Zolak & Bertrand: Was the Boston Bruins season a success?
The Bruins were eliminated in six games by the Florida Panthers on Friday night after a 2-1 loss at the TD Garden. It was a disappointing way to end the season, but was the season a failure overall? Zolak & Bertrand discussed whether or not this year for the Bruins exceeded expectations after the departure of key leaders and a number of question marks coming into the season:
Was this a successful year for the Bruins?
Zolak: Yes! I don’t pause. Yes. I think they even know that. Like last year, it’s like, pull the rug out from under me. Punch me in the nuts. We choked. No expectations where this team was. A lack of cap room. The players that you lost. The playoff players that you lost and you went further than they did and you took them to Game 6. With some of the injuries you had and some of the questions. Yeah. Successful year to me.
Beetle: I would just go back to where we were when we were talking about this team last July. If we could, we could go back to last July after the Bruins had choked and had fallen apart in the playoffs. And, you eventually found out that Krejci was done and that Bergeron was done. And then the Bruins go out in free agency and they sign Milan Lucic for one year and a million bucks. They go out and sign van Riemsdyk for one year and a million bucks. They go out and get Kevin Shattenkirk for a year and a million bucks. They signed Morgan Geeky, right? I mean. You look at those signings last July and you say, “oh God, this team is so effed. They are just trying to fill out a roster with old guys at $1 million a year. What? What’s happening with this team?” Patrick Brown got signed. He didn’t even make it out of training camp. I mean, they had all these signings that just you looked at and you were so unimpressed with, and you knew that it was a result of their cap situation, how they had pushed money into this year from last, how they just were going all out in 2023. And what did that mean for 2024. Big step back.
I mean, they had all these signings that just you looked at and you were so unimpressed with, and you knew that it was a result of their cap situation, how they had pushed money into this year from last, how they just were going all out in 2023. And what did that mean for 2024. Big step back. Unable to move one of the goaltenders. They couldn’t move Ullmark. And, so I just think you go back to that and think of your expectations then. They obviously changed your expectations when the season began and they were hot out of the gate and they got off to a great start. And I think they were playing over what they were as a roster. And by the end, I think their points total didn’t truly represent the talent on the roster. That they had sort of overachieved in the regular season, and I thought a fair expectation for them at that point. Again, changing expectations was get out of the first round. You got a good match up against Toronto, get out of the first round. They did it. But I also think, despite all of our problems with them in this series with Florida and all the critiques of not being able to clear the puck or not being able to generate enough chances. This was not a blowout. This was not a lopsided series. They were in every single game. They competed against a team that they didn’t compete against last year.
Everything Linus Ullmark said at break-up day regarding his future with the Bruins
TEMPE, ARIZONA – JANUARY 09: Goaltender Linus Ullmark #35 of the Boston Bruins during the NHL game at Mullett Arena on January 09, 2024 in Tempe, Arizona. The Coyotes defeated the Bruins 4-3 in overtime. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
By now, it’s no secret that the Bruins had discussions involving Ullmark at the 2024 NHL trade deadline. And though it’s been both believed and reported that Ullmark opted to use his trade protection to block a potential move out of Boston (likely to Los Angeles), Jeremy Swayman‘s emergence as a true No. 1 during the 2024 postseason has only put more doubt in regards to Ullmark’s future entering the final year of a four-year, $20 million contract.
“Oh, you want the juicy stuff?” Ullmark asked. “You got to catch me a little bit later [and] do an exclusive if you want to get to that part of that. So, it’s hard to not hear [the rumors]. You can’t isolate yourself because then you would live in a shed in the woods, and you’d show up for practice sometimes. But I mean, I have you guys. You’re always going to ask questions. You want to know what’s happening and you’re going to ask questions, obviously, to get to the answers that you might want. But I’m not going to give you any good answers other than that.”
Still, Ullmark was more than aware of the noise.
“That’s also one of the things that was new for me this year. I’ve never been a part of any trade talks before, so that was a new experience,” Ullmark admitted. “Was it hard? Yeah, it was hard because you’re very comfortable where you are. You don’t want to move when you feel like you’re playing well and you have the team and your teammates.
“So with that popping up now, I’m not the only one that has been in trade talks, obviously. There were other goaltenders out there in the league as well that had a lot of rumors with that they might get dealt and there might not be any opportunities for any of them. And for me, it’s above my pay grade as well, really.
“If I could, I’m probably going to say the same thing as everybody else: I want to stay and I’m going to stay. But yeah, we’ll live in a world where in professional sports we’ve got to deal with the hand you’ve been dealt. Like I said, I have one more year. I wouldn’t want anything else than to come back here, and get a little bit of a revenge tour.”
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA – JANUARY 27: Linus Ullmark #35 of the Boston Bruins greets teammates before playing against the Philadelphia Flyers at the Wells Fargo Center on January 27, 2024 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Tim Nwachukwu/Getty Images)
There are answers within those answers from the 30-year-old Ullmark.
He clearly doesn’t want to leave Boston. Both for his own feelings when it comes to being a Bruin, as well as his family’s wishes. And if he has the ability to control that — which he clearly did during the 2024 NHL trade deadline — he was going to utilize that to provide himself with the result he wanted. Which, again, is clearly being a Bruin and being at what he considers home here in Boston.
“I would say it’s more on the personal side,” Ullmark said of his reasons for wanting to stay with the Bruins. “We felt that ever since we came to Boston, we’ve been embraced by not only the city, but the team and the people that work throughout the organization. Like, everybody has been so nice, caring and lovable. And we felt that ever since our day one. And that makes you feel at home, that makes you want to stay there. And when you have that good thing behind you, you don’t want to move just because you have to move or something. You want to stay.
“That’s just what it comes down to. It doesn’t really matter how it goes on the ice. If you’re feeling that your life is taken care of off the side, and that your family’s well and they’re thriving and enjoying their time in school and with friends, you don’t wanna uproot them just because. I think that goes to anyone that has kids and families. It doesn’t matter what kind of a job you have, if you feel that, ‘You know what? I’m very comfortable and I like it here,’ you don’t really want to move at that point.”
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS – OCTOBER 30: Linus Ullmark #35 of the Boston Bruins looks on wearing his mask during the second period against the Florida Panthers at TD Garden on October 30, 2023 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
Based on that rationale, Ullmark does not sound like a man who is eager to waive his no-trade clause this summer. It will hardly get any easier for the Bruins to move him to a team on that list, too, as Ullmark’s trade protection drops from a 16-team no-trade list to a… 15-team no-trade list next season.
And Ullmark, for what it’s worth, did not feel like disclosing much of anything to me when it came to the details of that no-trade list.
“I mean, I have my list and my list is there,” Ullmark told me. “We’ve worked very hard for it. There’s a reason for why it’s there. And that’s something that the players before me worked really hard to get to the point where we have that luxury, and there’s a reason why it’s there, and there’s a reason why certain teams are on there. And there might be personal things, but that’s up to each and every player to have and what it comes from my personal things.
“That’s something for me, my family and, my agent to deal with and take care of. And I don’t have any obligations to share the reasonings or the reasons that I have certain teams on that list.”
Internally and externally, there’s been a belief that Ullmark does not want to waive his no-trade clause to go to a team in the Western Conference and that his no-trade clause involves a lot of teams that play in the West. The thought there is that being in the East makes it easier for Ullmark and his family to go back to Sweden in the offseason.
But it’s not as simple as a geography decision for Ullmark, as he revealed without outright naming — or confirming at the very least — any teams that may or may not be on that list.
“It all depends,” Ullmark said when asked about the potential geographical limitations involved in his no-trade. “It’s very hard. I mean, like I said, we don’t really have all these luxuries to really tell like, ‘I don’t want to be at certain areas.’ And there might be other things as well throughout your career that let’s say, for example, you have one team that would be on the West Coast that is really, really bad and you have them on your trade list. But then all of a sudden, maybe three years later, they’re not [bad]. They might be a contender.
“You can just look at Edmonton or whatever and look at those teams that might have been really bad, but now are really good. You might want to waive at that point, but you can’t really think about that, you know, in advance [like] how are these teams going to be in three or four years? You can’t really look into your little [crystal] ball in the future and say, ‘Hey, this is what it’s going to be, I’m going to go there’ and whatever because it might go to shit as well.”
Apr 24, 2024; Toronto, Ontario, CAN; Bruins goaltender Linus Ullmark (right) congratulates goaltender Jeremy Swayman (1) on a win over the Maple Leafs in game three of the first round of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs. (John E. Sokolowski/USA TODAY Sports)
And though Ullmark may be comfortable in Boston, the interesting wrinkle in all of this is Swayman’s aforementioned emergence as a No. 1 goaltender and with a payday that will ultimately reflect that change. As well as the fact that Ullmark is playing for his next contract. There’s both plusses and minuses within that reality.
Simply put, Ullmark needs to play and re-establish himself as a No. 1 goaltender for both the regular season and the playoffs, and it’s probably in his best interest to do that for a playoff team if he’s going to maximize his spotlight and earnings on that 2025 contract. The minus there is that Swayman being in Boston, and potentially making as much as $8 million per year on his next deal, obviously complicates that possibility. It may even make it downright impossible given the Bruins’ other roster needs, which at this point are glaring and undeniable.
And watching for 11 of Boston’s 12 playoff games was indeed tough on Ullmark.
“It’s hard in the way that you have to think about the greater good,” Ullmark said. “Like, it’s very tough in the way that you want your team to succeed [and] you want to be successful and you want the other guys to play well because that means you’re winning games. And I’ve said this many times before when it comes to me and Sway that we’re always going to have each other’s backs and support each other, because that means if he’s playing well [that] the team’s playing well, we have a good opportunity to win. And you want to win the last game of the season every year.
“But to balance that also with personal feelings, you kind of have to deal with those off the ice. And that’s what it means being a professional, that once we actually step into the rink, would it be on my away game or at home games, you have to stay professional. You have to put your pride aside and think about what’s better for the team right now. And for me, that was to push during practices and be verbally there and talk to people, give each other, some heads ups or push them to become better and maybe catch them when they’re falling down or anything like that.
“And I’m hoping that once this season has really been put in the back of our minds that people will feel like, ‘Yeah, he did whatever he could from the position that he was put in.'”
And though there’s no perfect answer or solution to the situation that Ullmark wants to put himself in for 2024-25, it’s clear that the decision is never as easy as simply saying to whatever the Bruins present to him this summer.
“People just think that it’s just about playing goal and it should be easy and go get a contract somewhere else or whatever [but] it’s not easy,” Ullmark offered. “You know, we play every single year and trying to improve ourself and trying to get that contract and you can’t take anything for granted in this league. It goes really quick. I mean playoffs is just an example of it. One day you feel like king of the world and you might be up 3-1 or 3-0 and then all of a sudden it’s 3-3 and you have a Game 7 on your hands. So it goes around quick. You have to enjoy it.
“But I wish that a lot of more people would see beyond just a professional side of it and see that we have our family to take care of as well off the side and have to think about the decisions that we make with them as well.”
