Article: Wild Are Weighing Themselves Down With Middle Class Bloat

[MrCheatachu]

I'm digging what P-Diesel is throwing down today...I'd subscribe to his newsletter.

That said, my head is spinning here guys.  I thought we hated Mojo/Freddy because their GIANT $2M contracts was clearly blocking all this wonderful talent we have at AHL from getting a shot at the top lines, yet we're also all pissy when our big offseason moves are to solidify the 3rd/4th line with guys who dont need to pack on the muscle?  

So we don't get some plug to fill in on our top lines, and we're grumpy?  If our prospects in Iowa cant take a roster spot from FreddyG or Mojo, then that's an issue.  If they're truely top-6 caliber, then we don't want them trying to fill out the Trenin role anyways...

[TheGoosesAreLooses]

1 hour ago, mnfaninnc said:

Really, this article shouldn't be about the middle class of guys the Wild have, this article should be about pumping the brakes on guys coming out of ELCs and making bank. Brinks trucks should be for guys with 5 years of service in the N, not the organization. 

I have to disagree with this. I'm all for a bridge deal on Rossi or Faber but let's remind ourselves they are RFA's and can be offer sheeted next year. If you are looking to get the best possible deal we could file for arbitration. I have no doubts there would be teams lining up to offer sheet either one if we lowball it and I think the worst thing for the future of this club short of losing Kap would be to lose either of these two well before we see their full potential. 

I would be far more confident in extending either one of these guys than giving out more contracts with term and money to role players into their 30's that fill out our bottom 6.  

[Protec]

Yurov and Buium are not far off. 

Kaprizov is still under contract and MN has good options to spend cap space in-house. 

There's lots to be positive about and MN is gonna be able to move older prospects if they don't take steps to jump up the depth chart. Maybe some of them won't bring a return but there's a new draft every year. 

The Wild have options. Fred, Foligno, and Hartman are gonna sink the Wild with their 10M worth of NMCs or whatever. MN is fine with good prospects and what I would call a pretty clean slate next year to improve the talent surrounding the core players.

[Protec]

23 minutes ago, Protec said:

The Wild have options. Fred, Foligno, and Hartman aren't gonna sink the Wild with their 10M worth of NMCs or whatever. MN is fine with good prospects and what I would call a pretty clean slate next year to improve the talent surrounding the core players.

I meant are not*.

I corrected it but in case that was confusing, I'm saying 10M on the guys who carried water while MN was on top isn't a huge problem. Minor problem kinda, but not too bad.

[B1GKappa97]

Quote

 Look at the NHL's most successful teams and what they allocate for their depth players. It quickly becomes clear that the Wild are zagging while the smartest teams zig.

The top teams set out to min-max their rosters, prioritizing star power, even at the expense of squeezing out the league's middle class.

Tony, come on. You have to have those star players before you build a team like that. We aren't there quite yet, but there is potential and we have insulated the depth of the roster while that incoming potential is on cheap ELC deals. 

In the meantime, we are raising our floor with these 'middle class' additions and waiting for our draft picks to overtake them. 

[B1GKappa97]

59 minutes ago, TheGoosesAreLooses said:

If you are looking to get the best possible deal we could file for arbitration. I have no doubts there would be teams lining up to offer sheet either one if we lowball it and I think the worst thing for the future of this club short of losing Kap would be to lose either of these two well before we see their full potential. 

I would be far more confident in extending either one of these guys than giving out more contracts with term and money to role players into their 30's that fill out our bottom 6.  

The beauty of getting all that cap-space back is you can do both. Having great role players is huge in the playoffs especially as the games tighten up and teams don't get to play with as much as space as they typically do. 

While arbitration would be an effective means of negotiating, I don't think it would be the best approach for Faber.

Unlike the unfortunate situation with Kevin Fiala (thanks Chuck.. and Fenton..), where we had the terrible timing to not be able to fit him in our cap due to previously signed long-term deals, and had to get him at the lowest cap-hit possible, we now have flexibility in the future to allocate cap-space to a blue-chip top-pairing defenseman. 

Edited July 2 by B1GKappa97

[B1GKappa97]

1 hour ago, MrCheatachu said:

I'm digging what P-Diesel is throwing down today...I'd subscribe to his newsletter.

That said, my head is spinning here guys.  I thought we hated Mojo/Freddy because their GIANT $2M contracts was clearly blocking all this wonderful talent we have at AHL from getting a shot at the top lines, yet we're also all pissy when our big offseason moves are to solidify the 3rd/4th line with guys who dont need to pack on the muscle?  

So we don't get some plug to fill in on our top lines, and we're grumpy?  If our prospects in Iowa cant take a roster spot from FreddyG or Mojo, then that's an issue.  If they're truely top-6 caliber, then we don't want them trying to fill out the Trenin role anyways...

PREACH!! THIS IS TRUTH

Honestly though, Yurov, assuming he turns out like he's projected to be, will more than make up for a mild overpay on Trenin 3 years from now. 

Edited July 2 by B1GKappa97

[Krotz the Wall]

The Wild are stuck. I firmly believe that the team performed better than expected after the buyouts. A number of guys had big, career years. Kap was better than advertised. Some of Guerin’s marginal moves paid off. The team won and got a lot of buzz, which I’m not sure was necessarily the plan. The playoff exists still happened. Instead of retooling and making future plans, the team switched to buttressing their current success… and with little cap space, the team could only continue to double down. The bottom dropped out last season. The team still doesn’t have much space, the young guys are still young, and the team is committed to moderate players for the next 3 seasons (mostly overpays in term and value) with few options to even cash in by trading vets, or simply changing things up.

The Wild are stuck. Faber will be getting a big extension. It’s likely Rossi will get a moderate bridge deal. Next season will end… and I am not expecting the playoffs. 25/26… Kap will be eligible for an extension while having his full NMC. The team will gain some marginal cap relief that season… $13m of dead cap, Flower/Jojo/Merrill minus whatever the raises figure out to be and rookies. Will Kap be interested? I can’t see it yet. They might be able to target a 2nd liner on moderate term.

Of course, Guerin could still trade Gus & Rossi and get Laine in a trade… and then we’ll have different questions. The Wild just look like they are hoping to get lucky.

[Protec]

Da Beauty-Buium is huge!

Getting a top 10 talent who's arguably the most polished and biggest winner with room to grow physically. 

His NHL-readiness timing gives MN new flexibility 100%.

They can approach the next year leading up to the cap penalties exodus with more choice on what to target. An expensive forward is easier now cause defense got reinforcements that is super promising.

Guerin can look for a quality guy and trade with his assets for a top end solution, OR gather together the Patrick Kanes and Pat Maroons or Ekmann Laarsons for way less money and all of the sudden Minnesota is stacked. 

I do think MN is handicapped with State income tax. There's no question teams from those States are where many players wanna be. NSH, FL, VGK, DAL, and now Montour to SEA makes it look even more like that's a real factor. 

MN is setting up for a long window to be competitive. Their picks, core, and vets look to me like cultivation of competitive continuity. 

[Roberinzki]

Don't disagree with this article as a whole. Wild are absolutely locking in too many middle of the road players and not enough high end talent. However, Thachuk got to basically pick his trade destination and wasn't coming here. Duchene was fine but wanted to play in a country music market lol so also wasn't coming here. Minnesota is a small market even though we love the shizz outta hockey it's not on the top free agent lists of places to sign. The last legit stars we signed (that weren't are now bought out and caused the current cap hell... So we mostly just draft and hope our picks like the area and the fans and the cold winters. 

[Pewterschmidt]

#MikeyMilneWatch

[MacGyver]

22 minutes ago, Protec said:

I do think MN is handicapped with State income tax.

Part of the reason we are not a destination team among other things and taxes are going to continue to rise.. No winning culture is another reason, and I think Guerin is as polarizing across the league as he is on this board. 

[Protec]

2 minutes ago, MacGyver said:

Part of the reason we are not a destination team among other things and taxes are going to continue to rise.. No winning culture is another reason, and I think Guerin is as polarizing across the league as he is on this board. 

Well at least if GMBG was to be fired, the team has assets and a good core.

[TheLeviathan]

Great article.  Worst of all....most of these guys we locked in on terms too long and with dollars too high....are not penalty killers.  They're not big.  And they're not fast.

Mojo, Gaudreau, Foligno, Hartman, Trenin, Zuccarello....none of them are fast.  Only two of them have size.  Only three of them have "grit".  Only one of them has any ability to produce.  We have nearly 20M wrapped up into that group.  It'd be fine if we had two of them, maybe even three, but it's far too much money and far too much roster space on guys that don't even fit what the GM says he's trying to build.

[Pewterschmidt]

58 minutes ago, MacGyver said:

and I think Guerin is as polarizing across the league as he is on this board.

I’m beginning to think there’s some truth to this.  The charm offensive by Guerin with his contract extensions with NMC’s might be an attempt to undue the damage he creates.   Time to start winning Guerin and silence the critics

[Dis-allowed display name]

3 hours ago, MrCheatachu said:

 

So we don't get some plug to fill in on our top lines, and we're grumpy?  If our prospects in Iowa cant take a roster spot from FreddyG or Mojo, then that's an issue.  If they're truely top-6 caliber, then we don't want them trying to fill out the Trenin role anyways...

I would agree with you except for I don't think the young guys are getting a fair shot sometimes.  Some come up and flash and are sent down.  Rossi just seemed to be punished for being young,  and has never been given a shot to be the center for Kaprisov.  Last year would have been the perfect year to play young guys, throw in the towel and get a high pick rather than what they did.  I know everybody HATES that but it is truth.  As a ticket buyer I would have been happier to watch propects try to earn spots the next year than walk out tired corpses and score one goal per night sitting on the playoff bubble.

I sort of thought that Trenin would be used in a GREEF line roll with maybe Foligno and Hartman at center because Hartman seems like sometimes he wants to play hockey and sometimes just goons.  But what worries me is this Kaprisov/Boldy line.  They produce, sure but put them on the same line and nothing else produces squat.  

I am not coahing material obviously, but I would sit Bold and Kaprisov down individually (after a few day of camp) and say if you can't play with the other star, who would you want as linemates that you think you can play well with and put pucks in nets?  Maybe Boldy wants Ek and player X, and Kaprisov wants Rossi and player Y.   I would then give that a shot to see if you can have to lines because I think Boldy and Karisov elevate some players like Lizard and you get more production out of playing them separate than you do playing them together and leaving the second tier guys with little skill to play off of.

[Dis-allowed display name]

1 hour ago, Protec said:

 

I do think MN is handicapped with State income tax. There's no question teams from those States are where many players wanna be. NSH, FL, VGK, DAL, and now Montour to SEA makes it look even more like that's a real factor. 

 

$5 million (after federal tax) playing in Florida is $5 million.   $5 million (after federal tax) here is close to $4.5 million.   I know players pay taxes in states where they play away games but for general purpose they get 90 cents on the dollar here vs FLA.   Jersey, Cali, Boston, and New York have it as bad as we do though.

Edited July 2 by Dis-allowed display name

[Lovehockey]

I agree with Tony 100%. This is the picture of what Wild has and what some people for whatever reasons trying to ignore. 
1. with all the signings the first 3 lines are occupied for 2-3 years 

2. All no-move/no-trade clauses added to contract for the simple reason- to show the player he is needed and he will be here for the long run

3. the young players cannot take anyone spot not because they are bad but because GM will not be paying 2 + mil to players to be in AHL

4. No changes will be done in a next few years because GM will not play 3+ mil players on the fourth line

5. the money we will have after this season will be spend on signing Faber, Rossi (or his replacement) and Kaprizov 

5. all this above indicates that BG believes that he created is competitive enough and will have some success

 

the question 1 is - does fans and you guys believe in this. I don’t 

the question 2 is - does Kaprizov believe in this is. I don’t think so

[joebou15]

Can anybody say they believe this team can beat any of the top 4 teams in a 7 game series?

You can't. And for just this year, no one would fault you for thinking that. This team doesn't have the money to spend, nor do they have flexibility to bring in a major star for this season. But as Guerin tries to manage fan expectations, he's taking that carrot of future spending power and cap flexibility and pissing it away. Each one of these moves pushes that carrot out further.

Some teams bring in an aging Steven Stamkos, or a Jonathon Marchessault. Others bring in Jack Eichel, or Brady Tkachuk.

This is so ass backwards from any sort of typical rebuild, it's staggering. Any team with this kind of light at the end of the tunnel from self-inflicted salary wounds wouldn't be so eager to pour salt on it with lesser skilled players signed to multi-year deals with a premium price.

Anyone worth playing in the bottom half of the lineup shouldn't have a contract longer than 2 years. 

But what's worse is that on many of these deals Guerin is only outbidding himself. In my opinion, Middleton shouldn't have gotten 4 years. Zuccarello, Foligno, Hartman (to a degree) were all signed to contracts poorly executed by the GM.

So next year, the year we've all been waiting for to have a fun, exciting team that has grown up their prospects with newfound money and flexibility to build a Stanley Cup winner is instead a team that's grown old again with almost none of that money or flexibility to enhance the roster.

Is it about fucking winning yet?

[Protec]

Minnesota learned important lessons last season. They're not buried and done for. I don't love the roster nut it's not the completed masterpiece more like the restoration project a few years into the process. If the Wild don't quit making small improvements and upgrades, they'll be fine. 

[Protec]

32 minutes ago, joebou15 said:

Can anybody say they believe this team can beat any of the top 4 teams in a 7 game series?

You can't. And for just this year, no one would fault you for thinking that. This team doesn't have the money to spend, nor do they have flexibility to bring in a major star for this season. But as Guerin tries to manage fan expectations, he's taking that carrot of future spending power and cap flexibility and pissing it away. Each one of these moves pushes that carrot out further.

Some teams bring in an aging Steven Stamkos, or a Jonathon Marchessault. Others bring in Jack Eichel, or Brady Tkachuk.

This is so ass backwards from any sort of typical rebuild, it's staggering. Any team with this kind of light at the end of the tunnel from self-inflicted salary wounds wouldn't be so eager to pour salt on it with lesser skilled players signed to multi-year deals with a premium price.

Anyone worth playing in the bottom half of the lineup shouldn't have a contract longer than 2 years. 

But what's worse is that on many of these deals Guerin is only outbidding himself. In my opinion, Middleton shouldn't have gotten 4 years. Zuccarello, Foligno, Hartman (to a degree) were all signed to contracts poorly executed by the GM.

So next year, the year we've all been waiting for to have a fun, exciting team that has grown up their prospects with newfound money and flexibility to build a Stanley Cup winner is instead a team that's grown old again with almost none of that money or flexibility to enhance the roster.

Is it about fucking winning yet?

Just don't see it that way. Last season WPG and NSH leap-frogged MN and Arizona had some good stretches. Vegas fell first round and Edmonton went nearly all the way. Nobody predicted that. 

I wouldn't mind Marchesseault or Stamkos but with their age and AAV, the Wild can do without that trade-off. Seeing Buffalo or Dallas do buyouts on big money deals or cagey old vets, I am perfectly happy with the Wild keeping the cart behind the horse. 

If Kaprizov wants to play in FL nothing is gonna stop him. MN wants him to stay obviously but a plan that works with or without him is in place. 

People who rip Guerin a lot forget where the Wild were just 3-4 years ago and the mostly successful seasons since. Winningest GM in Wild history over any 5-year span and everyone thinks they know better. 

[mnfaninnc]

6 hours ago, TheGoosesAreLooses said:

I'm all for a bridge deal on Rossi or Faber but let's remind ourselves they are RFA's and can be offer sheeted next year. If you are looking to get the best possible deal we could file for arbitration. I have no doubts there would be teams lining up to offer sheet either one if we lowball it and I think the worst thing for the future of this club short of losing Kap would be to lose either of these two well before we see their full potential. 

Why is an offersheet so bad? By the time the offersheet comes around, our penalties are over. We can match anything anyone wants to throw out there, or collect 4 1st round picks as compensation.

Kotkaniemi was successfully offersheeted in revenge for Montreal trying to offersheet Aho. Essentially, Montreal made it easy for Waddell to go on summer vacation since all he had to do was resign Aho. He matched and then took revenge grabbing Kotkaniemi on a 1 year offersheet deal with a handshake long term deal coming later. 

Outside of that, there's been nothing on the offersheet front. Faber is playing for his hometown team, he's not wanting to leave. Rossi is playing for the team that saved his life, he's not wanting to leave either. Just because a player is offersheeted doesn't mean the other team gets him, it means that the Wild can match. We'll have the money, so what is the problem?

And, should either one get offersheeted, Guerin strikes me as the kind of guy who takes down names. I am sure revenge would come and we have a lot of money to go for it.

[mnfaninnc]

4 hours ago, Pewterschmidt said:

#MikeyMilneWatch

He'd best be in the gym bulking up!

[Lovehockey]

Very good article 

[mnfaninnc]

2 hours ago, Dis-allowed display name said:

Jersey, Cali, Boston, and New York have it as bad as we do though.

But, here's the grind, for a young player getting his 1st big contract, these cities have way more excitement than the Twin Cities. The Twin Cities are set up as a good place to play hockey and raise a family. 

I'll certainly give the non state tax states an advantage on that, plus they typically have better weather. But the far coasts have a lot going for them too. It's not my cup of tea, but it is some people's.