On this episode of Pucks with Haggs, host Joe Haggerty is joined by guest Mick Colageo to discuss the Bruins latest setback, and how the team continues to show some of the same consistent flaws. Is coaching the team's biggest issue? And how does the team fix its issues on special teams? All that, and much more!
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SportsTranscript
00:00Pucks with Hags is brought to you by PrizePix and the GameTime app.
00:05Welcome to another edition of the Pucks with Hags podcast, as always, powered by our friends
00:10at PrizePix, the exclusive daily fantasy partner of the CLNS Media Network. I believe this is the
00:16138th episode of the Pucks with Hags podcast, so thank you very much for listening. I'm your host,
00:21Joe Hagerty. You can find my work at joehagerty.substack.com. Subscribe and get yourself
00:26a premium membership to get all of my Bruins and NHL writing sent straight directly to your inbox.
00:32I also write columns three times a week for the Boston Sports Journal, so go to bostonsportsjournal.com
00:37and check those out. With me today, longtime friend and colleague, Mick Colaggio. Mick,
00:41please tell everybody where they can find your work, my friend. I blog games at rinkwrapmc.com
00:48and link to them on X and Facebook, and I consult with Boston Hockey now, and who knows if we'll
00:56start writing again with them, but I just filed the Money Power issue of the hockey news on the
01:02Bruins, so that happened as well. Nice, so everybody check that out for sure. Let's also thank our
01:10sponsors, as always, our friends at PrizePix. Download the PrizePix app today and use the code
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01:25guaranteed. PrizePix run your game. Also thank all of our friends at GameTime. If you want to
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01:42your first purchase. Terms do apply, of course, but download the GameTime app, create an account, use
01:47the code CLNS for $20 off your first purchase. Download GameTime today. What time is it, Mick?
01:54GameTime. GameTime. Thank you, GameTime. All right, Mick, let's get into it. 4-0 loss
02:02on Tuesday night to the Toronto Maple Leafs for the Boston Bruins.
02:09All right, first let's talk about the reaction after the game. Jim Montgomery
02:16talked about they were better 5-on-5, better defensively, liked to play 5-on-5.
02:24You know, they drew some penalties as a result of better 5-on-5 play, so they had some power play
02:29chances. But basically, this team, this game was a massive and monumental special teams breakdown
02:36and a discipline breakdown. Again, a lot of bad penalties, Mick, in this game, I thought. A lot
02:42of avoidable penalties. Yes, there were penalties on both sides. Both sides were going to the box.
02:47It was kind of a power play fest. But most of the Bruins penalties were offensive zone penalties.
02:52Several of them were way away from the play and had nothing to do with what was actually going on.
02:58I felt like this was another example, and we've seen this all year long from this team,
03:04of extremely undisciplined play. And a lot of it was coming from their best players.
03:08I think Pasternak, Marchant, and McAvoy all had offensive zone penalties. I think McAvoy had two
03:13offensive zone penalties, if I remember correctly. That's your leadership that's
03:17taking these undisciplined bad penalties. They still lead the NHL by a wide margin
03:22with 74 minor penalties. That's 12 more minor penalties than anybody else in the league.
03:27175 penalty minutes. They continue to go to the box. They allowed three power play goals. Their
03:33penalty kill is ranked 20th in the league. They've been top 10 pretty much always. And now
03:39they're 20th, and they're giving up a ton of power play goals in addition to taking all these bad
03:43penalties. So it's the toxic combination of lack of discipline, and then the penalty kill can't
03:50actually bail you out. And then they go 0 for 6 on the power play. They're 29th in the league.
03:55I think they're scoring at 13% efficiency on the power play. The power play has been awful this
04:00year. It hasn't helped them out. And certainly going 0 for 6 and watching Toronto score three
04:05power play goals last night, they just got outclassed special teams-wise. So my question
04:10to you is... Did you see anything last night that made you feel this was any different than what we
04:19saw in October from this Bruins team? Because maybe they're a little better five on five,
04:23but I saw a lot of mistakes in the issues that we saw through the bad play in the early going
04:29against Toronto again last night. And it tells me that it hasn't exactly been two
04:33steps forward to this team. It's like two steps forward and one step back.
04:38That would be a good formula if they could sustain it. Two forward, one back.
04:43Unfortunately, they're not going to be playing the Flyers and the
04:47road-weary Kraken team back-to-back all the time this season, which is a big part of it too.
04:52Bingo. So it's going to get... Yeah, and with Calgary coming in,
04:55it's going to be another test. I think what we saw last night, my takeaway was that the Bruins
05:01were chasing that game a lot. They don't play well against speed that has cohesion. And the Leafs,
05:09not only when they're dancing with the puck and passing it well because of the skill they have,
05:15but from a defensive standpoint, their back-checking was really good. And the Bruins
05:21had a hard, hard time just making connections, not because they were just playing poorly or
05:27playing out of sync like they were earlier in the season. I just think that this is the scarier
05:32reality that they don't have much offense against good speed-based defense. They are chasing the
05:43game and trying to make things happen. And I think a byproduct of trying so hard to make things happen
05:49is you wind up taking scrapey penalties in situations where there was either too much
05:56adrenaline or something happened too fast and you're not used to playing at that pace.
06:01Or you're just chasing the game, Mick. That's when you take penalties too, when you're chasing.
06:05Yeah. And I think that's a bit of what we saw. I don't think I've seen a Toronto team
06:11that's played this well in sync with its goaltender in a very long time. Stola is
06:17obviously a big goalie, but there's a lot of big goalies. This big goalie seemed to have great
06:23chemistry with his defensive team. And the Bruins had a hard, hard time trying to figure their way
06:30through that and generate quality chances. Everybody was rushed. The scouting report is
06:36obviously out. Pasternak gets the puck. Make sure you got a guy on him to throw another guy at him
06:41because he's going to twist. He's going to turn. He's going to try to surprise you. And you're not
06:45going to shake him loose. You got to make sure that you take away his options because he turns
06:52over the puck if you do that to him. So I think he's going through a growing pains area here now
06:58that he's made a great impact in the NHL over the last couple of seasons in different ways. It's now
07:04harder for him to do that this year, especially now the team's kind of keying on him. They're
07:09less afraid of Marchand, although Marchand has played better hockey of late. I don't know if
07:15he'll ever be that guy who can pull a goal out of his butt when the Bruins need one. I think that
07:22phase of his career might be over, but I do feel like he is playing a better brand of hockey,
07:27closer to who he is as a player. But I do think the rest of this team is struggling, they're
07:33chasing. It really reminds me of the Bruins of the early 80s when they were a terrific team with
07:39Peterson and Middleton and Kruszelnicki and Fergus and Peter McNab still. They just had so
07:45much prouder. Then in one year, from 83-84 to 84-85, all of a sudden they just suddenly had
07:55such a hard time trying to keep up with the game and produce. Everything changed. It makes me
08:02wonder what the long-term effects of this season will be. If the Bruins are playing cohesively,
08:10they look to me like they're doing a lot of things well and they can sing with the choir
08:17at this level of hockey. But breaking through that glass ceiling and trying to make something
08:24happen and shake up that game and score a goal, it's a tough patch right now.
08:31This is going to be a hard season. It's going to be a lot like 0-9-10, where offense is hard
08:38to come by. Yeah, I think it will be to some degree and definitely until they bring in another
08:47legit top six winger type, I think you're right. I think they're not going to overwhelm teams
08:53with their offense many nights. That's simply not going to happen. Not that kind of group.
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10:39But like this, they do have enough talent, Mick, to operate on special teams and to excel and
10:47execute and to play better on special teams. They should not be 29th in the NHL on the power
10:54play. They should not be 20th in the NHL on the penalty kill. Given the personnel they have,
10:59given the coaching they have, given what they've done in the past, that's not as much about
11:06not being able to break free, not being able to keep up pace with another team.
11:11That's a little more coaching, I think, and execution when you're talking special teams.
11:17For this group, especially with the talent that they have on those units, they can put their best
11:21players on those units who can compete with the other teams and break through and get plenty of
11:26goals. When you look at the power play, when you look at the penalty kill, what do you see right
11:33now? There's a lot of the same players on the penalty kill. They should be better than they
11:39are in the PK. I know they're going out there more and getting a lot of work because of the
11:43penalties they're taking, but that's an area they simply have not been close to good enough,
11:47and it's lost them a bunch of games here. I can't remember the last time the Bruins penalty kill was
11:52bad enough that it lost them games. Or it wasn't elite. It's always top five in the league,
11:58and now it's suddenly way pedestrian. Yeah, and that combined with a power play that's just not
12:04doing anything, even though they have the talent to be able to do it. There's something there
12:09beyond they're not as fast as they once were or whatever. These other observations that we're
12:16making. There's something else going on there. I'm not buying into the Bruins of slower. I don't
12:21see that. Maybe the sample size just isn't big enough for them to have found the traction
12:31they need to find as a unit with integrating new players into it and deciding how they're going to
12:37do things and those players learning and being on the same page as far as everything goes,
12:43and the fact that Charlie Coyle has been such an important player and only recently as he started
12:47to play Coyle-like hockey. Yeah, it was good last weekend. No question about it. Yeah,
12:52if you look at the body of work over the course of the season, it's starting to come out for him.
12:57It's coming out for Marcian. Then you look at last night and you say, okay, so what was that about?
13:03And the only thing I can think of right now is that Toronto without Matthews kind of simplified,
13:09and I don't know if the Bruins didn't have the data to properly prepare for it. And adding Riley
13:18to that, they were a five forward power play prior to far as I know. And so I think that this is
13:25something that Barubi is probably going to have to look at and say, let's keep him there and figure
13:29out a way to integrate Matthews. And I think in a retro reverse moment here,
13:38if I'm the Bruins, I'm looking at Mason Lowry and thinking, I think it's maybe time for radical
13:43change here and let Charlie McAvoy focus on his five on five game and have Lowry. Let's integrate
13:51him. And I know he scratched last night. He scratched multiple times this year. And granted,
13:57he's on a learning curve. I get that. That's two in a row, I think, for Lowry, wasn't it?
14:05It was certainly two in the last three. Yeah. I don't know that he played Sunday
14:10against the Kraken, did he? Maybe not. It might've been a different kind of setup that they had.
14:17Because Peek is back in last night. Peek sat down, I thought, for one of these recent games.
14:22Yeah, he did. But he was hurt. He was knocked out last night.
14:26Yeah. So they lost him early on the Passeretti hit. So, yeah, I haven't heard more about that.
14:33But one of the social media guys said that Passeretti got, I think, an elbow or a stick to
14:42his head or something. Yeah. No, it looked like it was headcon. And it was tough because Peek was
14:47hunched over. Yeah. I kind of thought the way he went into him looked almost harmless. But maybe
14:53he got him where there's no protection right here. And that maybe there was something there.
14:58Yeah. But Peek's head was down low, too. That was part of the problem. He was hunched over
15:03towards the boards. Yeah. Where he was almost at elbow-shoulder level with Passeretti. And it was
15:08definitely an unfortunate... A little bit like that Ovechkin hit on Carlo right before the playoffs.
15:13They probably could have called contact to the head, like that two-minute minor that they do
15:18sometimes, the checking to the head or whatever. They could have called that one and given him
15:21two minutes. They ended up calling a five-minute major initially and then waived off the whole
15:25thing after reviewing it on video. That's the process. Yeah. And it was fine. It could have
15:32been a two-minute penalty. But I also think it wasn't predatory. It wasn't, I think, purposeful
15:38or anything like that. No, no. Passeretti, though, I got to say, he was nasty last night
15:42overall. Yeah. He was hitting other guys' borderline kinds of hits. I just think that
15:49every time he sees black and gold, he wants to pay back 2011. Probably. Well, I think probably,
15:55too, for him, having a veteran tryout for the first time and going through that whole process,
16:00he probably realizes that he's going to have to really bring it in all areas in order to
16:05keep his spot on a team. Yeah. He's kind of like... Anytime those veteran plays get to the
16:11point where they're kind of looking at their mortality when they have to go the veteran
16:14tryout route in training camp, I think it probably changes their view of their role, of how they're
16:20going to stay on the team, of what they have to do to stay, like all that stuff. It probably
16:24changes their approach and their mentality in a big way. There's a tennis player named Bernard
16:28Tormach who has immensely talented, weird style of play, but really a talented player. He used to
16:35start it out in the limelight, but then he faded. His compete level was off and he just was really,
16:42overthinking. I don't know what was going on, if he wasn't fully committed to his career.
16:46The guy keeps hanging around. He's spent 10 years bouncing around and continuing to show up
16:51at low levels and losing the guys you never heard of. And you say, what is he doing here?
16:55And that sort of felt that way about Pacioretty for the last several years. It's kind of like
16:59he's hanging around the NHL, but every team that wants to take a flyer on him is kind of like,
17:04well, let's see if there's anything left there. Maybe we can be the team that's the spark
17:08and brings back the old Max Pacioretty. Nobody seems to be doing it, but I got to say,
17:13in a diminished role, he seems at home with this club. Right now, the Leafs have a chemistry that
17:23the Bruins have a hard time playing against. Stolarz certainly is able to predict, anticipate,
17:31and be big right when it matters most. Right now, I think the Bruins are searching for offense,
17:37but I kind of agree with Monty. I think the byproduct of chasing the game and chasing teams
17:45is making the occasional bad penalty and trying too hard. And as the competition gets harder,
17:51the resolutions that... recalibrate, and now you got to be better. And so what was good enough
18:01then won't be good enough now. And so I think the Bruins have still got the makings of a very
18:08good hockey team, but it's just going to be one of those seasons where it's going to take a while
18:12for it to merge. And if they do survive the season and get into the playoffs, then who knows? Maybe
18:19it'll all be a blessing in disguise. Yeah. As far as Pacioretty goes, I mean,
18:24he had a couple of Achilles tendon injuries in there too. So that's played a big role in him
18:29sort of bouncing from team to team. Those are very serious injuries and he's had it happen to
18:32him twice. So that's pretty significant. But he's just at a point where he's older
18:38with production down now. He's in desperation mode to prolong his career, as a lot of those
18:44guys are. Tyler Johnson last night's in that same mode now too, playing the first game after the
18:49Bruins signed him the other day. Thought he was fine. But Max Jones goes on waivers. Riley Tufte
18:54already sent on waivers. You expected to see, once they signed Johnson, that Jones was going
18:59to be on waivers. That would likely be a corresponding move there and it was. And I
19:04think it's the right move. I think Johnson can help them. It's going to take him a little bit,
19:09probably a couple of games to get really up to speed, even though he's been practicing with the
19:12team. But getting back to your initial point with Monty and assessment of the game, all that stuff,
19:21I agree to a point, and he's at a point now where I thought it was interesting again last night,
19:26where he took accountability for the coaches needing to be better along with the players
19:30after the game. It was noticeable that he said that. And I do agree with him that it was better
19:36at five on five. But when he was asked about the penalties, he really soft-pedaled the answer and
19:41was like, maybe there was a couple of bad penalties, but we had a power play chances.
19:46Man, they took a lot of bad penalties. I thought they took a lot of poor penalties,
19:50penalties or bad judgment penalties, just lack of discipline penalties. And to me,
19:55the lack of discipline on this team that's been chronic all year, that's been problematic all
20:00year, that's been an issue all year, combined with the special teams play and the way it's
20:05been all year, those are reflections on coaching. Those are two of the biggest areas that coaching
20:10has an impact on a game, is the discipline and the ability to stay out of the penalty box and
20:15the special teams part of it. That is a lot of where the coaching comes in and has a significant
20:21imprint on a team. And I'm sorry, but that's why I think there's going to continue to be
20:27a magnifying glass, a microscope on Jim Montgomery and what's been going on at the beginning of the
20:32season. Yes, the dogs were put off a little bit with two wins back to back over the weekend, but
20:37I think you can very much say those were kind of like conditional wins, but you got to look at them
20:41a certain way because the Flyers are just not a good team. The fact that they lost to them the
20:45time before that was ridiculous. When you're watching the game, you could see the Flyers
20:49were trying to give it to the Bruins and they just didn't want to take it. So they get that win in
20:53Philly and then the game against Seattle, road-weary team where they caught them. It was a
20:59good game, they played well, but I think you got to look at those through a certain perspective
21:02as to who they were playing and how they won those games. And I take a bit more from this
21:08game against Toronto on Tuesday night and the mistakes, the chronic mistakes, that we continue
21:13to see this season and I say like where is the coaching in all this where these kind of issues
21:18are problematic? This is the areas where coaches can impact the game the most and they are failing
21:24in these areas time and time again this season. I think it's an issue. I see it as a byproduct
21:31of them playing against a team that plays faster than they do and I feel like all season long,
21:37anytime they were in a game against a team that plays faster than they do,
21:41they were more prone to this kind of a mistake. So I do think the fact that other teams play that
21:46much faster than them, that is the part of the coaching end of it that scares me because I don't
21:52feel like the Bruins are a slow team. So I look at that and I say that I'm looking more that as
21:59the root cause, the chicken and the egg. And coaching is obviously a results business. If
22:10they outshoot everybody 90 to 1 and they go 0-10, the coach is getting fired. But I agree with you
22:16and that's what will be on the gravestone if he loses his job eventually here because they can't
22:23sustain any success in the results column, then it's going to be about that. That's going to come
22:27up. That's going to be said and that's going to be one of the focal points of them. But I do feel
22:33like a prerequisite to them achieving the discipline that you're looking for is to play
22:42at the pace of the faster teams in the league because that's something that's always been a
22:47priority for Don Sweeney. In fact, let's dial back to the acquisitions of July and the signings and
22:54everybody said, boy, Donnie, those are some big players you signed. Well, I wanted to get guys who
22:59could cause anxiety on the four check. I was going for speed. They happen to be big. That's what he
23:04said. And he doubled down on it. He said it over and over again. Cam obviously acknowledges the
23:10bigness as being purpose related. But Donnie refuses to go there. He holds steadfast to it
23:18being coincidental. So in that regard, without the focus on the big, but the focus on the speed,
23:24where's the speed? Oh, yeah. So Kastelik, Kepke, two of the guys. Jones obviously didn't get a good
23:32start with the injury. Tufte, not quite at that level. So those guys are out of it for now. But
23:40Kastelik is such a blue ribbon success. Kepke is... He also, I gotta say, he also didn't take a bad
23:49penalty last night, Kastelik. That penalty away from the play, late in the third period of a
23:55close game, not a good penalty. Like that was another one. Yeah. Just senseless. Yeah. So
24:01there's stuff there to work out. But I don't know. I'm not quite looking at that. And I can't
24:13isolate it from them being a slower team in these games. Those are the games where I see it happening.
24:18You know what team Boston sports fans are most excited about this time of year right now?
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26:35Special teams, discipline, these are coaching things. That is a reflection on the coaching,
26:41big time. Those areas, like yes, you can say they're playing slow, other teams are playing
26:46faster than that. Maybe that's part of it. But I think those specific areas are always reflections
26:52on coaching, special teams and discipline. Those are two big areas that if they're not reined in,
26:59players aren't being reined in by the coach, and they're not executing, and they don't have a good
27:03game plan to what they're doing special teams wise, and they're getting beaten by other teams.
27:08I think it's a reflection on what the coaches are doing or not doing. I really think when it comes,
27:14if it continues to repeat and you continue to see the same thing over and over again,
27:19I think that's when your hands are tied and you have to make a move with a coach.
27:23If it's the same consistent problems over and over again that aren't getting addressed and
27:26aren't getting fixed, then that is proof positive A. That is the piece of evidence you need to
27:37present to anybody to say, we need a change in voice here, a change in strategy, or a change in
27:42what we're doing and thinking with this team, because we're not learning from any of the
27:46mistakes that we're making. If the brass is sitting down and saying, do we agree that Donny,
27:54Evan, Cam, do we agree that we are better than what we're showing? Why? If they agree that they're
28:03a faster team than what they're showing, and that they're a more disciplined group of players than
28:07what they're showing, then they have to look at the body of work and say, is this thing going to
28:11turn around? Then as soon as they start feeling like they're in danger of losing the season,
28:17you don't spend the kind of money they did in the off season, make the bold trade of Allmark
28:22the way you did in the off season, and add the things you did to this team, and then tolerate
28:27a season that winds up being a spacer season because you can't work out things that a new
28:33coach might be able to influence. That's usually how a coach loses his job. For sure, and I also
28:40think if they were going to make a move with the coach, it was not going to happen last weekend
28:43when they had back-to-back games and they were on a road, that was not the right time to do it.
28:47They're in the middle of a stretch right now of five games in seven days through this weekend.
28:52This will tell us a lot. But I believe after Saturday's game this coming weekend, they have
28:57two days off. So if things don't go well this week, I think that is a very logical time to
29:02potentially think about making a move with the coach where you'd be able to bring your new coach
29:07in, have a practice with the new coach, and then sort of focus on moving ahead. I think if they're
29:13going to make a move, it would logically come, I think, at the end of this week, and we'll see
29:17what happens. You get some tough competition coming in. Yeah, so it's going to be tough.
29:22There's no doubt about it, but that is something to watch. All right, Mick, Kevin Weeks, our good
29:29buddy Weeksey, who maybe we'll have on the podcast at some point, I hope. He's a great guy. Yes, he
29:34is. Tweeted yesterday, speaking to sources, several teams are interested in pending UFA
29:42after the season. Trent Frederick, with his size, speed, toughness, character, and skill,
29:47he's drawing attention in the marketplace. Of course he is. This is somebody that we
29:52talked about. Mark Diver mentioned it, I think, last week on the podcast, when we were talking
29:56about potential moves or players that could get moved, and I think he's the guy that probably
30:01would get you the most on the market and would garner the most interest around the league,
30:05because he's one of those sort of productive players that's also a power forward, that can
30:10drop the gloves, that a lot of teams don't have and would love to have. Kind of the unicorn player,
30:14that there's not that many of them out there in the league. Thoughts on this, the potential that
30:20he could get moved. I don't see it happening, because I don't think the Bruins are going to
30:24do it unless they really decide they need to shake up the roster instead of making the coaching move.
30:29Maybe this would happen later on if they continued to struggle after they replaced coaches.
30:33Maybe that's something they would look at, but I just don't see something like this happening.
30:39But the only other part of it is maybe they feel like they can't afford Frederick and they don't
30:42want to lose him for nothing at the end of the year, which might be a reality for them.
30:47Um, I don't see Frederick. I think a lot of the sharks are circling because they saw
30:54what happened with DeBrusque. He went into a contract year and crickets were coming out of
30:59Boston. And they're thinking, okay, this guy's going to go to market. There was probably a lot
31:03of DeBrusque talk during the season about, you know, trades, the people trying to get him under
31:08value from the Bruins, because they know the Bruins were conflicted about how they felt about
31:13him as a long-term core player. So in Freddie's case, it's no secret that Cam wants more players
31:21like Freddie, not fewer. So, um, I think that, you know, the Bruins also, he's a first round,
31:29he's a late first round pick. Um, the Bruins want to shore up their sense of we draft and develop.
31:39So, uh, the fact that Freddie's in a contract year, I asked him during camp, uh, how he feels
31:46about this. And I noted that, Hey, I am sure that the St. Louis blues are salivating as they try to
31:52recover their 2019 mojo. They know they lost their way. They know they tried to go too much for skill
31:58and not enough for toughness. And now they're trying to reacquire that kind of player. I am
32:03sure you are at the top of their list. And he kind of like looking at me like, well, uh, is there
32:08a question there? And I said, well, I says, you happy, you want to be here? He goes, I want to
32:13be here for the rest of my career. I love it. And so, and he, it was, it was totally heartfelt on
32:18his part. So, and at the preseason presser, the executive presser, I asked Donnie almost at the
32:24end of it, um, you know, when, cause he was already getting hammered with questions about
32:28players. And I said, uh, Trent Frederick's coming into his, you know, he's going to be
32:33UFA at the end of the year. If you don't, is there been any, uh, discussion? Oh, you know,
32:38we want me to give you my whole Rolodex here. And then, then he said, no, no, no. He goes, Freddie,
32:43we haven't opened extended. We have talked. Yeah. There are talks going on with, so he indicated
32:49there were extension. Then he gave me a little wink wink when, when he was done kind of like,
32:52uh, yeah, you know, I just think he felt a little shell-shocked with what Cam had to say about the
32:57whole, the whole, uh, Swayman thing that day. And, and I think that, uh, you know, so he was a
33:03little, um, a little, uh, under a fire there and, you know, in second, man, I've spent all this
33:09patience, you know, to trying to say nothing and accommodate the media's needs to discuss things.
33:15And then all of a sudden Cam goes, boom, you know? So I think that the Bruins have, I don't think
33:22he'd lie about that. I don't, you know, so I think that he, this is what he said. I believe him.
33:27Um, Freddie wants to be here. I believe him. I don't see either side being unreasonable in this
33:33point. And I do think that, uh, the, you know, that they value him. It's not going to be about,
33:39well, you produce this. So you think we think this, and I'm sure that plays into it, but,
33:45um, you know, when you're in a UFA year, it's real simple. It's, it's, uh, he can go anywhere
33:50he wants and play for anybody wants. And I'm sure the blues would be, uh, overpaying by more
33:55than a million a year, they would overpay. And so the Bruins have to be respectful here and, and,
34:02and accommodate him as best they can. But I do think that he's got to be here. You know, the
34:07middle has been the, the always been the quirky part of this team. And, and, uh, and if they see
34:13him as a solution, um, and not a problem to that middle, then, then, uh, it's time to act on it.
34:19Well, he's definitely not off to the start that he, if he wants a big contract or is,
34:23wants a big raise with one goal and a minus eight in the first 14 games of the season,
34:27Trent Frederick, Frederick has struggled in a big, big way, uh, to start this year,
34:31maybe the contract and, and, you know, some of that stuff weighing on his mind is,
34:35is playing a role in the way that he's playing. Um, but I, I do make to your point,
34:43I kind of knew Jake to brusque was not coming back. I got that sent from the first time that
34:48I talked to him at the beginning of last year that he was gone. In fact, I think he joked with me
34:53that he'd like sold the place he was living in or whatever, and was like homeless for the year.
34:57And as soon as he said that to me, I was like, all right, he's not coming. He's already cashed
35:01out in his place. Like he's ready to go. Um, you know, the writing was on the wall.
35:06They weren't going to be able to afford him anyway. So it was very obvious that,
35:09that, that was not going to happen. Uh, Frederick, I do agree with you. I think he probably wants to
35:14stay. I do think there are teams that are going to overpay for him. I do think he would have
35:18excellent value on the trade market. And the Bruins should explore that if they feel like
35:22they could get an, a great deal from somebody else and get value for him instead of losing
35:27him for nothing as they did with the brusque who clearly that absence now of the brusque
35:32speed and playmaking is, uh, is showing and is hurting the Bruins. And I think
35:37Frederick's absence of the big heavy player that he is, the willingness to drop the gloves, the,
35:42the, you know, the stuff that he brings to the table, just the, the, the side center and a wing.
35:47And they love that. Yeah. I mean, all of that is highly valued and would be missed if he was gone
35:54now, do I wish Trent Frederick would play like a big mean power forward all the time and all,
35:59you know, more often. Yeah. I think there are times when the switch you wish was constantly
36:05on and it kind of goes on and off sometimes with the way that he plays, but, um, that's tough to
36:11do. You know, it's tough for anybody to do in this league is to constantly play like that all the
36:14time. And I, and I think that that is hard and I, I sort and certainly acknowledge that. Um,
36:21but I do think, you know, there's something to other teams being interested in the blue,
36:25the Bruins, if they get to a certain point. And like I said, if they decide they need to shake
36:30up the team, cause I think the coaching thing is going to happen first. I do think they're
36:34going to make a coaching move at some point. I just feel it. Um, and I think that will be the
36:40move that they hope is going to be the impactful sort of like get shake the team out of whatever
36:45has been going on this first month and get the moving in the right direction. Uh, and maybe it
36:50goes beyond that if they continue to sort of falter where the Bruins have to look in the mirror
36:55and look at the roster and say, maybe like, there's something wrong with the way we put this
36:59together. And, you know, there's a flaw in this team that needs to be addressed, but I think we're
37:03far from that. I don't think any, I don't think that's the first move that's coming. No, no, no,
37:08people talk about players. And that's the wrong way to think about this. Now you did the player
37:12thing. They just did it. You move Walmart, you make Swayman the number one, you get a capable
37:17backup. And now you say, Oh, we can't reconstitute it. Our goalies. We've got our defense the way we
37:23want it. We added the door off. Now we got Lindholm in the middle. Now we think we're a
37:28contender. They go out there and they stink. And so you say, okay, what the hell's going on with
37:34this group? Well, it's really weird and ironic that all the incumbent players top 10 in their
37:39lineup, nobody played well to start the season. The way things that I've been concerned about is
37:45Morgan Geeky. Um, Morgan Geeky was a player who the Bruins took who Seattle discarded, did not
37:52offer a group to RFA contract. They let them go. And the Bruins said, wow, let's grab this guy.
37:58And see what he's got. And so they did. And it worked really well last year. This year,
38:04Geeky's been a disaster. He's thinking he's in when you think you stink. And so I think that
38:12Monty is was hesitant at the beginning of the season to give Freddie and Geeky a line and say,
38:20this is your line. This is your role. This is what you're doing on this team. He clearly did not work
38:27on any chemistry issues with them. Other than to say, these are my two guys that I can rely on to
38:33put anywhere. I need to fix something because of their versatility. I can play them up. I can play
38:39them down. They will help wherever they are. And I think Freddie is been methodically getting his
38:45game together and getting better as he goes. Geeky is in and out of a lineup. He is nowhere near the
38:51player he was last year. And that is really concerned right now. They got to figure out
38:57how to reintegrate him to this team because he was a very effective player for him. The Bruins on the
39:03walls last year. Yeah, I agree. He's one of a number of players. And Frederick's one of them
39:09too, frankly, right now that really needs to step up their game. A bunch of guys are still struggling.
39:14The brusque, you've lost all three to an extent. You certainly lost Geeky. And now you know,
39:19it's time to get Freddie back now. You lost your entire third line, basically.
39:25But they need to start getting better. No question about it. When you're a grinding team,
39:29you've got to have continuity line to line to have cumulative pressure. That's not there.
39:35No, definitely not. Mick, thank you very much for your thoughts. Let's thank our sponsors. Download
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40:14Download GameTime today. What time is it, Mick? GameTime. This isn't because it's GameTime.
40:18GameTime. Mick Colaggio, thank you very much for joining us today, my friend.
40:23And please thank the leaf blowers outside as well. They made a nice cameo appearance
40:27there at one point. I love it. Yeah. Hopefully they will be gone soon because the leaves are
40:31coming down. All right, everybody, thank you for listening. We appreciate it and we'll see you at
40:35the ring.