Article: The Oilers Provided the Blueprint For Minnesota’s Blue Line

[Justin Wiggins]

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[FredJohnson]

Boo Yum!!

[Burnt Toast]

The best organizations create opportunities for the players they can acquire. Not every player type is best available to be drafted in your slot. Not every player type is available in trade or FA. There are styles and trends but ultimately the Wild have ended up with a mix. They sure seemed excited about drafting ZB and picking up Jiri. I think the change you’re describing as a possibility for our Dcore is coming. As a fan I enjoy that style of hockey. Hopefully someone in the NHL can put together a formula for knocking off what the Panthers have going. I’d enjoy the current SC champions getting lit up. 

[BillieGismylover]

I don’t think our defensemen are going to be the problem. Faber, Buium and Brodin will make for a very solid core. BG needs to really think about what he’s potentially getting in Boeser. A good player no doubt. But unless he signs for a hometown discount I’d be passing. He’s a career plus minus -33. He’s not known for his defense or physicality. He’s a 40 to 50 point a year player. Personally I’d rather pay Rossi. I think BG knows he needs a top line center to give Ek a break. Problem is who do you go after now that Duchene and Toews are off the market. Do we really think Tavares or Marner would sign here???

[Will D. Ness]

I thought Edmonton's defense was pretty awful in the finals.  Their gaffes far outweighed their offensive contributions.  Difference in the series IMO.

[Patrick]

If Edmonton had the Wilds D they would be hoisting the cup right now. 

[Mateo3xm]

“Edmonton just proved that those mistakes don’t have to torpedo your season.”

I feel like Their defense torpedoed their playoff series. Edmonton’s defense has always been subpar at playing defense and you can’t win a championship with horseshit defense. I don’t see any similarities in those two with Buium and Jiricek. Buium is actually very defensively responsible and so is Jiricek.

Jiricek just needs a little work on backskating. Edmonton is one of the most oblivious teams in terms of filling holes on their team. They obviously didn’t need more offense and yet they chose to get offensive defenseman like walman and klingberg. For some reason the fans of the oilers can’t figure out that it isn’t the goalie, it’s the defenseman in front of the goalie.

[Mateo3xm]

1 hour ago, Will D. Ness said:

I thought Edmonton's defense was pretty awful in the finals.  Their gaffes far outweighed their offensive contributions.  Difference in the series IMO.

100% I don’t know why their management can’t see that that’s the issue. Oilers management is atrocious and I’m honestly wondering if MCD is second guessing if he wants to stay there.

[NoJoSux]

Klingberg is gonna be the answer, yup. That's the ticket boys. A defensive liability Euro defenseman. 

This article should be talking about Florida's Euros and effective value guys like Schmidt and Kulikov. The Panthers Euros are big and play the body. Their defense is a solid group with very few weak points.

The Oilers couldn't say that. They gave up a ton of goals in the finals. 

[Enforceror]

The defense is part of the reason I think we're not too far off from contender. I think we have one of the better d-cores. Gus isn't elite but he's not far off. Hoping Wally can get it figured out. The point though, I agree with the back to front build. If we can figure out how to get a couple pieces up front we'll be in the running. I don't think we'll find them this year though.

[0 Stanley Cups]

Both Spurgeon and Brodin's ability to stay healthy should be a concern for the Wild going forward.  Spurgeon had hip and back issues the previous two seasons, and the only season Brodin has played 82 was in 2018-19.  Brodin will also be on team Sweden for the upcoming winter olympics, do we really think he's going to play 82+olympics next year and be healthy enough for a playoff run...nope.

[Pewterschmidt]

10 hours ago, Enforceror said:

The point though, I agree with the back to front build. If we can figure out how to get a couple pieces up front we'll be in the running.

We're on year seven of the build out of the back end.  Does bill begin building out the forward corps in year 10?

[mnfaninnc]

6 minutes ago, Pewterschmidt said:

We're on year seven of the build out of the back end.  Does bill begin building out the forward corps in year 10?

If you are building it out via drafting, then, yes, they probably show up accomplished more like year 10. I'd expect to see Lambos this season in St. Paul and we're going to see The Wall. 

Forwards take a little less time to develop and we will likely see a lot of Yurov and OgZ this season. We don't have any superstars in this group that I can see, though. Drafts '20-22 should provide a good core of players....when they're ready. Sadly, I think Peart is a miss. 

[mnfaninnc]

With McDavid and Draisaitl, Edmonton has the luxury of being able to outscore opponents with some sloppy defense. The Wild do not have either of these players and are not able to outscore opponents in a track meet style. 

Perhaps we get some good offense from our back end, and we've been known for that for quite some time. However, that does not mean that the defenders can be sloppy back in their own end. We simply can't have that.

Implementing the rookies will likely lead to mistakes, but I expect them to learn from mistakes and not keep committing them. This is why I find this article to be misleading. We have nothing to learn from Edmonton, Florida is who we should be concentrating on. 

[Justin Wiggins]

13 hours ago, Mateo3xm said:

“Edmonton just proved that those mistakes don’t have to torpedo your season.”

I feel like Their defense torpedoed their playoff series. Edmonton’s defense has always been subpar at playing defense and you can’t win a championship with horseshit defense. I don’t see any similarities in those two with Buium and Jiricek. Buium is actually very defensively responsible and so is Jiricek.

Jiricek just needs a little work on backskating. Edmonton is one of the most oblivious teams in terms of filling holes on their team. They obviously didn’t need more offense and yet they chose to get offensive defenseman like walman and klingberg. For some reason the fans of the oilers can’t figure out that it isn’t the goalie, it’s the defenseman in front of the goalie.

Yes, their defense started to finally fail in the Final. But they've made it to the Cup Final two years in a row with volatile defense, and quite frankly, so has Florida. The point is you don't need two Norris Trophy candidates on your blue line to make it that far - you just need to fit your pieces together right. And the Wild have a collection of freaking awesome pieces with multiple skillsets to use. 

Just please don't sit Buium if he has a defensive mistake two games in a row. 

[Enforceror]

We had success early in the season shooting from the blue line. Yeah it's not high danger but if we have someone net front to clean up the garbage it's a viable strategy. I think this is why were after another Ek.

[Enforceror]

2 hours ago, Pewterschmidt said:

We're on year seven of the build out of the back end.  Does bill begin building out the forward corps in year 10?

I guess that depends on if our picks hit or not....and when. FA has not been kind to us and honestly, I'd rather not get stuck with an aging non-productive forward that just eats cap space....just for the purpose of "satisfying" the fan base. 

Not sure where to draw the line between patience and pitchfork.

 

[FredJohnson]

18 hours ago, NoJoSux said:

Klingberg is gonna be the answer, yup. That's the ticket boys. A defensive liability Euro defenseman. 

He’ll offset our light-on-the-puck Euro forward.

[Pewterschmidt]

1 hour ago, FredJohnson said:

He’ll offset our light-on-the-puck Euro forward.

Jeez I can’t unsee the neck beard

 #protec where have you gone

[NoJoSux]

18 hours ago, Enforceror said:

The defense is part of the reason I think we're not too far off from contender. I think we have one of the better d-cores. Gus isn't elite but he's not far off. Hoping Wally can get it figured out. The point though, I agree with the back to front build. If we can figure out how to get a couple pieces up front we'll be in the running. I don't think we'll find them this year though.

Yes, but the chemistry has to be rekindled. When MN was winning at a league-best pace, they were rolling four lines, playing three pairs, getting wins against Dallas, Colorado, and Utahzona was also easily taken care of. Last year without Kirill and especially with NoJo's regular season blowbag'n the Wild were disjointed, disconnected, easily rattled, rapidly regressing, and only a couple guys would be going at a time. Hartman losing his mind against Ottawa was an example of MN getting smoked and Spurgeon getting blasted against the Isles with no response. 

I've said this here for a long time but the formula is there with each Cup team. You need a couple top lines and special teams that's effective regularly. Then, goaltending and depth for a long run. Obviously, a good coach and a GM that can grab Seth Jones, or Vladimir Tarasenko at the last minute to boost ya over the top. Marchand adding in double-rat quality to the Panthers doesn't hurt either, but you can see the winning teams find that sometimes. STL did it under Berube. Colorado was unstoppable when they won with Kuemper for crud's sake. The Wild have had their moments but never good enough or at the right times. Close, but they're worse off than the bewildered and begotten Oilers right now. 

The Wild will need to find a chemistry and confidence that they haven't really had too good or consistently since marketing did the failed playoffs grit-video. This year the Winnipeg game one was looking good til it wasn't. That was kinda a turning point last year IMO.