Ray Shero reportedly joining Wild’s front office

Before the Minnesota Wild head into one of the busiest summers in franchise history, they’re adding a familiar and established personality to their management team.

Ray Shero served as GM for the Pittsburgh Penguins from 2006-14, where earned a Stanley Cup ring in 2009, before moving on to the New Jersey Devils and being in charge there from 2015, until he was fired in 2020. Now, according to reports, the experienced manager will be joining the Wild as a senior advisor to general manager Bill Guerin.

With years under his belt and a ring on his finger, his voice and history can play a pivotal role for a team that is just beginning to see its competitive window with some young stars on their roster. Of course, Shero has his own experience with that and was dealt the burden of keeping the likes of Marc-Andre Fleury, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang, and Sidney Crosby happy in Pittsburgh with new contracts.

Even in New Jersey, he saw the value in top centerman Nico Hischier and was able to keep him around on a very team-friendly deal for what he can bring to each game offensively.

Overall, his trade history is fairly questionable at times. He’s made some significant moves, like trading Taylor Hall to the Arizona Coyotes and paying some high draft picks for Nikita Gusev’s rights, only for him to wash away from the league shortly after. Shero has paid some high prices for rentals and post-hype prospects like Mirco Mueller, for example, but also has gotten some key value in others. It’s a very mixed bag when it comes to decisions when he has been in charge.

Past examples aside, Shero can simply be a guiding voice and a giant source of connections across the NHL for Guerin to take advantage of. It doesn’t hurt to have experience on your team and Shero certainly has that.

Also he’s from here, so that works.