Brad Marchand knows all about the rumors and the logic behind them. He’s an unsigned veteran who’ll be 37 next year, but is still playing at a high level.
The Bruins have some incentive to deal him if they’re moving toward a rebuild, and there would be a market for him if they did.
Still, Marchand doesn’t think it’s going happen.
Marchand was an in-studio guest on the “What Chaos Podcast” that was recorded last week and dropped on Tuesday. The Bruins captain talked about a variety of topics during over 30 minutes on the show. The biggest of those was naturally his response to the rumors he could be traded.
“All it takes is one article, or one person making a comment on TV or the radio or a podcast — and then it kind of takes off from there. Other people start writing articles off the same comments,” he said. “So I try not to get caught up in it.
“You can’t worry about things you can’t control and that you don’t have a part in. But I could see — with the way that on paper it looks, at this time of year, that’s what people do. They start looking at potential outcomes and stuff like that. I get it.”
The hosts asked Marchand what he thought it would feel like if he was moved.
“Obviously, it would be very weird,” Marchand said. “I think I would feel very weird, probably a little lost. But I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about it before. And I don’t really think about it, because it’s not something that I really see happening.”
Whether he is confident that he won’t be moved or simply assuring his own hopes, he said he doesn’t want to be traded.
“My goal is to play here forever,” he said. “I love it here, and my family obviously loves it here. It’s all I know. What I love most about it is the expectations that are put on the group by — internally, just from management, ownership, from the team within. The expectation to be good every year is what you want to be part of.”
How long is forever?
“I’ve always wanted to play til I was 40,” said Marchand, who amended that. “I want to play as long as I can play where I’m still effective.”
He said he doesn’t want to hang on as a bottom-six shell of himself.
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