- Tottenham Hotspur called David Pastrnak the Bruins captain in a post that was deleted hours later
- Pastrnak waved the whole thing off Tuesday night with “It’s a football team”
- Read below for what the Spurs photo actually showed and when Boston names its captain
The Bruins still have not named a captain. A Premier League club went ahead and did it for them.
Tottenham Hotspur posted Tuesday that midfielder Xavi Simons had “exchanged jerseys with captain David Pastrnak” while working out at Boston’s practice facility. Pastrnak got asked about that line after the Bruins beat the Flyers in preseason and gave it roughly four seconds of his time.
“I had a couple of texts. You know, it’s a football team, so I don’t think you guys should worry about the football team. It was great to have Xavi around and meet up with him.”
Catch him brush it off here:
The post itself did not survive the day. Pete Blackburn grabbed a screenshot before Tottenham quietly deleted it:
Look closely at the photo the Spurs attached and the leak falls apart. Pastrnak is holding up a plain black spoked-B sweater with no “C” anywhere on it. The club’s own write-up of the visit calls him a “Boston Bruins ice hockey legend” and never uses the word captain.
Simons is in Boston on a rehab trip after tearing his ACL in April. He put in work at the Bruins facility and also linked up with Celtics star Jayson Tatum.
As for the guy at the center of it, Pastrnak wore an alternate captain’s “A” against Philadelphia and fed Morgan Geekie on the power play in a five-goal night:
Boston has run without an individual captain since trading Brad Marchand to Florida in 2025. Pastrnak, Charlie McAvoy and Hampus Lindholm all wore letters last season.
General manager Don Sweeney said earlier this month that the club will name a captain before the opener. That opener is Sept. 29 against the Rangers, so Boston has six days to beat a soccer team to its own announcement.
