Article: The Mikael Granlund Contract Should Have Ended the Marco Rossi Debate

[mnfaninnc]

32 minutes ago, SkolWild73 said:

Of course, Billy has all the power, but that doesn't mean you sign him to a 2 x $4.5.  What kind of message does that send to the rest of the players on the team as well as the rest of the league?  We offered him 5 x5M.  To do less years and offer less would be a terrible look.  The CBA wasn't put in place to screw over players coming out of their ELC, it was done to help teams to keep the players that they drafted.  Back to the 5 X 5M we offered.  If we offer 4 years, then the AAV goes up.  4 x6-7 is fair for both sides.  The total contract is close to what we originally offered, and we can still trade him if we want down the road .  Rossi gets close to what he is asking for, just less years, and if he plays well, he will get a larger one at the end of it when he is a UFA

You're wrong here. Less years = less AAV coming out of the ELC. More years>AAV because you are buying out improvement + UFA years. Go back and look at the Fletcher years, you'll see it.

[B1GKappa97]

2 hours ago, MNCountryLife said:

Every dollar of every contract matters.  We can say: "Pay the Man, he is worth it"... and he probably is.... but it won't change the fact that if we can get Rossi at $5M instead of $7M that leaves $2M more that can go to another player and make this team deeper.  So we play the money game. 

Exactly. Its crazy to me that we get mad at Bill because he 'overpaid' Zuccy/Hartman/Foligno/Trenin/Middsy but when he tries to get value from a more valuable player, which will make him an easier asset to move in the future, we also get upset with him...

Fact is that Rossi has limited leverage. It sucks for him but it is what it is. The sooner he and his agent accept that and sign his deal, the sooner he can start increasing his value to make another team want to offer more than some spare parts for him via trade. 

[mnfaninnc]

19 minutes ago, ArizonaWildFan said:

This isn't meant to be an argument but rather looking at last season from a different perspective. Would Rossi have been higher than a 60 point player last season if Kaprizov and Ek wouldn't have been out at the same time for an extended period? IMO absolutely.

Guerin is quick to say that Ek needs depth help. Guerin was tight-lipped when Rossi stepped in to Ek's role while he was injured, without having Kaprizov's help as well.

Rossi has been and continues to be held to a higher standard than others on the team and around the league. I wish the Wild management and coaches, along with the Rossi hating fans, would just come out and say they don't like him rather than trying to make lame excuses for not wanting him around. Grow some balls, people, because statistically moving on from Rossi just doesn't make sense.

I don't know that Rossi would have been higher. If Heinzy keeps Boldy-Ek-Kaprizov together, Rossi doesn't really have anyone helping him. If Heinzy goes Boldy-Rossi-Kaprizov, which would be an good line too, he's likely higher.

But, in that argument, Rossi doesn't get PP1 time, likely lowering his point total, and he's likely getting a little less icetime. 

[B1GKappa97]

Rossi's not getting $7M unless somebody offer-sheets him. 

So he should just accept the offer on the table and let us move on already. 

[OldDutchChip]

27 minutes ago, ArizonaWildFan said:

This isn't meant to be an argument but rather looking at last season from a different perspective. Would Rossi have been higher than a 60 point player last season if Kaprizov and Ek wouldn't have been out at the same time for an extended period? IMO absolutely.

Guerin is quick to say that Ek needs depth help. Guerin was tight-lipped when Rossi stepped in to Ek's role while he was injured, without having Kaprizov's help as well.

Rossi has been and continues to be held to a higher standard than others on the team and around the league. I wish the Wild management and coaches, along with the Rossi hating fans, would just come out and say they don't like him rather than trying to make lame excuses for not wanting him around. Grow some balls, people, because statistically moving on from Rossi just doesn't make sense.

the whole universe is against Rossi! zona - stay strong!

[goenzoy]

3 hours ago, MNCountryLife said:

Every dollar of every contract matters.  We can say: "Pay the Man, he is worth it"... and he probably is.... but it won't change the fact that if we can get Rossi at $5M instead of $7M that leaves $2M more that can go to another player and make this team deeper.  So we play the money game. 

There is zero chance of getting Rossi for $5M or for that matter any forward with 2C potential . Sole exception maybe a one year deal signed 3 days before training camp . With the risk that Yurov will be good and Kaprisov healthy  whole season. And Rossi not doing a 60 put a 75 point season 

[goenzoy]

3 hours ago, OldDutchChip said:

so it's simple - Rossi is a good player - but he doesn't fit our Top 6

If he fits Top 6 is not really relevant 

Even a 3C can demand close to 7 million next off season 

And the height argument is almost bizarre . Rossi will be a 200lb player soon 

[SkolWild73]

28 minutes ago, mnfaninnc said:

You're wrong here. Less years = less AAV coming out of the ELC. More years>AAV because you are buying out improvement + UFA years. Go back and look at the Fletcher years, you'll see it.

With my example I gave, I do not think I am wrong.  If he was signing for 7 years yes, I am suggesting 4, no UFA years are being bought out, it takes him right to his UFA season.  Signing him for 2 at $4.5 yes gives him arbitration rights and a higher QO in two years but cut my proposal of 6-7M in half and say 6.5M a year pays him 26M.  He would need a contract of 8.5M to make up the difference in two years.  I think the optics of offering a player 5 years and then cutting it to two is not a good look, and I think a 4-year contract at 6-7M is quite fair for both sides.  Just my opinion though.  

[0 Stanley Cups]

1 hour ago, B1GKappa97 said:

Exactly. Its crazy to me that we get mad at Bill because he 'overpaid' Zuccy/Hartman/Foligno/Trenin/Middsy but when he tries to get value from a more valuable player, which will make him an easier asset to move in the future, we also get upset with him...

Fact is that Rossi has limited leverage. It sucks for him but it is what it is. The sooner he and his agent accept that and sign his deal, the sooner he can start increasing his value to make another team want to offer more than some spare parts for him via trade. 

Very true, BG was used to getting players to accept less than their worth because poor old-BG we have the parise/suter buyout, please take a team friendly deal.

Rossi does have limited leverage, just wait a bit until Ek gets hurt then the Wild are going to be hurting.  BG has to be sweating a bit until 97 and 23 resolves itself.  The way Rossi has been treated sure shows Wallstedt, Jiricek, Buium, Yurov, and Ohgren what awaits them!

Trenin at $3.5 for three more years is a brutal overpay, but he signed after Foligno got hurt much of the season and the Wild had no other big bodies.

[B1GKappa97]

16 minutes ago, 0 Stanley Cups said:

Very true, BG was used to getting players to accept less than their worth because poor old-BG we have the parise/suter buyout, please take a team friendly deal.

Rossi does have limited leverage, just wait a bit until Ek gets hurt then the Wild are going to be hurting.  BG has to be sweating a bit until 97 and 23 resolves itself.  The way Rossi has been treated sure shows Wallstedt, Jiricek, Buium, Yurov, and Ohgren what awaits them!

Trenin at $3.5 for three more years is a brutal overpay, but he signed after Foligno got hurt much of the season and the Wild had no other big bodies.

They were hurting with Ek injured even when Rossi was playing.. dude had only 4 points in all of March despite playing top-line minutes with Boldy and Zuccy while Kap and Ek were out the entire month. 

If it was Rossi signed to a $5.25M contract and Ek trying to get $7M... Ek probably would've gotten that $7M. 

Edited July 8 by B1GKappa97

[OldDutchChip]

44 minutes ago, goenzoy said:

If he fits Top 6 is not really relevant 

Even a 3C can demand close to 7 million next off season 

And the height argument is almost bizarre . Rossi will be a 200lb player soon 

of course it's relevant, he wants and expects himself to be a top 6 player. 

it's not a height argument but more weight and strength that matters and how you use that. 

[goenzoy]

2 minutes ago, OldDutchChip said:

of course it's relevant, he wants and expects himself to be a top 6 player. 

it's not a height argument but more weight and strength that matters and how you use that. 

He is already a top 6 player. If he can do it any season and during any game is a different story . At the end of the day team needs to sort out next season 

The rest is rather irrelevant and what will follow in 2026 

But at least they still have the whole August 

[OldDutchChip]

10 minutes ago, goenzoy said:

He is already a top 6 player. If he can do it any season and during any game is a different story . At the end of the day team needs to sort out next season 

The rest is rather irrelevant and what will follow in 2026 

But at least they still have the whole August 

[MNCountryLife]

I never understood why we play inter-divisional opponents in preseason.  Don't we play them enough already.  West teams should play east teams in preseason.

[WildNotMild]

9 minutes ago, MNCountryLife said:

I never understood why we play inter-divisional opponents in preseason.  Don't we play them enough already.  West teams should play east teams in preseason.

Probably to cut down on travel, although it doesn’t help much in the Western Conference.  Second is the thought that divisional matchups will help put butts in the seats for meaningless games.

[WildNotMild]

Again, McBain just signed a 4.25M x 5 year contract coming off a 27 point season.  I don’t think Rossi is a 5M or less player on any deal, although Billy can stick to the QO only.  I do think it is tricky for Billy to argue that Rossi shouldn’t get a better contract and then likely try to trade him to another GM while arguing that the same other GM should value Rossi higher in a trade than the value Billy placed on Rossi.  Although that is the same logic that many posters on this forum use.

[mnhockeyfan03]

7 minutes ago, WildNotMild said:

Again, McBain just signed a 4.25M x 5 year contract coming off a 27 point season.  I don’t think Rossi is a 5M or less player on any deal, although Billy can stick to the QO only.  I do think it is tricky for Billy to argue that Rossi shouldn’t get a better contract and then likely try to trade him to another GM while arguing that the same other GM should value Rossi higher in a trade than the value Billy placed on Rossi.  Although that is the same logic that many posters on this forum use.

I would rather have Mcbain than Rossi.  

[WildNotMild]

11 minutes ago, mnhockeyfan03 said:

I would rather have Mcbain than Rossi.  

It depends.  If we are talking about a 3C, then I would agree because McBain’s height, weight and nastiness would be a benefit.  If we are talking about a 2C, then Rossi’s better skill and 2-way game would prevail.

I think this is part of the underlying issue with the Rossi situation.  If Yurov shows that he is a legit 2C or definitely will be, Rossi isn’t a good fit as a bottom 6 center.  If Yurov struggles or is a better fit on the wing, then the Wild still need an offensive top 6 center.

I am not a huge Billy fan, but I think he is really trying to bide his time before having to really commit to Rossi because of the above.  I would like to see Rossi stay because the more natural centers a team has, especially in the playoffs, the better.

[mnfaninnc]

2 hours ago, SkolWild73 said:

With my example I gave, I do not think I am wrong.  If he was signing for 7 years yes, I am suggesting 4, no UFA years are being bought out, it takes him right to his UFA season.  Signing him for 2 at $4.5 yes gives him arbitration rights and a higher QO in two years but cut my proposal of 6-7M in half and say 6.5M a year pays him 26M.  He would need a contract of 8.5M to make up the difference in two years.  I think the optics of offering a player 5 years and then cutting it to two is not a good look, and I think a 4-year contract at 6-7M is quite fair for both sides.  Just my opinion though.

I wouldn't be completely unhappy at 5 x $5m, and I could probably swallow 4 x $5m, but the best thing for the Wild is to have the contract end while Rossi is still an RFA. 2 x $4-4.5m is right where Rossi is right now. It's not just the points but overall game. This contract is easy to move if necessary. 

It may sound like I'm being harsh on Rossi, but I'm not on the trade him bandwagon unless we really improve our team. My biggest issue is that he still needs strength to be the most effective player that he can be. But, if you look at how it went for Granny, how it went for Nino, and how it went for Coyle, they all got 2nd contracts with a low AAV. My point is that this is also how Rossi should be treated. It was recently that people start handing out large contracts to kids after their ELCs. I would say that the success rate on that is a little higher than 50%. 

But what we could do is have a mock arbitration case for Rossi even though it wouldn't count for anything. So, if I'm in Guerin's shoes, I look straight into the agents eyes and tell him "I don't know which player Marco is. Is he the one for the first 3/4 of the season, or the one for the last 1/4 of the season." "Let's go 2 years and he can prove which one he is."

The thing is, none of us really know which player he is. We've got the evidence of the injury that he played through, and that could be part of the reason, but the slide started well before the puck to the knee. Scoring 0 points and looking invisible against Colorado and Dallas and then scoring 3 points against San Jose makes you look like you're a ppg player. But really, are you? No, and that's the issue we have here. Does Rossi simply disappear in important games with better competition? 

I also would like to see angry Rossi, one with a chip on his shoulder like Marchand has played his whole career. We don't need any face licking, but I'd like to see him playing with that chip and getting into a few scrums, fighting for position, chipping at goalies who don't quite have the puck frozen. I don't think you get a look at that with $7m x 7 or $6m x 6. I think you probably do with $4-4.5m x 2. And, would this be a team value contract? You bet it is! 

When Granny got his 2nd contract, he put up another 40ish point year and then exploded on the wing with 69. Was 60 a mirage? I don't know and neither does anyone else. That's why you bridge at a low number. That carrot for the young guys still needs to be there. 

[mnfaninnc]

2 hours ago, MNCountryLife said:

I never understood why we play inter-divisional opponents in preseason.  Don't we play them enough already.  West teams should play east teams in preseason.

I might be wrong, but I think it's the teams that set up the preseason games, not the league. They do it for a short travel schedule, and that's the way the divisions are set up. Really, out east you could go just about anywhere for preseason, and nobody cares about the west so this is what we have. It will be interesting to see if Utah does some Pacific conference teams.

[mnfaninnc]

1 hour ago, WildNotMild said:

Again, McBain just signed a 4.25M x 5 year contract coming off a 27 point season.  I don’t think Rossi is a 5M or less player on any deal, although Billy can stick to the QO only.  I do think it is tricky for Billy to argue that Rossi shouldn’t get a better contract and then likely try to trade him to another GM while arguing that the same other GM should value Rossi higher in a trade than the value Billy placed on Rossi.  Although that is the same logic that many posters on this forum use.

It's internal and external. Internally you want the player for a low number, externally he may be the next Gretzky. GMs play this game all the time. It's really none of our business what Utah gave McBain. Shooter merely has to point to Tavares' contract and say "see." 

[Tony Abbott]

9 minutes ago, mnfaninnc said:

Shooter merely has to point to Tavares' contract and say "see." 

This would work great on someone who did not know anything else about Tavares' situation or market value. Do you think his agent is one of them?

[mnfaninnc]

5 minutes ago, Tony Abbott said:

This would work great on someone who did not know anything else about Tavares' situation or market value. Do you think his agent is one of them?

No, and I don't think it's an arms length deal either. But, it is a quick answer to WNM's question on McBain. And it also points out that there are other valuable things to have other than point production. Plus McBain always scores against us. If he just played us, he'd probably be a 50 goal scorer.

[mnfaninnc]

Interesting tidbit, Mikael Granlund is tied for the highest paid forward on the Ducks, yikes!

[OldDutchChip]

1 hour ago, WildNotMild said:

It depends.  If we are talking about a 3C, then I would agree because McBain’s height, weight and nastiness would be a benefit.  If we are talking about a 2C, then Rossi’s better skill and 2-way game would prevail.

I think this is part of the underlying issue with the Rossi situation.  If Yurov shows that he is a legit 2C or definitely will be, Rossi isn’t a good fit as a bottom 6 center.  If Yurov struggles or is a better fit on the wing, then the Wild still need an offensive top 6 center.

I am not a huge Billy fan, but I think he is really trying to bide his time before having to really commit to Rossi because of the above.  I would like to see Rossi stay because the more natural centers a team has, especially in the playoffs, the better.

how about i bring up matt duchene? yes he is older, but in the next 4 years he will for sure outperform Rossi. so how about that for comparison? Rossi at 4.5 for 4 years? no? 

also try to understand that this is not about just Rossi. Billy needs to construct a team that can actually win the SC and he has to be smart at it. he cannot overload our top 6 with players that share similar limitations, ones that will be exploited in the Playoffs. That is as simple as that. We need to diversify our top 6. 

Sure, if our team was Vegas then Rossi could slot in the top 6 and line up with brutes like Stone and Eichel.

OOOOOh let's make that happen - surely they'd trade Dorofeev for Rossi! Rossi kicks his butt in your precious point comparison 60 to 52....they would no doubt jump at that? 

no, of course they won't. there is a lesson in there if you can uncover it 😉