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By Kalisha Turnipseed -
No matter how people feel about TNT broadcaster Anson Carter, he was right about one thing. The Minnesota Wild don’t have the depth to make a sustainable playoff run. However, general manager Bill Guerin is still managing the team like they’re not far away from winning the Stanley Cup.
He extended Mats Zuccarello, Ryan Hartman, Marcus Foligno, Marcus Johansson, Frederick Gaudreau, Marc-Andre Fleury, Zach Bogosian, Jon Merrill, and Alex Goligoski because he believed they could make an impact until their mid-to-late 30s. Guerin was an impact player for 22 seasons of his Hall of Fame career and retired at 39 years old. He created the Wild to be “untouchable” during cap hell. He wanted to make them the NHL’s most irritating team.
Some Wild fans are hanging on to the 2002-03 season and the 2007-08 Northwest Division title as a blueprint for how Minnesota can win with Kirill Kaprizov. Although they haven’t won a playoff series since 2014-15, they still retired Mikko Koivu’s No. 9 into the rafters.
How do they cater to fans? By creating Hockey Day Minnesota, Wild Fans No. 1 banner, the 2015-16 Stadium Series, and the 2021-22 Winter Classic. The team of 18,000 will always stand behind the Wild, including attacking Carter for being honest about the team on TNT. The Wild are playing for a wild card spot in the playoffs which isn’t anything new. That’s the Wild’s ceiling. A borderline playoff team.
What do borderline playoff teams do? They end up finishing outside of the two wild card spots, falling into the mushy middle. The Wild love to blame injuries and referees blowing games instead of owning up to their mistakes and taking responsibility. Why not show a 60-minute effort on a consistent basis? These players are human, and it’s impossible to play 60 minutes every game. However, the Wild are still finding their identity. They market themselves as “Grit First” and “It’s About Winning,” but Guerin hasn’t built a contender around Kaprizov.
Guerin didn’t draft Kaprizov, Matt Boldy, Joel Eriksson Ek, and Brock Faber. But he used a first-round pick on Marco Rossi, who he’s considering trading. He also drafted Marat Khusnutdinov, Jesper Wallstedt, and Daemon Hunt, who haven’t made a championship-level impact in the NHL. More prospects are on the way, but what we’ve witnessed so far suggests that the prospects aren’t ready. Guerin is depending on Judd Brackett to bring in young, cost-effective talent, but he almost always prioritizes high-floor veterans over young players with upside.
When he was in Vancouver, Brackett drafted Elias Pettersson fifth overall in the 2017 draft and Quinn Hughes seventh overall in 2018. Brackett took Pettersson as a top-five pick and Hughes as a lucky seven pick. Brackett needs the opportunity to get a cornerstone player within the top-seven of a draft. Rossi is a ninth overall pick (2020), but the Wild aren’t prioritizing him like Kaprizov, Boldy, and even Eriksson Ek, even though he’s been their most consistent 5-on-5 forward this season.
The Wild took Danila Yurov 24th overall in 2022, but he’s performing as a top-seven draft pick in the KHL. Riley Heidt is also out-performing his draft stock. The Wild got him in the second round, and he has first-round skill. Guerin’s making Brackett’s job harder by wanting to win now. Therefore, Yurov and Heidt must become first-round caliber talents for Minnesota to have enough skill to compete in the playoffs.
Guerin was an impactful veteran later in his career, but he was also an outlier. Zuccarello, Jonas Brodin, Fleury, and Bogosian have been veteran performers who belong on championship teams. Any winning team would value Hartman’s versatility. The same goes for Foligno’s leadership and Jared Spurgeon’s longevity.
But that’s where the cutoff begins. Johansson’s speed and No-Trade Clause (NTC) keep him on the team, and Dean Evason is the reason they signed Gaudreau through 2027-28. Guerin has prioritized veterans, which makes it more difficult for him to build a younger core around Kaprizov, Boldy, Eriksson Ek, and Faber.
Guerin has won four Stanley Cups as a player and may not understand Minnesota sports fans' desperation. Many people here would rather see him lean into the upside of young, cost-effective players than build a roster full of high-floor, low-ceiling veterans who are easy to coach. By building teams that are good enough to make the playoffs but lose once they get there, he’s making it more difficult for Brackett to do his job. It would be easier for the Wild to get high-end players if they had better draft picks.
The Wild are wasting the opportunity to win with the core of Kaprizov, Boldy, Eriksson Ek, and Faber. Fans will have to wait for the veteran contracts to expire and prospects to mature into impact players on a contending team. However, there’s a way for Guerin to build a Cup-winning team as soon as 2024-25, but he can’t assume that most veterans will make an impact in their mid- to late-30s as he did. He needs to invest in a winning core that will support his cornerstones. He needs to build a team with an identity that will give him winning results.
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