With what Bruins’ management wanted to accomplish in the offseason – getting a good two-way center (Elias Lindholm) and beef on the back end (Nikita Zadorov) – the brass had little choice but to grant many fans’ fervent wishes by letting lightning rod winger Jake DeBrusk walk.

Turns out, the much-maligned winger wasn’t as easily replaceable as some thought.

Not that DeBrusk is burning it up in Vancouver (0-4-4 in six games), but the absence of one bona fide top six winger now seems to be disrupting all top three lines. The units are now in a constant shuffle as Coach Jim Montgomery is seven games into his search for at least an adequate place-holder for DeBrusk’s old second line right wing spot.

And it’s not just any second line right wing that the Bruins are missing. They are missing DeBrusk’s particular set of skills. He’s not only an every-situation player, but his speed on the wing has not been replaced by any of the revolving group of players trying out for the position.

The daily 2 p.m. waiver wire announcement came and went on Wednesday and the Bruins had not designated anyone for a trip south on I-95. That means that, given the Bruins lack of cap space, none of the foreseeable options (a Tyler Johnson contract, a Fabian Lysell call-up) is in the cards for Thursday’s matchup against the Dallas Stars at the Garden, unless they choose to send down a waiver exempt player like Matt Poitras.

While Poitras hasn’t been great since his first game this season against the Kings, that doesn’t seem likely.

That’s just as well. If the Bruins are to pull out of this bout of uninspiring hockey, their best players are going to have to play better. And while the Bruins miss DeBrusk, for his speed and the threat of it, it’s clear that there’s a whole lot of space between the Bruins’ top players’ current performance and their known ceiling.

Speed may not be the first thing that comes to mind with this team, but several of the players can play faster than they have been. A case in point was in the first shift of the Bruins’ 4-0 loss in Nashville.

David Pastrnak, not what anyone would consider a slow player, was in pursuit of the puck and, instead of keeping his legs churning, he reached out and simply hooked Predator Gustav Nyquist just 13 seconds in. Even though the Preds took a penalty of their own just seconds later, the Pastrnak penalty immediately scrambled the new line combinations that Montgomery had drawn up, including the new top-heavy first line with Brad Marchand and Lindholm.

Whether the lines were going to work or not – and there was promise at the start of the second and third periods that they might – that early penalty was not a helpful first step.

In their league-leading 40 minor penalties this season, there have been far too many stick fouls, indicating that they’re behind the play.

“It’s discipline,” lamented Montgomery to reporters in Nashville after the loss. “We’re taking far too many stick penalties. You want to take good penalties that prevent scoring chances and usually you’re going to kill those off (which was the case of the oft-penalized Zadorov’s hooking infraction), but we’re having too many in the offensive zone And we’ve got to sharpen that up.”

While the departure of DeBrusk is felt more acutely when you haven’t scored more than a goal in six periods, the understandable belief is that the additions of Lindholm and Zadorov will start paying more dividends. The additions of Mark Kastelic and Cole Koepke have certainly helped the Bruins in the points that they have accrued this year.

Is there a cause for concern? Yes. Is it a time to panic? Let’s hold off on that for just a little bit longer. Growing pains were expected, and there are players on this team that have proven themselves to be a lot better than they’re playing right now.

They just can’t let things snowball on them. They have to work their way out of this, especially Thursday against the stingy Stars (13 goals against in seven games).

“One, we stick together. Two, is we have a process that has given us a lot of success and we have to get back to that,” said Montgomery. “Sometimes we’re not starting on time and sometimes we’re not finishing playing 60 minutes. You look at the first seven minutes of the second period, that was Bruins hockey. Why do we get away from that? Some of it is we just have to continue to believe in being patient and believe in the process.”

So far, the shortcuts they’ve been trying to take are getting them nowhere.