Article: The Wild's Moral Victory Era Is Already Over

[Sam]

4 minutes ago, mnfaninnc said:

Was this in reference to the offsides call? Or something else?

Yea sorry, it made sense in my head.

[mnfaninnc]

5 hours ago, Dis-allowed display name said:

So the best hockey they might have played all season came in game 2 when they really blitzed Vegas for the entire first period and scored three goals.  They seemed to be really in sync, but they were also throwing bodies around and dishing out good hits.  As I have always understood playoff hockey going back to the days of the North Stars, things not only get tighter on the scoreboard but the physical nature turns up to 11 in the playoffs..

I have this exact same thought. What I think has happened is that the toll has been taken. Vegas is a big team that plays big. We are a small team trying to play big. Foligno, Trenin, and Breezers are our big guys, with Middleton and Bogosian on D. That's it. I have yet to see Midsy or Bogo lay some guys out. 

This is an all hands on deck series, and they've got to all lay the wood every chance they get, and we will need everyone else to join in. Yes, even if they are a fly on a windshield, they need to take their hits. My eyes are seeing it from both Rossi and Gaudreau even though they probably aren't doing much damage. 

I saw nice strong hits from Faber and Kaprizov last game on Eichel. I think we need the softie lines to be doing that too. Boldy has also stepped up, and Ek has been very physical. That top line is playing playoff hockey.

[mnfaninnc]

1 minute ago, Sam said:

Yea sorry, it made sense in my head.

I thought the rule was any body part not in the zone counted as onsides. To me, looking at the NHL offsides camera angle, it showed Nyquist's back elbow at the very least over the blue line. That is a body part. Both skates were in the zone, but he was leaning over the blue line. 

I also thought that to have a call overturned it had to be clear visual evidence. Perhaps my interpretation of the rule is wrong, but in my eyes, there was a body part onsides and that fulfills my understanding of the rule. The blue line now goes up to the roof. 

So, I was a bit perplexed on how the call was overturned, and also why Heinzy didn't appear to go over the interpretation of the rule.

As for phantom calls, we caught a break on the highsticking Bogosian's face, it looked like he flinched but didn't get hit. There was stick contact through a Saad's stick that snapped, and no call was made, which happened the other way around earlier in the series. I felt like that no call had already been established.

[joebou15]

SSme m I ght be willing to feel upbeat, excited for the future of things and continue to give the team a mulligan as it contends for a Cup with less spending power.

However, that's never how the GM played. He had the opportunity to bottom out and gain high draft picks and come into next year with even more bullets to fire. He chose, instead, to compete for a cup and thus keep his team competitive. 

So if the GM wasn't willing to lower expectations, why should we?

Tony is right. The Wild had chances to take a stranglehold on the series and they didn't. Because that's how the playoffs work. It doesn't matter if you came close, or the storyline of the series feels more positive. All the matters is wins and losses. And through it all, the Wild had the same swing throughout each of the last 3 series and it hasn't mattered if it was a dominant good, or an injury-depleted one, or one like this year where they are healthy and scoring. They have not won when it mattered most.

That's where I'm at. I'm not willing to let them off the hook for another playoff one and done (if they lose in Game 6 or 7) when the organization hasn't once been willing to lower their own standards.

And if you're a boxer with one hand tied behind your back, all it takes is to land one good punch for the KO. So fight, or don't fight. Win or lose. Morale victories are over. Time to make shit happen. 

[Imyourhuckleberry]

3 hours ago, Up North Guy said:

I know they won't do it, but I would slide in Ohgren. Nyquist has and is doing nothing and won't be back next year.

I almost indicated Ohgren or Hinostoza, but I just don't think Hynes would put them in this position without an injury at this point. It definitely doesn't sound like they are considering sitting Nyquist.

Nyquist is one of the guys they trust defensively, including on the PK. He made a bad mistake not straddling the line while Hartman crossed the blue line, but the Wild have outscored Vegas 2-1 during his minutes(59:39 TOI) in this series. One was a power play goal.

They aren't really playing Nyquist on the PK while everyone is healthy, but he was 3rd among Wild forwards in PK time after March 1st in the regular season--he joined the Wild March 2nd, and he had the lowest goals against per 60 among all Wild forwards who recorded at least 10 minutes of PK this season. He also setup a short-handed goal, so his PK goal differential was significantly better than any of the other forwards who recorded at least 10 minutes on the Wild PK this year.

Quote

Wild coach John Hynes likes his team’s mindset and hadn’t yet decided if he’ll make any lineup changes for Game 6, but he did indicate that he expects Filip Gustavsson will be ready to start after he fell ill before Tuesday’s game and made it through two periods before having to pull himself for Marc-Andre Fleury.

 

[Kevin]

To be serious and keeping home town emotion out of this, talent usually wins out and that is exactly what is happening in this series.  The reason why Vegas enters with a 1 seed and the Wild are a wildcard is because they are just a better team.  The frustrating point is that hockey is hockey and so many nights the bounces fall your way even if you are not the best team on the ice and the Wild have had more than their share of chances in this series.  However, the team is from Minnesota where lucky things very seldom happen.  Hopefully Guerin spends wisely this off season and our chances of being "lucky" improve through talent next year

[mnfaninnc]

9 hours ago, Kevin said:

The reason why Vegas enters with a 1 seed and the Wild are a wildcard is because they are just a better team.

Vegas also had a lot of injuries this season and look like they are reasonably healthy. So, while we should have finished better with a healthy lineup through the regular season, the same should be said about Vegas, they could have been the #1 overall seed.

[OldDutchChip]

13 hours ago, Sam said:

You’re not sure what was implied? I thought I was pretty straightforward with my thoughts of a shitty call. At least from the replays they showed us on FanDuel, they probably had something more definitive in Toronto. Btw, this whole optimistic and positive outlook on things is a good look for you ODC. Keep it up.

But it was a clear offside….

[Scalptrash]

20 hours ago, Dean said:

14 mil cap penalty  is a morale victory Billy says. That’s loser talk. Dallas has that on IR and you don’t hear them talking morale victories. only in minny do we find morale victories in being losers . Who says you have to spend to the limit to win a cup ? So by Billy’s thinking next year with all his money he has to win the cup . Billy could have found better players at better value during his 5 years here  but no. Doing the same crap and calling it something different is what we do. Morale victories. Haha 

  Until Billy resigns kappy he hasn’t done crap! With Judds prospects taking a decade to produce in nhl , kappy leaving would be devastating. Such a bright future of fantasies ! 

Agree 100%. Thank you for a realist point of view. Billy has one year to make it to the WCF or he is a failure. This is based on everything he has been spewing and excusing for the last three years. The only recent prospect that has truly met or exceeded expectations is Rossi, and no matter what he does, he can't win. He will be replaced by someone older, who isn't rising, but declining, and won't produce the same.

Judd gets way too much credit for his genius picks. Only Boldy and Rossi have truly panned out so far. Lots in the pipeline, just like forever, but very few ever live up to the hype. Many other teams seem to still do better and get immediate contributions.

 

[raithis]

16 hours ago, joebou15 said:

SSme m I ght be willing to feel upbeat, excited for the future of things and continue to give the team a mulligan as it contends for a Cup with less spending power.

However, that's never how the GM played. He had the opportunity to bottom out and gain high draft picks and come into next year with even more bullets to fire. He chose, instead, to compete for a cup and thus keep his team competitive. 

So if the GM wasn't willing to lower expectations, why should we?

Tony is right. The Wild had chances to take a stranglehold on the series and they didn't. Because that's how the playoffs work. It doesn't matter if you came close, or the storyline of the series feels more positive. All the matters is wins and losses. And through it all, the Wild had the same swing throughout each of the last 3 series and it hasn't mattered if it was a dominant good, or an injury-depleted one, or one like this year where they are healthy and scoring. They have not won when it mattered most.

That's where I'm at. I'm not willing to let them off the hook for another playoff one and done (if they lose in Game 6 or 7) when the organization hasn't once been willing to lower their own standards.

And if you're a boxer with one hand tied behind your back, all it takes is to land one good punch for the KO. So fight, or don't fight. Win or lose. Morale victories are over. Time to make shit happen. 

Who says it was the GM? 

Let's say hypothetically that Kaprizov did not want to be part of a team going into a rebuild?  Everyone who makes this comment assumes that he would be fine playing on a team that is not competitive at all. 

Teams who tear it all down do not bounce back quickly - especially those who at the time did not have much in the cupboard when it comes to prospects, and who also did not have a ton of players who would yield a lot of high picks as trade assets to bounce back extremely fast.

A lot of teams were starting to get pressed up against the cap ceiling, so trades to get those picks would have included salary dumps for underperforming players with bad contracts, further reducing the types of picks we would get in return and we'd be saddled with bad contracts.

Even more, the Wild hasn't generally been a team that attracted the best free agents without a bit of overpayment, so all those bad contracts start to impair our ability to re-sign the good prospects that age out of their ELCs.

A full rebuild would have set this team back a long ways and we'd be worse off.  Whether someone like Kaprizov (or his agent) indicated that he wanted to play for a competitive team or if it was Leipold or whoever, it doesn't really matter. Guerin read the field right.  This was the best choice forward, and the Wild have done well to progress despite it.

Edited May 1 by raithis
Clerical error

[joebou15]

3 minutes ago, raithis said:

Who says it was the GM?

The GM is the one publicly saying this.

Sure, there could be stuff happening in the background, but we also don't get to hear or see what's going on in the background.

[Imyourhuckleberry]

On 4/30/2025 at 8:25 PM, mnfaninnc said:

I thought the rule was any body part not in the zone counted as onsides. To me, looking at the NHL offsides camera angle, it showed Nyquist's back elbow at the very least over the blue line. That is a body part. Both skates were in the zone, but he was leaning over the blue line. 

I also thought that to have a call overturned it had to be clear visual evidence. Perhaps my interpretation of the rule is wrong, but in my eyes, there was a body part onsides and that fulfills my understanding of the rule. The blue line now goes up to the roof. 

As far as I can tell, "any body part" is an incorrect interpretation of the rule. The line does extend to the roof since 2021. Prior to that, a player was required to have "skate contact" with the ice in order to avoid offsides. Now, a player can be in stride with their trailing skate in the air, but the rule still applies to the skates rather than any body part.

Quote

A player is on-side when either of his skates are in contact with the blue line, or on his own side of the line, at the instant the puck completely crosses the leading edge of the blue line. On his own side of the line shall be defined by a “plane” of the blue line which shall extend from the leading edge of the blue line upwards. If a player’s skate has yet to break the “plane” prior to the puck crossing the leading edge, he is deemed to be on-side for the purpose of the off-side rule.

Basically, if a player’s skate is in the air, but isn’t completely in the offensive zone, he’ll be considered onside.

This tweak eliminates the need for determining whether or not a player’s skate was touching the ice or was 2 mm off the ice.

Quote above taken from a Boston Bruins site posted back in 2020.

Nyquist, unfortunately, clearly had both skates beyond the blue line there.

[mnfaninnc]

On 5/2/2025 at 1:14 PM, Imyourhuckleberry said:

Nyquist, unfortunately, clearly had both skates beyond the blue line there.

Well, I stand corrected. I thought they'd changed it to any body part, so a guy wiping out could stick his hand back onside. Or, in this case, Nyquist's upper body was onside, but there is absolutely no debate on the skates. They are clearly over, and if that's the rule, Nyquist had to straddle and he didn't make that effort.