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Wednesday Wake-Up Call: Dennis Seidenberg

Vancouver Canucks v Boston Bruins - Game Three

BOSTON, MA - JUNE 06: Dennis Seidenberg #44 of the Boston Bruins skates against Vancouver Canucks during Game Three of the 2011 NHL Stanley Cup Final at TD Garden on June 6, 2011 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)

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The Wednesday Wake-Up Call is where we pick a struggling player and kindly ask him to SNAP OUT OF IT ALREADY. COME ON. YOU’RE BETTER THAN THIS!

Dennis Seidenberg, D, Boston Bruins

Key stats: 0G-1A-1PT in 8GP, minus-4.

Cap hit: $3.25 million annually

Seidenberg was a key piece of Boston’s Stanely Cup run from a year ago, playing over 27 minutes a night while recording 11 points in 25 games. But numbers don’t fully explain how crucial he was to Boston’s success.

"[Seidenberg] finished last year as the second most valuable player in the Cup playoffs behind Tim Thomas, and seemed to himself realize just how good he could potentially be on the ice,” wrote CSN New England’s Joe Haggerty. “No longer was he just a shot-blocking machine with a nice offensive package of skills, but he’d become a dominant force at the defensemen position to bookend with the equally dominant [Zdeno] Chara.”

Yeah. Pretty high praise.

Which is why Seidenberg’s start to the 2011-12 season is so disappointing. He seems to have reverted to the enigmatic form shown during stints in Philadelphia, Phoenix, Carolina and Florida. His reputation then was of an inconsistent player that failed to fulfill his potential when less than 100 percent physically. So what’s the ailment holding him back now, you ask?

The dreaded Stanley Cup hangover. More, from Boston.com’s Tony Massarotti:

Dennis Seidenberg is a minus-4 through the first eight games of the regular season. Is anyone else worried about this? Seidenberg logged a preposterous amount of ice time last spring (an average of 27:38 per game, one second less than Zdeno Chara) and was arguably the Bruins’ second most valuable player in the postseason behind Tim Thomas.

That smells like a Stanley Cup hangover, no?


Either there’s major collusion amongst the Dennis Seidenberg Appreciation Chapter of the Boston Sportswriter’s Guild (FYI: neither actually exist) or yes, he was indeed the second-best Bruin in the playoffs.

This party explains why the Bruins are off to such an uneven start. Anytime your second-best player struggles, you’re probably going to lose more games than you win -- and Boston is 3-5-0 through eight games.

So wake up, Dennis Seidenberg. Your team needs you.