Bruins Trying To Trade Henri Jokiharju

The Boston Bruins are looking to lighten their load on defense, as reported by Elliotte Friedman on his written 32 Thoughts before opening night, Henri Jokiharju is being shopped in trade.

Yesterday, the Bruins placed the Finnish defenseman on waivers for the purpose of assignment to Providence. This came after a lackluster preseason where he was beaten out by many incoming players out of the summer window and from within the system. Part of the logjam Boston made for itself on defense heading into this year’s training camp was prominent on the right side. Their July 1 acquisitions of William Borgen and Connor Clifton solidified the depth under Charlie McAvoy, however, that pushed Jokiharju out of many media lineup projections.

The 27-year-old is entering the second season of a three-year, $3MM AAV contract, signed back in 2025 after the Buffalo Sabres traded him to the Bruins for a fourth-round pick. Boston’s last-minute acquisition of Jokiharju at the deadline was a fill-in grab after they sold defensive defenseman Brandon Carlo to the Toronto Maple Leafs. Carlo’s absence left nearly 19 minutes of ice time every night up for grabs.

Jokiharju, up until then, had filled a minimal role in Buffalo before the deal, contrary to when he totaled a career-high 20 points and fought his way into a second-pair role with the Sabres in 2024-25 through 74 games. He even was given top-pair utilization in 2021-22 and 2022-23, averaging over 21 minutes a night through 120 games between the pair of years.

After breaking into the league at age 19, he has struggled to maintain an NHL role, which became further evident during his time in Boston. He was a first-round selection by the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2017 NHL Draft and recorded 12 assists in 38 games with the team as a rookie in 2018-19. Chicago traded Jokiharju to Buffalo in exchange for Alexander Nylander in the following offseason. Over six years in Buffalo, Jokiharju totaled 81 points in 351 games.

Despite the Bruins’ underutilization of Jokiharju, playing him in just 41 games in 2025-26, his success internationally has been more in his favor. He has earned roster spots on Team Finland at 2025’s 4-Nations Face-Off, where he scored a goal in three games, at the Milan Olympics, scoring an assist to help his native country win Bronze, and later eight points at the IIHF Worlds that summer en route to a Gold medal.

The former 29th-overall pick, despite those triumphs, is now the highest-paid player on the Providence Bruins and takes up a mere $1.8MM of the NHL Bruins current cap, because his contract is larger than that of a minimum contract. It is not a substantial chunk of the Bruins’ money allocation, but it makes sense why Boston is attempting to offload that deal. Jokiharju has shown he can offensively contribute to a blue line like before and considering the abundance of defenders the Bruins have, things just haven’t worked out.