Bruins Coach Jim Montgomery Sounds off on $30M Defenseman's Inconsistent Play Thus Far In Boston

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Tom Banks
November 8, 2024 (2:34 PM)

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Nikita Zadorov was a huge off-season signing for the Boston Bruins, and now Jim Montgomery has shared his thoughts on the player thus far.

The Boston Bruins are off to an uncharacteristically slow start to the season in 2024/25, posting a 7-7-1 record through 15 games played, and it reportedly has Head Coach Jim Montgomery on the hot seat. One reason that the team had optimism coming into the year was the free agent signings of Elias Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov, but to this point, neither appear worth the money they were given this past summer.

When asked about Zadorov's play, Montgomery had an interesting reaction, as he pointed to Zadorov's inconsistency sounding worried about the way the big defenseman goes about his business on the ice.

"I don't see him pressing. I think overall he's finding his way in our systems, and I think at times he looks like he's understanding exactly what we're trying to accomplish, and at times he looks like he's not," said the coach in Thursday's press conference.

Following these comments, analyst Pierre McGuire noted that in the problem he has been less than receptive to coaching, pointing to this as the reason why he has played on six different teams over the past 10 years.

"He's very nasty, the biggest thing with him, and I don't want to scare Bruins fans. He got be receptive to coaching. He moved around a lot, and when you're a player that big, that fast, that tough, the question starts to be why he moved around so much? Those are hard guys to find."

Zadorov doesn't share these reservations about how he fits in with the Bruins however, as he believes he's growing into his role with the team as of late.

"I think the last five games I've really gotten into it, and it's been good, it's been easy so far," Zadorov said.

On paper, the numbers for Zadorov look solid in Boston, but after the team handed him a six-year deal worth $5 million per season, it's safe to say that they were expecting a little more. Ultimately, that is the type of money that teams give to second pair defenseman that they expect to help lead the team into the future, and Zadorov just hasn't been that for Boston, so now we wait and see whether he can live up to the expectations and defy recent notions of him as a player.