After signing goaltender Tuukka Rask to an eight-year, $56 million contract, the Boston Bruins are up against the salary cap. In fact, they’re technically over it, which has led to rumors that Chris Kelly or Brad Marchand might be on their way out.
Bruins GM Peter Chiarelli attempted to kill those rumors by saying that he’s comfortable with the Bruins’ current cap situation. Furthermore, he doesn’t anticipate making significant moves of any kind for the remainder of the summer.
“I think right now we’re going to stand pat. I like the fact that we’re going to have competition on the third line. We have some good young players already in the organization that we just recently acquired,” Chiarelli told CSN New England. “You never know what happens after the summer, but [off-season transactions] will slow down. It has slowed down [already].
“As of right now, we’re going to stand pat. Things may change, but that’s just where we are right now.”
As mentioned above, the Bruins have exceeded the cap ceiling, but that’s not true in practice.
That’s largely because Marc Savard will spend another season on the long-term injured reserve list due to his career-ending concussion. Jarome Iginla’s contract is also bonus-laden, which means that his cap hit for 2013-14 can be as low as $1.8 million. However, if Iginla fulfills enough bonuses to exceed the cap, then the difference will be put towards the Boston Bruins’ 2014-15 cap hit.
That might not sound ideal, but given that the cap is projected to raise significantly in 2014-15, they likely view it as a tolerable outcome. At least, they seem comfortable enough with it to keep Marchand and Kelly.