The Boston Bruins announced the signing of veteran center Dominic Moore to a one-year contract worth $900,000 on Tuesday, giving head coach Claude Julien quite a few centers to worth with when training camp and the preseason begin.
The Bruins entered the offseason having two legitimate top-six centers in Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci, and they signed another in David Backes as a free agent in July.
They also must find a spot for young center Ryan Spooner to continue his development. Noel Acciari and Riley Nash also are capable of playing down the middle. One or more of these centers might have to play on the wing, but it’s not a bad problem to have. The Bruins might need to score a lot of goals this season to overcome their lack of elite blue-line depth.
Boston ranked fifth in goals scored per game and seventh in power-play percentage last season, and it has the scoring depth to match or better those totals if most everyone is healthy throughout the 2016-17 campaign.
Here are our projected forward lines after Moore’s signing.
Projected Forward Lines as of Aug. 31
Brad Marchand–Patrice Bergeron–Ryan Spooner
Matt Beleskey–David Krejci–David Pastrnak
Frank Vatrano–David Backes–Jimmy Hayes
Danton Heinen/Seth Griffith–Noel Acciari/Dominic Moore–Riley Nash
Others in the Mix
Tyler Randell, Austin Czarnick, Brian Ferlin, Zac Rinaldo, Zach Senyshyn, Sean Kuraly, Jake DeBrusk, Tim Schaller
Thumbnail photo via Eric Hartline/USA TODAY Sports Images
