Daily Faceoff: Frank Seravalli and Jason Gregor talking about the Boston Bruins and RFA goaltender Jeremy Swayman.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Gregor: “Now, there are still a few RFAs. Detroit fans are sitting there and saying, What about us, man? You got (Moritz) Seider. You got (Lucas) Raymond.
You got Swayman in Boston, you know, some reports about $10 million, I don’t know…”
Seravalli: “That’s not true.”
Gregor: “I think that’s a little high. But, where do you come out on these three deals. Some pretty significant players.
Like, if Boston doesn’t have Ullmark and Swayman, that’d be huge. Like, I think they get it done ultimately, don’t they?”
Seravalli: “Yeah, look, the fact that Swayman was back at the Bruins practice facility without a contract, participating in informal Captain skates was a really good sign.
Just as a total personal aside, I feel so, I can’t tell you what I feel for Johnny Gaudreau’s agent, Lewis Gross, who also represents Swayman, to have to get back to business at a time like this, eventually, when you’re grieving is hopefully it’s cathartic for them and helpful to at least think about something else. But man, what a difficult situation that is, you know, especially for the agent as well, so close to Johnny and Matthew and his family. So didn’t mention him earlier, but certainly thinking of Lewis Gross.
And when it comes to Swayman, these two sides have been, I don’t know how far apart they are right now, but going back to July, the Swayman camp was in the mid-eights, I believe, and the Bruins were in the low to mid sixes. So that’s a significant gulf in terms of AAV.
I don’t know where they stand on terms of length of deal and term, but I wonder if it’s a philosophical potential departure from where the Bruins ideally want to pay a goalie.
But here’s the thing if, if you were only designed on paying a goalie six or six and a half million a year, then Ullmark should have been your guy. You should have kept Ullmark then instead. Am I crazy in saying that?”
Gergor: “No, I don’t think so. I think that’s accurate. And you know, you’re probably going to have to adjust that number as the cap goes up here the next few years. But ultimately, I won’t be surprised if he comes in around $8 million, you know, (Connor) Hellebuyck range and stuff like that.
Now, he’s younger, so I can see there’s lots of reasons why. I’m sure Hellebuyck’s camps like hey or sorry, Swayman’s camp, it’s like, come on here. We, there’s, there’s lots of arrows here, if we just have a sane discussion, where we can see,”
Seravalli: “But he’s also played way less. His body of work, it’s 132 games Like, It’s not nearly the same.”
Gregor: “No, no.”
Seravalli: “I’m not saying he’s not worth it. I’m just saying it’s, it’s a totally different argument. So he hasn’t, he hasn’t won any Vezina’s and he hasn’t, and it’s still the goalie position, which is viewed totally different than anything else and should be.”
Gregor: “Well, it’s funny how the goalie position, Frank, is the one where there’s been a decrease in contracts of the top guys. Defensemen still go up. Forwards still go up.”
Seravalli: “Understandable. It’s a position where, year to year, unless you’re one of the top three or five guys, you, you don’t really know what you’re getting.”
Gregor: “And you’re playing fewer games now, right? Like, gone are the days, really, of the 70-game goalie.”
Seravalli: “We’re never going to see it again.”
Gregor: “Yeah, there’s gonna be somebody who’ll do it, but I agree with you, but probably rarely see it.”
Seravalli: “You think we’re gonna have a goalie at some point again that plays 70 out of 82 games. I don’t know that there’s anyone able, with the demands on the position, to be healthy enough to play 70 games out of 82 in a season”
Gregor: “Now, you could be right, but I just think somebody will do, an injury will lead to a team and they’ll be like, you know what, we’re in a race, we’re doing it.”