At this point in his career with the Boston Bruins, it’s probably time to drastically lower expectations for what Elias Lindholm is going to be for the next handful of years.
That seems more reasonable than continuing to bang the drum that the player is a disappointment, or that the contract is one of the worst handed out in team history based on the term, the money involved and the modest returns in each of the first two seasons in Boston.
The 31-year-old center has been remarkably consistent, posting 15 goals and 47.5 points in his first two seasons with the Black and Gold while battling back problems in each of those first two years. But that consistency is underwhelming rather than a picture of bringing high-level performance to the table.
He’s never been the top-line playmaking pivot-type that could seemingly work best with David Pastrnak, and truth be told, he hasn’t even been the airtight defensive two-way center he was reputed to be while finishing as a minus player in each of his first two seasons in Boston either.
Lindholm is very strong on faceoffs in all situations, has a good enough shot to flirt with 20 goals in most seasons where he stays healthy, and is a good supporting center that’s likely best served as a third-line mainstay. That’s not exactly what was envisioned for a player who’s signed for five more seasons at $7.75 million per season and has a full no-movement clause for the next three seasons before it becomes a modified no-trade clause (10 teams) for the final two seasons of his contract in Boston.
So he’s not going anywhere for any Bruins fans out there daydreaming about trade scenarios or getting out from under a contract that the player is not going to live up to during his time in Boston.
The Lindholm contract is problematic from another point of view, as well, as it could give the B’s major pause at paying out 29-year-old looming free agent center Pavel Zacha for fears of having too much cap space tied up in aging middle-6 center-types down the middle.
Still, Zacha looks like a player who’s continuing to improve and elevate in his game, while Lindholm undeniably looks like a hockey player on the slow decline.
The bottom line for Lindholm, though, is that he needs to take this summer to get into top physical playing shape and attempt to address the back issues that have hampered his performance in each of his first two seasons.
“Elias talked about what his summer is going to look like and how he's going to attack that. So right away, he's aware that he would like to train a little differently and adapt to what he needs to do to be healthy all season, to make the impact that he wants to make. He even referenced the Olympics, albeit it's a dream, he might have been able to use that time a little more effectively in terms of recovery and rest and maybe doing some work as relates to it,” said Don Sweeney. “But a chance to go to the Olympics, it's not like he wasn't able to play. He did a good job being able to play. Now he wants to get back to playing the level that he believes he's capable of, we believe he's capable of. And injuries are not the player's fault. It's a matter of what you can do as a result of training to counteract that. And he's willing to put that work in.”
As Sweeney referenced, it certainly would have been better for the Bruins – and for Lindholm’s NHL performance – if he had sat out playing for Team Sweden at the Winter Olympics as Zacha did with Team Czechia. Instead, Lindholm got an injection and played in the tournament and struggled to feel good down the stretch, including two points and a minus-3 in the six games against Buffalo in the playoffs.
“I felt good until the injury and then pushed myself real hard to be able to go to the Olympics. Kind of a long shot [to play in the Olympics], but after the injection and obviously I ended up going,” said Lindholm. “After that it was tough to kind of recover, I think going over there and my body was not great but battled through and then came back and kind of kept grinding and couldn't find the confidence or stuff like that to play my game. So it was tough.”
The Bruins have an Elias Lindholm problem pic.twitter.com/V9LxAQsuGR
— Evan Marinofsky (@EvanMarinofsky) May 2, 2026
It’s all well and good that Lindholm will explore ways to overcome his back issues, but those don’t tend to go away for aging players who have already logged plenty of miles on their tires. And it’s probably high time that the underachieving player focuses more intently on doing what’s best for the Bruins team paying him almost $8 million per season rather than what’s best for his Olympic team.
The good news is that things will be a little more normal wear-and-tear for an aging veteran like Lindholm next season, as there will not be a compacted NHL regular season schedule, and the Bruins center will get NHL All-Star weekend off like most of the rest of the league.
But the bottom line is that Lindholm is not the top-line center that Boston envisioned when they signed him a couple of years ago, and they are readily admitting that while working on developing 21-year-old Fraser Minten and 19-year-old James Hagens as their top 6 centers in training over the next few years.
“I think both [Minten and Hagens] have that skill set. They're both a little different players. One's more like Bergy [Patrice Bergeron] as far as a 200-foot player and maybe [doesn’t] see the ice as well as Hagens does. Hagens’ head is up all the time [and] he's constantly looking to distribute,” said Cam Neely. “Fraser said to me at the exit meetings, he's like, ‘wow. what a difference playoff hockey is compared to regular season hockey.’ So that experience for him was invaluable. He realizes how things [on the ice] close quicker. There's not as much time to do anything.
“Once he figures that out, like every player does over time, or most players do over time, I think he's going to grow and continue to grow. Whether they either become number one centers is up to them and how that goes for them and what the path is for them. We want to give these guys every opportunity to take a job that's staring at them. I mean, we all in this room recognize we don't have a true number one [center], you know? That's something that we want to try to rectify, whether it's this offseason or those guys growing into it. But it's something that we know that's needed.”
The Bruins have moved on from any hopes that Lindholm might be able to bounce back into being anything close to the player that topped 40 goals and 80 points in a season for the Calgary Flames years ago. Now it’s about getting the most out of the player they have millions tied up into and finding somebody else to fill the role they once originally envisioned for him a couple of summers ago.