He’s carried the team, but does a trade make more sense than keeping him around?
It might be time for the Bruins to trade Tim Thomas. The guy is playing out of his mind, and based on his past, one might interpret that as a semi-fluke. This isn’t to say Thomas is a bad goalie or going to seriously regress next season, but when a guy has a .941 save percentage it’s generally going to come down by at least 20 points no matter how great he plays. Thus, the next few weeks would be the best time to put his name out on the market, and hope a team such as the Lightning (perhaps for someone like Michel Ouellet??, a 25 year old winger), whose goalies aren’t exactly shutting other teams down, would make a nice deal. With Manny Fernandez and Tuukka Rask as the logical fill-ins for Thomas, the goaltender plan I previously wrote about could be accelerated, with Thomas bringing in a valuable offensive player in order to give the team better balance and a better future with Rask in net and another quality scorer, instead of Thomas leaving after the season or re-upping him, only to have the guy block our best prospect, in Rask.
A team that has been scoring but not stopping the puck is Toronto, but after their previous deal for Andrew Raycroft gave us the goaltending advantage already, I’m not sure how willing they would be to entertain another trade with the Bruins. The Penguins might also be looking for some goaltending help, as well as possibly the Blackhawks and the Thrashers or Flames. These are not by any means rumors I’ve heard, but simply conjecture based on looking at which teams have been scoring but giving up too many goals. No matter what, the Bruins should be looking to improve their depth at the forward position, with left wing and center the prime positions of need. Another interesting possiblity for a trade would be with the hope of clearing cap space for a future run at a key free agent or two.
A nice addition to espn.com would be an NHL trade machine like that of the NBA trade machine, because that would make coming up with possible trades much easier, given the difficulty in knowing whether deals would actually work under the cap.
The Sports Beat 
So bck in novmember you where saying just give up the season and try to progress a 20 year old goaltender. And play it by the percentages and bring in a golie whos had a ruff time because he should turn it around. Thomas has carried this team for the last 2 years
I love Tim Thomas, but I want to win a Stanley Cup, so back in November I thought the best chance at setting the team up to realistically compete for a Cup would be to hope Rask is ready within a couple years and to add a young forward–something I still think would have been a solid plan had Manny Fernandez not completely disappeared.
I would say no, Tim Thomas brought a face to the bruins this year and has a following not seen since Andy Moog. He stood tall durring the playoffs and proved his place as a number 1 goalie for Boston. The should trade Manny and try to bring a goal scorer to Boston.
You people are fools. You who wrote the article, and those of you who replied. I’ve been saying for years that Timmy was gona be something special, and look at the mother fucker now; Leading the NHL in save % and GAA. Eat a dick. All of you.
Nice. how f-ing stupid does the author feel now? Fast forward to the 2011 scf and Timmy is again standing tall for the bruins! Ive liked thomas since the first time I saw him and when I read up on him and all the shit he went through and still keeping his nhl hopes alive just gave more reasons to become a fan. Best american goalie.
Bill, the idea of trading Tim Thomas was for last year, not this year. At the time I thought we were much further away from contention than we are now (obviously), so things have changed; speaking of changes, you might want to change the “L” after your semi colon to an “l.” Bon appetit!
How is “trading Tim Thomas” looking now, a year later? huh? exactly.
This article is prescient. Timmy was on fire, but look at the soft goals he’s allowing again. It’s time to trade him before the playoffs start again and the Bruins exit out the first round due to his flukey goaltending again. There has to be some hard-luck team out there looking for better goaltending. Tim can provide that, he just can’t provide a winning round in the postseason. We should be able to get a good player or two, especially if we throw in someone like Sobotka.
I say this to who ever wrote this artical that “Your a complete idiot.” Tim Thomas is the greatest thing the Boston Bruins have right now and untill they get someone that can score 50 goals a season or until they get Rask to step it up and be a good goalie (not saying he sucks because he doesn’t) it would be the dumbest thing they have ever done. “so stop talking because ur a complete retard”
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WOW I thought my point of view was limited but after reading the other comments it the bloggers who’s views are limited.
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One Stanley Cup championship later, led by the single greatest example of goaltending in a bruins regular season and playoff, you look like a FUCKING IDIOT
LOL!