Could Bruins Road Trip Be What the Team Needs? Billy Jaffe Weighs-In

On Thursday's edition of Toucher and Hardy, Billy Jaffe who is a Bruins analyst for NESN, joins the show and explains how the Bruins can greatly benefit from going on their four-game roundtrip. This comes on the heels of the team being home for seven straight games following the All-Star break, which Jaffe explains could have played a factor in taking the players out of their routines.

Dan Roche: Their energy was tremendous coming out too. From that home stand it just looked like there was a whole better vibe to them.

Billy Jaffe: You need to get on the road. Sometimes you just need to get on the road.

Fred Toucher: That's what Billy's been saying this whole time.

Billy Jaffe: Get on the road and you get out of this routine. The holiday CBA break - all star break is great. It rejuvenates, refreshes. You get time with your family, or if you're single, you get time with your whatever, you're on the beach, etc. But it gets you out of your routine. Not bad, but okay. You can come back from that. But then you're home for seven games, which I think it was 12 days. So next thing you know you're out of this routine not for just eight days, but now you're close to 3 weeks.

Dan Roche: And it look like it towards the end.

Billy Jaffe: Yeah. So they get on the road and now they had a kick ass game last night. Tonight's going to be tough though, back to back.

Dan Roche: Yeah but you know what Billy? I said this to the guys earlier, this game for some reason they play a game like they did last night and everyone says back to back games, they'll be gassed. And they play really well in these games.

CONNECT WITH TOUCHER & HARDY: linktr.ee/ToucherandHardy

For the latest, Visit the show page on 985thesportshub.com. Follow 98.5 the Sports Hub on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram! Visit our channels on Twitch and Youtube!

The Boston Bruins, even before their recent slump, were a team with more than one need.

But the problem for B's general manager Don Sweeney has been a lack of capital. And in more ways than one.

After repeated 'win now' moves and home run swings — his biggest coming last year between deadline deals for Dmitry Orlov and Tyler Bertuzzi, as well as bonus-laden deals for Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci signed with the intentions of maximizing their options for 2022-23 — the Bruins are short on both draft picks to trade and cap space to add.

So, for the Bruins, it's about exhausting every internal option before looking elsewhere. And the Bruins added a new option to that list Sunday with the signing of P-Bruins forward Justin Brazeau to a two-way contract.

Brazeau, who had been skating with the Bruins only an AHL-only contract (and thus ineligible for a recall to Boston), will make a league-minimum $775,000 at the NHL level on this contract, which runs through next season.

Down in Providence, Brazeau has posted a career-high 18 goals and plus-24 rating through 49 games this season, while his 37 points are just eight points away from matching last year's career-high of 45 in 67 games.

Brazeau's 18 goals with the P-Bruins are tied with Georgii Merkulov for the second-most among all Providence skaters (Anthony Richard leads the team with 19 goals), while his 37 points are the fourth-most on the team behind Merkulov (44), Fabian Lysell (40), and Richard (38).

When it comes to Brazeau, the first thing that pops off the page is his size.

Listed at 6-foot-5 and 245 pounds, Brazeau immediately becomes the biggest forward in the B's organization.

Considered a project when the Bruins first signed him, 'skating' was the biggest knock on Brazeau, according to those I talked with regarding the intriguing prospect. But by now, it's clear that the Bruins have seen enough progress in that department to feel that Brazeau could be an effective NHLer.

It's only fair to assume that — even with those statistical improvements — they wouldn't have converted his deal to a standard, NHL contract had they not been satisfied with those developments this season.

It'll also be interesting to see just how quickly the Bruins get the 26-year-old up to Boston for a look.

Unless the Bruins got word that another team was going to sign Brazeau to an NHL contract had the Bruins not done so first, it stands to reason that the Bruins signed Brazeau when they did so that they could get him up to Boston for an NHL run. Boston's decision to put Oskar Steen on waivers on Sunday, especially with Jakub Lauko currently dealing with an upper-body injury and a questionable status for Monday, only adds to that belief.

Brazeau would also fit a potential (or glaring, depending on who you ask) need for a space-creating, big-bodied wing who throw his weight around and answer the bell in the Black and Gold's bottom-six forward group.

This has been a need for the Bruins since they lost Milan Lucic to an injury and a domestic violence incident that will keep him away from the club for the rest of the season, really. And while Brazeau is not of the Lucic mold as a heavyweight fighter (Brazeau uses his frame and size as a physical threat more than his fists), he does allow the Bruins to go back to a fourth-line look that's more speedster-speedster-bruiser, which was Jim Montgomery's ideal mix when he created the effective Lucic-Beecher-Lauko line to start the 2023-24 season.

Brazeau, who spent time in the Maple Leafs organization before coming over to the Bruins, has recorded 49 goals and 113 points in 167 games with Providence over the last three seasons.