The Boston Bruins have set themselves a mandate this offseason - get back to being the Bruins of old. The kind of team other NHL franchises were scared to play against - the kind of team that could combine skill and scoring ability with grit and toughness, finding the perfect balance wherein a perennial Stanley Cup contender could be built.
With new GM Don Sweeney replacing Peter Chiarelli, the Bruins are likely hard at work outlining a plan to make that mandate a reality.
While Boston currently fields an extremely talented team - making their playoff miss this season all the more baffling - there are some productive players whose future in black and gold is currently in question.
One such player is power forward Milan Lucic - a player who, according to the latest report, could wind up facing just about any potential career outcome at the moment.
"I'd be very curious - I think Boston is having a lot of debate about, 'Do we do a contract, or do we just let him come back next year and if he has a great year, we've got to pay even more. Or do we look at a guy whose body has just taken too much and he's not going to be Milan Lucic anymore,'" Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman said, while appearing on Calgary's Sportsnet 960 Monday, via TodaysSlapShot.com.
"To me, Milan Lucic is an interesting case. I think that's a great example - I don't know what Boston is thinking there. I think they've got a lot of different ideas in their mind about what to do and what not to do."
Lucic, still just 27, has one year at $6 million remaining on his current three-year deal. The former second-round pick suffered through one of the worst statistical seasons of his career in 2014, managing just 18 goals and 26 assists in 81 games as the entire Bruins squad stumbled their way to a postseason-less finish.
When on his game, Lucic is one of the most physically dominating forwards in the NHL. Combine that with a surprisingly deft scoring touch and it's clear why former power forward extraordinaire and current Bruins president Cam Neely wants to see Lucic remain a Bruin and why Sweeney told Friedman that he viewed Lucic as a "foundational player."
"That is who Milan Lucic is," said Friedman. "I'm not sure what they are going to do with him... He had such a down year last year. A year when he was not himself... If you go out and get Milan Lucic now, you're going out and getting a guy who is at $6 million, coming off a down year and he's a free agent after next year."
In order to right the wrongs of last season, tough decisions need to be made in Boston and Lucic is going to command a new, high-figure contract in the not-too-distant future.
Luckily for Sweeney he has a phenomenally talented team and a fantastic opportunity ahead of him, but unfortunately, he's also got a particularly difficult stretch including some painful roster decisions facing him at the immediate outset of his Bruins GM tenure.
