Article: Guerin Built Minnesota's Roster With Three Timelines In Mind

[Citizen Strife]

For a near PPG player, Boldy sure seems very streaky about it. Kap, Boldy, Zucc, and Rossi are the only players .8 PPG or above.  Ek and Faber are the only others at .5.  so if they don't get theirs, forget it.

[RedLake]

Wonder who's gonna win tonight lol.

[Lern2spell]

19 hours ago, Burnt Toast said:

The Wild should continue to build a team around KK to compete for years, not just this year. I still contend with the Cap penalties still in play this isn’t the year to go all in. 

They should build around Kap for future years, but the teams with established, high end cores, that have built up tight to a flat cap are about to get rewarded with a great cap increase. Take Tampa for example...they have a top six that includes Kucherov, Guentzel, Point, Hagel, Cirelli, and Geekie, three of their top 4 defensemen, and Vasilevskiy in net. All signed or controlled for the next two years before anyone is due a hefty raise. They did this with some drafting, but most was giving up picks, players, and prospects to get or keep impact players. They sacrificed some good players (Spurgeon?). Tampa now gets to use the significant cap increase the next two years to sign quality depth players to really round out their team. IMO, they are the team to beat. The Oilers and Utah are primed to break out in the same way. So why not go for it this season, by identifying an impact top six player, and doing what is needed to secure them?

[Imyourhuckleberry]

2 hours ago, RedLake said:

Wonder who's gonna win tonight lol.

USA over Slovakia, in a pre-tournament game?

World Juniors are about to start for Zeev Buium and 9 Minnesota players.

• A total of nine states are represented, with nine players from Minnesota, four from Illinois, three from Massachusetts and New York, two from California and one each from Florida, Michigan, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Looks like Riley Heidt missed the final cut for team Canada, along with several other talented players. Among the cuts were forwards Beckett Sennecke, Matthew Wood, Denver Barkey, Andrew Cristall and Riley Heidt, defencemen Zayne Parekh and Cameron Allen and goaltender Scott Ratzlaff.

Rasmus Kumpulainen, Aron Kiviharju, and Sebastian Soini all made the Finland roster.

[RedLake]

Is it on TV tonight?

[Burnt Toast]

4 hours ago, Lern2spell said:

So why not go for it this season, by identifying an impact top six player, and doing what is needed to secure them?

I’m on board with a top six pickup and the best they can afford at the trade deadline. Doing what they need to secure them is ok if it’s a reasonable trade. I’m almost certain Wild management will make this kind of move. 

[Pewterschmidt]

1st goal by wpg (on pp) was 100% on wall-e.  Come on young one.  Give us a reason to believe

[Will D. Ness]

6 minutes ago, Pewterschmidt said:

1st goal by wpg (on pp) was 100% on wall-e.  Come on young one.  Give us a reason to believe

He was pretty bad all game long actually. 

I'll give him a break for all the obvious reasons, but damn the clock might be starting to tick.

[MJB59]

Sad to see this current demise of the team, understanding the injuries aside, are the players outside of KK and MB allowed to score? Are they capable, I am always amazed at the major scoring droughts that some of these professionals go through. Since putting on skates as a youngster, scoring is the prize of the game, everyone spent abundant time honing their skating, stickhandling skills, checking, and shooting was also one of them, I realize this is elite level hockey, but that is where the players have got to make it happen.

[RedLake]

Mn State income tax=Kap going bye f'in bah bye.

[Thatoneguy]

Must be time for the annual mid-season meltdown? 

 

It's not weird, it's wild. 

 

Injuries or not, this team looks like they would rather be doing anything but be playing hockey.

[mnfaninnc]

Boy, these last 2 games (3 if I'd have watched the FL game) are a real bummer. Looks like Midsy is more valuable than we all thought!

The whole idea of banking points is because all teams go through this sort of slump for one reason or another. However, I believe there was an unforced error. My hierarchy of goaltenders is Goose, The Wall, Fleury. The Wall is easily transferred to the A with no waivers, so he's the one who has to go. I believe that The Wall should have started at home vs. Utah (a game he earned with his play vs. Vegas) and Fleury sacrificed to play vs. Winnipeg. I think that gave us the best chance to split. Obviously, this is not how Heinzy sees it.

The 2nd goal that Fleury allowed vs. Utah was the difference, and he needed to have that one. I think The Wall probably gets us to at least OT in that game. So, for a split, The Wall needed to stand on his head and steal one last night. He couldn't. 

A point made that probably belongs on the "Masking" thread is that we've had 3 goaltenders play this season, and all 3 have been sub par on the PK. One would probably conclude that with 3 different goaltenders, but the same unit in front of them, that it's probably not the goaltenders that are the problem. Is the goalie the most important part of the PK? Yes! Does the goalie know the weak spots in the scheme that he has to stop? I really don't know, their play suggests that they may not. With the defensive minded forwards that we have on this team, it should not even be an issue to have a PK somewhere around 15th. When we keep getting scored on 5 seconds into a PK because we lose a draw would suggest that someone in the scheming room is messing up. 

Gaunce: I thought he played well last night except for the penalties. He's big and can play any forward spot. To me, this looks like the 13th forward we should be carrying going forward. 

I think everything changes when Ek is ready to return. Hartsy needs a goal really bad, empty netter or not, he just needs a goal. I have not been impressed by Boldy's production. Whether it be Hartman or Gaudreau, they just aren't good enough to help him (I won't even cover Johansson). Boldy is not quite ready yet to put on a superman cape. His slump has come at the worst time. Give Khus a try up there with Boldy and let's see if there's anything there?

Checking around the leagues, looks like a lot of players are on Christmas break. Spacek potted another one and is leading the baby Wild defenders in points. That's quite an improvement over last year. Ohgren is nearly a point/game player. To me, his value is going to come in winning board battles and playing that 200' game. He seems like a dirty work type of player. I thought he was not aggressive enough with the body up here, more bodychecks were needed. Yurov is back playing again and potted a couple of goals this week. 

I have to disagree with ODC and L2S on going for it this year. Timing is everything when loading up and with $15m in cap penalties, the timing just isn't quite here yet. We add for the now, and I think the Jiricek trade is for that. But, let's not get rid of guys who will give us 3 good years of ELC play which will be tremendous value. You need those kind of players when you make a run. This allows us to go get the holes in the lineup. I have no doubt that Buium, Yurov will be able to step right into elevated roles when they come over. Jiricek will also and will get bridged probably for a lower price, somewhere in the upper $2m range. Getting value is paramount to a deep run. Now, with that, there will need to be some subtractions. 

I would expect to see both Yurov and Ohgren take spots in the forward group. Johansson is the expected subtraction and Hartman has a 15 team no trade clause. Rossi is also an RFA. I'd think those 2 are possible exits, but I'd anticipate if Rossi is traded, it will be for another now piece (like a Tuch), so I think it's Hartsy who will have to go. The other subtraction could be if Zuccarello decides to call it a career, which is also a possibility.

On defense, Merrill is gone, Dermott is likely gone. We need 2 more spots. I think we keep Bogosian who has a value contract and need to send Spurgy somewhere with a 10 team NTC. I believe the most we can retain on his contract is 20% that I read when capfriendly was up. Does that mean we keep Chissy? Or do we keep him as 7th D? To me, if we keep Chissy as 7th D, that is the point where you can say we truly have 7D, not a 7th D. I also don't think Chissy will be too hard to resign and it will be low. 

That means the team will be full. Now, where do we fill at? It doesn't appear that there are many UFAs who can help us. Rantanen is the big name. Sam Bennett will be available, but I think we'll be pretty strong down the middle. I can't remember who suggested it, but we may need to trade for someone locked in longterm and just take on the contract.

This is an exciting time for the team even though we're slumping. Not only are we transitioning into a better team, we're also transitioning into a much more skilled team. We may be able to outscore our troubles with these guys, though unproven.

[mnfaninnc]

One thing I forgot to mention, Kaprizov going after the guy who hit Rossi which looked like knee to knee. Last year, around this time, Rossi went after a guy who took liberties with Kaprizov. Is it that he wore green, or does Kap have a bond with Rossi? Before trading Rossi away, perhaps this needs to be investigated. Kaprizov may like playing with Rossi.

[Pewterschmidt]

From Russo:

“Well, Kaprizov can’t be expected to be the lone guy to score.

Ryan Hartman has one goal in his past 22 games and no points in his past 15. Boldy has three goals in his past 18. Johansson has one goal in his past 14. Freddy Gaudreau has two goals and one assist in his past 15. Marcus Foligno has one goal in his past 20.”

 That right there is your apathetic old core doing their thing.  Really outside the box thinking Bill with the 4 yr term and NMC clauses for players that have been career placeholders on every team they’ve played on

[Citizen Strife]

I don't think Guerin is just sitting around waiting for things to happen though.  The Yurov back and forth will he/won't he thing has gone on about as long as the Kaprizov shit did.  Laine up and said, "Yeah no."  Which is funny, because the Canadiens are about as bad offensively as the Wild are...but I digress.  That PPG pace coming back to bite me on the ass after I said he wouldn't be worth squat.

The team is no different than last year, just with better overall 5on5 structure.  The same issue presents itself: if the team falters to injuries, their depth is AHL level guff.  What was Guerin supposed to do?  Dermott sure hasn't helped.  Ohgren for sure wasn't doing anything in the few games he had.  Jiricek just got here.  Most of the best players the AHL has have come up and shown that Lauko, Trenin, etc. are just better equipped to handle those duties.  

I don't endorse putting Wallstedt against better teams.  Why he played the Jets game and not the Utah game is beyond me.  This is a personnel issue.  Only 4-5 guys score consistently, only 3 of those (Kap/Zucc/Rossi) do it every game, rather than in streaky bunches.  Middleton and Faber were killing it together, and Ek is proving yet again to be irreplaceable.

I said I felt the early start was a mirage.  I worry the slip continues and they struggle to make the playoffs if they let other teams back into the race.

[OldDutchChip]

4 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

I have to disagree with ODC and L2S on going for it this year. Timing is everything when loading up and with $15m in cap penalties, the timing just isn't quite here yet. We add for the now, and I think the Jiricek trade is for that. But, let's not get rid of guys who will give us 3 good years of ELC play which will be tremendous value. You need those kind of players when you make a run. This allows us to go get the holes in the lineup. I have no doubt that Buium, Yurov will be able to step right into elevated roles when they come over. Jiricek will also and will get bridged probably for a lower price, somewhere in the upper $2m range. 

My friend - let me ask you - what will happen should the Wild collapse or whimper out in the first round? What will Kap do? Patience? Process? No No No. You want to bet on the prospects to help entice Kap to stay? Who? Wally has shown that he is unplayable. Ohgren - for all the hype - is in AHL (yes playing good - but that means zilch here). The same type of "adjustment" is expected from Yurov and Zeev. You think Kap is going to sign up to babysit them and stand up for Rossi and Zuccy when they get beaten up? We have to go for it, we have to sell high on these prospects for the now, we have to let Kap experience winning with our club! Five years into his career with the Wild - he has exactly ZERO games into second round of the playoffs. ZERO winning that matters. If we do nothing and let our prospect come in and wait for gradual improvement with Zeev, Yurov, that Jiri fella that got booted from one of the worst teams in hockey....and Wally - who is again - unplayable and makes you wonder if MAF will be resigned....that will assure - Wild next year will have the same result AT BEST. So go ahead and predict what Kap, his family and GF will decide? The chance for continuing mediocracy and wasting his prime years here or potentially going to play with Mitchy in Philly? Demidov in MTL? or Join Panarin in NY? or Vasy and Kuchy in Tampa? 

That is the reality if we do nothing. There is no other choice. Use these assets now. Wally, Ohgren, Yurov, Zeev, Rossi, Height, whatever - they are nothing compared to Kap. 

Edited Sunday at 08:11 PM by OldDutchChip

[Citizen Strife]

You're using Philly and Montreal as examples of progress?  

[Lovehockey]

Trade Rossi and Hartman for Alex Tuch. Do something now , like it was pointed out correctly in above post there is no 5 years plans in any sport, even 3 years is questionable 

[OldDutchChip]

37 minutes ago, Citizen Strife said:

You're using Philly and Montreal as examples of progress?  

where did i say progress? what i did note are the players - you know young russian superstars? chance to lead a team in a big city? 

[Citizen Strife]

Kap doesn't strike me as a city life guy.  Fiala and Gaborik did, but Kap just wants to win.  As bad as the losing skid is, Philly, Montreal, Chicago, and lots of other teams are in way worse shape this season. 

[OldDutchChip]

4 minutes ago, Citizen Strife said:

Kap doesn't strike me as a city life guy.  Fiala and Gaborik did, but Kap just wants to win.  As bad as the losing skid is, Philly, Montreal, Chicago, and lots of other teams are in way worse shape this season. 

Kap played in one of the biggest city in the world - Moscow. He has a famous GF with famous family ties that probably exposed him to a bit more than coon rapids scenery tours or applebees (hence the money is likely NOT the biggest reason for him - so us having a mil extra means very very little). I bet his GF has a voice in the relationship and probably would "encourage" him to pick a more desirable location. 

After 6 years of loosing (or sorry - not winning a lot) - 28 year old superstar (best player in the league) decides to sign off on staying in MN for his whole career to become the official mentor for all future MN wild prospects. 

His GF and Family are thrilled - quote "we are all so proud of Kirusha, this has been a dream of his; from playing on the top KHL team to leading Russia to Olympic goals, nothing comes close to joining MN wild support club and god willing - one day winning Beauty League Cup and supplanting Wes Walz as play by play announcer" 🤔

[Citizen Strife]

You're really going to get stress issues from all the "Kap's going to leave" stuff.  Wild lose a game, "OH NO HE"S GONNA BE GONE IF WE DON"T TRADE A GUY!"

July 1st.  That's the day to worry about it.

[OldDutchChip]

15 minutes ago, Citizen Strife said:

You're really going to get stress issues from all the "Kap's going to leave" stuff.  Wild lose a game, "OH NO HE"S GONNA BE GONE IF WE DON"T TRADE A GUY!"

July 1st.  That's the day to worry about it.

July 1st.  That's the day to worry about it. i think that is a bit too late to start worrying 😉 

 

[Enforceror]

None of us know what 97 wants, needs or intends to do....but since speculation is the spice of the forum, I'll add my complete guess to the mix:

Kap stays due to matched funds, a good locker room, and a desire to take his team to a cup (loyalty). Unless his GF wears the skates in the relationship, in which case Kap goes to the Caribbean League...

[Pewterschmidt]

51 minutes ago, Enforceror said:

Unless his GF wears the skates in the relationship

😜