The Boston Bruins have had one big piece of business to attend to for most of the offseason — and Jeremy Swayman still remains without a new contract with just over a week until training camp opens.
Although rumors have continued to fly, including one that stated the Bruins haven’t returned Swayman’s calls in three weeks, time is running out for the two sides to find common ground on a long-term contract.
The 25-year-old is the goaltender of the future in Beantown, especially after his standout play in the 2024 postseason, but player and club just can’t seem to find a number that will work.
And as hockey insider Elliotte Friedman reported at the end of last week, that’s due to the netminder’s relative inexperience in the National Hockey League.
“One (source) said to me, what he thinks is going on is that while the Bruins don’t disbelieve in Swayman, the fact is he’s only played 132 NHL games,” Friedman said on the latest episode of the 32 Thoughts podcast.
“The guy is super talented, he’s gonna be star, nobody disputes that, but he thinks what the Bruins are saying is, ‘we do believe in Jeremy Swayman, but he hasn’t carried the full load yet.’ And that’s why he believes they are hesitant to commit.”
If true, that would certainly be an interesting reason as to why the Bruins haven’t offered a suitable contract offer to the Alaska native. After trading 2022-23’s Vezina Trophy winner Linus Ullmark to the Ottawa Senators, it signalled that the crease was Swayman’s for the foreseeable future.
But why trade Ullmark away if the front office isn’t confident Swayman can take over the starting job full time?
The Jeremy Swayman saga drags on in Boston
The Bruins’ training camp is now just over a week away, and it looks like the two sides are no closer to getting a deal done. That’s worst-case scenario, as every other restricted free agent has been locked up by the front office this offseason.
If Swayman holds out, the crease will be left to Joonas Korpisalo, who came over in the trade that sent Ullmark to Ottawa. Korpisalo struggled mightily last season, and the Finn is a definite downgrade from the American.
Still, Swayman has only played three full seasons in the NHL, and has never been the undisputed starter, instead helping form one of the league’s best tandems along with Ullmark. Friedman reported that Swayman recently met with team president Cam Neely, although it doesn’t looked like that has moved the needle too much in negotiations.
“You’ve got a team that believes in its position, and you’ve got a player that believes in his position,” Friedman asserted. “And the leverage would seem to be with the player because they traded Ullmark, but the Bruins haven’t changed their mind yet.”
Friedman said that the Bruins recently offered an eight-year deal ‘in the 6s,’ but it was rumored that Swayman was looking for as much as $10 million AAV.
There is clearly still a huge discrepancy between the two sides, and as the offseason winds down, this is getting more and more precarious. It’ll be intriguing to see if there will be any kind of resolution before training camp opens on September 18.
