Going into the trade deadline, Don Sweeney seemed like he was on the fence on whether he wanted to be a buyer or not. It was safe to say that the Boston Bruins needed a lot of help at the left defense position, and they were in dire need of secondary scoring. Those issues were at least addressed when Don Sweeney made a couple trades to add former MVP Taylor Hall, depth forward Curtis Lazar and puck-moving defenseman Mike Reilly. 

All the new additions were able to make their Bruins debut on Tuesday against the Buffalo Sabres. So, let’s take a look at how they did in their debut, and how they can each help the team going forward.

Taylor Hall

Hall should be right in the midst of his prime at 29 years old. So far this season, he has just 19 points in 38 games, which is pretty poor for someone who was MVP of the league just three seasons ago. However, he was playing on one of the worst teams in the history of the NHL, and he has admitted that playing for the Buffalo Sabres has shaken his confidence a bit.

In his debut, Hall showed some flashes of skill but looked rusty, as Buffalo had held him out of games for a while before he was traded. Many believed that he should have had his first point with the Bruins on Craig Smith’s goal, but it was clear that he lost the puck and did not assist on the goal.

Ideally, Hall should be able to build some confidence while playing for a winning team and go back to being the player he was on the New Jersey Devils. Most of his time will likely be playing left wing alongside David Krejci, who should be able to set him up to score quite a bit. I think that the Bruins could have gotten quite a bargain with Hall, only giving up Anders Bjork and a second-round pick. If Hall goes back to being a top tier forward, the B’s could potentially have struck gold.

Curtis Lazar

Lazar is a rock-solid fourth liner that can provide a lot of energy and a little bit of scoring for a Bruins fourth line, which is in desperate need of some help. So far this season, Lazar has nine points in 34 games. These numbers aren’t much to brag about; however, he was only a minus 4 while with the Sabres, which is pretty impressive considering how bad of a team they are.

In his Bruins debut, Lazar showed a lot of the energy we talked about and even set up a couple teammates for some scoring opportunities. This could end up being a very good pickup for the Bruins.

Mike Reilly

Reilly was easily the most notable addition when watching him play in his Bruins debut. He was effective in all three zones, and it looked like he was creating some offense with his puck-moving skills.

So far this season, Reilly has 19 points in 41 games, with 40 of those games being with a bad Ottawa Senators team. While playing for the Senators, he was only a minus 2, which is pretty solid for a defenseman on one of the worst teams in the league. If Hall doesn’t work out, Reilly could very easily be the Bruins best deadline acquisition this season.

Don Sweeney has made it clear with these trades that he is going all in on this season. However, if the Hall experiment goes well, he could end up re-signing here, as he has mentioned that he would like to play multiple years in Boston. But obviously, that depends on how he plays for the rest of this season. All in all, after just a couple days, I would give Sweeney an A for this trade deadline. However, since hindsight is 20-20, so we will have to see how it plays out.