Boston Bruins: Is Ryan Spooner likely to be traded?

The Boston Bruins are reportedly fielding offers for forward Ryan Spooner and he could be moved this offseason as the team reloads.

According to Ryan Kennedy of The Hockey News, the Boston Bruins are entertianing offers for pending restricted free agent Ryan Spooner. He says that the New Jersey Devils, Vancouver Canucks and Las Vegas Golden Knights all have interest.

The Golden Knights will begin play in the upcoming season.

Spooner was scratched twice during round one of the Stanley Cup Playoffs series against the Ottawa Senators, so the rumor mill began to churn once again.

In 2016-17, Ryan Spooner appeared in 78 regular season games for Boston. He had just 11 goals and 28 assists for 39 total points. Last week when asked about Spooner and his future in Boston, GM Don Sweeney did not give a glowing review.

"“Well, to be determined. We’ll look at our roster and what our options are. He has options as well as an RFA and we’ll have discussions with his representatives and see where there’s a fit. Ryan struggled down the stretch, had a nice bump when Bruce (Cassidy) first took over, the familiarity probably helped. Offensively it tailed off.”"

After that statement from Sweeney, it makes sense that the Bruins may be shopping Spooner.

His new head coach Bruce Cassidy, who was also familiar with the forward from his time in Providence, didn’t mince words either.

"More from Chowder and Champions3 Midseason Chaim Bloom Decisions That Have Killed the 2023 Red Sox10 Patriots Who Will Be Cut by Tuesday’s Roster DeadlineMLB Screws Red Sox Fans With Broadcast for Mookie Betts Return3 Most Underpaid Celtics Heading Into the 2023 SeasonRed Sox Continue Rollercoaster Season With Massive Win“I’ll tell you what my issue was at the end with Ryan. It was well-documented with Claude he didn’t like his defensive game and some of the other things. For me, I didn’t like his offensive game at the end. He wasn’t playing to his strengths, and that bothers me about players, if they’re not able to play to their strengths when the temperature of the game goes up. We can work with him on his weaknesses. We’re there to coach up the defensive part of it, but he wasn’t attacking and that was disconcerting to me, that he’s a guy that should be creating offense in the series where offense was hard to find and we weren’t getting enough of it, so we made the switch.”"

That’s certainly not the type of review you want coming from your head coach, especially with so much young talent in the system for Boston.

The Bruins could look to deal Spooner in a sign-and-trade deal, or they could trade away his RFA rights. The Bruins have traded free agent rights away before with Carl Soderberg and Colorado, but Soderberg was an unrestricted free agent. Boston would likely expect a third-round pick in exchange for Spooner, as the forward has under-produced but is still just 25 with plenty of potential.

Boston is without their natural second and third-round picks in this year’s draft. They traded away the third rounder in the Flyers deal for Zac Rinaldo.

Next: The Future of the Boston Bruins

This should certainly be an interesting offseason for the Boston Bruins, and only time will tell if Spooner’s time hs come to an end in the black and gold.