According to general manager Peter Chiarelli, it's not Manny Fernandez's bad back (herniated disk) that led the Bruins to ship the veteran backstop to the minors Thursday for a conditioning stint. The issue remains the goalie's tender left knee.
"The back's fine, but right now, we are testing the whole package," said Chiarelli. "The main issue is the knee; we want to see how durable it is."
Asked if surgery could be an option for the 33-year-old Fernandez, Chiarelli said, "That's certainly a factor, yes." Asked if it appears surgery is inevitable, Chiarelli added, "I don't know."
Boston's season now hinges on the vagaries of the injury ward, which also has prized center Patrice Bergeron still in a fog, some six weeks after being pasted headfirst into the boards by Philadelphia defenseman Randy Jones.
Bergeron, who remained in his Boston condo throughout most of November, recently has been home in the outskirts of Quebec City. There remains no timeline as to when he will return to the lineup, or even resume skating, adding to the initial belief that the 22-year-old pivot could be finished for the season. "He's feeling better, but only slightly," reported Chiarelli. "If you looked at his recovery as a curve, that curve is going up, but not a lot. He still has good days with no headaches, then a bad day with headaches. He can walk a little, have some light massage, but that's really about it."
Bergeron, said Chiarelli, would be able to lift light weights, but he has been advised to do nothing that would increase his heart rate, which in turn could trigger headaches related to the Grade 3 concussion.
Now, what about patching up what is left of the working lineup, which, almost miraculously, has remained among the top eight in the Eastern Conference? With Bergeron and Fernandez tagged with the long-term injury designation, their cap figure - a combined $9.08 million - can be replaced on the books. That sounds appealing, but it's a quirky fix, because if either of the injured players returns, then their salary is added back to the ledger, possibly creating a cap nightmare. Yes, teams can take on dollars, but it's a financial shell game - unless players are done for the year.
According to Chiarelli, trade chatter reached its busiest point of the season last Monday.
"Everyone was off and running," he said.
Chiarelli joined in, of course, and that was even before Tim Thomas went down with a groin pull Wednesday night in New Jersey. Management suspects Thomas could be sidelined for only up to two weeks, and the goalie's agent, Bill Zito, confirmed that Friday.
"No drama, as far as I can tell," said Zito. "It looks like the standard goalie groin pull."
Yes, good news, but ill-timed, as Thomas has been the team's undisputed MVP the first two-plus months. Alex Auld was added for depth, which should allow top prospect Tuukka Rask to return to Providence for proper incubation, but Rask isn't going anywhere until Thomas returns to game fitness.
Fernandez factors into the equation, too, provided he doesn't undergo season-ending knee surgery. He hurt the knee in late January while playing with Minnesota, and some 11 months later he is still having problems. Now, his greatest return on investment could be to get to the operating room, allowing the Bruins to use his money for the year.
Meanwhile, it's the Bergeron vacancy that now is the front office's focus.
"There are ways we can go here, and we're looking at them," said Chiarelli. "You know, the usual suspects."
Who are they? Chiarelli won't say, of course, but overpriced underachievers always lead the list. When other clubs see another squad with two hurt players, representing more than $9 million in cap money, they are eager to get to the phone in an attempt to offload dough. If a club is looking to move a No. 1 or 1A pivot, you can bet he's probably collected only 10-12 points on the season and is on the books for $3 million-$4 million.
Injuries are nothing new, especially on Causeway Street. What is new, however, is the struggle to fill in for the wounded and make the books work at the same time. Chiarelli made his best fix yet when replacing Dave Lewis with Claude Julien. But coaches' salaries don't get applied to cap figures.
These next 6-8 weeks, with his club risking a free fall out of the playoff hunt, stand to be the most demanding yet of Chiarelli's tenure.
Buying a little room
When the NHL Board of Governors met recently in Pebble Beach (Winnipeg must have been closed), it failed to reach a consensus on ways for clubs to "take back" salary when trading players. With so many clubs tucked up against the salary cap ($50.3 million), the dollar exchange often becomes the sticking point when trying to flip Player X for Player Y.
One simple method to help melt the ice, if only slightly: expand the buyout period on player contracts. Currently, clubs are allowed to shed players, and trim one-third of their remaining guaranteed wage, in the two weeks leading up to the annual free agent period (July 1). And though another provision is rarely implemented, clubs also are allowed to buy out deals later in the offseason, immediately following an arbitration award.
If the buyout period were left open 52 weeks a year, it wouldn't lead to any megadeals, but it certainly would lend some salary relief to clubs. Witness: Mark Recchi in Pittsburgh last week. The veteran winger, who signed as a free agent over the summer for $1.75 million, was deemed unusable by coach Michel Therrien.
By Thursday, the 39-year-old Recchi was assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, his first minor league designation since 1990. On Friday, the Penguins called Recchi back on waivers, in hopes that another NHL club would grab him at a 50 percent discount - which is exactly what happened when Atlanta claimed him yesterday.
If the buyout window were still open, the Penguins simply could have trimmed one-third off what Recchi is due - a drop to approximately $800,000. His remaining $1.2 million also would be deleted from the team's cap figure. As an added bonus, the Penguins could have the rest of this year and all next season to pay Recchi the $800,000. Recchi then could shop himself as an unrestricted free agent again.
A pioneer in the NHL, O'Ree still making a statement
Former Bruins winger Willie O'Ree, who broke the NHL's color line Jan. 18, 1958, was back in the Hub of Hockey last week, making the rounds as director of the NHL's Diversity Program.
Among his many stops over three days: the Horace Mann School for the Deaf and the Clarence R. Edwards Middle School, where O'Ree and Bob Sweeney, director of the Bruins Foundation, staged a street hockey clinic.
"You know, simple shooting and stickhandling drills," said O'Ree, reached Friday after returning home to La Mesa, Calif. "Great kids, and you know, some of them had never even held a stick before."
O'Ree, 72, who will be honored on Causeway Street Jan. 19 (matinee vs. Rangers), played in 45 NHL games, all with the Bruins, and collected 4 goals and 14 points. In his Boston days, he lived with a cousin in Roxbury and made his way to Boston Garden via streetcar. He said he loved his time in Boston and found teammates and fans welcoming to the league's only black player.
"Chicago was the worst," he recalled, noting that he learned to ignore racial slurs. "They had this one big winger, Eric Nesterenko, who, one night in Chicago, got me behind the net, butt-ended me right in the mouth - knocked out two teeth, broke my nose, fractured my cheekbone.
"He made a couple of racial remarks my way, and he stood there, laughing, with this look that said, 'OK, what are you going to do about it?' Well, I smacked him over the head with my stick and a real donnybrook broke out."
In the locker room, his nose plugged and his face stitched, O'Ree recalled that he dimmed the lights and pondered his future.
"I was thinking, 'Hey, I don't need this. I can go home to Frederiction, play there, have a good life,' " he recalled. "But after a few minutes meditating on that, I turned the lights on and figured, 'Heck with that, if I'm going to leave the NHL, it's not going to be what others say and do to me - it's going to be because I don't have the skills, and they don't want me.' "
O'Ree played his last NHL game with the 1960-61 Bruins, and kept playing professionally, mostly in California, through the late 1970s. He joined the NHL front office in 1998, filling a number of diversity roles.
Etc.
Casting for a Vegas team?
Las Vegas remains hot on the rumor mill to land an NHL expansion franchise. According to one source long connected with league dealings, the fee will be some $300 million - more than three times the asking price prior to the CBA fixing player salaries. Hollywood's Jerry Bruckheimer, producer of such hits as "Top Gun" and "Pirates of the Caribbean," is the rumored money man for a franchise that could open for business in 2009-10. Mr. Blockbuster, 62, was born in Michigan and went to high school in Detroit, which means no one will have to tutor him on a Gordie Howe hat trick. Los Angeles Kings billionaire Philip F. Anschutz already is fronting a state-of-the-art arena that will stand only a couple of blocks off the famed Strip.
He jumped into hockey, too
Lost in the fine print of the obituary for Evel Knievel, the legendary daredevil who died Nov. 30 at age 69: Some five years after dropping out of high school to become a drill operator in the copper mines of his hometown, Butte, Mont., he played briefly with the ECHL's Charlotte Clippers. He also later played with the Butte Bombers, a semipro hockey club.
Still an unhealthy scratch
The new year approaches, and still no word where/if Peter Forsberg will play in the NHL this season. Agent Don Baizley: "If he can't play at 100 percent, he doesn't want to play." Foppa, last seen with the Predators, intended to play this season, and has drawn interest from many places, including Ottawa, Detroit, Colorado, and Vancouver. But ongoing foot/ankle issues prevented him from playing a few weeks ago in a tournament with the Swedish national squad.
Lining up the Ducks
Scott Niedermayer is back in Ducks camp and could play his first game Wednesday, once they return to the Honda Center from a three-game road trip. Now, the question remains when/if Teemu Selanne will come back, too. He told a Helsinki newspaper recently that he'll make up his mind between Jan. 1 and the Feb. 26 trading deadline. Unlike Niedermayer, who began skating in earnest about a month ago, the Finnish Flash may not have been skating. "Teemu's always in great shape," said general manager Brian Burke. "I can't say whether he's skating, but if he was, I think I'd know that - it's hard for a guy to skate in Southern California without me knowing about it. There just aren't that many rinks."
Blueprints for change
The Broadway Blueshirts could be moving one block to the west (turning them into an off-Broadway act), if plans proceed for yet another Madison Square Garden to be built as part of a proposed new Penn Station. The new digs would be on the west side of Eighth Avenue, long the home of the Farley Post Office building (good news for players who wish to mail in their performances). Meanwhile, across the Hudson, the arena that once was home to the Devils is now known as the Izod Center. Construction continues all around the acreage at Exit 16W, the Meadowlands being transformed into a humongous theme-park destination that will include an indoor ski jump. In fact, some of the ski facility's infrastructure is already in place, above the building that once was home to the three-time Cup champs - who helped turn hockey from an exciting downhill sport into one that became far more monotonous, like cross-country skiing.
Loose pucks
The Leafs made easy work (6-2) of the Rangers Thursday night, running their season-high winning streak to four games. Will that take the heat off embattled GM John Ferguson Jr.? Probably not . . . Despite their decent standing, the Bruins still aren't bringing many eyeballs to NESN. Their Wednesday night visit to Newark posted a 1.65 rating, compared with the 4.28 the Celtics posted on
Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at dupont@globe.com; material from personal interviews, wire services, other beat writers, and league and team sources was used in this report.
