The Bruins are heading toward the 2026-27 season with a defense-heavy roster, but that doesn’t mean every contract on the books is going to age well.
Boston has added blueliners through free agency and a trade, yet general manager Don Sweeney still hasn’t cleared out the logjam enough to open up obvious roster space. That leaves the Bruins staring at a few deals that could become headaches once the new season begins at home against the New York Rangers without Charlie McAvoy.
Alex Steeves is one of them. Signed last summer, the forward was an encouraging early-season story after coming up from the Providence Bruins in the American Hockey League.
That run earned him a new two-year contract worth an AAV of $1.625 million, but the deal now looks like an overreaction to a short burst of production. Steeves eventually became a healthy scratch as the season wore on, and that continued into the playoffs against the Buffalo Sabres.
Mike Eyssimont is in a similar spot. Boston clearly had a message in mind when it gave him a two-year deal with an AAV of $1.45 million, but the fit has been uneven.
Eyssimont appeared in 56 games last season under first-year coach Marco Sturm, scoring eight goals and 18 points, yet he was used in only two of the six games against the Sabres. With the Bruins carrying a long list of bottom-six forwards and only three fourth-line spots available, he looks like a player Sweeney should at least consider moving before camp.
Then there’s Henri Jokiharju, who stands out as the most problematic contract of the group. Boston acquired him at the March 2025 trade deadline, then signed him to a three-year deal with an AAV of $3 million after he was brought in to fill the roster spot left by Brandon Carlo’s trade to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Instead, the arrangement has become a costly mismatch. A defenseman on that kind of money sitting in the press box for stretches of the season is exactly the kind of cap decision that can come back to haunt a team, and Jokiharju looks like the likeliest name to be moved if Boston does trade from its blue line.
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