It’s now Aug. 7, and the Boston Bruins and goaltender Jeremy Swayman have yet to come to an agreement on a new deal for the restricted free-agent goaltender. While it might seem like the two sides are at odds, it’s more of a stalemate than anything.
While fans are clamoring for the Bruins to get a deal done and acquiesce to Swayman’s demands, according to Andrew Raycroft of WEEI and NESN, fans should not be concerned with the lack of an extension, at least not yet. Raycroft said that he fully expects Swayman to be playing on opening night.
The former Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs goaltender also said he wouldn’t be surprised if the deal was not finalized until the week before training camp, which opens on Sept. 18. In the middle of July, Raycroft also said that one reason the deal was held up was the lack of time between the draft, free agency, and development camp, all of which take up a lot of time for Boston’s upper management. After those all passed, everyone left for the summer and is likely not thinking about business.
Swayman is eager to stay with the Bruins, and the team is eager to have him back, but financially, it seems the two are either on different pages, or neither party has opened the book yet.
The first reason fans should not be concerned is simply the lack of hockey stuff going on with the Bruins right now. Recently, David Pastrnak got married, and most of his teammates were there (Swayman included). Front office executives are taking time off before training camp.
Another reason that fans should not be concerned is that there has been no talk of an offer sheet being extended to Swayman from other teams. According to Cap Friendly, early on in free agency, the Buffalo Sabres, Montreal Canadiens, and Detroit Red Wings (among others) were eligible to send an offer sheet his way. Either Boston has kept hush-hush about who was extending offer sheets, or nothing has come in.
While on every one of those teams, Swayman would be the starter, when it comes down to brass tax and the money he would likely command to be pulled away from Boston, they could or would not want to spend it.
Finally, going into the season, the Bruins have just over $8.6 million in cap space available, and that is money they should spend on Swayman. The increase would be more than double what he was paid in 2023-24 at $3.475 million and put him among the top five highest-paid goalies in the league. The price tag is not something management should balk at, especially given the solid performances he’s put together in the last two seasons.
Swayman is slowly becoming one of the top-tier goalies in the league, playing a career-high 44 games (43 starts) last season in his first full campaign as the Bruins’ “starter”, winning 25 of them and losing 18 (10 in regulation, eight in overtime or the shootout). He also held a 2.53 goals-against average and a .916 save percentage. Not quite Sergei Bobrovsky numbers, but enough to make the All-Star team.