It doesn’t take a lot of film to appreciate what Anders Bjork can bring to the Bruins.
Injuries might have robbed the Notre Dame product of two full seasons of pro hockey, but repeated shoulder procedures haven’t done much to erode some of the hallmarks of Bjork’s game — namely his ability to put opposing skaters on their heels thanks to his impressive set of wheels.
Given his speedy and crafty skillset, coupled with a scorching start during the preseason, it only took Bjork about three weeks into the 2019-20 campaign before getting a call back up from Providence.
No longer saddled with any nagging ailments, Bjork was finally granted the opportunity to traverse through a full campaign up in the NHL ranks — and all the highs and lows that come with it.
When he’s on his game, Bjork can be a spark plug in Boston’s middle-six, capable of both generating chances off the rush and using his speed as an effective presence on the forecheck, especially as the first man in on a 2-1-2 system.
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When he’s off, O-zone production and shot volume tend to dry up for Bjork, while failing to consistently adhere to the finer details of the game — a common fault among young NHLers — was an occasional lapse for the winger.
With these growing pains in mind, when the time came for the Bruins to evaluate their latest acquisitions in Ondrej Kase and Nick Ritchie — it was often Bjork that was on the outside looking in, appearing in just one of Boston’s final five games ahead of the stoppage in play.
“With Anders, it was a teaching moment,” Bruce Cassidy said back on Feb. 27, following a win over Dallas in which Bjork was benched for most of the second period. “If you want to play in April and May, this is what you’re going to see every night for hopefully two months. You’re going to have to get used to it, you’re going to have to start playing — not start playing, but you can’t go back. … There’s things, you’ve just got to learn to manage the puck better in certain games like this.”
Ultimately, Bjork’s benching should be viewed was a necessary measure for the Bruins — given both the need to size up Kase/Ritchie and light a fire under Bjork ahead of the stretch.
But if the NHL does indeed return later this summer, the 23-year-old winger very well could be a key cog in another promising playoff run.
"With the trades and me going out of the lineup right after that, I feel like I gotta put the work in to earn my spot back," Bjork said when speaking to the media via Zoom call on Wednesday. "I think that's the culture on the team, for sure. And that's how we've been successful — guys are constantly pushing each other because you have to if you want to play."
Like most youngsters, Bjork has much to improve in his overall game.
But a quick glimpse at the underlying numbers highlights a promising player that could aid Boston beyond O-zone production.
Locking things down
When Bjork first inked his entry-level contract with Boston back in May 2017, the book on the speedy winger was that of a dynamic winger with a tantalizing offensive ceiling. After all, he tallied 109 points in 115 career games with the Fighting Irish — including a finalist nod for the Hobey Baker Award in 2017.
And yet, while Bjork has shown some flashes as being a steady contributor on offense, it has actually been his defensive metrics that have stood out this season.
Among the 16 Bruins skaters that have logged at least 400 minutes of 5v5 ice time this season, Bjork ranks fifth overall in goals against per 60 minutes of play with a rate of 1.76 — with only Brandon Carlo, Matt Grzelcyk and David Krejci ahead of him. If we want to switch to expected goals against per 60 minutes, only Grzelcyk has a lower rate than Bjork's 1.82.
(For Reference: Expected goals accounts for both shot quantity and quality by factoring in multiple shot factors, including the type of shot, distance from the net, angle, 5v5, power play, penalty kill, etc. As such, a player with a low expected goals against rate means that opposing teams aren’t generating good looks when he’s out on the ice).
Even if Bjork may not regularly deal with the same matchups that Patrice Bergeron and Boston's top six face, it's rather evident that Bjork has not be a liability in Boston's own zone — a promising development for a young skater still learning the ropes up at this level of competition.
(For reference on Micah Blake McCurdy’s individual impact charts via Hockey Viz — On the offensive side of things, you’d want to see a player providing positive xG numbers — with the red blobs signifying where the team is generating a majority of their shots from whenever said player is on the ice. Defensively, negative xG numbers are a sign that a team is snuffing out opposing scoring chances whenever said player is on the ice. As such, the blue blobs represent where the opposition’s shots aren’t regularly coming from. As seen above, even if Boston's defense is already one of the tops in the league with or without Bjork out on the ice, opponents shot rates in the slot do indeed dry up when the winger has been deployed).
For Bjork, his goal of rounding out his overall game has been aided by having the likes of two-way stalwarts like Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand being just a couple of stalls away in Boston's dressing room.
A transition threat
With the wheels that Bjork has in his possession, it should come as no surprise that he's one of Boston's top threats on the rush, capable of generating quality chances for a Bruins' roster that often tends to produce 5v5 offense off of aggressive forechecking and cycling the puck through facilitators like Brad Marchand, for example.
But Bjork's speed makes him far more than just an occasional high-quality catalyst on offense.
Thanks to the awesome work that Corey Sznajder puts together, we can see that Bjork's ranks as one of the best on Boston's roster when it comes to navigating through the neutral zone and orchestrating clean entries — a must for a team that likes to get into a rhythm and dictate the pace when operating in the offensive zone.
While Bjork may not carry in the puck nearly as much (49%) nearly as much as offensive juggernauts such as David Pastrnak (64%), David Krejci (64%) or Brad Marchand (64%), he does lead all Bruins skaters in terms of entries per 60 minutes — posting a rate of 25.80. So even if he isn't directly carrying the puck into the O-zone at the same rate as a player like Pastrnak, Bjork's ability to consistently enter the offensive zone — whether it be carrying it in, dumping it in, etc. — makes him a very valuable asset that should only continue to improve once he continues to round out his overall game.
At this point, the lack of consistent scoring might be the lone thing that has halted him from consistently carving out a regular role in Boston's line. He might be a regular in terms of getting the puck into the opponent's side of the ice, but those efforts have not always yielded much in terms of offensive production. Among that same crop of 16 Bruins skaters with at least 400 minutes of 5v5 ice time, Bjork has the sixth-lowest expected goals for per 60 minutes rate at 1.99 — with Boston's fourth line of Joakim Nordstrom, Chris Wagner and Sean Kuraly standing as only forwards with lower xGF/60 totals.
Still, even if the tangible offensive production has sometimes been few and far between, Boston's lines that have featured Bjork have at least steadily been on the right side of some baseline puck-possession metrics.
For example, a line featuring Bjork, Charlie Coyle and Jake DeBrusk has out-attempted opponents, 53-40, held a plus-9 advantage in 5v5 scoring chances and only relinquished one goal in their 59:10 of ice time together this season. The lone knock against them? Only two goals scored during this time.
For Bjork, hiking up those shot totals and fighting through some of the heavier play expected come the postseason stand as the clear-cut adjustments that need to be made if/when the season returns.
Given the amount of depth on Boston's roster, it's far from a guarantee that regular minutes will be afforded to Bjork if the Bruins are indeed allowed back on the ice in the coming months. But as a younger player with steady defensive metrics and promising neutral-zone production, Bjork certainly appears deserving of another look.
He may not be the offensive catalyst that many expected he would be coming out of South Bend (at least not yet), but the winger's total skillset paints the picture of a reliable middle-six talent that can impact a game and series far beyond the traditional stat sheet.
Stats and graphs via Natural Stat Trick, HockeyViz and Corey Sznajder.