So Nathan Horton is, at least for now, a Bruin, along with Son-of-Colin Campbell; they get to re-unite with former Panthers teammate Dennis Seidenberg. And there was much rejoicing. Boston traded the 15th overall pick and perennial scapegoat Dennis Wideman for these guys.

So the real questions now become: Who else do the Bruin shed in order to free up some cap space? Does trading Wideman mean a guarantee that Stuart and Boychuk will be signed? This seems to put a lot of weight on the younger defensemen who have played in Providence for the most part until now, unless Chiarelli plans to fast-track Yuri Alexandrov. We're looking at leaning on some very young defensemen, either way.

Son-of-Colin....okay, okay, GREG Campbell only put up 17 points last season in 60 games for the Florida Panthers. The only upside apparent from him is that the Bruins might get a few Wheel-of-Justice calls thrown their way for playing him, but aside from that, he's probably a fourth-line guy. It'd be great to see the Bruins flip him and, say, Wheeler, Hunwick or Ryder for a winger like Kris Versteeg or Mason Raymond, crafting a lineup that looks like this:

Lucic-Savard-Horton
Wheeler/Ryder-Krejci-Hall/Seguin
Sturm-Bergeron-New Guy
Thornton-Sobotka-Marchand

Chara-Seidenberg
Ference-Stuart
Boychuk-Hunwick
McQuaid/Alexandrov/Bodnarchuk

Rask
Thomas(?)

What I love about the movement of Wideman is that it does in fact open up options from the minor leagues, getting a new guy into the 7th spot, which is good if the Bruins plan to use Alexandrov as has been rumored. It also forever and ever eliminates the heart-attack-inducing FAIL that was Wideman-Hunwick as a D-pair. Flashes of brilliance from those two were NOT worth the constant panic attacks when they weren't on their game together. It'd be far preferable, now, if the Bruins do keep Hunwick, to put him with someone who's a bit less of a puck-moving defenseman, like Boychuk. If Boychuk has another year like his last, the D should be in good shape.

Campbell is an RFA - if the Bruins do make him an offer, he's apparently a hard-hitting, relatively fast guy, which opens up the option of having a fourth line that's not a bunch of goons, but rather a small, ass-kicking, occasional goal-scoring line, if the Bruins can work Marchand in. Having Thornton, Campbell, and Marchand rotate games around Sobotka could be a fairly interesting situation.

Another issue lies in goaltending, as several sources have reported that Thomas would be willing to waive his no-trade clause to be a #1 starter somewhere. San Jose, Tampa Bay, and Philadelphia are reported as being the front-runners pursuing him. Could we potentially be looking at swapping Timmy for a decent winger from one of those cities? Does Recchi re-sign? Only eight more days until we find out for sure, and the salary cap increase isn't going to make these decisions any easier. Different, but not easier. The only guarantee seems to be that Chiarelli and Neely aren't quite done here.

And of course the last question becomes....who will be the Next Great Bruins Scapegoat?

FRIDAY IS THE NHL DRAFT (duh).

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