Kessel on chances of staying with the Bruins: "Slim"

The Phil Kessel roller coaster has taken another dive folks. Early this afternoon, the Boston Globe's Kevin Dupont reported that Kessel had broken off negotiations with the Bruins.

Here is an excerpt from Dupont's post on the Bruins Blog at Boston.com.

"Phil Kessel has made it clear that he doesn't intend to negotiate any longer with the Bruins, his Toronto-based agent in recent days informing the Boston front office that the right winger's priority instead is to sign a free-agent offer sheet with one of the league's 29 other teams."

However, Kessel spoke with Sportsnet.ca on Thursday afternoon and denied the Globe report that he's broken off all negotiations with the Boston Bruins. "I don't know who is saying that, but it's not true," said Kessel.

Kessel said that he didn't think he would be a member of the Boston Bruins during this coming season, and that his chances of returning were, "Slim."

It is starting to look like Kessel will end up in Toronto with multiple draft picks ending up in Boston. However, Kessel could still end up in other locations as Nashville, San Jose and the New York Rangers are still interested.

Bruins sign Wozniewski

The Bruins have signed 29-year-old defenseman Andy Wozniewski to a one-year contract for additional depth.


The tale of the tape on Wozniewski:

• 6-foot-5
• 225 lbs.
• Played in AHL last season for Peoria and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton
• 3 Goals, 18 assists, 74 games last season
• 1 NHL game in 2008-2009 with St. Louis
• Played in 77 career NHL games (St. Louis and Toronto), scoring two goals and 10 assists.

Wozniewski will compete with Johnny Boychuck for the 7th defenseman role. Wozniewski will likely be a depth defenseman who will end up in Providence and may be called up if the Bruins back line is hit with multiple injuries.

Bruins tell Leafs they will match any offer sheet for Kessel

Happy Labor Day everyone, I hope you all are enjoying. You've got to love reporting tweets, but they are the new wave, so here you go.

According to a tweet from TSN's Darren Dreger, the Boston Bruins' front office has notified Toronto Maple Leads GM Brian Burke that the B's will match any offer sheet that the Leafs throw out to restricted free agent Phil Kessel.

Dreger's tweet reads as follows, "Bruins say they've told Burke if he goes after Kessel, they will match. This may be fun to watch. :)"

There has been a lot of speculation that something may happen with Kessel this week because Peter Chiarelli may be worried about Toronto offering Kessel a sheet.

Obviously, Toronto is in the same division as Boston so the Bruins GM will most likely try and do anything possible to move Kessel out of the conference.

There of course still is the chance that Boston could move some other players in order to sign Kessel. Previous candidates were Chuck Kobasew and Andrew Ference.

REPORT: Maple Leafs paving way for move for Kessel

According to Bob McKenzie's twitter page and TSN.ca, the Maple Leafs may have just made several moves to put themselves in a position to acquire Phil Kessel.

Want to check out the stories, click on one of the two links. TWITTER:http://twitter.com/tsnbobmckenzie

TSN.CA: http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=290103

Here's why the speculation is rampant: If the Leafs submit an offer sheet for Kessel in the next few days it would be very difficult for the Bruins to match. They would have to ship out a couple of players swiftly.

If Boston weren't to match, (which is likely) the Leafs would owe the Bruins a first, second and third round pick.

That said, the Leafs just acquired a 2010 second rounder in exchange for their second and third rounders in 2011.

The Boston Globe reported that Bruins GM Peter Chiarelli admitted that multiple teams were interested in Kessel last week.

Stay tuned here, as this is purely speculation at the moment but Bob McKenzie usually finds himself in the know ahead of others.

Julien extended, Chiarelli address' organization being called cheap with Kessel

Now, as all of you know by now Claude Julien has signed a multi-year contract extension to remain the Boston Bruins bench boss.

In his two seasons with the Bruins, Julien has compiled a 94-48-22 record in 164 games. Julien is a proven winner, winning 64% of his games as the Bruins head coach and 60% of his games throughout his stops in New Jersey, Montreal and Boston.

Now, of course this is big and great news over on Causeway street. However, there was another twist to things yesterday that caught my attention.

With about a week and a half to go until training camp kicks off and Phil Kessel still unsigned, the question of course came up of, why not?

Peter Chiarelli seemed real agitated when the question came up. Chiarelli was quick to point the finger at Kessel’s agent Wade Arnott. Chiarelli said that Arnott has created a bit of a 'media war' and that the sides have discussed a contract since the draft, contrary to what Arnott claims.

The Bruins General Manager was then asked if he thought this would cause a distraction for his team? “It becomes a distraction because the other party starts making it a distraction,” he said. “I understand all the tools of their trade, too. I used to be an agent. So you deal with it. We have a strong room, we’ve got strong leadership. It’s just part of the game.

Chiarelli then showed a little more frustration, when he addressed the buzz that has started that the Bruins front office was back to their old habits of not paying their stars.

“I just get a little disturbed when they talk about us being cheap. Because it’s not about that. Look at some of the second contracts we’ve given — Patrice Bergeron, David Krejci. It’s not about that. It’s about a balance.”

Now, I agree with Chiarelli that it is about balance. However, can you really let a potential 40 goal scorer just walk?

By my count the Bruins have $1,304,167 million remaining in cap space. The only contract that the Bruins have right now other than players named Savard or Krejci, that would create the space necessary to sign Kessel is Marco Sturm's, $3.5 million.

This contract shipped out, would leave about $4.8 million in space and would give the Bruins the opportunity to sign Kesel. Now, people have heard Chuck Kobasew's name put into trade rumors, but, with that contract shipped that would only leave just over $3.6 million in space, not enough to sign the 21 year-old forward.

So where does that leave the Bruins and Kessel? To me, the writing is on the wall and Kessel will not be back with Boston in 2009-2010. Chiarelli is saying all the right things, that he will match any offer sheet, but will he?

Chiarelli is clearly posturing to send the message out to other teams to stay away. But with the cap so tight for Boston, is it really a stretch to think that if a team were to put out an offer sheet to Kessel that Boston wouldn't let him walk? Boston after all would receive multiple early round draft picks.

Kessel has been mentioned in rumors to multiple teams. San Jose, Edmonton, Vancouver, New York (Rangers), St. Louis and Los Angeles are among the laundry list.

On a day that was supposed to be a happy one for Peter Chiarelli, it ended up being a bit frustrating. Will the onslaught of questions frustrate Chiarelli to the point of ending the soap opera before camp?

My gut would lean me towards no, but hey, we've all been wrong at one point or another in this tango between Kessel and Chiarelli.

REPORT: Bruins to announce extension for Julien tomorrow

The Boston Bruins have announced a 10 a.m. press conference at the TD Garden.

The club is expected to announce a contract extension for head coach, Claude Julien who was entering the final year of a three year contract, signed in 2007.

In June, Peter Chiarelli said that re-signing Claude Julien was a priority of his, along with his other RFA's. Look for Julien to have a deal similar to Chiarelli's, keeping the coaching staff in tact for years to come.

Some new faces show at Ristuccia, Begin checks in

Hello Bruins fans, it's another day of ice time for the black and gold in Wilmington.

The players who participated in the skate were, Tim Thomas, Tuukka Rask, Kevin Regan, Matt Dalton, Adam Courchaine, Marco Sturm, Brad Marchand, Matt Marquardt, Andrew Bodnarchuk, and Jeff LoVecchio, Milan Lucic, Steve Begin, Andrew Ference, Dennis Wideman, Byron Bitz, and Johnny Boychuk.

The news of the day was that there were a few new faces on the ice. Key faces like Ference, Wideman and Bitz.

Also, the projected fourth line center for the Bruins, Steve Begin was on the ice at Ristuccia for the first time. For those of you who don't know much about Begin, I will let him explain the type of player he is.

"I'm not a big talker on the ice. I'm pretty quiet," Begin said. "I talk with my shoulders. I'm in-your-face. I just go skate, hit, block shots."

David Krejci, who skated on Monday opted for an on-ice workout. He has said that he is not at the point where he can skate every day. This is a clear indication that Krejci will not be ready to go come opening night on October 1. At least, that is what this blogger would speculate.

Sharks prepping offer sheet for Kessel?

The Sharks are still interested in the Bruins speedy RFA, Phil Kessel and it appears they may submit an offer sheet for the restricted free agent, Slam Sports reports.

Boston has under $ 2 million in available cap space and therefore doesn't have the cap space to sign the restricted free agent. Kessel is said to be looking for something close to $5 million.

For the Bruins to sign Kessel, they would have to dismantle their roster to stay under the cap. So if the Sharks sign Kessel, they would likely not match the offer sheet. However, we have picked up on some low lying rumors that the Bruins could be shopping Andrew Ference and Chuck Kobasew to create space.

There are rumors that the Sharks could put in an offer sheet to Kessel as early as next week. If Kessel were to accept the sheet and sign in San Jose, the Sharks would owe the Bruins multiple draft picks.