WILMINGTON, Mass. — Midseason trades are never easy on the players involved. Leaving familiar surroundings, parting with friends and teammates and uprooting families can be a difficult process.
But it’s a little easier when you’re leaving a team battling to get back into the playoff picture in front of a half-empty building to join a club poised to make a long postseason run in a strong hockey market. That’s the move forward Rich Peverley made on Friday when he came to the Bruins from Atlanta in a deal for Blake Wheeler and Mark Stuart.
“It’s a big thrill to be part of a really historic organization and to be coming to a team that has a chance to go pretty far in the playoffs,” Peverley said after taking the ice as a Bruin for the first time on Sunday in practice at Ristuccia Arena.
Chris Kelly‘s change of fortune was even more dramatic. He came to Boston from Ottawa on Tuesday, leaving a Senators squad that is in last place in the East.
“I couldn’t come in at a better time,” Kelly said. “This team is playing well. Obviously the team I had in Ottawa, we weren’t going to make the postseason. It’s tough to play those last 20, 25 games knowing that your season’s going to be done with the last regular-season game. Obviously that’s not the case here and I’m happy to have an opportunity to play in the postseason. That’s the best time of the year.”
Kelly made his Bruins debut on Friday, ironically in Ottawa against his old club. That was a matchup that created some mixed emotions for the veteran forward, who was happy to have some familiar surroundings while making the switch, but admitted it was a bit awkward to face his former teammates so soon after the trade.
“It was a bit of both,” Kelly said. “Being familiar with the rink and the equipment staff in the visitors’ room helped a little bit, but it was still a weird feeling going out there for the first few shifts playing against old teammates and friends.”
Kelly at least had an inkling the trade was coming, as the slumping Senators are in full fire sale mode with a series of trades in the past week.
“It’s tough to see guys leave, especially when we had been together so long,” Kelly said. “I was drafted in ’99 with the Sens and spent my whole career there. To see guys leave that I had played with and grew up with was tough.”
Peverley, on the other hand, had only joined the Thrashers in January, 2009 when he was claimed on waivers from Nashville. With Atlanta still just four points out of the final playoff spot in the East, he wasn’t expecting his stay in Atlanta to end this quickly.
“I had no idea,” Peverley said. “Sometimes you read rumors or you hear things, but my name was never mentioned or anything so I had no idea.”
Peverley doesn’t mind the change of scenery though, as he was anxious for a fresh start after battling some inconsistency this season. His numbers were solid at 14-20-34 through 59 games, but they are off slightly from his breakthrough 22-33-55 season of a year ago.
“It was kind of an up and down year,” Peverley said. “I wasn’t too pleased with my overall production at both ends of the rink. I was kind of hoping that the team would do a little bit better, but I’ll move on and I’m glad to be here now.”
Peverley doesn’t expect it to take much to adjust to Boston’s style of play, as Atlanta’s system under former Bruins assistant Craig Ramsay is very similar to what Claude Julien utilizes with the Bruins.
“I think what’s probably nice is that [Ramsay] brought a lot of the systems that were used here down to Atlanta, so I’m familiar with what I’m getting into,” Peverley said. “There’s isn’t too much change in that way.”
The only change is the stakes are now higher, as Peverly and Kelly have now joined a team that hopes to be playing pressure-packed games well into the spring.
