Aahhhhh Summer!
It's been 82 days since the Boston Bruins finished losing a three games to none lead and a three-nothing lead in game seven to the Philadelphia flyers and what's gone on with the Black and Gold since? Lets look at a few things.
Tuesday, August 3, they signed their first round draft pick, second overall, Tyler Seguin to a rookie contract and will have him in the fold when training camp begins in September. Always a good thing.
They have resigned all around good guy Shawn Thorton to a two year contract. They have not traded Marc Savard nor Tim Thomas which ain't a bad thing at all. Savard is still magical when healthy and if you have to have a five million dollar goaltender, keeping Thomas, the 2008-2009 Vezina Trophy winner, in your stall is pretty darn good.
Cam Neely was upgrade to President of the Boston Bruins and now all things Bruin will go through his office.
Daniel Paille will be a part of the team for the entire year.
Blake Wheeler remains with the team via arbitration. Winning his case and earning more than 2 mil after signing with the B's
David Krecji hopefully will be fully recovered from the broken wrist that put him out of the playoffs and essentially took the Bruins out as well.
Milan Lucic is looking forward to a return to his old self after a less than stellar season in which he was out for two extended periods with injuries.
And the Bruins open their season in Prague, Czech Republic as well as their last two pre-season games.
But my favorite thing they did was acquire Nathan Horton from the Florida Panthers with Gregory Campbell (Colin's son) for the enigma known as Dennis Wideman.
Horton brings a lot of promise (have we heard this before) to Boston as he has scored at least 20 goals in each of the last five seasons with Florida and there is no reason he should not continue that trend here with a little help from his friends. He has averaged 70 games played in those years so injuries don't seem to be a major problem.
Heaven knows the Bruins can use all the scoring punch they can muster after last season in which they finished last in the league in goal scoring.
Not much is gonna let us Bruin fans forget last May, but like every year at the start of camp and the season, our loyalty brings us right back to the hope and excitement that the beginning of a new campaign brings. And with the additions and deletions and keepers, well as always, its hockey and it's the Boston Bruins and how the heck knows what's gonna happen. We'll be there no matter what…the masochists we are…we will be there!
Go B's!
-Diehard
