Article: There's A Lot Riding On Jesper Wallstedt's Bounceback Season

[B1GKappa97]

15 hours ago, Outskated said:

The blame for Wally's bad year falls solely on BG's shoulders.  Flouting a 3-goalie rotation and telling him to get an apartment were egregious errors.  It totally messed with his head and made everything a disaster.  Goalies are already headcases, so this was just a stupid move especially when we had almost no cap space to start the season.  This year, BG is leaving money available in case he has to go trade for a goalie if Wally struggles.

Gus is to blame. If he hadn't come out scorching hot, they would've found a way to rotate in Wallstedt. 

[Citizen Strife]

Outside of injuries, everything that happened was on Wallstedt.  Gus can force things to an extent, but if Wall played like shit in Iowa, that's under his control.

Gus playing for a contract should force Wallstedt to man up and take the backup role.  Fleury isn't there to "block him" (hate that term, but it applies for once).  So it's his role to lose.

Edited July 17 by Citizen Strife

[Imyourhuckleberry]

15 hours ago, 1Brotherbill said:

Buium and Jiricek on the 3rd pair.  Maybe spread the new kids out but reality is he is a 3rd pairing right now.  As far as his offensive skill he is top pair on this team.  Spurgeon is not a scorer.  Brodin is average with Faber.  Middleton we don't know and probably never will.  Buium has shown he can score.  So the two kids are going to be the offensive defenseman on this team.

I think they might put Buium at 1st pairing with Faber. Middleton and Spurgeon have a solid history together. I don't think they are going to pair up 2 guys getting their first full season on NHL ice for line 3.

[mnfaninnc]

I think The Wall is going to be just fine. One nice thing about having this goalie tandem is that they play pretty much the same style of game. The Wall is a bit bigger than Goose, but both are calm in the net and The Wall is reported to be able to track pucks better than Goose. 

My hope is that they start the season playing every other game. Both goalies can get settled in, then. 

What The Wall has missed the past season or 2 has been getting NHL shooters against him. The angles are slightly different as NHL shooters can pick corners, so I imagine an adjustment period for him. I also believe he is a quick learner.

[1Brotherbill]

8 hours ago, Imyourhuckleberry said:

I think they might put Buium at 1st pairing with Faber. Middleton and Spurgeon have a solid history together. I don't think they are going to pair up 2 guys getting their first full season on NHL ice for line 3.

Maybe, but Faber and Middleton work well together.  Spurgeon and Brodin can teach the new kids.  Regardless the d core will be more offensive this season with Buium and Jiricek. 

[1Brotherbill]

23 hours ago, Burnt Toast said:

I think so too. I base my opinion on his family. He grew up surrounded by professional goalies. I’ve read things he’s said, he’s aware of where he’s at and what areas need to improve. I’m really excited about the season coming up, not just to see JW, but all the new players. 

When you hear him talk he has a handle on what he needs to do and where he wants to go.  The three goalie thing last year was really unexpected and foolish to even think it would work.  That messed with his head a bit.

[ArizonaWildFan]

Does anyone miss ODC weighing in? All the posts make sense now.

I don't follow things in Des Moines much, but how much of Wallstedt's down year had to do with the Iowa Wild having a down year? They fired the coach and brought in a new guy so something must have been wrong. In watching the big club all season, it sure seemed like quite a few of the top AHL'ers were away from the Iowa club. Just a thought.

[Imyourhuckleberry]

7 minutes ago, ArizonaWildFan said:

Does anyone miss ODC weighing in? All the posts make sense now.

I don't follow things in Des Moines much, but how much of Wallstedt's down year had to do with the Iowa Wild having a down year? They fired the coach and brought in a new guy so something must have been wrong. In watching the big club all season, it sure seemed like quite a few of the top AHL'ers were away from the Iowa club.

Did I miss some news on ODC?

Iowa Wild didn't fire their coach, he was hired away by the Vancouver Canuck's head coach, Adam Foote. It did force the Wild to look elsewhere and they likely have a better coach now. I know most people felt like they should have upgraded the Iowa Wild coach, so this could be a promising development.

Per Adam Foote, Brett McLean will run the power play for the Canucks.

[FredJohnson]

On 7/16/2025 at 11:48 AM, Scalptrash said:

Does anyone feel really good about Wallstedt? I certainly don't. He either isn't that good or kind of a head case. If he is going to make it in the NHL, he should be dominating in the AHL. I'm not that impressed by a .908 and .910 save percentage in the AHL, even when he was playing well. He's been touted for years that he was essentially the second coming and I'm just not seeing it. Look out for Jiricek too.

He's still too young to write off.

[FredJohnson]

On 7/18/2025 at 9:36 AM, ArizonaWildFan said:

Does anyone miss ODC weighing in?

Does anyone miss hemorrhoids?

[Pewterschmidt]

On 7/18/2025 at 9:48 AM, Imyourhuckleberry said:

Per Adam Foote, Brett McLean will run the power play for the Canucks.

Good luck with that

[FredJohnson]

On 7/18/2025 at 9:36 AM, ArizonaWildFan said:

I don't follow things in Des Moines much, but how much of Wallstedt's down year had to do with the Iowa Wild having a down year? They fired the coach and brought in a new guy

I don't follow the club in Dezy Moinz a lot either but the guys on Wilderness Talk do as well as the guys on The Sota Pod (especially spokedz). They've been pretty critical of the whole operation in Iowa for several years.

 

 

[FredJohnson]

On 7/18/2025 at 9:48 AM, Imyourhuckleberry said:

Iowa Wild didn't fire their coach, he was hired away by the Vancouver Canuck's head coach, Adam Foote.

(The following is completely random and reckless speculation)

Maybe McLean got the wink/nudge from Silly Billy that he was gonna get fired. So McLean hit the trail like horse 💩.

[Up North Guy]

1 hour ago, FredJohnson said:

(The following is completely random and reckless speculation)

Maybe McLean got the wink/nudge from Silly Billy that he was gonna get fired. So McLean hit the trail like horse 💩.

Smells like it

[raithis]

I think Wallstedt will be fine too.  There will be an adjustment period as he gets used to the NHL, but I honestly think he will do better in the NHL than the AHL after that initial adjustment period.  He reminds me so much of Gustavsson that I think the Wild's defensive system will complement him kind of like it has with Gus.

The Wild just need to get him some consistent playing time so that adjustment period doesn't last all season.

[Mateo3xm]

On 7/16/2025 at 11:48 AM, Scalptrash said:

Does anyone feel really good about Wallstedt? I certainly don't. He either isn't that good or kind of a head case. If he is going to make it in the NHL, he should be dominating in the AHL. I'm not that impressed by a .908 and .910 save percentage in the AHL, even when he was playing well. He's been touted for years that he was essentially the second coming and I'm just not seeing it. Look out for Jiricek too.

I don’t care what superstar goalie you have, if you don’t have a defense in front of you, you aren’t going to be good. If you look at his stats, he’s been very solid in pretty much every league he’s been in and he’s been playing in leagues above his age range for a long time. One bad season with horrendous defense in front of him isn’t a concern for me. 
He had a shutout in the NHL, granted it was against the Blackhawks but still that’s impressive. I think if he had the wilds defense in front of him, I think he’ll do just fine but obviously there’s going to be growing pains.

[Mateo3xm]

On 7/22/2025 at 12:45 PM, raithis said:

I think Wallstedt will be fine too.  There will be an adjustment period as he gets used to the NHL, but I honestly think he will do better in the NHL than the AHL after that initial adjustment period.  He reminds me so much of Gustavsson that I think the Wild's defensive system will complement him kind of like it has with Gus.

The Wild just need to get him some consistent playing time so that adjustment period doesn't last all season.

That’s exactly what I think too.

[Mateo3xm]

On 7/16/2025 at 2:03 PM, Pewterschmidt said:

considering the Fletcherian draft haul he gave up.  Mainly Guerin b/c he's the one who had a stiffy for Jiri. And at his age it's time for Jiri to start showing REAL potential.  Nevermind the bigger guys need more time blather...not when you forfeit a couple drafts to get the guy.

We basically gave up a boarder line 3rd pairing dman and a later 1st round pick for him. From what I saw of him he looked solid in the NHL. Obviously there’s still things to improve but he has plenty of time to improve those. He’s 21 ffs. He doesn’t need to be ready to go at 21 yrs old, that rarely happens. Also defenceman typically take longer to develop and often times bigger players do.