No surprise here. That was one of the reason the Bruins traded him away…they knew he and his California wife had no plans on sticking around and re-signing with a New England team. The funny part was when they traded him to Calgary instead. Although Calgary *IS* technically closer to California, it’s also considerably farther north of the border. Of course, he has family in Calgary, but still…the Flames couldn’t have expected him to stick around for long. Whatever. At least the Bruins got Chuck Kobasew and Andrew Ference for him (and Wayne Primeau).
Well, so much for the Dave Lewis experiment. Not a surprise, considering the late season flop, the lack of team offense and the grumbling from players that he inhibited their offensive innovation. Hey, what do you expect when you hire an ex-defenseman to run your team? Even worse, with that on his resume he still couldn’t improve the defensive play of the team.
What *is* shocking is that they didn’t do this after their season ended. There’s only a week to go before the draft. Apparently, whoever will be inheriting the team will be utilizing players drafted by Chiarelli.
Alberts tended to be inconsistent this season, but he’s still young. Plus, he was one of the few Bruins who actually dropped the gloves when necessary last year. He’ll never be an offensive juggernaut, but as long as he continues to improve his game and maintains a strong defensive presence, he’ll be fine. Good to see he’ll be around for the near future.
You know it’s a slow news month when this becomes the biggest Bruins news since Tuukka Rask joining Providence to essentially just sit around and pander to the locals. (What? No Dropkick Murphys?)
On a few positive notes though:
The Bruins *do* need defensive help
The dude *was* the 55th overall selection in 2005
Hockeysfuture.com earlier today (before they changed the team he was on) listed him as the 9th best prospect in the Blue Jackets organization.
His offensive numbers nearly doubled this year (well, from 17 points to 31 points, but he *is* a “defensive-minded” defenseman)
Hey, for a fifth round pick? I’ll take it.
I just hope they find better video out there for the kid than this…
Sportsline reports that the B’s signed Hannu Toivonen to a one-year extension Thursday, ensuring that the goalie prospect will have at least one more year to develop in the Bruins’ system.
With Tuukka Rask slated to join the Bruins next year, and with Tim Thomas firmly entrenched as the starter right now, it begs the question of what the goaltending situation is going to look like for next year.
As I mentioned last year (to an onslaught of dissenting opinions), the best situation for the Bruins last year would have been that Toivonen stepped up his game and took the #1 goaltending job from the then 32 year old Tim Thomas. This would have allowed Thomas to either have been decent trade bait or become possibly the best backup goaltender in the league.
Now the Bruins will have a 33 year old goaltender between the pipes and two hot prospects battling over who could be the future franchise goaltender for the Bruins (and, yeahyeahyeah I know Thomas could still legitimately be around for the next five years). The problem is that you need to give your prospects a chance to play. If Thomas was destined to be a backup, then you could have given Toivonen the starts in Boston and Rask the starts in Providence. But now, barring a timeshare situation in Providence, only one of them is going to get significant playing time. The Bruins will probably look for a veteran to back up Thomas.
