To say, by dealing Marc Savard, that the Boston Bruins’ offense would be left with bigger holes than a block of Gruyère cheese would be an understatement. But dealing the hockey club’s No. 1 center and best offensive pivot wouldn’t necessarily be the worst thing to happen. That is, of course, if the front office can learn from their previous mistakes and properly fill those voids.

If the Bruins can successfully trade the two-time All Star, as well as another $4M-plus contract—Ryder, Thomas—then they have opened up some space for some potential free-agents (tomorrow, July 1).

If we’ve learned anything from this past season, we know that the 2009-10 Bruins roster just couldn’t step-it-up and replace Phil Kessel when it came to burying the puck. The entire team as a whole, as well as individually, didn’t meet the expectations of their 116-point season of yesteryear, and failed to pick up the slack of losing their 2006 first-round draft pick and his 36 goals. From potting the second-most goals in the NHL during 2008-09 with 270 goals-for (3.29 per game), the B’s plummeted to an NHL-low 196 goals (2.39 per game) last season; were an average 9th with 2.77 goals-for average in 13 post season games.

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Bruins President Cam Neely and general manager Peter Chiarelli will introduce recently acquired forward Nathan Horton and second overall pick in last Firday’s draft, Tyler Seguin, to the media at 11:30 a.m. in their second visit to Boston. Horton and Seguin will then participate in a Bruins Street Brigade youth hockey clinic at Boston’s Puopol Park’s basketball court in the North End from 3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Following the conference and clinic, the two will head over Fenway Park on Lansdowne St. where they will throw out the ceremonial first pitches before the Sox vs. Rays game at 7:10 p.m.

As Mark Recchi enters his 22nd season in the NHL, and third as member of the Boston Bruins, his role once again will be to mentor new and younger players while leading by example.

One new face will be 25-year-old Nathan Horton, who was acquired from Florida last Wednesday.

“I see a young gentleman that’s potential has been untapped.” said Recchi during a press conference earlier this afternoon.

Horton has seen five different coaches (Mike Keenan, Rick Dudley, John Torchetti, Jacques Martin and Pete DeBoer) as well as five different general managers (Dudley, Keenan, Martin, Randy Sexton, and Dale Tallon) in his six-year tenure in Florida. An organization with a bit more stability in a new city may be exactly what Horton needs.

“I think part of it is, I don’t think he’s been in the greatest place for development [Florida]” said Recchi. “I think they’ve always been kind of floundering around and I think the Boston sports market is going to be tremendous for him.”

The 6′2″ 220 lbs. Horton has put up some impressive numbers throughout the early stages of his career, 142-153-295 scoring totals in 422 NHL games—all in Florida. Although in each of his last three seasons his goals have tailed-off (31, 27, 22, 20), Recchi sees, along with tremendous potential, a superb talent.

“Number one I think he really wants to be a good player. And I think he’s really excited to get this opportunity to come here.” said Recchi. “I think it sounds like he’s willing and able to come in here and get better and learn and continue to grow as a player.

“He’s a tough kid, he can score, he can pass, this kid is just pure talent. We’ve just got to get it out on a more consistent basis” continued Recchi. “I believe if you surround him with the right people, you surround him and he’s willing to learn and be effective, then it’s going to be a great fit and he’s going to be a huge factor for our hockey club.”

If the Bruins are going to go deep in this year’s playoffs, they now have experience and veteran leadership on their side.

Shortly after his one-year extension for the 2010-11 NHL season with the Bruins was made official, Future Hall-of-Fame forward Mark Recchi addressed the media via conference call this afternoon.

“I’m excited about the opportunity to come back. I think the Bruins are again, continuing to go in the right direction.” said Recchi. “And to be part of the Bruins again, it’s going to be something special.”

The decision to remain a Bruin didn’t take the 42-year-old too long to decide.

“Well it happened, basically, for the most part, right after the season. I had some great conversations with Peter [Chiarelli], Claude [Julien] about it and it was dialogued back-and-forth—they wanted me back and I wanted to come back and we started going from there. I wasn’t that hard to be honest with you.”

Recchi was to become an unrestricted free-agent on Jul. 1, so the quick re-signing of No. 28 is a nice sigh of relief. Last season, Recchi didn’t ink an extension until Jul. 2, 2009—Day 2 of NHL’s free-agency date.

“Last year was more the organization trying to figure out what they were going to do. More than it was just me waiting until the end.” said Recchi. “Peter had a lot more things going on last year at this time and he needed more time to figure cap-wise dollar-wise where things were going to fit.

“This year was a little different he [Chiarelli] was very adamant on bringing what he wants back.” Recchi added “he had a pretty good idea what his team was going to look like; what he wants to do.”

The 22-year NHL veteran and two-time Stanley Cup winner has posted 28-31-59 in 99 career games in Boston, and 9-7-16 totals in 24 post season contests.

Savard's time in Boston could soon be over.

As the trade talks around Bruins’ No. 1 center Marc Savard continues, the thought of losing one of the NHL’s premiere set-up men after drafting Tyler Seguin just a few nights ago is enough to make most Black-and-Gold backers pull their hair out.

The day after picking Seguin second overall in Friday night’s 2010 NHL Entry Draft, the Bruins dealt center and impending RFA Vladimir Sobotka to the St. Louis Blues for defensive prospect David Warsofky, opening up a possible third-line center slot for Seguin if in fact Savard is shipped out soon. If the point of dealing the Bruins power-play pivot is to clear cap-space ($4M) then we already know the Bruins won’t get equal value for No.91.

The Bruins currently have five roster forwards making at least $4M—Savard, Horton, Lucic, Ryder, Bergeron—and seven who take in $3.5M and up—Krecji, Sturm (Sturm’s cap will be null for the time he’s placed on LTIR).  Certainly ridding an albatross contract like Ryder’s would be ideal, but the reality of any general manager willing to take on that existing contract is a fable.

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Well, the Bruins finally got a defenseman.

Boston Bruins General Manager Peter Chiarelli has traded center Vladimir Sobotka to the St. Louis Blues for unsigned draft choice David Warsofsky.

The 20-year-old Warsofsky, who was originally drafted in the fourth-round (95th overall) of the 2008 NHL Entry Draft by the Blues, is a junior at Boston University and a native of Marshfield, Massachusetts. In 79 games with the Terriers, the 5′9″ Marshfield, MA, native totaled  15-31-46 and 75 PIM. He also played for the U.S. National Development team in 2007-08 with 4-2-6 in 15 games.

Sobotka, 22, was an impending restricted free-agent come Jul. 1, and was most likely dealt to open-up a center spot for No. 2 pick, Tyler Seguin.

The Boston Bruins selected forward Ryan Spooner of the OHL with the No. 45 overall pick. The Hockey Spy had him projected at No. 34 overall in his pre-rankings.

With the second selection in the second round of the 2010 NHL Entry Draft, the Boston Bruins selected forward Jared Knight at No. 32. The HockeySpy had him ranked 54th overall in this year’s class.

I was hoping this pick—via Toronto for Phil Kessel—was going to a defenseman, Jon Merrill in particular; ranked 29th by the HockeySpy). But we’ll see what their own pick No. 45 will soon bring in.

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Derek Forbort

During Round One of yesterday’s NHL Entry Draft, the Los Angeles Kings wasted no time in making the trade of of the day.

As defensemen started dropping like flies out of the top-10, Kings general manger Dean Lombardi acquired the 15th overall pick (originally the Bruins’) from the Florida Panthers for their 19th and 59th overall picks, and drafted hulking defenseman Derek Forbort—who had spent the previous two seasons in the U.S. national team’s development program. Forbort, 6′4″ 198 lbs. and often compared to Buffalo’s Tyler Myers, now joins the Kings’ blue-line of young studs: Jack Johnson (3rd overall in 2007) and 2008 first-round picks Drew Doughty (2nd) and Colten Teubert (13th).

Boston’s 15th overall pick was dealt to the Panthers on Wednesday, along with the third-round pick in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft and defenseman Dennis Wideman, in exchange for right-winger Nathan Horton and center Greg Campbell. Now it’s the Kings who reaped the benefits of this transaction; wheeling-and-dealing to steal Forbort.

Even before drafting center/forward Tyler Seguin with the second overall pick Friday night, the Bruins remained fully-loaded with roster players up the middle—Patrice Bergeron, David Krejci, Marc Savard—as well as centers in the system—Maxime Sauve, Jamie Arniel, Brad Marchand, Joe Colborne, and Zach Hamill.

On defense, however, is where the Bruins could really start building. Yuri Alexandrov, Andrew Bondarchuk, Jeff Penner, and Steven Kampher are a few of the up-and-comers to possibly crack the Bruins’ roster within the next couple of years. A player like Forbort (or trading up to 12th to snag Cam Folwer) could have been a cornerstone defenseman for the B’s future on the blue-line.

But on the other hand, if you think like Carolina Hurricanes general manager Jim Rutherford, then drafting any defenseman in the first-round is essentially a waste of a pick. The former NHL goaltender now GM firmly believes that by the time a defenseman is  good and NHL-ready, he’s already a free-agent. This is historically true; for every one Denis Potvin there were probably 1,000 Greg Joly’s in between.

Jon Merrill

Rounds 2-7 will undergo today, with the Bruins picking 32, 45, 97, 135, 165, 195. With focus on the blue-line, I like 6′3″ defenseman Jon Merrill (University of Muchigan) who is still on the board.

Although the deal—and second overall selection Tyler Seguin—should help the Black-and-Gold and their struggles to light the lamp for this upcoming season, and being in just infant stages of these deals, the question of whether or not the Bruins overpaid for the former Panthers will eventually be answered.

Boston Bruins general manager Peter Chiarelli will have a little more wiggle room to fill out his roster for this upcoming season. The NHL announced that its salary cap will be $59.4M for this 2010-11 season, up from last year’s $56.8M ceiling. The salary floor will be set at $43.4M.

With 17 players inked for the Black-and-Gold, the cap-space they now have is just north of $5M according to capgeek.com. Boston still has Mark Recchi, Steve Begin and Miroslav Satan as their impending unrestricted free-agents come July 1—with only Recchi expected to be re-signed. Of the impending restricted free-agents: Mark Stuart, Vladimir Sobotka, Blake Wheeler, Greg Campbell, and Daniel Paille have yet to be inked.

With a roster not yet complete, Chiarelli seems to have to put his foot on the accelerator to find Tim Thomas ($5M cap-hit) a new home for this upcoming season, especially with the amount of players he’s expected to keep.

Other notable impending UFA’s in Providence: goaltender Dany Sabourin, center Drew Larman.
RFA’s: goaltender Kevin Regan, defensemen Andrew Bondarchuk and Adam McQuaid, and forward Mikko Lehtonen.