Lancer wrote:Hockey Widow wrote:Benning got a lot of internal credit for building up the big bad Bruins. Chiarelli got a lot of external credit. I remember when we signed Benning and Lucic shared with some friends that Benning would be missed and he felt his absence would see a decline in the Bruins. Gave him most of the credit for not only drafting but trades and FA signings.
Interesting to see the plight of the Bruins these days after a couple years post-Benning. They still Patrnak, McAvoy and some serviceable parts but nothing really promising to look at post-Bergeron/Chara/Marchand/Rask - all of whom are starting to show their age.
Plight of the Bruins? Given their respective seasons thus far, it's funny you think the Bruins are in some kind of purgatory, at least compared with Vancouver.
Pasternak leads the team in scoring, Debrusk and McAvoy are both on 40-point paces. Heinen is 22. Bork is 21 and has 9 points in 16 games. Marchand is only 29 and Krug is 26. They were a playoff team last year, and are only three seasons removed from an appearance in the Cup finals.
They're icing a younger team than Vancouver, and seeing as they haven't had a top-10 pick since Hamilton/Seguin (thanks Toronto) I'd say the Bruins actually have done the "rebuild on the fly," while the Canucks have been forced into the more traditional rebuild.
If Edmonton didn’t win the lottery with McJesus, you wonder if things would be appreciably better than before they drafted him?
Kind of a silly question, isn't it? Of course they'd be worse. Ditto for Pittsburgh without Crosby, Washington without Ovechkin, Tampa without Stamkos etc.