''Well, I have my dreams - and they surely have me. I'll be moving on... on... I want them all!''
Paraphrasing here, the lyrics of an old song from parts much akin to L'Ancienne-Lorette rather than any town in the greater Boston area or in Massachusetts, so - suffice it to say, Patrice Bergeron might know what it's all about; he might recognize it. But few other Bruins might have a chance to... at all! It's not all that important right now, though...
Who hasn't dreamt of going back to Beantown? Once you've been there, been born there, lived there a significant part of your life...? I know I want to go back, too! Hence it is not surprising one bit that Jeff Gorton would want back in - into the city, into the fanbase, into the Bruins organization!
Those are rumors though - only rumors! But they make a hell (or a heaven) of a lot of sense!
Gorton basically built that Stanley Cup championship team of 2011, and all within a very short timespan, years prior, when he was acting as the interim G.M. after Mike O'Connell was dismissed and just before Peter Chiarelli was added to the mix with the mission to add the final pieces of that puzzle. And what did Pete add, of note? Mercenary marksman Nathan Horton. That's it. All the other pieces he added (Gregory Campbell, Michael Ryder, Tyler Seguin, Claude Julien himself... Brandon Bochenski?!?) have proven to wear out their welcome a tiny wee bit too fast... And, lately, the additions were all subpar, to say the least: Miroslav Satan?!? Reilly Smith, Matt Fraser, Joe Morrow, Brendan Connolly, Matt Mottau... Brian Rolston?!? Loui Eriksson doesn't count: he's a certifiable veteran! And though one still hopes that Connolly (and, maybe, Smith too) can blossom into lethal top scorers, in time...? That is, most unfortunately, less than certain, at this time!
Gorton, for his part, built the true core of the contending Bruins: he drafted, recruited or signed all of the following: Brad Marchand, Tuukka Rask, Milan Lucic, Zdeno Chara. Phil Kessel and Marc Savard. (Even though Chiarelli is often credited, totally wrongly, of
some of those coups!) He had a hand in extending the contracts of other key figures, such as the goaltender that would change everything,Tim Thomas, and Bergeron himself. That was all back in 2006 - a year of transition, if there ever was one... And it's (almost) all reminded right there,
on his short bio on the website of his current employer - the execrable New York Rangers.
But let's not go there...!
Can Jeff Gorton accomplish his dream - this wonderful dream of going back?
Most importantly of all, though, should he be allowed to?
The Bruins have a perfectly suitable G.M.-to-be within their ranks already: home-grown talent, groomed within the organization at any rate, Don Sweeney! A teammate of team president Cam Neely back in the days when they should have won, at the very least, one cup (...) Sweeney would probably be as reliable a G.M. (ha, almost typoed that into a GEM here - lol) as O'Connell and, in retrospect, that is quite the compliment indeed. After all, what did good ol' Mike do, above all else? He got rid of that over-hyped, under-achieving perennial choker, Joe Thornton! He shipped him off to San Jose, where he has been choking ever since, allowing the Bruins to turn the page and find themselves a new franchise player: who turned out to be, arguably, Patrice Bergeron. (Though many will be of the opinion that the Bruins do it by committee - and I would agree with that wholeheartedly! Bergeron cannot do much by himself: he needs a Chara, Rask, Krejci, Lucic, Marchand, a hired gun of service too - in order to get it properly done! Franchise committee it is!)
I can see Sweeney being the guy who would pull the trigger on just such a deal, too: shipping off Lucic and, maybe, Marchand too, for some package with which to build from, just like in the much-maligned Thornton deal. And, hopefully, it would turn out much better than the Seguin deal, in the short term, too? Or Sweeney would meet the same fate as O'Connell and Chiarelli did, but that much faster than they did...! My, how cruel this is: here the man hasn't even been hired as the G.M. yet that we're discussing the conditions for his dismissal already! Sorry, Don...! I'm on your side, really: I loved it when you were one of those ''big four'' defensemen, ever reliable, protecting the Bruins' zone: it was you and Garry Galley, Ray Bourque of course and... Al Iafrate? Michael Thelven? Gord Kluzak? Anyway...!
One can understand why Neely would want to have a chance to bring back Gorton instead of giving a chance to his old pal Don -a neophyte, basically- to fill this role. Rumors are Neely is awaiting the Rangers' elimination in order to be able to speak to Gorton, as per NYR head honcho Glen Sather's wishes... That slithering snake-in-the-grass, Sather: he was a viscous scumbag in Edmonton and he is only a bigger one now, in New York! All Bruins fans should hate him with a passion! Who cares that he was a Bruin himself in his formative years, under the tutelage of the one and only Harry Sinden? Sather sucks - period! That he would prevent one of his underlings to achieve his homecoming dreams (that is assuming that there are such dreams in Gorton's head! Sure - there should be!) with the inane excuse that his team ''is still competing'' - what the hell has it got to do with front office personnel defections? The team on the ice would not even know, let alone be affected by it - come on! That is all hogwash and bulls*** coming from a master hogwasher (?) and bulls***ter known as Glen SATHER - that is what it is, I'm telling you, folks!
Neely has had other candidates in mind, sure: but
one was scooped up by those pitiful, if hellbent, Devils (and he came from another pit, too - how ironic is that) while the other one is a mystery man who, I personally hope, will turn out to be... Don Cherry!
Just Do It - for Blue!
Alas, like it or not, Cam ''The Man'' Neely has to wait it out before he is granted permission to simply talk to Jeff Gorton about a return to this position he held so very briefly, on an interim basis, back in 2006... And he might have to wait a while longer, to, as those other perennial chokers, known as Washington Capitals, and their own all-star franchise choker, Alexander Ovechkin, appear to be doing it all over again, in their series against the New York Rangers... Ah, those damn Caps: they seem to enjoy playing up to their full potential of mere spoilers whenever they come to face the Boston Bruins; but, then, whenever the stakes are really high, they will always fold and choke on the very spot! Just like Joe Thornton's Sharks. And, this time, it frustrates the Bruins organization and their fanbase on a whole new level: stifling their G.M. hiring process, which grinds down to a halt, unable to move forward because of them - and SATHER! (Yes, folks: feel free to think of Sather and of Satan in the same way, why don't you now...!)
But, one can hope that, maybe, even though the Rangers move on to the next round (and the Canadiens
don't - bwah-ha-ha: CH-okers! They wrote the book on choking, actually: and the Price is always WRONG! But that is another story...) and NYC finds itself in the final four on ice (not the ''frozen four'' - that's the other tournament! They got so far only because they didn't face
the Bruins! It was the only reason why they reached the Finals last year, too; only to lose so miserably to the Kings!) perhaps Glen ''Satan'' Sather will have a change of attitude, if not of heart...? And maybe, then, he will allow Cam Neely and Jeff Gorton to meet up - and talk business! While his Rangers try and best the Lightning for the honor of losing to the Ducks in the big finale! :-)
Yes - Jeff might yet make it indeed: and prove some old adage wrong in the process (you know which one: the one that has it that you can't go back or something...?)
Then again - I am not holding my breath on that one... not at all!
