Kalman: Time For Some Lineup Stability After Bruins Sign Gagne
WILMINGTON (CBS) – Just when you thought training camp was over, the Bruins decided to use the first week of the regular season to continue auditioning players for roles like some sort of open casting call for a neighborhood talent show.
Through four games, including three losses, we've seen Matt Fraser, Bobby Robins, Craig Cunningham, Jordan Caron and Seth Griffith get brief chances to impress. Now the Bruins have rewarded Simon Gagne for his loyalty during his tryout plus one week of practicing without a contract to sign the 34-year-old forward for one year and $600,000 against the NHL salary cap.
I'm not sure if there's truth to the notion that if Gagne doesn't work out after a couple games the Bruins are thinking of brining in a ventriloquist, a tap dancer and guy that can spin plates on top of a stick. But it's time for the Bruins to settle on a lineup and ride it out for a little while.
This has been the most hectic first week of the regular season for quite some time around the Bruins, maybe even the most hectic in general manager Peter Chiarelli's eight seasons at the helm. An organization that has prided itself on patience has turned over its lineup through four games with the nonchalance of someone making his bed in the morning. While the instability isn't the biggest reason the Bruins have only acquired two of a possible eight points, it certainly hasn't helped.
The shortness of patience with personnel and rapid changeover clearly has a lot to do with the salary cap. It also obviously has to do with Chiarelli wanting to do something big – hopefully for his sake to acquire a top-six right winger – in the wake of the Johnny Boychuk trade.
There are players who need assessing at the NHL level before Chiarelli can take the next step. Why else would center Ryan Spooner be seemingly immune to the lineup changes despite his ineptitude? Why else would coach Claude Julien suddenly decide a matinee against the speedy Colorado Avalanche is a perfect opportunity to work the human pylon Matt Bartkowski into the lineup? Why else would the Bruins abandon their attempt to make Loui Eriksson the heir apparent to Jarome Iginla without giving Eriksson at least one regular season game with David Krejci and Milan Lucic? Why else would it seem like the Bruins are in no rush to take veteran center Gregory Campbell off the non-roster injures reserve and insert him back in the lineup?
Campbell, who missed all of the preseason with what was called a "core" injury, has been skating for two weeks. In practice at Ristuccia Arena on Tuesday he went through a lot of the "battle drills" that are typically the last step before a return to game action. But after practice Julien downplayed any progress Campbell might be making toward a comeback.
"Right now he's not ready. And when they tell us he's ready, we'll assess whether he's physically or in good enough shape to be in our lineup," Julien said. "So practicing is one thing, playing games is another and we know that. So you've got to be in real, real top shape in practice before we can even considering talking about him playing."
Keeping Campbell out of the picture takes the heat off Spooner. He can play almost without fear of a demotion or scratch at this point. Whether the Bruins are trying to build up Spooner's confidence for their own purposes or to impress someone willing to make a trade is anyone's guess. Nonetheless it's been difficult to find Spooner linemates that can bring out the best of his abilities. Fraser is at a similar stage of development as Spooner, trying to translate his game from the AHL to the NHL. Caron's become more of a mucker as his NHL career as plowed along.
Now Spooner should get Gagne, who along with Daniel Paille completed the Bruins' fourth line for practice on Tuesday. That trio should give it a go against the Detroit Red Wings on the road on Wednesday. If Gagne plays well in his first few games after returning from a year off, he could move up the depth chart. That would take some of the heat off Chiarelli. If Spooner or Griffith lights it up, suddenly Chiarelli can stand pat a little longer or make the trade he has been seeking.
The man under the most stress has to be Julien, who's only graded on wins and losses and knows earning those wins with so much change can be difficult. For now Julien, to his credit, seems on board with the early-season lineup changes that are more reminiscent of a Marx Bros. movie than a Stanley Cup contender.
"Those things happen sometimes. You know every coach would like things to be smooth, but it's not reality," Julien said. "Some years you've got a bigger challenge than others. And that's what I'm facing right now is, what we are as a matter of fact as an organization facing, seeing where certain guys fit and also giving them time to fit in. So you know you've got to balance these things out and what we don't want to do right now is panic because of our record. We want to fix our games but we don't want to panic on our view of what we're trying to accomplish here as an organization."
If the Bruins aren't panicking, they have a funny way of showing it. They've prided themselves on their team-first concept, trust in one another, and belief in the system for years now. Those things are difficult to establish when you don't know who's going to be skating next to you from game to game. The more the losses pile up, the more the pressure the players will be under to force things rather than comfortably jell.
For the Bruins' sake, the Gagne signing should be the last of the lineup moves for at least a few games. A little patience and chemistry can go a long way to righting a team that's off the track. The Bruins have proven that in the past. It's time to apply that theory to the present.
Matt Kalman covers the Bruins for CBSBoston.com and also contributes to NHL.com and several other media outlets. Follow him on Twitter @TheBruinsBlog.
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