The NHL Network’s latest winger rankings put a bright spotlight on just how much value the Bruins are getting from David Pastrnak.
In the network’s Top 20 Wings Right Now list, Pastrnak checked in at No. 2, behind only Nikita Kucherov. That’s a tough spot to dispute after Kucherov captured his second Hart Trophy this past season, even if plenty of fans and analysts thought Pastrnak deserved more MVP attention for his own year. Kucherov’s late-season scoring surge and the way he carried the Tampa Bay Lightning made him the clear choice in the end.
What stands out for Boston, though, is how Pastrnak stacks up against the rest of the group financially. Kirill Kaprizov, Mitch Marner, Mikko Rantanen, and Kyle Connor all make more annually than Pastrnak, even though the NHL Network placed them 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 11th on the list, respectively. Kaprizov is the outlier because of the size of his deal, but the broader point is hard to miss: Pastrnak is being viewed as better than several higher-paid wings while costing the Bruins less.
That makes the ranking both a compliment and a warning sign for Boston.
On one side, it’s a clear reminder that Pastrnak is delivering enormous value. He finished sixth in Hart Trophy voting, and his importance to the Bruins is obvious. Without him, it’s difficult to picture where the organization would be right now.
On the other side, the list exposes the bigger issue. Boston has one of the league’s top two wingers on a bargain of a deal, but Don Sweeney hasn’t done enough to build the kind of support around him that a player of Pastrnak’s caliber deserves. The Bruins may not get another chance to have a superstar of this level on such a team-friendly contract, and that puts even more pressure on the front office to maximize it.
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The Bruins have spent the summer hearing plenty about the lineup around David Pastrnak, and most of it has centered on whether Boston can do enough down the middle to keep up in a tightening Eastern Conference. Pastrnak got his own nod from NHL Network as the second-best winger in the league right now, but the more uneasy news for Boston came from a recent Athletic ranking that left the clubs top centers near the bottom of the NHL picture.
Even with that kind of outside skepticism, the Bruins have not publicly backed away from their center-by-committee approach. The question hanging over training camp is whether that confidence holds up once the games start and the matchups get heavier, because for a team built around Pastrnak, center depth remains one of the clearest pressure points on the roster. [Read more 🡒]
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The larger backdrop makes the opportunity even clearer. Nikita Kucherov, Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon have dominated recent Hart Trophy talk, but the next wave is starting to form, with names like Cale Makar, Nick Suzuki and David Pastrnak also in the mix. For Robertson, the question is whether he can turn a strong resume into the kind of MVP-level season that changes how the league views him and, by extension, how Dallas is judged. [Read more 🡒]