What Milan Lucic meant to the Boston Bruins
Milan Lucic returns to Boston on Tuesday night with the Los Angeles Kings, which meant it was time for a new tradition in the NHL: The Players Tribune article in which he bares his soul about seeing the Bruins bear again.
“I have to say, every day as an LA King has been a happy one. I don’t think I could have landed in a better spot for me and my family. But I’ll always appreciate how Boston shaped my life,” he wrote. “Coming back to the Garden for the first time this week, I’ll be battling the butterflies, for sure. Who knows, maybe I’ll just go out there and drop the mitts just to get the blood flowing. For old time’s sake. Boston: Thank you. For everything.”
It’s interesting: At the end of his time with the Boston Bruins, there were definitely some Lucic detractors. There wasn't another player who inspired “should they trade him?” debates in Boston quite like Lucic, as evidenced that it was a topic in June 2014 and then four months later and then again six months after that.
The “trade him” side of the argument always seemed to come back to the same point: He wasn’t playing like a $6 million a year player, so there’s no point in belaboring the fact that the already cap-strapped Bruins weren’t going to pay him more than that.
As Elliote Friedman said last June:
“I think one of the biggest questions being asked in Boston as an organization right now is, 'What has happened here?' and, 'How long-term is this? What does it mean?' I think the Bruins are being asked about him. I think there's a lot of hard, internal questions being asked about, 'Do we do it, or do we think that there's still a lot left to give because if we do trade him, we change the makeup of our team in a major way.'
Which, of course, the Bruins decided to do. They traded Lucic to the Los Angeles Kings last June, retaining some salary, and officially turned the page on that incarnation of the franchise.
So as he returns to Boston on Tuesday, there wouldn’t be any hard feelings. It was a business. They went their own ways.
“No, there was nothing negative, no hard feelings or anything like that. I understood the situation leading into the off-season, and sometimes things don’t last forever,” said Lucic, via LA Kings Insider. “I was ready and prepared for anything. I was ready and prepared to come back here. I was ready and prepared if I had to move on.”
Lucic gets it and I imagine the fans do too. I liked this take from Kirk Luedeke from ScoutingPost last September:
Lucic will be missed far more than most are letting on. Even if he didn’t fight as often near the end as he had done before…even if he didn’t move his feet with the consistency that a player of his status and cap hit demanded, there were times when he was in a class all his own as a force of nature. Those moments simply weren’t enough for a lot of fans…and the team decided to move on as well.
But to me, Lucic symbolizes an important time in Bruins history- as the franchise has won just six total Stanley Cup championships since 1924, he and his 2011 mates established a legacy that will always be respected in Boston. He was the right player, at the right time. His 139 goals, 342 points and 772 penalty minutes in 566 career NHL games with the B’s won’t land him at the top of any of the team’s statistical categories, but they do tell part of the story of a player who wore his heart on his sleeve for eight seasons.
“The right player, the right time.” I think that succinctly sums up Lucic and the Bruins, as even he indicated.
“I am pretty fortunate that I got to be a Bruin in probably one for the best times to ever be a Bruin,” he told LA Kings Insider. “They have only won six Cups in the 92 years they have played, so like I said it was a great time for me here, a special time for me here.”
He embodies that time. Winning with his fists. An intimidating reputation preceding him. A championship ring, and nearly another. Then, finally, getting compensated for that success, and having that compensation spell the end of his time in Boston.
Not that he holds it against the Bruins. Not that Boston will ever hold it against Lucic.
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Greg Wyshynski is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter. His book, TAKE YOUR EYE OFF THE PUCK, is available on Amazon and wherever books are sold.
