A lot of people are saying that "Bourque is passable on the 3rd line, meh", to which I respond:
- Bourque is only on the third line because Bergevin and Therrien like to structure the team around DD's needs. Pacioretty is injured, Cole is gone, and Prust is injured so it is inevitable that Moen and Bourque be placed on the third line, to help little DD, better than having Gallagher and Gionta. It's worth pointing out that Bourque was passable when playing with Plekanec and Gionta before and that if a top-sixer were injured we would be fine with Bourque being bumped up to 2nd line. Second, that Bourque and Moen are given babysit duty reveal a strength of theirs, by being 6'2" they can compensate for the limitations of other players.
- The land of Habsistan has dealt with a decade's worth of underperforming bottom-six players such as Andreas Engvist, Yannick Weber, Tom Kostopoulos, Matt D'Agostini, George Laraque, Aaron Palushaj, David Desharnais, etc. When we have players like Bourque who can not only play on the third line, but also provide intangibles like size and the ability to jump to second line if there's an injury, we should be happy. That's not a trivial thing.