Trading Eriksson is a surrender, but it’s the only solution remaining
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COMMENTARY
The Boston Bruins are in a no-win situation with Loui Eriksson.
Hang onto the forward after Monday’s 3 p.m. NHL trading deadline passes, and the team pretty much guarantees that he’s walking come the July 1 free agency period.
Trade him before the afternoon cutoff point, and Boston is likely looking at little but draft picks in return.
That young defenseman? Well, he’s out there, somewhere. But the Bruins seemingly grabbing him for a 30-year-old winger seems a foolhardy proposition.
“Well, I think anybody that has an opportunity to improve their club, be it as you described, a top-four potential, top-four defenseman, I think they’d be excited to do that,’’ Bruins general manager Don Sweeney said in a press conference Sunday prior to his team’s lackluster 4-1 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning at the TD Garden (Boston is now 13-16-3 at home this season). “What the cost of that is, is what we’re all balancing. During the last several weeks, I’ve had a lot of discussions with 29 other general managers, to see where they’re trying to improve their clubs, and the overwhelming thought is that we’ve stockpiled a number of players and I think that it has set this organization up going forward very well and we’ve done a very good job this year. Our team has grown along as we’ve said. I think our players have done a good job and I think our coaches have also done a good job.
“As we stand right now, we’re in a playoff position. I’d like to try and help and support the group, and that’s what it’s really all about.’’
Is it though?
At 34-23-6, the Bruins currently sit in third place in the Atlantic Division, a somewhat surprising turn of events based on last summer’s re-tooling of both the front office and the on-ice product. Boston is only four points in back of the Florida Panthers for the division lead, and trading Eriksson, making $4.25 million in the final year of his deal, would surrender any lingering delusion that the team is good enough to make a playoff push come April, particularly in an uneven Eastern Conference.
Sweeney said the team has made Eriksson and his agents a contract extension, but those talks — as they might be with free agency looming — have stalled.
“There have been ongoing discussions,’’ Sweeney said. “Certainly, they have their position and we have ours. I’d like to find a deal, but it hasn’t happened to this point.’’
It’s not going to.
Thus, Eriksson needs to go, leaving Sweeney in the unenviable position of punting on any deep postseason chances.
“Most of the talks have centered around draft picks, and a lot of prospects have not changed hands, here and there,’’ Sweeney said. “I think this is the time where teams zero in on not giving up much on their own club, when that they feel they’re in position, and other teams are feeling like they may take a step back and restock come June, so they’re trying to accumulate those. That’s sort of where the balance of the talks have been.’’
Teams in a payoff push aren’t necessarily going to surrender prime value in exchange for a guy likely to be wearing another jersey come October. Somebody is going to overpay for Eriksson, a fine yet inconsistent player, this summer. He’s not going to get that sort of cash from the Bruins before 3 p.m. Monday. If by whatever slight chance he does, a segment of lucid Bruins fans will want to string Sweeney from the rafters at the Garden.
Eriksson is tied for second on the Bruins with David Krejci with his 48 points. The Bruins will, indeed, be giving up an important segment of what has made them successful during the 2015-16 season.
But most Bruins fans, understanding the limitations of the product, understand this. And if they don’t quite grasp the reason for it, the inherent knowledge is that Eriksson is either going to be an expensive mistake by the front office (just trying to rebound itself from the errors of former GM Peter Chiarelli) or, preferably at this point, a third first-round pick in the 2016 NHL draft.
“Loui is a valuable player and other teams are probably seeing him accordingly as such,’’ Sweeney said. “To me, as the question was asked earlier, he’s an impactful player in our hockey club. I would have continuing negotiations with him as such. You know we value him; we’ve offered him a significant contract. There’s a gap there that exists at times with players and we’ll see where it goes. Doesn’t mean I’ll stop between now and then as to whether or not something will materialize.’’
It won’t. Eriksson’s camp knows full well there’s more money to be made in the summer.
Sweeney and the Bruins need to get whatever they can for him now, which is going to be a lot less than people had hoped, even during the NHL’s frantic trading deadline.
The Bruins are selling when they are in a positioning in which they could be buying. But it’s also what they need to do. The standings say one thing, but these Bruins, as constituted, are something else entirely.
Good core. No hope.
At least for this spring. Come back in the fall.
“We’ll see what’s going to happen,’’ Eriksson said on Sunday. “All I can do is just play and just help the team, like I’ve been saying the last couple times I’ve talked to you guys.
“Coming back to it again, I’m just trying to play the game and have fun with the team and try to win games right now.’’
That will happen somewhere else come Monday evening.
Contact Eric Wilbur at: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter: @GlobeEricWilbur and Facebook www.facebook.com/GlobeEricWilbur
Bruins’ top trade targets
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