Morning Skate: Miscommunication

Why is Bill Belichick accompanying this post?!

That photo was tagged with “Bruins,” so it seemed too good an opportunity to pass up.

Earlier today, Belichick told the media assembled at Patriots minicamp (unprompted) that he was sorry to hear about Bruce Cassidy’s firing and wished him the best.

As someone on Twitter put it, you know you made a controversial move when Bill Belichick talks about it without being asked.

Anyways, the Take Machine keeps churning, and Don Sweeney’s press conference yesterday did little to settle things down.

Sweeney got a bit testy with the assembled media at times, sounded defensive more than once, and offered several contradictions — not exactly a “everything’s under control” performance.

Per Sweeney (I’m paraphrasing), the players didn’t turn on Cassidy nor did he lose the locker room, but a new voice and new direction are needed.

Cassidy was good at knowing when to press buttons, but too many buttons were being pressed.

Nothing Sweeney could say yesterday was really going to shut everyone up, but as Conor Ryan noted for Boston Sports Journal, it just seems like there’s something going unsaid about this whole thing.

Anyways, it’s probably time to begin to move on.

At least things are relatively quiet otherw — oh wait, David Pastrnak trade rumors!

It’s worth noting that in that article, Fluto was merely suggesting that if Pastrnak indicates a lack of interest in being part of a rebuild/retool/whatever is happening, he’ll have to be dealt — not that he’s actually being shopped.

You’d think the Bruins would basically write a blank check to keep the best offensive player they’ve had in decades, but who knows?

That leads to a scarier “what’s worse?” question: the Bruins losing Pastrnak or Don Sweeney being in charge of orchestrating the return?

Today’s discussion topic

It’s easy to forget that there’s hockey still being played.

Tampa evened the Eastern Conference Final last night, as the Colorado juggernaut awaits.

Do you see this is a Colorado coronation, or do you think either East team has a chance?