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.

[SkolWild73]

1 hour ago, MrCheatachu said:

And yes, I still think we need to bitch about Trenin and some of the movement/trade protection that BG has handed

I used to think we had a ton of no movement/trade clauses until I started looking at other teams.  This year we have 5 players with no movement clauses and three with modified no trade clauses.  Next year, that drops to one NMC (probably 2, assuming Kap gets one), and 4 players with modified no trade clauses.

Vegas for example has 4 players with a NMC, 5 with full no trade clauses and 4 with modified no trade clauses.  

As for Trenin's contract, it is $3.5M for the next three years with no trade protections.  Easily tradeable.  

Edited Friday at 07:33 PM by SkolWild73

[Pewterschmidt]

21 minutes ago, SkolWild73 said:

As for Trenin's contract, it is $3.5M for the next three years with no trade protections.  Easily tradeable.

We all wish this were true.

The sack of shit that is regular season Trenin (82 games vs 6 games) has a modified no-trade clause that probibits him from being traded to 10 specified teams.  great job Bill, it wasn't enough that you over paid and over termed Brazzeau 2.0

[SkolWild73]

19 minutes ago, Pewterschmidt said:

We all wish this were true.

The sack of shit that is regular season Trenin (82 games vs 6 games) has a modified no-trade clause that probibits him from being traded to 10 specified teams.  great job Bill, it wasn't enough that you over paid and over termed Brazzeau 2.0

Puckpedia shows no trade protection.  Where are you finding that he does?

Minnesota Wild Contracts, Cap Hits and Salary Cap | Puckpedia

Edited Friday at 08:15 PM by SkolWild73

[Pewterschmidt]

14 minutes ago, SkolWild73 said:

Puckpedia shows no trade protection.  Where are you finding that he does?

Minnesota Wild Contracts, Cap Hits and Salary Cap | Puckpedia

[SkolWild73]

3 minutes ago, Pewterschmidt said:

I guess I will trust Puckpedia before AI overview of an article from aol.com

[mnfaninnc]

20 hours ago, SkolWild73 said:

I guess I will trust Puckpedia before AI overview of an article from aol.com

I just tested AI to give me the largest states by size. Out of the top 15 states, it got 4 wrong. I consider this an F.

So, also interesting was looking at the state flags. I had no idea Washington actually has a picture of George Washington on the flag. And, what happened to the MN flag? When did that change?

[MrCheatachu]

2 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

I just tested AI to give me the largest states by size. Out of the top 15 states, it got 4 wrong. I consider this an F.

So, also interesting was looking at the state flags. I had no idea Washington actually has a picture of George Washington on the flag. And, what happened to the MN flag? When did that change?

Recently, 2024 i believe.  But you're opening a can of worms on that one...

The old flag had two main issues:

1. Imagery in the center was detailed and complex, which isnt great when you're trying to recreate it or recognize what was on the flag.  It featured the french words 'le etoile du nord' but you would have to really closely examine the flag to see the picture in the middle as nothing more than a blob
2. If you looked closely at the imagery, it was a white farmer plowing the land with a native american riding away in a horse.  It was felt that this image depicted the white man forcing the natives off the land.

They ran a contest in 2023 for new designs, and came upon the new simpler flag with blocks of blue for the lakes and a darker section of blue with a white 8 pointed star for 'le etoile du nord' or 'the north star'.

Of course because it's 2024, 50% of the country feels the flag is 'too woke', and even though it is suppose to represent the lakes and the north star that the flag is actually proof that MN is a hellhole and working to appease the Somalian immigrants because of the similarities in the flag.  People still fly the old flag as a sort of 'dog whistle' fighting 'wokeness.'  I'm 99% sure I can guess how Protec feels about the new flag...

If you want to see a badass flag, check out Rochester, MN:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_Rochester,_Minnesota.svg

[Quebec1648]

Given that others have already commented on the flag, I will offer a brief comment as well, although I know it's supposed to be a hockey focused forum.

The primary issue with changing the flag comes down to three things.

1. Was it a pressing issue for most Minnesotans, or just a small segment of the population? I would say there were more important issues than a flag.

2. A state with no past has no future. Trying to erase the past usually ends up making things worse rather than better. 

3. Who gets to decide what's considered offensive? Are we going to redesign or change everything because someone is offended? We would be renaming things like every 5 minutes.

Would England have become a global power if Rome had stayed out of the British isles?

Can we bring back the Montreal Expos? I am offended by the way MLB treated the Montreal fans / community.

[mnfaninnc]

3 hours ago, MrCheatachu said:

They ran a contest in 2023 for new designs, and came upon the new simpler flag with blocks of blue for the lakes and a darker section of blue with a white 8 pointed star for 'le etoile du nord' or 'the north star'.

Of course because it's 2024, 50% of the country feels the flag is 'too woke', and even though it is suppose to represent the lakes and the north star that the flag is actually proof that MN is a hellhole and working to appease the Somalian immigrants because of the similarities in the flag.  People still fly the old flag as a sort of 'dog whistle' fighting 'wokeness.'  I'm 99% sure I can guess how Protec feels about the new flag...

I had briefly heard that it was changed and the woke comment but didn't know where that was coming from. Then, when looking at the states and flags today, something looked very unfamiliar! Thanks for the representation description, I wouldn't have gotten that from just plain looking at it. 

About all I can say is that is a huge change. If they were going for simple, mission accomplished. I did like the Rochester flag a lot. 

Seems like the new flag kind of misses the mark. Not in a woke way, but in a missing detail way. It's kind of like the Twins Blue and Yellow uniforms. I'm not sure where they got that from. They look nice but where is the yellow from? Don't eat the yellow snow? 

Flags and uniforms are symbols. For me, the Wild need a change. The current jerseys just look outdated. With 5-6 new rookies coming in, and likely some trade deadline deals, it seems to me that you'd want a visual representation of this is a new and different team. Not to mention the benefit of to the owner of sales of the new look. The road jersey, especially needs a new look, it's very stale. 

I think both reverse retros are the best upgrade at this point, but I wouldn't mind seeing the old North Star jersey with the Wild colors, especially the roads. If you want to stay with the green/red combo, I'd brighten the shades and am very curious as to why there is no lake blue in the jersey. 

[mnfaninnc]

2 hours ago, Quebec1648 said:

2. A state with no past has no future. Trying to erase the past usually ends up making things worse rather than better. 

I suppose this was what I meant by the flag being very simple and lacking complexity. There's got to be more to the state than a lot of water and a clear view of the North Star visible from all 50 states. 

Did MN also change the state seal? 

Also, I'm trying to steer clear of any political talk here. The flag simply caught me by surprise as a wholesale change. 

[Quebec1648]

18 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

I suppose this was what I meant by the flag being very simple and lacking complexity. There's got to be more to the state than a lot of water and a clear view of the North Star visible from all 50 states. 

Did MN also change the state seal? 

Also, I'm trying to steer clear of any political talk here. The flag simply caught me by surprise as a wholesale change. 

The flag change was political and was opposed by most people. Only about 20% of those surveyed supported the change. However, a future legislature can simply change it back.