Boston Bruins' Don Sweeney Looking To Retool Heading Into Draft Day
With the Stanley Cup Final starting on Saturday, the Boston Bruins continue to work on their preparation for the entry draft on June 28th in Nashville.
Having the draft in just under a month, Bruins General Manager Don Sweeney will be tasked with getting the Bruins cap compliant for the 2023-24 season.
Paired with the Bruins' salary cap issues, Sweeney has the tall task of trying to maximize the current Bruins' draft, finding creative ways to expand upon this year's crop of five picks or restocking 2024 and 2025 draft selections that were dealt away in pursuit of an elusive Stanley Cup championship the past two seasons.
From «Bruins' GM Don Sweeney Looks to Retool /Rebuild Heading Into Draft Day» - James Swindells, Blackngoldhockey.com (6/1/23)
Don Sweeney has dearly away the Bruins 2022 first-round, a 2023 and 2024 second-round selections out west. Then at this past season's trade deadline, he dealt away 2023 and 2024's first-round picks, a 2023 fifth-round selection, a 2024 third-round pick, and 2025 second and fourth-round selections.
Those nine picks Sweeney surrendered brought in Lindholm in 2022, followed by the 2023 acquisitions of Tyler Bertuzzi, Garnet Hathaway, and Dmitry Orlov.
With those lost draft picks is the hard reality that re-signing any of the trio of players acquired at this year's deadline may be almost impossible, by the fact that the Bruins are facing a salary cap crunch this offseason.
One avenue that could be pursued leading up to draft day, is dealing away rostered players with term left on their existing contracts to free up salary cap space. To make the team cap compliant and regain some draft picks lost in the 2022 and 2023 deadline deals.
Three names that have been all over trade rumour are Linus Ullmark, Matt Grzelcyk, and Derek Forbort. In terms of maximizing the return on either player, it is believed that the market value for Ullmark and Grzelcyk may never be higher.
In order to have a successful offseason and draft the Bruins need to consider every possible option, if the package is good enough.
