I was a big fan of his last year and you can see his offensive potential.
If he doesn't improve his defending then he's just going to be a 3rd pairing PPQB. And with Zach Werenski returning next year, he won't even be on the top unit.
I don't see any noticeable improvement from last year in his own zone, which was atrocious. He's still injury prone, which isn't good. And although he might have taken his conditioning more seriously this summer than he has in the past, it's not showing up with more minutes because he's such an anchor defensively. He can't do anything about being small, but he CAN do something about being weak, and he still looks very weak in the corners, in front of the net, and in puck battles.
I'm open to keeping him, but the only D who should be "untouchable" is Werenski, but I could also see the value in shopping him for a center or a more valuable two way defenseman around the same age. The D needs a complete overhaul, and unlike a player like Peeke he might actually have some value due to his offensive upside.
My defenseman rankings are this:
Werenski>Blankenburg>Boqvist>Bean>Peeke>Gudbranson
Excluded Gavrikov because he's gone. (He'd be at #2 BTW)
Since Blankenburg is also small and injury prone with not as great offensive upside, I don't see him having more trade value than Boqvist. Jake Bean probably has next to no trade value. Peeke might just because he's a right shot. Gudbranson is unmovable.
So if you're going to make moves to shore up the defense, it seems Boqvist is the most obvious answer to get some value back