Article: The Minnesota Wild Have Already Blown Their Post-Parise/Suter Windfall

[Tony Abbott]

1 hour ago, Patrick said:

Yikes. Tony's gotta take a break for a bit and go for a walk in the sunshine. None of those guys have NMC towards the ends of the deals if I remember correctly. There is LOTS of room for BG to make things happen.

Ironclad NMCs through the first year of the post-Dead Cap Era, then heavily protected trade lists in the second. There's very little wiggle room for Guerin, and even if there is, he's shown no willingness to use it with any of "his guys."

[Citizen Strife]

If any of the new prospects or defenseman end up the "impact players" (i.e. a Faber), Guerin will pay them instead of having to look outside the organization for the help.

The Wild CAN have nice things.

[Citizen Strife]

The only thing you can accuse Guerin of right now is leaving the Wild slightly less flexible to do the "outside help" option in case of emergency.  However, it seems unwise to completely lambaste them when we don't know what Option 1: build from within/draft first is going to do.

[Protec]

Keyboard GM stuff is funny to me. Talk is cheap. Fun to do, but meaningless. 

In certain professions, or jobs it's your name on the license. You're future, reputation, your insurance is covering for mistakes and the full liability is on you. 

If you operate in that paradigm full-time, there's no fantasy, perfect-world solutions. You're forced to make tough decisions and you bear the weight of the consequences with your group. Many times you have to work with what you got. No mulligans, no take-backs.

I'm surprised we don't see more articles showing how sweet it is that Guerin took Fenton's Granlund/Fiala trade and turned it into a #1RD from MN who will be a franchise type Wild player.

Or how a HOF goalie came in for an average pick and has won a lot of games for MN.

Or how L1 between EK, Boldy, and Kaprizov are all signed to affordable deals during MN's most difficult stretch after firing Parise/Suter and paying the toll. 

Instead it's a constant ragfest, ripping on Guerin for signing last season's shootout hero, point-producing lizard, and paying up two loyal, grit guys while the organization drafts extra prospects. 

Okay, tell me you got GDS without telling me you have Guerin derangement syndrome. 

[Tony Abbott]

45 minutes ago, Protec said:

In certain professions, or jobs it's your name on the license. You're future, reputation, your insurance is covering for mistakes and the full liability is on you. 

If you operate in that paradigm full-time, there's no fantasy, perfect-world solutions. You're forced to make tough decisions and you bear the weight of the consequences with your group. Many times you have to work with what you got. No mulligans, no take-backs.

Which is why he should make good moves and not bad moves.

[punch_cut]

9 hours ago, Tony Abbott said:

Full no-move clauses for Hartman, Zuccarello, Foligno. 12 million-plus where the team has absolutely no say over whether they can move. What would you rather have? $12 million to throw around, or those three guys two years later into their 30s?

Come on! Look at you trying make your point with false information. They don't have full NMC other than the 2yr for a ppg Zucc contract.

[Protec]

2 minutes ago, Tony Abbott said:

Which is why he should make good moves and not bad moves.

I'm pretty sure no matter who the GM is, many of the same people would be sour grapes. Nevermind the hypothetical mystery GM could be even worse.

You don't think it's ironic coming off Fletcher & Fentonisms, people are spitting venom at GMBG who's got a better winning percentage than any other 5-year stretch in Wild history? (While having inherited those results.)

[Tony Abbott]

23 minutes ago, punch_cut said:

Come on! Look at you trying make your point with false information. They don't have full NMC other than the 2yr for a ppg Zucc contract.

In 2025-26, the first year of the post-Parise/Suter Era, they're full no-moves.

In 2026-27, the second year of the post-Parise/Suter Era, the clauses become fairly heavily protected trade clauses (15-team for Foligno, 10-team for Hartman)

[Tony Abbott]

22 minutes ago, Protec said:

I'm pretty sure no matter who the GM is, many of the same people would be sour grapes. Nevermind the hypothetical mystery GM could be even worse.

You don't think it's ironic coming off Fletcher & Fentonisms, people are spitting venom at GMBG who's got a better winning percentage than any other 5-year stretch in Wild history? (While having inherited those results.)

He stepped into the door as the three most impactful offensive players in franchise history were coming into the league -- none of whom Guerin acquired.

[Protec]

So who should have been the guy and what specifically should have been done in your opinion? 

The GDS crowd rips only and never really says what should have been done alternatively. Who should have been hired and what exactly should they have done? 

Basically, you're saying anybody could have positioned the Wild into the same or better place by now. That about right?

[TtheGrouch]

The doom and gloom reporting and comments get really tiring to read.

Do we have dead cap now? Yes.

Do we have a few players that have looked like they don't belong in the big leagues this year? Yes.

Will Bill G have some tough decisions coming up in the next few seasons? Yes.

However.

The Wild have been a good team over the last few years that have been entertaining to watch and besides this year, with the injury-bug and down performances, the team still has a small chance to make the playoffs.

The Wild have quite a few talented players that bring something to the table and are "character guys." These are guys like Fleury, who would rather struggle here, than potentially win a cup somewhere else. That says something about our culture. We have top-tier young(er) guys like KK97, Ek, Boldy, Faber, and Rossi.

The Wild have a great prospect pool.

I have faith that we will be doing just fine and contending for Cups in a few years, not just 1st round exits.

Enough with "the sky is falling" comments and articles. Balanced coverage is important to have, how about more of that?

[Luke Sims]

We could still sign Phil Kessell...

[Protec]

Maybe if OCL hired Fitzgerald who has Hischier, 2 Hughes, Mercer, Holtz, and also have not done anything significant to get near a Stanley Cup sniff. That's two #1 overalls, and equal to Boldy draft slots to essentially out-do the Wild in terms of draft capital. NJ ain't doing way better. 

This is another example of why GDS is now a thing. MN sucks and Guerin should be fired but zero alternative explanation or coherent justification. 

It's just weird and appears to be totally biased. To the point, no good moves can be recognized, only bad. Haha. 😄

[Protec]

4 minutes ago, Luke Sims said:

We could still sign Phil Kessell...

Love it! Now there's a Kwik Trip hot-dog spokesman if there ever was one...

[Will D. Ness]

1 hour ago, Tony Abbott said:

In 2025-26, the first year of the post-Parise/Suter Era, they're full no-moves.

In 2026-27, the second year of the post-Parise/Suter Era, the clauses become fairly heavily protected trade clauses (15-team for Foligno, 10-team for Hartman)

So Zucc has a full NMC 25-26?  I thought it was 10-team.

I hope there was something gained for all these restrictions. 

[Sviginak]

Per Capfriendly,

Freddy - All four years left M-NTC 15 team

Foligno - 4 Yrs, first two NMC, last two M-NTC 15 team

Hartman - 3 Yrs, first one NMC, last two M-NTC 10 team

Zucc - 2 Yrs, both NMC

Mojo - 1 Yr left NTC

 

[Tony Abbott]

45 minutes ago, Will D. Ness said:

So Zucc has a full NMC 25-26?  I thought it was 10-team.

I hope there was something gained for all these restrictions. 

He had a 10-team No-Trade last year and this year. Not sure if the 10-team got ripped up for an NMC, or if there was just a gentleman's agreement.

[Will D. Ness]

Ok so I finally found the cap friendly info hidden in the weeds for 25-26:

Foligno and Zucc have full NMC.

Hartman 15 team NMC.

Bogo is TBD (looks like no restrictions)

Spurg 10 team NMC.

Freddy 15 team NMC.

Brodin no restrictions after 24-25.

Brass tacks = 8M tied up.  14M tradable to half the league.

Could be better but there is flexibility there.

 

[Burnt Toast]

12 hours ago, Tony Abbott said:

impossible

I’d leave out the nearly. These players are not going anywhere. It’s clear there is no money for a “Big Swing” type of move in the foreseeable future. This is the direction Wild management chose and I accept it. If you need an example of how hard it is to deal with NM NT clauses see AG. MAF is playing good hockey. The real question is who can project when major regression sets in? Hopefully someone in Wild management is willing and capable of doing that for all future extensions. Getting value up and down the lineup requires it. 

[raithis]

I don't even get the point this article is trying to make. 

Most teams in the league probably have 5 mostly non-elite players in their 30s with contracts totalling ~$15M.  An average of $3M each for 5 veteran players on a team isn't outlandish.  In today's NHL, that's not farfetched, and neither are the NMCs, NTCs, and M-NTCs.  Many teams have a number of them.

It's my belief that many of these players will end up comprising our 4th line.  Ideally a team wouldn't have so much of their salary cap tied up in 4th liners, but if our prospects are good enough to push them down that far, then we won't have much to complain about.

Time will tell.

Now, if Guerin adds more non-elite 30-something players with sizable contracts with a long term, then I'd start to agree with you.  Right now, this is more or less typical of any franchise in the league.

[mnfaninnc]

20 hours ago, Burnt Toast said:

Good point. At the SC podium VGK players were raving about the addition of their new star 1C JE. The Wild are looking at a 10-12$M 4th line in 3 years. I actually like the players they resigned but I liked the Deweys too. I’m not saying there’s not a plan I’m saying I can’t see it nor have I historically seen it. Vegas had strong, big, physical players sprinkled throughout their lineup which you alluded to. I think that’s a must, therefore I think the Stramel pick was an ok situational choice.

I'd like to highlight this post and go back in time to when Vegas came into the league. Vegas took a lot of 3rd line guys, but they also ended up taking size. This is something that Fletcher should have known about going into the expansion draft, size mattered. 

What do you expose, then, if you need to expose? Players making a lot of money who don't have size. Haula had some size, speed to burn, and a low level contract, but Tuch had really good size, so that made it work.

You know who didn't have size? Spurgeon, who was making over $5m at the time. Staal also could have been exposed, even though he had size due to his age. But, instead, Fletcher chose to get rid of no money and players who had size. 

If you fast forward to the next expansion draft and look at what Seattle liked, size was another factor, especially on defense. Both of these GMs had a track record with other organizations, so they were scoutable, and you could make a logical guess as to what they were going after. 

While this is not even a little bit of the point of this article, I just thought that BT had an interesting comment that helped explain this pretty well.

[mnfaninnc]

Wait just a moment. The extensions start next season while we are still under the heavy lifting of the buyouts. If we can fit that into next year's cap, why can't we fit that into subsequent years? That argument makes no sense.

But, if we are having to pay rookies/prospects who made it and are performing, like, say Faber and maybe Rossi with the buyout money, well, that's what we have to do. At least they're already here. 

Do we go the bridge deal route, or go full 8 Xs and sign them through their prime? I think that is the main question here. If we go 8 X $8m on Faber, well, then we have eaten up some cap space. The last 1/2 of that contract is probably quite a bargain. If we go bridge on the extension and then the big contract, we probably have some room.

The other issue is Kaprizov getting a raise, which he will. Is it a $3m raise? Probably in that neighborhood. So, out of the $13m we are going to suddenly regain, $3m probably goes to Kaprizov, and $7m probably goes to Faber, and some more probably goes to Rossi/Dino/The Wall. Well, that about does it, and the hope is that all of those players will have earned the increase. 

This really doesn't have anything to do with the extensions, but people like to bitch about them. This has everything to do with the prospects maturing into really good players that we want to keep and that costs money. 

Out of my estimates, this is all doable and didn't even include the cap increase. This is where we get our player, I guess. Or, we simply rent guys at the TDL.

[Burnt Toast]

2 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

Seattle

The Kraken took Souci. Big, strong and low cost. The Wild lost an important player IMO. He was also the kind of player that resigning works well with cost/age/size. I’m not sure who else could have been exposed to the same draft because of guess what… yup NM NT clauses. I know these are negotiated by agents and are a thing in the NHL but they sure end up limiting team choices. 

[Willy the poor boy]

11 hours ago, Protec said:

I'm pretty sure no matter who the GM is, many of the same people would be sour grapes. Nevermind the hypothetical mystery GM could be even worse.

You don't think it's ironic coming off Fletcher & Fentonisms, people are spitting venom at GMBG who's got a better winning percentage than any other 5-year stretch in Wild history? (While having inherited those results.)

Hey , they fired Evason for those same resullts.

[punch_cut]

7 hours ago, Burnt Toast said:

The Kraken took Souci. Big, strong and low cost. The Wild lost an important player IMO. He was also the kind of player that resigning works well with cost/age/size. I’m not sure who else could have been exposed to the same draft because of guess what… yup NM NT clauses. I know these are negotiated by agents and are a thing in the NHL but they sure end up limiting team choices. 

They protected 3 D in 7/3/1 configuration. Spurg, brodin, dumba were the right people protected.