Bruins re-sign Patrice Bergeron to one-year, $2.5M contract

Bergeron was an unrestricted free agent after finishing up an eight-year contract with a $6.785M cap hit. While Bergeron was technically a free agent, there was no doubt that he would return to the Bruins, it was more of a question of if he was retiring or not. There were rumours at the end of June that Bergeron was re-signing with the Bruins but there was no word on the details of the contract until now.

While Bergeron is coming off a career year in 2021-22, it wasn’t in the offensive department. He was still really good there too, with 25 goals, 40 assists and 65 points in 73 games last season. It was the defensive side of his game where he had a career year, capturing his fifth career Selke trophy in the process.

Bergeron finished the season with a 66.23 percent shot attempt share and a 69.4 percent expected goal share at even strength, both of which were not only the best in 2021-22, they are the best totals from any season since those stats started to be tracked in 2007-08, and both by at least 1 percent too.

With this deal, the Bruins find themselves with just over $2M in cap space. They still have one restricted free agent to deal with in Pavel Zacha, who has an arbitration hearing scheduled for Aug. 11.