The End of a Brief Era: Kaberle signs three-year deal with Canes
Kaberle's time in Boston is hard to categorize because it was both a success and a failure. (Getty)
Kaberle’s tenure in Boston will be viewed as a failure in an individual sense but a rousing success in a team perspective. How much Tomas Kaberle added to the Bruins Stanley Cup run is questionable at best but the sting of trading away a boatload for an underwhelming player wore off a hell of a lot on June 15th. Kaberle’s final numbers as a Bruin are 1-8-9 +6 in 24 regular season games and 0-11-11 +8 in the playoffs. Not terrible numbers but watching the games it was clear that Kaberle wasn’t worth the dowry the Bruins had to give up. The one area that he was brought into Boston to improve, the power-play, worsened over time with Kaberle at the point, so much so that his role was greatly reduced in the playoffs.
It’s with somewhat mixed feelings that I’ll bid adieu to Tomas. He wasn’t worth the price, didn’t improve the team in any tangible way, and was an easy scapegoat on a team that struggled on the power-play but he was part of a Stanley Cup winning Bruins team, something nearly all Bruins fans thought was unrealistic just weeks ago, and for that I’m thankful. His era won’t be categorized so easily. Unlike most eras, which are judged one way or another, Kaberle’s mixed a bit of good and bad and the good far outweighed the bad.
