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By Tony Abbott -
Nothing gets stuff done like deadlines. With the Minnesota Wild and Brandon Duhaime headed towards an arbitration hearing on Thursday, the two sides wrapped up their business on Sunday afternoon, inking a one-year, $1.1 million deal, as reported by Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman.
Duhaime played his second full season with the Wild last year, following up his six-goal, 17-point rookie campaign with 9 goals and an assist over 51 games this season. Duhaime had to contend with injuries throughout the year, which hid some signs of progress from the gritty forward.
Duhaime finished third on the team (among those with 400-plus minutes) in scoring 0.97 goals per hour at 5-on-5, behind only Matt Boldy (1.12) and Kirill Kaprizov (1.04). Duhaime's scoring rate is tied for 84th among 413 NHL forwards, comparing favorably to high-end players like Nikolaj Ehlers (0.98), Patrik Laine (0.97), and Patrice Bergeron (0.95).
Duhaime might not have the raw talent or all-around offensive ability of those players, but he has good speed, flashes of great hands, and fires the puck a ton. Last season he was one of just 62 NHLers to shoot nine times an hour or more at 5-on-5. Players like Trevor Lewis, Frank Vatrano, and Miles Wood have made solid careers off that profile, and now Duhaime can prove he belongs in that class over a full, healthy season.
The amount of money Duhaime signed for might not seem super significant, as the gap between what the Wild and Duhaime would've been looking for was almost certainly a few hundred thousand dollars. But for Minnesota, every dollar counts this offseason, with the weight of the Zach Parise and Ryan Suter buyouts squeezing the team to the tune of nearly $15 million.
The Wild still must sign Filip Gustavsson (whose arbitration hearing is scheduled for August 4) and Calen Addison, who are both Restricted Free Agents this offseason. Assuming Marco Rossi and Brock Faber will be on the roster, they'll have one remaining roster space after agreeing to terms with Gustavsson and Addison. The team has about $6.32 million to get all that done, while hopefully leaving some leftover cap space to add at the trade deadline, or at least pay out any rookie bonuses.
This deal also sets Minnesota up for a tricky offseason next summer. The Wild's identity revolves around bigger, grittier two-way players like Duhaime, Joel Eriksson Ek, Marcus Foligno, and Pat Maroon. After this season, Duhaime, Foligno, and Maroon will all become Unrestricted Free Agents, and the Wild's buyout burden will not lessen. What do they do then?
That's a problem to figure out next year. In between now and then, the Wild had to keep Duhaime around next season. They took care of the problem they could solve now at a reasonable rate that both Duhaime and the team should feel comfortable with.
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