A square deal in Round 1?

The No. 5 pick in Saturday's NHL draft, the crown jewel the Bruins hold for the royal beating they took in the 2005-06 season, could end up the draft pick to be named later -- possibly 8-10 picks later.

Jeff Gorton, Boston's acting general manager, confirmed Friday that he has talked with other clubs about making a deal that would net the Bruins an NHL-ready roster player, and in turn the Bruins would surrender their No. 5 pick for a selection later in the first round.

``Yes, there is that thought, and it's something we would consider," said Gorton, who will run the draft table for the Bruins while GM designee Peter Chiarelli remains on the Ottawa payroll. ``But that said, the player coming back would have to be a pretty good player -- not someone in his 30s who isn't going to be with our club long-term."

Specifically, said Gorton, the price for that reshuffling of the first-round deck would have to be a forward guaranteed to play on one of the club's top two lines, or a defenseman who could play in the top two pairings.

Ideally, the swap would leave the Bruins with a pick in the 8-15 range, an area where Gorton believes the Bruins would still secure a forward or defenseman with potential to make a long-term impact. Only rarely do even one or two of the top five picks step immediately into NHL action, and those chances thin out even more after the initial cream gets skimmed.

One element to keep in mind: The Bruins' abundant cap room could play a significant role in such a deal getting done. A trade partner who is edging close to the cap figure (approximately $43.5 million) could be tempted to relinquish a younger, higher-compensated player simply to gain immediate cap relief.

Without a cap, the financial relief was still available in this kind of a scenario, but the cap now frames, if not enhances, this type of swap. In most cases, however, a club looking to deal with the Bruins would be looking to unload older and pricier talent. If the scenario were turned around, and the Bruins were looking to move up 8-10 spots to No. 5, they would dangle 33-year-old Glen Murray, still on the books here for three years at a total cost slightly north of $12 million.

Earlier this month, the Bruins saw their No. 7 pick in the 2000 draft, Lars Jonsson, fall off the board. It's never a good day when a club decides to admit a mistake and cut a prospect free, but Jonsson's development wasn't impressive enough, according to Gorton, for the Bruins to roll out first-round money for the Swedish defenseman, who now can cut his own deal as an unrestricted free agent.

``In our minds, it came down to admitting a mistake, and every club makes them," said Gorton. ``Sometimes you're just better to admit it rather that just keep throwing money at it."

The Bruins essentially went ``off the board" with the pick of Jonsson, who was rated a second-rounder, at best, by most clubs. The Bruins, after sizing up the rest of the high-end stock in the 6-12 range, gambled that Jonsson could develop as a high-end, puck-moving, power-play-quarterbacking blue liner. Six more seasons of scouting him, according to Gorton, didn't convince the front office that he could ever be the high-impact player they envisioned.

``He'll do fine," said Gorton. ``He can play in the league, but we felt he still had a few holes in his game, and we also felt at this time we have some depth at defense. We'll take the pick and let him move on."

Gorton said the Bruins tried to deal Jonsson's rights at the signing deadline, but no one offered better than the compensatory draft pick.

Adding a bit of insult to injury is the fact that the Bruins missed twice in the first round in 2000. Martin Samuelsson, selected No. 27 in the same draft, did next to nothing in his three-year run with Providence (AHL), and did next to nothing again this past season with Linkoping in the Swedish Elite League.

The underlying bit of irony is that the Bruins ended up with perhaps the best late first-rounder in 2000. Brad Boyes, selected No. 24 by Toronto, had a brilliant 2005-06 season with the Bruins, riding most of the season on Patrice Bergeron's wing.

Had the Bruins owned the No. 5 pick in 2000, and selected as the Islanders did, they would have claimed Raffi Torres. As of last night, Torres was wrapping up his second full season -- playing for the Oilers in the Stanley Cup finals. The Isles eventually flipped Torres to the Oil, along with Brad Isbister, for Janne Niinimaa and a draft pick.

Mistakes. Everyone makes 'em, even in cases where they initially had it right.

He knows he has to shape up

If it's good for a 44-year-old Chris Chelios, then it's at least as good for a 36-year-old Jeremy Roenick.

JR, following a disappointing 2005-06 season with the Los Angeles Kings, has signed on with the Malibu, Calif., sweatshop run by the renowned T.R. Goodman, with an eye on getting in top shape this summer and landing a free agent deal that will lead to at least an 18th NHL season.

``He's there at 6 o'clock every morning, five days a week, at least five hours a day," said Roenick's agent, Neil Abbott. ``He realizes now that he's got to put more into his conditioning, and that it wasn't where he wanted it to be last season."

Roenick, flipped from Philadelphia to Los Angeles when the Flyers signed free agent Peter Forsberg last summer, collected only 9 goals and 22 points in 58 games with the Kings. A broken finger and a series of nagging injuries -- possibly conditioning-related -- kept him out of the lineup for nearly one-third of the season.

Goodman's camp has drawn a lot of NHLers over the years, including the likes of Chelios, Rob Blake, Mathieu Schneider, and Shawn Horcoff, the Oiler dynamo. Chelios has been a Goodman acolyte for some 15 years.

``Goodman's got this `no mercy' approach to the whole thing," said Abbott. ``If you're not there at 6:00 every day, he's pretty blunt, he doesn't want you. It starts with a 1-mile run, and then you hit the gym. And Jeremy's into it -- he doesn't want it to end, go out on what was a bad note last year in LA."

A world hockey association for coach/instructor Wesley

Blake Wesley, the other half of the NHL's Wesley brothers (Glen, the ex-Bruin, was busy with the Hurricanes last night in Edmonton), these days is director of US Hockey Operations for the Okanagan Hockey School in beautiful Penticton, British Columbia.

Following a coaching stint in the Western Hockey League, Blake, 46, hooked on with the OHS as a coach/instructor five years ago, and his various roles have taken him all over the world.

``Let's see . . . England, Hong Kong, United Arab Emirates, all over the US and Canada," said Wesley Friday, speaking on a cellphone as he made his way on business through the mountains of Washington state. ``It's been pretty exciting."

The UAE, the oil-rich desert nation, was by far the most unusual stop, said Wesley, noting that rink facilities there are hardly state-of-the-art. But an underlying demand for hockey instruction exists, he said, because of a great number of children born to Canadians and Europeans who moved there as engineers, many of them employed in the oil industry. The OHS (www.hockeyschools.com) will send instructors to Dubai and other UAE cities this year for a ninth time.

``One of the rinks is in this old auditorium, with a special seating area for dignitaries who come by," said Wesley. ``You've got this ice rink, with a special seating area, kind of like you'd see in a theater, and it's got these grandiose chairs and everything. It's for kings and queens and dignitaries.

``I never got to meet the king when I was there, but the UAE Secretary of Sport came by one day, and I got my picture taken with him up in that area. It's hysterical."

Wesley, the 22d pick overall in the 1979 draft (a.k.a. ``the Bourque draft"), played just under 300 NHL games for the Flyers, Whalers, Nordiques, and Maple Leafs, finishing up his NHL tour in 1985-86.

``A long time ago, isn't it?" mused Wesley. ``People ask me all the time now, `Hey, are you Glen's brother?' And I say, `Hey, he's my brother -- heck, I forged the pass for him!' "

Ex-Bruins Andy Moog and Dixon Ward are also on the OHS coach/instructor roster.

Etc.

Peter Chiarelli said yesterday morning that he intends to make his coaching choice this week, prior to Saturday's draft. He confirmed that he met last week with Pat Quinn, and also that ex-Habs coach Claude Julien, hired last week to run the Devils bench, had been on his list of candidates. The Bruins' GM designee said he plans to interview one other former NHL head coach, as well as a ``couple of young up-and-comers." It's likely that Kevin Dineen will get a call in the next day or two, provided the Ducks, parent club of Dineen's Portland (AHL) squad, grant him permission to talk with Chiarelli. For the moment, Chiarelli said, the entire Boston coaching staff, including coach Mike Sullivan, remains in contention to be retained. ``I had hoped to get this done by now, and I know it looks like like I'm leaving Mike out there, swinging in the wind a little bit," said Chiarelli. ``But he is a candidate, and I have to go through my process." As for where Chiarelli will sit the day of the draft, he only knows he won't be allowed to be at the Boston table. He said he was uncertain what role, if any, he will play for Ottawa, and was uncertain whether the Senators would ask him to be at their table.

The Lightning have until July 1 to swap winger Martin St. Louis, and if they don't, the former University of Vermont star's no-trade clause welds him to the Bolts for the next five years. Meanwhile, they're not going to deal Brad Richards, who just signed on for five years at a mind-boggling $39 million. Of Tampa Bay's Big Three, the most tradable now is No. 1 pivot Vincent Lecavalier, on the books for each of the next three years at $7.1 million per season. With Joe Thornton and his $6.7 million per year erased from the Hub of Hockey, a deal for the 26-year-old Lecavalier could be one of the very few trades that truly would recapture fan interest on Causeway Street. Only one problem: The Bolts no doubt would ask that Patrice Bergeron be part of the deal, which would make it a nonstarter. However -- and this is what makes the thought interesting -- the Bruins could offer up anyone else on the roster. The toughest decision then becomes this: Would it be worth it to the Bruins to give up prized goalie prospect Hannu Toivonen to bring Lecavalier here? If it indeed is time for Lecavalier to leave Tampa, look for Toronto and Philadelphia to get seriously into the mix. Both clubs had enticing packages on the table a couple of years ago when the Lightning, at the very last minute, decided to keep him.

All qualifying offers for NHL restricted free agents must be issued by Sunday, the day after the draft, or they are rendered unrestricted free agents. A slight twist in the new CBA allows RFAs, even with qualifying offers in hand, to have their agents talk with other clubs about offer sheets as of June 26 -- five days before the start of free agency. However, a club would not be allowed to make a Group 2 offer sheet to an RFA until July 1.

Kent Hughes, the Boston-based agent for Bergeron, said Friday he and Bruins acting GM Jeff Gorton have had preliminary discussions about a new pact for the 21-year-old pivot. Bergeron will be given his qualifying offer this week, but a deal isn't likely until after July 15, the target date for Chiarelli to take over the Boston front office. Asked if he expected another club to render Bergeron a Group 2 offer sheet, Hughes politely refused comment. Meanwhile, rumors continue to simmer around the league that July 1 will bring a significant change in past practice, leading to a number of Group 2 sheets being extended.

The NHL's Board of Governors will sit down Wednesday in Vancouver and likely rubber-stamp the sale of the Blues to Dave Checketts and friends . . . The Ducks bumped Teemu Selanne's deal to $3.75 million, nearly quadrupling his pay of $1 million last season. The deal also contains hefty team-related bonuses for the Finnish Flash, all of which would end up added to the club's cap figure . . . To clarify a point made here last week about a smaller ice sheet being adopted for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver: the size will be the conventional NHL sheet of 200 feet x 85 feet . . . Right winger Petr Tenkrat, not seen in the NHL since 2001-02 with Nashville, signed on with the Bruins last week. ``We've watched him for a while," said Gorton, noting that the club's scouting staff pushed for the signing. ``The way the game's gone, with speed a premium, we think he's a better fit than he might have been before." Tenkrat spent four of the last five seasons playing in Finland . . . Agent Neil Abbott reports that, contrary to reports out of Europe, Bruins winger Mariusz Czerkawski is not under contract in Switzerland for next season. ``They've shown interest, but there's no deal there," said Abbott. ``He's an unrestricted free agent, and he'd like to stay in the NHL, if that's possible."

Former Bruin Sergei Samsonov, who last night stood two victories from having his name on the Stanley Cup with the Oilers, intends to explore the UFA market come July 1. ``He's ruled nothing out," said Abbott, asked if Samsonov would consider new deals in Edmonton or Boston . . . Neil Smith as general manager. Ted Nolan as coach. Pat LaFontaine as adviser to Islanders owner Charles Wang. Alrighty then. I don't know Wang, but based on all these hires, I have to believe he's a guy who rushes to Target at 6 a.m. for the day-after-Christmas sale.

Kevin Paul Dupont's e-mail address is dupont@globe.com; material from personal interviews, wire services, other beat writers, and league and team sources was used in this report.