Four teams that would benefit most from a trade for Bruins RFA Jeremy Swayman

It feels like there is always an RFA that lasts until October every year. This time it's Jeremy Swayman.

The Boston Bruins had been at an impasse with their young starting goaltender all summer, and the balance shifted significantly in Swayman's favor in late June after the club traded 2023 Vezina Trophy winner Linus Ullmark to the Ottawa Senators.

Swayman is Boston's biggest scoring hope, and everyone knows it. Despite their impressive defensive depth, the Bruins can't realistically compete for the Stanley Cup with a tandem of Joonas Korpisalo and Brandon Bussi – and yet here we are. Less than a week before the season opener, the Bruins still don't have their best goalie under contract.

Negotiations between Swayman and the Bruins spilled into the public forum over the weekend, with Cam Neely causing a stir at a press conference when he suggested the club had offered the goaltender a new contract worth $64 million, a figure that Swayman's representatives disputed. (Daily FaceoffFrank Seravalli subsequently reported that the actual offer was closer to $62 million).

Now the entire hockey world is waiting with bated breath to see what comes next in the Swayman saga. While it still seems like the most likely outcome is Swayman and the Bruins finding common ground at some point, that no longer seems inevitable.

What happens if the unthinkable happens and Swayman is traded? Here are four teams that would benefit the most from landing the 2023 William M. Jennings Award winner.

Even with Connor Bedard, the Blackhawks are one of the worst teams in the NHL. They've made some moves this offseason to get a little better, but their forward group is still lagging tremendously after Bedard, Teuvo Teravainen, Taylor Hall and Tyler Bertuzzi – and that says nothing about their porous defensive group.

The Blackhawks can't stay in the basement forever, especially now that Bedard's entry-level contract is up. But it also seems like they haven't found the No. 1 goalkeeper of the future yet. Adam Gajan, a second-round pick of theirs in 2023, struggled in his first post-draft season with the Green Bay Gamblers of the USHL; Drew Commesso, their 2020 second-rounder, was just OK in his first AHL season with the Rockford IceHogs.

Swayman turns 26 in November. He is a good deal older than Bedard, but most goalkeepers develop their strength long after their counterparts in attack and defense. The Blackhawks also have plenty of cap space they can use to give the Anchorage, Alaska native goaltender as much as he wants – possibly even $64 million (or more).

The Avalanche do not have the same level of financial flexibility as the Blackhawks, so any deal they would make for Swayman would have to include some cap offset, most likely in the form of a salary reduction. However, Colorado's urgency to find a solution in goal is far more important than Chicago's and arguably any other team in the league.

Just look at the top four teams in the Central Division last season. Three of them have a clear starting goaltender in the prime of his career: Dallas has Jake Oettinger, Nashville has Juuse Saros and Winnipeg has Connor Hellebuyck. Meanwhile, the Avalanche have Alexandar Georgiev, a 28-year-old who plays for UFA and posted an uninspiring .897 save percentage in 63 games during the 2023-24 regular season.

The Avs just didn't get the saves they needed for a long playoff run last season. On their way to the Stanley Cup in 2022, they proved they were more than capable of winning games without a true top goaltender, albeit with Gabriel Landeskog and Valeri Nichushkin in the lineup throughout the playoffs. Colorado's lineup simply isn't as strong as it used to be. A goalie like Swayman would go to great lengths to cover up the cracks in his foundation.

The Red Wings struggled tremendously to meaningfully dictate play for much of the 2023-24 season, relying instead on unsustainable shooting percentages to inexplicably stay in the hunt for the eighth playoff spot until the final days of the race to stay in the Eastern Conference. Their big collapse in March felt like a foregone conclusion, while also being a strong indication that big changes needed to happen over the summer.

Instead, the Red Wings began a frustratingly sluggish offseason, making tiny changes in an apparent effort to disrupt the status quo as little as possible. As part of their decision to re-sign Patrick Kane and replace David Perron with Vladimir Tarasenko, the Red Wings signed 37-year-old goaltender Cam Talbot to a two-year contract; He will most likely compete for playing time in Detroit with Ville Husso, Alex Lyon and 2021 first-round pick Sebastian Cossa.

None of these options are particularly inspiring, with the possible exception of Cossa if he continues to build off his encouraging 2023-24 season. Hiring a goaltender of Swayman's caliber would do wonders to boost the Red Wings' ambitions as legitimate future contenders. As it stands, it's difficult to take her seriously.

The Flyers appear to have mended their relationship with Alexei Kolosov, their best young goaltender, after he threatened to return to Russia rather than honor his NHL contract. If all goes according to plan, Kolosov – whose KHL track record is solid if unspectacular – will share starts with Ivan Fedotov and Samuel Ersson this season until one of them works his way into the starting job. They all have NHL upside, but there isn't a candidate in this group that should be missed.

It can be a little difficult to pinpoint exactly where the Flyers are in the metamorphosis, especially now that Matvei Michkov has arrived in North America. If Michkov can be as impactful right away as, say, Kirill Kaprizov was in his rookie season, the Flyers could compete for a playoff spot in the Metropolitan Division. But that would be a pretty significant improvement over the 2023-24 season, when the Flyers finished sixth in the Metro and 11th in the East with 87 points in 82 games.

Would the Bruins be interested in sending their prized young goaltender nearly 300 miles away to Philly? It's certainly hard to imagine Swayman trading in his black and gold uniform for an orange one. But the Flyers have some money to spend, they desperately need a true starter, and you can easily imagine John Tortorella storming into Danny Briere's office to support a move for a goalie upgrade. It's a fascinating prospect.

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