looks a lot better than this year, too, with no offense meant to the likes of Dmitry Orlov or Tyler Bertuzzi. Next summer’s class is headlined by Matthews, but Toronto teammate William Nylander is also up, as is game-changing winger Sebastian Aho in Carolina and Jonathan Marchessault, who just won the Conn Smythe in Vegas. The top defenseman on the board is Brandon Montour, a player who made life hell for the Bruins in the first round on the Florida blue line.

It’s a deep class, too — The Hockey News has DeBrusk as its No. 13 UFA — so the Bruins should be in a pretty good position. Spotrac currently has just 12 teams with more space next summer than the Bruins, with just four of those teams currently having more players under contract. And it’s unlikely those teams can match the quality of players under contract that Boston has.

The road to the Stanley Cup is certainly far bumpier in 2023-24 than it looked in 22-23, when the Bruins got a flat tire far earlier than they should have. Yet, this team should compete for a playoff spot, and even if the club falls short again, it has a clear path to some potentially massive upgrades in the near future.

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