Article: Wild Have Been Very Efficient With Contracts, Apparently

[Thomas Williams]

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[Scalptrash]

Trenin......🤦‍♂️

[B1GKappa97]

but but but all the NTC 

but but but all the old guys

but but but trenin

:(

[MrCheatachu]

24 minutes ago, B1GKappa97 said:

but but but all the NTC 

but but but all the old guys

but but but trenin

😞

Coming in 11th place of 32 teams basically a 'C' rating.  Not sure that's something to get all excited about.  There are a few outliers, but the teams at the top of Dom's list are the teams going deep into the playoffs.  In fact, if you compare Dom's list of efficient teams with the 2025 draft order (reversed) i'm not sure if i'm going to be all that excited about being the 11th most efficient team that efficiently gets bounced out of the playoffs in the first round:

Dom's top 10 efficient teams:

1. Tampa Bay
2. Carolina
3. Colorado
4. Florida Panthers
5. Ottawa Senators
6. Dallas
7. Vegas
8. Edmonton
9. New Jersey
10. Winnipeg
11. Minnesota

How last season ended (based on Draft Order)

1. Florida Panthers
2. Edmonton Oilers
3. Dallas Stars
4. Carolina Hurricanes
5. Winnipeg Jets
6. Washington Capitals
7. Vegas
8. Toronto
9. Las Angeles
10. Tampa Bay
11. Colorado
12. Ottawa
13. Minnesota

[Imyourhuckleberry]

42 minutes ago, MrCheatachu said:

There are a few outliers, but the teams at the top of Dom's list are the teams going deep into the playoffs.  In fact, if you compare Dom's list of efficient teams with the 2025 draft order (reversed) i'm not sure if i'm going to be all that excited about being the 11th most efficient team that efficiently gets bounced out of the playoffs in the first round:

Imagine being 3rd on the list and getting bounced in the 1st round.

Dom gave the Wild a B+, which maybe should be a B-, but 11th out of 32 is still above average. Past futility does not guarantee future futility. The Twins, for example, lost 18 straight playoff games for a stretch spanning back to 2004, not winning a series for nearly 20 years, but then they won a postseason game and that led to winning a series in 2023.

The Wild have struggled to win a series lately, but they outscored Vegas in 2025 playoffs, and now have room to improve the team that they haven't had the last couple of seasons when they were so far below all other teams in the percentage of salary cap space they could use for current players.

It may not happen this season, but a series win could be coming soon to an arena near you. I'm certainly more hopeful for the Wild than I have been in any of the last 7 seasons where they have had more than $1M going to each of Parise and Suter. Once Parise and Suter hit 35, they were no longer worth close to their deals, but they were stuck with those contracts through last season, so the future looks brighter, assuming that Kaprizov signs the extension...and Rossi will likely return too.

Buium, Jiricek, Yurov & Ohgren should all make the team more interesting, if not better, and usher in a new era of Wild optimism.

[raithis]

1 hour ago, MrCheatachu said:

Coming in 11th place of 32 teams basically a 'C' rating.  Not sure that's something to get all excited about.  There are a few outliers, but the teams at the top of Dom's list are the teams going deep into the playoffs.  In fact, if you compare Dom's list of efficient teams with the 2025 draft order (reversed) i'm not sure if i'm going to be all that excited about being the 11th most efficient team that efficiently gets bounced out of the playoffs in the first round:

Dom's top 10 efficient teams:

1. Tampa Bay
2. Carolina
3. Colorado
4. Florida Panthers
5. Ottawa Senators
6. Dallas
7. Vegas
8. Edmonton
9. New Jersey
10. Winnipeg
11. Minnesota

How last season ended (based on Draft Order)

1. Florida Panthers
2. Edmonton Oilers
3. Dallas Stars
4. Carolina Hurricanes
5. Winnipeg Jets
6. Washington Capitals
7. Vegas
8. Toronto
9. Las Angeles
10. Tampa Bay
11. Colorado
12. Ottawa
13. Minnesota

I don't know that it's much to get excited about, but I also take it as evidence that it's not as bad as some people make it out to be, which I think was more Thomas's point.

Every team has to comply by the same salary cap rules (supposedly), so if a team is doing better, it generally means it is because they were able to assemble a team of more talented players for less - the efficient contracts being discussed.  A lot of that has to do with each player's desire to be on that team and how well they are able to attract top-tier talent in the first place.  It also has to do with each team's ability to develop their players.  You will see more efficiency from teams that identify those players early, getting then locked into contracts before their production makes those contracts look better and better.

One of the things hurting the Wild is that they don't have a lot of those developing players producing in their lineup yet.  In that regard, I do think that 11th is something to be excited about since I'd think at least a few of these hyped prospects will actually live up to at least some of that hype.  Some won't of course.  Others may just become services able NHLers, but by then they will be the ones that start to push out the veterans and will help skew our talent level (and contract efficiency) upward.

The fact that the Wild are at 11 without as many star players as some other teams does mean something.  It may not seem as exciting now, but it seems like they are on the right path forward...or at least a better path than they have gone in the past.

[MrCheatachu]

6 minutes ago, raithis said:

Every team has to comply by the same salary cap rules (supposedly), so if a team is doing better, it generally means it is because they were able to assemble a team of more talented players for less - the efficient contracts being discussed.  A lot of that has to do with each player's desire to be on that team and how well they are able to attract top-tier talent in the first place.  It also has to do with each team's ability to develop their players.  You will see more efficiency from teams that identify those players early, getting then locked into contracts before their production makes those contracts look better and better.

Bingo, are we looking at the dog wagging the tail or the tail wagging the dog.

Since every team has the same amount of money to play with, those who perform better are going to rank higher on the list than those that do not perform well.  It's clearly not a 1:1 correlation between efficiency and your finishing position, but it's damn near linear which is why coming in at 11th efficient isn't horribly surprising when we finished 13th in points.

And yes, I still think we need to bitch about Trenin and some of the movement/trade protection that BG has handed out since I'm not hoping this club continues to finish in the top 1/3 of the league.  We shouldn't be striving to be an average club if we're looking to have a deep playoff run.

It's no surprise if you look at Dom's list of worst efficiency:

1. Kraken
2. Blackhawks
3. Preds
4. Islanders
5. Ducks
6. Sharts

You dont see many playoff contenders.