Name: Marc Savard
Position: Center
Age: 32
Height: 5′10″
Weight: 191
Shoots: Left
Status: Signed through 2016-17 NHL season at $4,007,143 cap-hit per season

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 12.61% w/Byron Bitz and Blake Wheeler; 12.44% w/Marco Sturm and Steve Begin
Regular season, PP: 53.52% w/Michael Ryder and Sturm
Playoffs, EV: 50% w/Milan Lucic and Miroslav Satan
Playoffs, PP: 47.73% w/Ryder and Satan; 36.36% w/Satan and Lucic

The Good: Without a shadow of a doubt, Marc Savard makes the Boston Bruins precipitously better on the power play. And despite the injuries that kept him sidelined for exactly half the season—foot, knee, concussion—Savard’s 17 power play points led all Bruins’ players; now making him the club’s leading point-getter power play for the fourth-consecutive season. His 10 goals, 23 assists, and 33 points  put Savard in the Bruins’ top-7 list  in each respective stat category.

Savard courageously returned from his third IR stint, Grade 2 concussion, for all seven games of the Bruins’ final round of the playoffs. After blasting a howitzer of a shot that had eyes over the shoulder of Flyers’ goaltender Brian Boucher in Game 1 of the semifinals, Savvy showed his ability to snipe—being more than just a set-up man.

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Name: Miroslav Satan
Position: Right wing
Age: 35
Height: 6′3″
Weight: 191
Shoots: Left
Status: UFA

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 16.39% w/Vladimir Sobotka and Milan Lucic
Regular season, PP: 37.5% w/Michael Ryder and Marco Sturm
Playoffs, EV: 33.02% w/Krejci and Sturm
Playoffs, PP: 21.65% /Marc Savard and Ryder

The Good: Picked up for short money—$700,000 pro-rated—on Jan. 2, the B’s acquired the 14-year veteran forward who showed he still had a lot of offense to contribute. Although potting nine in 38 regular season games—on pace for roughly 20 in a full 82-game season—it was in the playoffs where Satan’s signing turned into a steal.

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Name: Michael Ryder
Position: Right Wing
Age: 30
Height: 6′0″
Weight: 186
Shoots: Right
Status: Final season under three-year, $12M contract; $4M cap-hit per season

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 45.91% w/David Krejci and Blake Wheeler
Regular season, PP: 39.45% w/Marc Savard and Marco Sturm
Playoffs, EV: 53.29% w/Vladimir Sobotka and Wheeler
Playoffs, PP: 25.30% w/Savard and Miro Satan

The Good: Started the season off with a bang; thinking we’re finally going to see the 30-goal Michael Ryder in black-and-gold. He tallied 3-3-6, plus-1, and 16 shots on goal in his first eight games of the season. Finished the 2009-10 campaign with 18 goals—tied for third on the team. During the playoffs, the 30-year-old lit the lamp four times—including two important goals in Game 2 in Buffalo.

Surprisingly, Ryder finished seventh on the squad with 109 hits;  his 191 shots on goal ranked him third; and was one of two Bruins skaters to have played in all 82 games.

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Name: Vladimir Sobotka
Position: Center
Age: 22
Height: 5′10″
Weight: 183
Shoots: Left
Status: RFA

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 13.43% w/Miroslav Satan and Milan Lucic; 10.23% w/David Krejci and Michael Ryder
Playoffs, EV: 54.01% w/Ryder and Blake Wheeler; 9.39% w/Ryder and Daniel Paille

The Good: Was there a more physical player in Black-and-Gold for the first round of the playoffs than Sobotka? Even throughout the entire season, on a consistent basis, No. 60 threw his weight around ice, night-in night-out. The 5′10″ sparkplug registered 30 hits in the six games against Buffalo, and despite a shoulder injury, still managed to notch 40 total for the post season (third most). And his 136 hits, in 61 regular season games played, was fourth-most on the squad.

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Name: Johnny Boychuk
Position: Defense
Age: 26
Height: 6′2″
Weight: 225
Shoots: Right
Status: UFA

Defensive pairings:

Regular season, EV: 36.1% w/Matt Hunwick; 24.4% w/Andrew Ference
Regular season, PP: 33.18% w/Zdeno Chara; 23.36% w/Derek Morris
Playoffs, EV: 87.6% w/Chara
Playoffs, PP: 68.69% w/Dennis Wideman; 28.28% w/Chara

The Good: Persistence, perseverance, and hard work defines No. 55.

Last year in Providence, Boychuk was a stud — posting 20-46-66 totals for the P-Bruins and capturing the Eddie Shore Award as the best AHL defenseman.  Like any AHL player, making the transition to the NHL always comes with skepticism and question marks. The 26-year-old shattered those notions this year, becoming a bona-fide top-4 blue-liner in Boston.

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Name: Matt Hunwick
Position: Defense
Age: 25
Height: 5′11″
Weight: 180
Shoots: Left
Status: Last year on his two-year, $2.9M contract.

Defensive Pairings:

Regular season, EV: 31.78% w/Dennis Wideman
Regular season, PP: 51.32% w/Wideman
Playoffs, EV: 82.55% w/Wideman
Playoffs, PP: 90% w/Zdeno Chara

The Good: A tremendous skater who has the offensive skill, and mindset, to become a very good scorer on the back-end. Despite a dismal regular season—and zero points in his last 10 games—Hunwick was playing his best hockey of the season towards the end of of the year and into the playoffs.

As opposed to last year, Hunwick managed to play in every post season contest, 13, and posted half of his six points on the power play alongside Zdeno Chara on the blue line.

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Name: David Krejci
Position: Center
Age: 24
Height: 6′0″
Weight: 177
Shoots: Right
Status: Signed through 2011-12 season at $3.75M cap-hit per

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 43.78% w/Michael Ryder and Blake Wheeler
Regular season, PP: 36.45% w/Mark Recchi and Wheeler
Playoffs, EV: 49.13% w/Miroslav Satan and Marco Sturm
Playoffs, PP: 75% w/Patrice Bergeron and Recchi

The Good: Just wait until the 24-year-old center gets some wingers who can actually light the lamp with some regularity. With the poor performance of Ryder and Wheeler over the 2009-10 NHL season  – missing golden opportunities wide of the net, off the iron or right in the breadbasket of opposing goaltenders — most certainly kept Krejci to a pedestrian 52 points in 79 games.

The Czech Republic native really turned the corner during the Olympics, playing for his home country — looking like the David Krejci, circa 2008-09. No. 46 netted 21 of his 52 points in 22 games after the Olympic break, including five assists in four of his last five games of the season. Along with the late-season push he gave the Bruins into the playoffs, Krejci proved to be one of the team’s best two-way players and a rock in all three zones.

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Name: Mark Stuart
Position: Defense
Age: 26
Height: 6′2″
Weight: 213
Shoots: Left
Status: RFA

Defensive pairings:

Regular Season, EV: 32.89% w/Dennis Wideman; 29.85% w/Andrew Ference
Regular Season, PK: 44.6% w/Wideman; 27.7% w/Ference
Playoffs, EV: 51.82% w/Wideman; 41.7% w/Ference
Playoffs, PK: 63.64% w/Wideman; 36.36% w/Ference

The Good: A solid stay-at-home defenseman, especially logging the ice time of a No. 5/6 blue-liner. Plays with the physicality and grit needed on the back-end, and arguably the strongest player on the squad.

After being the team’s Iron Man in consecutive games played, 213 straight including the playoffs since the 2007-08 season, Stuart was struck with two separate injuries — sternum, finger — that kept him sideline for 26 regular season games, and nine post season contests.

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Name: Dennis Seidenberg
Position: Defense
Age: 28
Height: 6′1″
Weight: 210
Shoots: Left
Status: UFA

Defensive partners:

Regular season, EV: 78.78% w/Zdeno Chara; 8.28% w/Matt Hunwick
Regular season, PP: 46.72% w/Dennis Wideman; 22.13% w/Chara
Regular season, PK: 63.12% w/Chara; 18.44% w/Wideman

The Good: At the Mar. 3 trade deadline, the Bruins’ brass weren’t too active; especially by not addressing their needs with help putting the puck in the net. But after making some non-impact moves — college/minor leaguers — Boston shipped blue-liner Derek Morris back to Phoenix for a conditional draft pick, and acquired Seidenberg from Greg’s Used Car Lot: aka the Florida Panthers.  Seidenberg’s dynamic presence was immediately felt from day one in Boston — leading the team with over 25 minutes of ice time against the Toronto Maple Leafs.

After setting aside my admiration of No. 53, I soon realized that the swapping of defensemen was certainly a slight upgrade for Boston’s back-end. The Bruins got a hulking D-man that logged a ton of minutes — even strength, power play, and penalty kill — blocked a plethora of shots; could move the puck better than any blue-liner on the team; and had great vision, puck handling, and puck movement out of his own end and through the neutral zone.

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Name: Trent Whitfield
Position: Center
Height: 5′11″
Weight: 209
Shoots: Left
Status: $550,000 through 2010-11 season

Line combinations:

Regular season, EV: 13.39% w/Michael Ryder and Mirslav Satan; 12.48% w/Shawn Thornton and Steve Begin
Regular season, PK: 50.94% w/Daniel Paille; 13.21% w/Marco Sturm
Playoffs, EV: 76.19% w/Begin and Thornton
Playoffs, PK: 48% w/Begin; 24% w/Blake Wheeler

The Good: One thing you can’t take away from Trent Whitfield is his hard work, hustle, and tremendous effort.

In 16 games this season in Boston, Whitfield provided 11:02 of average ice time (TOI) and a solid 1:01 during the shorthand. No. 42 was solid on the face-off dot, winning 103-of-178 draws for 57.9-percent. However the 32-year-old got a little overzealous, on Oct. 22, when he dropped the gloves with Flyers’ defenseman Ole-Kristian Tollefsen in his second contest of his NHL season.

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