EHM The Blue Line

The struggling Boston Bruins traded captain Joe Thornton to the San Jose Sharks on Wednesday night in exchange for forwards Marco Sturm and Wayne Primeau and defenseman Brad Stuart.

Thornton, who signed a three-year, $20 million contract with Boston in August and was once thought to be the future of the franchise is now gone just before the B's take on the eastern conference leaders, the SENS.

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That is a sock move ..... I would have expcted trade Raycroft and get a decent goalie or fire the GM .... but Thornton .... never saw that one comming. I wonder if the B's will regret the trade in the future. My guess will be yes.

Holy boats!! I know he'd been losing fairly heavily in the "court of public opinion" around Boston this year (something I've yet to understand) but really this is a giant shock. Interesting that Stuart is in the deal after his struggles. San Jose at one point two season ago I think it was told their season ticket holders at the end of the season that this was now the new era for the Sharks and that soon Stuart would assume the Captaincy and lead the team as he was "the face of the team".

Seems they've both fallen from favor on their teams. I still don't see how you can let a guy that is that big, that skilled, and still that young go. Especially as he was your homegrown talent. That's just borderline incomprehensible to me.

Looking for a comparison I first thought Lindros or maybe Jagr but this however feels to me a bit like Chicago trading Roenick. There will always be a great number of fans as the years go by that still shake their heads over the day they traded Thornton.

Boston could've gotten a lot more than Primeau, Sturm and Stuart. They should've asked for Marleau.

I think this shows that nearly $7M is hard to move in a salary cap system. I think this is good for both teams in the short-term, but I can't believe Boston will look back on this in 10 years or so and say they were glad they did it.

Horrible trade for Boston...they will never replace Joe...

I'm searching for a comparison too...but its difficult...who trades their Modano or Yzerman? Noone succesful...

Bitterly disappointed. It's such a short-sighted trade. Yes, the Bruins need to improve their defence but this isn't the way to go about it.

It's daylight robbery! Thornton is worth so much more than the three we got in return. I think this demonstrates how this was a rush deal by the Bruins to get another man at the D.

Ok, now we've bolstered the defence with a decent defenceman. Now what about scoring goals? Thornton had 33 points this season and that was while he's been in his slump. If he'd been given more of a chance to get back his form then he could have really have played a big part in turning things around.

If I'd have to trade out a key player then it would be Raycroft. As much as I like the guy and as much as he is a quality goalie in the making, he has been leaking goals left, right and centre and so if any top Bruin should go it should have been him.

I don't like how it makes Thornton look like the scapegoat for Bruins' failures this season so far. I think Sullivan should take the blame and not our star player.

This just reminds me of what Minty has been telling me about the downfall of the Hawks.

archibalduk wrote:This just reminds me of what Minty has been telling me about the downfall of the Hawks.

Yeah, that's why I compared it to Chicago's Roenick trade, also done supposedly for player that can really help the team but was actually all about money and finding a scapegoat. Roenick was dealt to Phoenix in '97 cuttng the legs out from under one of the best Hawks teams in decades. The rest, as they say, is history.

He was dealt at the time for Alexei Zhamnov, Craig Mills and 1st round selection that with our brilliant drafting acumen became Ty Jones That was the beginning of this charade that Zhamnov is a highly skilled plamaking #1 center that infected the Hawks like a darn fungus and haunts us to this day. Who's going to be the #1 center in Boston now? Wow. Spooky...

Welcome to the 'Dark Times' Boston fans; hopefully it won't last as long as it has here in Chicago after we dealt our dynamic young "face of the franchise".

Boston has a LOT of d-men now. Leetch, Tanabe, Moran, Stuart, Boynton, etc.....But everytime i see a team accumulate a decent/well-known 6 or more on D, the rest of the team suffers.

Will be interesting to see how Samsonov does now.

Sure doesn't seem like the smartest move on Boston's part.

Who do you guys think will play wing? Marleau or Thorton?

I think it will be more like when Forsberg and Sakic were in Colorado and they each centered a line but played together on the PP. Given that setup I'd think Joe takes first line and Marleau becomes one helluva 2nd line center. The continuing problem though will be who plays with them?

hehe look for some overachievers coming to San Jose as a result of having 2 awesome centers....hey it worked for Tanguay