NHL Notebook: Even with over $25 million coming off the books, could Bruins be looking at another cap crunch this summer?

The 23 players in the Bruins’ dressing room might be solely fixated on the 2022-23 campaign and making the most of however long they can keep this contention window ajar, but such a singular sentiment can’t be echoed by Don Sweeney and Boston’s top brass.

Because for as much as the B’s are trying to stay in the present, this franchise is already staring at a hefty to-do list this summer. 

Whether it be David Pastrnak’s pending payday or the Boston bracing for a future without Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci down the middle, the Bruins are likely going to have to allocate a hefty chunk of cash in order to prevent this team from slipping in the Eastern Conference landscape. 

And let’s face it, regardless of whether the Bruins come up short this spring or hoist Lord Stanley’s Cup, a full-blown roster teardown doesn’t seem to be a feasible scenario that the Bruins will entertain in the years ahead – not with franchise pieces like Charlie McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm locked up long term, and ESPECIALLY if they want to keep Pastrnak on board for the next eight years.

As such, it seems like a given that the Bruns will be opening their checkbook early and often this offseason — tossing out contracts left and right in order to either retain talent or add outside help to plug in holes up and down the depth chart in order to orchestrate a retool, rather than a rebuild. 

Thankfully for the Bruins, such a seismic offseason is coming at a perfect time, considering that Boston has nine contracts coming off the books entirely in 2023 — generating close to $27 million in available cap space (per CapFriendly). 

At face value, having a solid chunk of change available would seem to assuage some of the fears regarding Boston’s roster augmentation in 2023 and beyond. But that surplus seems destined to dry up quickly, at least after crunching a few numbers.

Because even if Boston does re-up Pastrnak long-term, it sure seems like the B’s are going to have to concede to a franchise-record extension that will account for at least an $11 million annual cap hit, if not more. And when you toss in the $4.5 million in bonus overages that will carry over from both Bergeron/Krejci’s incentive-laded contracts, the Bruins could suddenly be looking at little under $11 million in cap room — and that’s without Bergeron/Krejci signed and just six total forwards inked on the active roster.

Yikes.

Sure, the Bruins still have plenty of time to manufacture some more cap room, especially if they move a contact like Mike Reilly or Craig Smith between now and the end of February.  

But considering how quickly Boston’s cap room this summer can dry up, the Bruins had to be buoyed by Gary Bettman’s comments earlier this season — with the NHL commissioner acknowledging back in October that the league’s salary cap ceiling could rise by at least $4 million in 2023-24.

Such a spike from the league’s current $82.5 million upper limit would be a welcome sight for teams like the Bruins who are expected to spend big this offseason, but Bettman did guard against those lofty projections by adding that such an increase would only become possible if the players’ escrow debt to the owners is paid off before the end of the current season. 

"We believe that there is a good probability that the escrow will be paid off this season," Bettman said back in October. "It may not be, but it's going to be close we think, which means the flat cap will be replaced by a bigger increase. Revenue is pretty vibrant. We probably did $5.4 billion in (hockey-related revenues) this past season) which is actually about a half a billion more than we projected a year ago when we were starting things up. Things are good."

That current escrow is a direct result of the COVID-19 pandemic, with the 50-50 split in hockey revenue between the players and owners (as agreed to in the current CBA) out of wack due to those tumultuous last couple of years. 

While players were still getting paid during the pandemic, the league’s revenue took a major hit due to attendance restrictions and other factors — leading to the imbalance of that 50/50 cut.

But alas, even if the NHL’s revenue streams are surging now (further bolstered by the league’s hefty TV deals with both ESPN and Turner Sports), Bettman offered a more sobering outlook earlier this week at the league’s board of governors meeting down in Florida — noting that current projections have that escrow still in place by the end of this season.

If that escrow is not paid off by the end of this season, Bettman expects that the current salary cap will only increase by $1 million to $83.5 million in 2023-24 — the threshold we used when crunching the numbers for our earlier fiscal exercise with the Bruins.

And with Bettman noting that the escrow balance — which started at $1.1 billion — is still expected to sit at around $70 million by the end of the regular season, it does seem like the Bruins have to go into this summer with the expectation that they won’t have nearly as much fiscal flexibility as they expected.

And beyond Pastrnak’s new deal and those bonus overages, the Bruins will also have to account for matters such as:

- Tossing out a hefty contract or two to account for the loss of one or more top-six centers in Bergeron and Krejci.

- Finding some common ground with Pavel Zacha — a potential 2C of the future who is ALSO due for a shiny new contract this summer.

- Hand out new contracts for RFAs in Trent Frederic and Jeremy Swayman.

- And fill out the rest of a lineup that is looking rather thin up top if Boston lets most of its pending free agents depart.

Perhaps the Bruins will get bailed once again if Bergeron and/or Krejci return for yet another year at an absurdly cheap contract.

At this point, the Bruins might have to just sit and hope for such a scenario. Because otherwise, this team isn’t going to have a whole lot of help when it comes to avoiding a cap crunch this summer. 

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Ullmark, Swayman debut new Winter Classic gear

When the Bruins take to the ice at Fenway Park on Jan. 2, their two netminders will be paying tribute to some former B’s goalies — as well as a couple of other Boston legends — thanks to their new gear. 

Ullmark, who designed his new Winter Classic mask with the help of longtime collaborator David Gunnarsson, opted to recreate Andy Moog’s snarling bear mask with his new attire — while also mimicking Byron Dafoe’s pads, glove and blocker during “Lord Byron’s” tenure between the pipes in the late 90s.

And Swayman made sure to recognize the Bruins’ outdoor venue for their matchup against the Penguins on Jan. 2, with his mask featuring Ted Williams, David Ortiz and a fellow Alaskan in Curt Schilling. And with his pads, Swayman opted for a throwback look in homage to the netminders of yesteryear.

Bergeron - future coach?

There’s no question that Patrice Bergeron is headed for the Hall of Fame whenever he puts the finishing touches on his lauded career. But could the B’s legendary forward transition his talents to coaching? Based on his influence in the dressing room and the way his teammates respond to his challenges, Jim Montgomery wouldn’t really be surprised. 

"Nevermind, the Hall of Fame player he is. He's a Hall of Fame person and leader, so much so that after the first — I was not happy with our team, and I was not very happy in between the periods when I addressed the team,” Montgomery said following Saturday’s win over Columbus. “Second period, no impact. So I said to Bergy with 40 seconds left from the second, I said, 'It's your dressing room.' 

“I just hope he doesn't want to be a head coach, because we came out and played our best period of the game. And that just speaks volumes of — one, it's how much I trust him. And it's how much the players listen to him."