Boston re-signed restricted free agent forward Lane MacDermid and signed unrestricted free agent defenseman Garnet Exelby, and both will have a chance in camp to compete for spots with the big club.

Both players signed one-year, two-way deals. MacDermid will make $600,000 if he sticks with the big club in Boston and $70,000 if he is assigned to their AHL affiliate in Providence, while Exelby will make $600,000 in Boston and $130,000 in Providence.

MacDermid was a fourth-round pick of the Bruins in 2009 and made his NHL debut this past March in his third pro season. At 6-foot-3, 205 pounds, the 22-year-old supplies size and toughness, which he showed by taking on Rangers heavyweight Mike Rupp in his NHL debut in New York on March 4.

MacDermid played five games in Boston, then joined the team as a black ace in the playoffs for the second straight year. He didn't score, but had six shots and 10 hits with the big club, while adding 4-12-16 totals, 121 penalty minutes and 13 fighting majors in 69 games in Providence.

MacDermid, who has 13-27-40 totals, 434 penalty minutes and 54 fighting majors in 212 games in his three seasons in Providence, has a shot at earning a job in Boston this year. While the re-signings of fourth-liners Shawn Thornton, Gregory Campbell and Daniel Paille would appear to block his path for now, he could stick as the club's 13th forward or get into the fourth-line mix if Paille or Campbell slips up to the third line.

Even if MacDermid doesn't make the team out of camp, he will likely be in line for more call-ups during the season if injuries strike. He did not look out of place at all in his brief stint last year, and while he is known for his toughness, he is a more well-rounded player than many pigeonholed in that role. MacDermid has been used as a penalty killer throughout his time in Providence and helped Windsor win the Memorial Cup in his final season of junior hockey in 2008-09.

Exelby is on the other end of the spectrum. While just 30, he is trying to earn his way back into the NHL after playing in the AHL the past two seasons. Prior to that, he played 408 games in the NHL with Atlanta and Toronto, posting 7-34-50 totals with 584 penalty minutes. Earning a job in Boston would bring his NHL career full circle, as he was selected by the Thrashers in the eighth round of the 1999 draft, which was held at what was then known as the Fleet Center.

Like MacDermid, Exelby carries a reputation for his physical play, as the 6-foot-1, 215-pounder is known for his big hits and is willing to drop the gloves when needed. He was a regular on the Atlanta blue line for five seasons from 2003-09, but saw his ice time diminish in Toronto after being traded to the Leafs.

This will be his third straight one-year, two-way deal with an Original Six team. After signing with Chicago two years ago, he spent the entire 2010-11 season in Rockford, where he served as captain and posted 3-10-13 totals with 128 PIMs and eight fighting majors in 77 games.

Last year, he signed with Detroit but other than being called up as a black ace in the playoffs he remains in Grand Rapids. Exelby put together a solid campaign there, with 7-14-21 totals, 177 PIMs and eight fighting majors in 75 games.

Exelby will likely spend the bulk of this season in Providence, where the Bruins could use an experienced blueliner to help bring along their younger defense prospects. With Andrew Bodnarchuk signing with Los Angeles and Nathan McIver remaining unsigned, the Bruins had been facing the prospect of stocking Providence with a defensive corps consisting of first-year pros Tommy Cross, Torey Krug and Zach Trotman along with fellow youngsters Matt Bartkowski, Colby Cohen, David Warsofsky, Kevin Miller and Ryan Button.

With his NHL experience, Exelby can't be ruled out of the mix for a job in Boston either. The Bruins have five veterans back in Zdeno Chara, Dennis Seidenberg, Johnny Boychuk, Andrew Ference and Adam McQuaid, with rookie Dougie Hamilton expected to round out the top six. That still leaves room for someone to claim the seventh spot. Barring the addition of any other veteran free agents, Krug and Bartkowski likely have the inside track, but Exelby could earn the job with a strong camp if the Bruins decide Krug and Bartkowski are better off developing with lots of ice time in Providence rather than sitting in the press box in Boston.

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.

Photo via Facebook/Garnet Exelby

No, Roberto Luongo hasn't been traded yet. And how could Bruins fans truly hate Luongo? His ability to motivate Tim Thomas in last year's Stanley Cup Final, not to mention his own sieve-like netminding in the three games at the Garden, were instrumental in Boston winning its first Cup in 39 years.

Aaron Rome played a key role too. He also galvanized the Bruins' effort and helped turn the series around, but Boston fans were far less appreciative of that as it came at the cost of Nathan Horton's health.

Rome was responsible for one of the most controversial hits of the 2011 playoffs, delivering a late shot to Horton early in Game 3 that knocked the Bruins winger out for the rest of the series with a concussion. It also ended Rome's postseason, as he was suspended for the last four games of the Final. Horton struggled to regain his form early this past season, then suffered another concussion in Philadelphia in January that sidelined him for the rest of the year.

Rome, meanwhile, battled through his own series of less serious injuries, playing just 43 games with hand, thumb and knee ailments. Among the games he missed was Vancouver's return to the Garden on Jan. 7, denying the Bruins any chance to avenge the hit.

Any revenge now won't come against the Canucks. Despite Rome's career-best 4-6-10 totals last year, Vancouver will not be bringing the unrestricted free agent back next season. That news was revealed by his agent, Kevin Epp, on the NEWS 1130 in Vancouver on Monday.

Vancouver already has six defensemen under contract for next season with Alexander Edler, Kevin Bieksa, Dan Hamhuis, Keith Ballard, Chris Tanev and Andrew Alberts, plus restricted free agent Marc-Andre Gragnani. They may also retain veteran unrestricted free agent Sami Salo, giving them plenty of depth of defense without the journeyman Rome.

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.

Photo via Facebook/Aaron Rome – Vancouver Canucks

On Wednesday, the Bruins officially announced the signing of center Gregory Campbell to a new three-year, $4.8 million deal through the 2014-15 season. They also announced an "agreement in principle" to sign center Chris Kelly to a four-year, $12 million deal to keep him in Boston through the 2015-16 campaign.

The Kelly deal, however, can't be official just yet, and he will technically hit the market on July 1. Bruins general manager Peter Chiarelli doesn't anticipate any issues with finalizing the deal then, with the delay caused by some salary cap complications.

"With respect to Chris, we've got a commitment from him for four years and we're not able the register that contract yet," Chiarelli said in a conference call on Wednesday. "We have to wait because of payroll tagging issues. That will be something we do on July 1. He has my commitment, he's given me his commitment, and we're ecstatic to have him for four years."

Those issues led to reports Wednesday night that the contract with Kelly had been rejected by the league, but based on Chiarelli's statements there should not be an issue with making the deal official on July 1 once the expiring contracts for players heading into free agency are off the books.

In return for that patience, and that $12 million commitment, the Bruins will get to retain one of the top two-way centers in the league who has played a huge role for the Bruins on and off the ice since coming from Ottawa at the 2011 trade deadline.

Kelly reached the 20-goal mark for the first time this past season, with six of those goals being game-winners. He also scored an overtime winner in Game 1 of Boston's first-round playoff clash with Washington, making the Bruins 19-0-0 when he scored last year. Even with the increased offensive output, Kelly remained a standout defender, finishing third in the league at plus-33 and second among Bruins forwards with 56 blocked shots.

"You've seen him score clutch goals for us, you've seen him take clutch faceoffs for us, you've seen him make great defensive plays, make great offensive plays, and he shows up every night," Chiarelli said. "Kells is another guy who has been adamant and has been in the discussions that I've had with him that he wants to stay here and I think it's evidenced by the fact that he's making this commitment to us."

Kelly has also been a key leader for the Bruins, and it did not take long for those qualities to be recognized by his teammates. He earned an A on his sweater as an alternate captain before the start of the 2011-12 season after playing just 24 regular-season and 25 playoff games with the team. That combination of two-way skill and intangibles could have earned him even more on the open market, but Kelly's priority was to stay in Boston.

"Right from Day 1, I think he knew that I wanted to be back and they wanted to have me back," Kelly said. "There's no better feeling than that – to be wanted, to come back to such a great organization. To be a Bruin is something that’s been really special to me."

Chiarelli was grateful for that.

"Kells is another fellow as a centermen that, had he went to the market, he would have gotten much more money than this," Chiarelli said. "So it's kind of a feel-good [story], these two players, and happy to get them done at this time. They're two really important pieces to our team and to our effort to try to keep the team together as much as possible."

Kelly will be with the team for four more years now, and getting that length of term was an important factor in agreeing to the new deal.

"Obviously you want to play hockey as long as possible and to get the four years is something great," Kelly said. "The four years that I get to spend in Boston is even better. Like I said before, it's a great hockey city and I’ll have the opportunity to play with a lot of great players for the next four years hopefully."

Signing a free agent for that long can carry risks, but Chiarelli is comfortable with making such a commitment, even with Kelly turning 32 on November 11.

"He's still relatively young from a free agent perspective and Chris keeps himself in very good shape," Chiarelli said. "I've seen how he plays over the years and he's a very smart player, so at the end of the day, I didn't really have an issue with that. He can change his game and he can move up and down the lineup and he can fill a lot of spots, and just his intelligence and his hockey sense, it wouldn't surprise me if he played beyond the four years."

And to get Kelly locked up for four more years, the Bruins are willing to wait a few more weeks before they can make the deal official.

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.

After bringing back Michel Therrien for his second stint behind the Canadiens bench on Tuesday, Montreal is set to add Martin Lapointe as the club's new director of player development, TSN reported on Wednesday.

Lapointe spent three seasons on the opposite side of hockey's fiercest rivalry, playing in Boston from 2001-04. Lapointe came to the Bruins on one of the most infamous free agent deals of the pre-lockout era, cashing in on a career year with the Red Wings when he tallied 27 goals and 57 points in 2000-01 with a four-year, $20 million deal with the Bruins.

Lapointe went on to post modest totals in Boston, never scoring more than 17 goals in a season and finishing with a 40-43-83 line in 205 games over three years before the final season on his deal was wiped out by the owners' lockout.

While he spent the bulk of his 991 NHL games with Original Six teams, coming up with Detroit and also playing in Boston and Chicago, Lapointe does have ties to Montreal as well. He's a Quebec native and played his junior hockey under Therrien in Laval. He also played with new Montreal general manager Marc Bergevin in Detroit in the mid-90s.

After finishing his playing career in Ottawa in 2008, Lapointe also worked with Bergevin in the Blackhawks organization. Lapointe served as a pro scout while Bergevin worked his way up to assistant GM before landing the Montreal job this spring.

According to TSN, Lapointe also considered joining Therrien's staff as an assistant coach, but instead chose to stay on the management track in the front office.

There was an opportunity to be an assistant coach after the Canadiens announced on Wednesday that assistants Randy Cunneyworth and Randy Ladouceur had been relieved of their duties. Cunneyworth had served as the Canadiens' interim head coach after Jacques Martin was fired last December, but Cunneyworth was demoted back to an assistant role when Bergevin was named GM and began the search for a new coach.

Bergevin said at the time that whoever he hired would have the discretion to retain the current assistants or assemble a staff of his own, and Therrien has obviously chosen the latter.

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.

Thornton didn't meet with the media Monday, and the Bruins did not officially announce the two-year extension Thornton was first reported to have signed Saturday until late Monday afternoon, but that didn't stop teammates and opponents alike from weighing in on the new deal with praise for the efforts of Boston’s popular pugilist.

Toronto tough guy Jay Rosehill traded punches with Thornton the last time the teams met in Toronto on March 6 but had nothing but compliments for his fellow enforcer after Monday’s morning skate as the teams prepared to clash again Monday night at the Garden.

"It's nice to see a guy that's come as far as he has and has done well and proven how well he can play get rewarded," Rosehill said. "To have a guy like that on your team is great. I think they're happy to have him, obviously. I like to model myself in a similar style, I guess you could say, in playing that tough role but at the same time being able to play out there and contribute on the ice."

Thornton certainly has contributed plenty in his first five seasons in Boston, posting career-highs with 10-10-20 totals last year before playing a key role in the Bruins' run to the Cup with his leadership, toughness and energy. This season, he's continued to provide the Bruins with a strong physical presence, leading the entire NHL with 19 fighting majors. He’s done that while still being responsible and reliable enough to skate a regular shift, a rarity among the tough-guy set.

"I definitely respect the job that he does," said Bruins center Gregory Campbell, Thornton's linemate for the past two seasons. "It's not an easy job. I think you get more of an appreciation for him playing with him. I know he’s respected around the league, but when you play with a guy you obviously see a different perspective. What I see from him is professionalism every day, hard work, and he's a leader off the ice. He’s a big part of the team."

The Bruins will reportedly pay Thornton $1.1 million a year for the next two seasons to keep him a part of the team. The signing will follow extensions to Adam McQuaid, Rich Peverley, David Krejci and Johnny Boychuk, all of whom would have been free agents this summer. The Bruins still have several players scheduled for free agency after the season, including Campbell, who would like nothing better than agreeing to an extension of his own.

"Of course this is where I want to be," Campbell said. "This is a great place to play, a great organization, and a successful one. Every player wants to play where there’s been success, and there's more success to come. It's really nice to see those guys get those extensions, and they’re a big part of the team, but the important thing is focusing on playing and not the other stuff."

Thornton's focus has never wavered on his long road to the NHL, which featured a decade toiling in the minors before earning his first opportunity at full-time duty in the NHL with Anaheim in 2006-07. Thornton earned his first Cup ring that season with the Ducks, who were coached by Randy Carlyle.

Carlyle took over behind the Leafs bench earlier this month, but he's kept track of his former player and isn't surprised by the success Thornton has found in Boston.

"I think that Shawn Thornton has been able to continue to build off the year we had him in Anaheim," Carlyle said. "He hasn't changed his approach. I think he's getting more recognition because he went out and earned it. He's a catalyst. He was a catalyst for our hockey club when we had him in Anaheim, and that’s what he's doing for the Bruins. It's great to see a player put in number of years of hard work, and I’m talking years, not months of hard work, and be rewarded with a contract of that stature. He's earned everything that he's got, and he earns it the tough way."

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.

By the time the trade deadline arrives Monday at 3 p.m., it will be a full deluge of deals.

That makes for a joyous time of year for many fans, as armchair GMs dream of the power forwards and puck-moving defensemen that could be added to their favorite clubs.

For the players in the league, the days and weeks leading up to the deadline can be a little less enjoyable, as the rumors of deals can be tough to escape. But the players have little choice but to deal with the potential of changes coming to their team as the speculation swirls.

"Obviously it's around," Bruins center Chris Kelly said in a recent interview with NESN.com. "It's around everywhere. It's kind of shoved in your face a lot of times. But I think it's how you deal with it. If you start worrying about it or it's taking over your mindset, I think you're going to be in trouble because those are things that are out of your control. All you can do is worry about going out, playing hard and doing your job.

"If a team feels that moving you is best for that team, then that's what they're going to do," Kelly added. "At the end of the day, you don't really have a say unless you've got one of those no-trade clauses. I think as you get older you realize that."

Kelly speaks from experience, having come to Boston from Ottawa before last year's deadline. He proved to be a valuable addition with his performance in Boston's Cup run, and has shown his value again this season with 14-13-27 totals and a selection as one of Boston's alternate captains.

Still, the fear of being dealt is ever present for many. Even those fortunate enough to be out of the rumor mill's spotlight or possessing some semblance of control with a no-trade clause have to fear seeing friends and teammates dealt away.

As important as the moves that brought Kelly, Rich Peverley and Tomas Kaberle to Boston last season were to the Bruins' championship, it still came at the cost of popular teammates Mark Stuart and Blake Wheeler leaving the team.

"We lost a couple of good players last year that was pretty hurtful," Bruins forward Daniel Paille said. "But to get Kells and Pev was such a reward and you get to meet new guys. We understand that things like that happen, but when guys like that leave it kind of sucks for all of us because we all get along. We all hang out together."

That's no different this season, as the Bruins have remained a tight-knit group that sticks up for one another on the ice and hangs out together off it. But they're also a team in the midst of an ill-timed slump, going 4-7-0 in its last 11 games and being shut out four times in that span.

General manager Peter Chiarelli has stated repeatedly that he doesn't want to mess with the chemistry that helped Boston win the Cup last season, but some moves are likely before the deadline. Ideally, he'll just be making additions to the current roster at the expense of draft picks or prospects, but every Bruin knows it's possible they could see more friends and teammates shipped out. That's the nature of the business, even on a team no one wants to leave.

"I think if you ask everyone in here, everyone enjoys being around one another," Kelly said. "Everyone enjoys being on this team. That's been no secret around here."

The rumors that fly around the league are no secret either. The players know all too well the names that get bandied about, try as they might to ignore the talk.

"Over the years you kind of get used to the fact that there is a deadline," Paille said. "I mean, you look at [Jarome] Iginla, it seems like his name is in the rumors all the time. I couldn't imagine what he goes through. For me, I haven't heard my name in the rumors at all, and if it is, it happens. I'm not too worried about it.

"I like just focusing on hockey," Paille added. "It makes it a lot easier to play my game. If you get worried about that you start thinking too much and you don't play the way you need to play. For me, it's better to just ignore it."

Paille's approach is the one most players attempt, but it's easier said than done at this time of year once the dealing begins and players know the bulk of the moves — and the worries that accompany them — are still to come.

Have a question for Douglas Flynn? Send it to him via Twitter at @douglasflynn or send it here. He will pick a few questions to answer every week for his mailbag.