The Boston Bruins need a No. 1 center. They haven’t had one since Patrice Bergeron retired after the 2022-23 season.
These players are difficult to acquire. They rarely hit free agency and they cost a lot on the trade market. Drafting and developing an elite center is the best path to getting one. But the Bruins had a decade to draft and develop a top-six center who could take over for Bergeron and David Krejci and they couldn’t do it.
The Bruins spent a lot of money in free agency last July to sign Elias Lindholm to play a top-six center role. Lindholm, who came to Boston on a seven-year, $54.25 million contract, hasn’t lived up to expectations so far with 20 points in 43 games. He’s not a true No. 1 center.
So, how could the Bruins find this kind of high-end forward they so desperately need?
Vancouver Canucks centers Elias Pettersson and J.T. Miller could potentially be available, per The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun.
“League sources have confirmed that the Vancouver Canucks are listening on both J.T. Miller and Elias Pettersson,” LeBrun wrote earlier this week.
“With the season going the way it has and the drama in the room involving the players, Canucks general manager Patrik Allvin is wise to at least see what the market is for each. It doesn’t mean either will be moved, but the mere fact we know for sure the Canucks are talking to teams on each player is certainly not nothing.”
Pettersson and Miller both qualify as legit No. 1 centers. Pettersson is 26 and four-and-a-half years younger than Miller, but the latter is a better fit for the Bruins if general manager Don Sweeney wants to shake up his roster.
For starters, Miller has a smaller salary cap hit and less term left on his contract. He is signed for the next four seasons with a cap hit of $8 million. That’s not a cheap number by any means, but it’s much easier to take on than Pettersson’s $11.6 million cap hit that runs through the 2031-32 campaign.
Miller is a proven goal scorer. He has scored 30-plus goals in three consecutive seasons, and he has hit the 20-goal mark six times. He’s also a very talented playmaker who consistently creates scoring chances for his teammates, evidenced by the fact he has tallied at least 50 assists in three straight seasons. Miller has posted 29 points (eight goals, 21 assists) in 30 games this season. He missed 10 games earlier this year for personal reasons.
Miller is an absolute force on the power play, too, and that’s an area the Bruins desperately need to improve. Entering Thursday, Boston ranks 31st out of 32 teams with a 12.4 percent success rate on the power play. This unit has been dreadful all year for the B’s and it’s a major reason why they are the fourth-lowest scoring team in the league at 2.58 goals per game.
Pettersson tallied 83 power-play points over the three previous seasons in Vancouver. Miller tallied 108 over the same span, including 30 assists on the power play in both the 2021-22 and 2023-24 campaigns.
Miller also is a more physical player and much better on faceoffs. He is winning 57.5 percent of his draws this season, far higher than Pettersson’s 45.7 percent win rate. Pettersson’s career faceoff percentage is 45.2, whereas Miller is at 54 percent. From a play style standpoint, Miller would be a better fit for the B’s than Pettersson.
Miller has 91 games of playoff experience, and he’s been especially productive in the Canucks’ last two postseason runs with 30 points (nine goals, 21 assists) in 30 games during that span.
What would it take to acquire either player? Quite a bit, and that’s where it gets tough for the Bruins because they have so few quality trade assets.
Their prospect pool is one of the worst in the league, and they don’t have a lot of good young players at the NHL level. Mason Lohrei has value as a talented 23-year-old offensive defenseman. Would the Canucks be interested in Trent Frederic? Vancouver would need another center if they dealt Pettersson or Miller.
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The Bruins’ top prospects are Matthew Poitras, Georgii Merkulov and Fabian Lysell. Poitras and Merkulov can play center, but neither is capable of filling a top-six role at the moment. A lot of veteran players on the Bruins roster have no-movement or no-trade clauses.
The Bruins could dangle a first-round pick, but they’re really not in a position to be trading another first-rounder when you look at the lack of talent in their prospect pool and the abundance of draft picks they’ve dealt away in recent years.
The Athletic’s Josh Yohe reported on Tuesday that the Canucks rejected an offer for Miller from the New York Rangers earlier this season that included center Mika Zibanejad. Zibanejad is a much better offensive player than any center on the Bruins roster. So if he’s not enough to get Miller, what chances do the Bruins have?
Many other teams would be able to outbid the Bruins if the Canucks are serious about trading Miller or Pettersson, but Sweeney should at least try. The roster he built has a lot of flaws, and the lack of a real No. 1 center is one of them.
A roster shakeup could be enough to turn the Bruins’ season around, but it’s hard to make those kinds of deals when you have limited salary cap space and weaker trade assets compared to many of your rivals.
