What waiving John Moore, Chris Wagner means for the Bruins

The Bruins dropped a lil’ Saturday Surprise on all of us with their decision to place both Chris Wagner and John Moore on waivers on a scheduled off day for the team.

First of all, just what exactly does that mean?

Well, if a claim is made by another team, the Bruins are out from that player’s contract; Moore has another two years at $2.75 million per, while Wagner is on the hook for $1.35 million per through the 2022-23 season. The Bruins would certainly love to create over $4 million in cap space out of thin air. But if they’re unclaimed and sent to Providence — which definitely seems like the calculated risk being made here — the Moore-Wagner duo will count for $1.85 million against the Boston cap, freeing $2.25 million. That could prove beneficial should the team’s center-by-committee plan fail or if the defense needs more than just Derek Forbort to be legit.

The Bruins would also be able to call both players up from Providence (and send them back down) without getting waivers involved for a month’s time, which could be useful in the case of Curtis Lazar’s expected week-to-week absence due to an upper-body injury or if an injury strikes the Boston defense.

Secondly, was it an actual surprise?

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  I first wondered if Wagner's spot could be in jeopardy when we hit the halfway point of training camp and he was still skating with AHLers on a consistent basis.
  
  That worry became legit when the Bruins didn't even take Wagner for a spin with Trent Frederic and Tomas Nosek, the two (seemingly) constants of the Bruins' 2021-22 fourth line, at any point during the preseason. But then Lazar suffered that aforementioned upper-body injury, opening the door for a right-shot, forward with center capabilities and penalty-killing experience. That's, uh, Wagner.
  
  But the Walpole, Mass. native was not elevated, but rather demoted, with a trip to the waiver wire. The simplest reason may be that the Bruins wanted to see if someone would relieve them of the remaining two years at $1.35 million on Wagner's contract,. Or that they viewed him as the least likely to get claimed in a extra skater battle between Anton Blidh ($750,000) and Karson Kuhman ($725,000). This also would've been Blidh and Kuhlman's first experience with the waiver wire, which may have given the Bruins pause in terms of offering them to the rest of the league for free.

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  In the fourth year of a five-year, $13.75 million deal signed in 2018, the 30-year-old Moore had been playing the right side for all of training camp, which is arguably the B's thinnest position in the organization. With Kevan Miller retired and Steven Kampfer in the KHL and without an NHL free agent addition, the Bruins are relying on Connor Clifton to be the third-pairing rock behind Charlie McAvoy and Brandon Carlo. They're also relying on all three players to be upright for the entire season. That latter note seemed to give Moore some considerable job security, all things considered.
  
  For as much as bellyaching as you'll hear about Moore's contract and his inability to find a permanent fit within the B's defense grouping really from the moment he arrived here, one thing you can't take away from him is his NHL experience (537 games and another 49 career playoff games). The Bruins also lauded Moore's ability to jump into action and log big minutes after long layoffs. That, with all the team's recent departures on the backend, isn't the worst option to have as a No. 7 or No. 8.

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  So, with both players out of the mix (for the time being), what do the Bruins look like at the bottom of the roster?
  
  As of right now, the Bruins have three players competing for Lazar's vacated spot on the fourth line: Blidh, Kuhlman, and Jack Stunicka. (This is obviously assuming that Wagner is not in their plans, which again, is currently unknown.) But for what it's worth, Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy seems iffy on playing the 22-year-old Studnicka in a fourth-line role.
  
  “You look at the bottom of the lineup, is that the best spot for Jack? Is that going to be the best for his development and best for the team?" Cassidy said. "We’ll answer those questions internally. And that’s what he’s up against. He’s done everything we’ve asked. He’s put emphasis on those other things as opposed to [scoring]. It’s just the other guys have played well, too.
  
  "It’s one of those good problems to have. We’ll sort through it this week and make a decision. But we’re going to do what’s best for the Bruins and what’s best for Jack, and if we decide that he has to be a top-nine guy, then we’ll have to make that decision.”
  
  Studnicka is just one of several options the Bruins have on their fourth line beyond the injured Lazar and waived Wagner, of course, from the previously mentioned options still on their roster to P-Bruins skaters such as Jesper Froden and Oskar Steen.
  
  On the backend, and as alluded to, things get a little murkier.
  
  Now assuming one of the team's right-handed defensemen gets hurt, and assuming Moore is taken out of the Bruins' plans with a potential waiver claim, the B's next move would be to call Jakub Zboril and move him to the right side. Zboril has done this for the P-Bruins in the past, but rarely for the Big B's. In the event of multiple injuries, the Bruins are calling either Urho Vaakanainen, Tyler Lewington, or Brady Lyle. It's not the most encouraging list in terms of experienced, NHL-ready options, and the most well known of the group (Vaakanainen) was dealing with an injury last we knew.
  
  As it relates to the cap, it's worth mentioning that beginning the year with Moore and Wagner on the roster, along with Zboril, would've seen the Bruins begin the year with less than $900,000 in projected cap space. That's not a ton of wiggle room.
  
  But by waiving Moore and Wagner, and assuming they report to Providence and are not claimed (the 'worst' case scenario from a financial standpoint if you're the Bruins), opening the 2021-22 season with Zboril and two extra forwards is likely to see the B's begin the year with $2.4 million in projected cap space.
  
  And those calculations, as it turns out, were enough for the Bruins to take a calculated risk on the waiver wire.

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Ty Anderson is a writer and columnist for 985TheSportsHub.com. Any opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of 98.5 The Sports Hub, Beasley Media Group, or any subsidiaries. Yell at him on Twitter: @_TyAnderson.