By Tony Abbott -
The Minnesota Wild are celebrating their 25th anniversary this season. In most circumstances, that's a huge milestone and cause to celebrate. Fans get a chance to remember their past while looking toward a bright future.
Unfortunately, that might be all the State of Hockey gets to celebrate on this anniversary.
The "25" patch on their sweaters will, to many, represent a quarter-century of irrelevance. That's definitely not charitable. Minnesota has had moments in the sun. Their 2003 Western Conference Finals run, the blockbuster signings of Zach Parise and Ryan Suter in 2012 being the biggest. But even the rosiest view of the Wild's history has to admit that they've often been afterthoughts to the national media, free agents, and most disappointingly, in the playoffs.
That's what hurts the Wild faithful so much about this week's news that Kirill Kaprizov rejected a would-be record-shattering eight-year, $128 million contract from Minnesota.
From Day 1, the superstar winger made the franchise relevant in a way no one else has. Not Marian Gaborik, Mikko Koivu, Zach Parise, Ryan Suter, or anyone else. His Calder Trophy win is the only major player hardware the franchise has ever taken home. For lack of a better term, Kaprizov just has that 'it' factor, giving Minnesota rare and desperately needed pizazz. When he's on, the Wild become appointment viewing.
If this week's news is truly the beginning of the end for Kaprizov, Minnesota will return to irrelevance.
That's a fate too terrible for the Wild, and everyone involved knows it. It's why owner Craig Leipold got out ahead of any rumors that Kaprizov might want to go elsewhere and declared, "Nobody will offer more money than us." Putting $128 million on the table showed Mr. Leipold was serious.
But Kaprizov rejecting that offer plays into the worst fears of Minnesota sports fans: The offer might be serious, but the players don't take the Wild seriously.
There aren't a lot of winning scenarios from here. The possibility that Minnesota trades the only superstar in their history is impossible to swallow for most Wild fans. But having it go public that Kaprizov rejected a max deal at $16 million per season, and eventually signing him for, say, $18 million, doesn't send a great message to the rest of the league, either.
$16 million is already $2 million more than the next-highest-paid player in the NHL. Someone will eventually get more than that number, of course, but $128 million is $128 million. It's mind-blowing that an NHL player, even one who was looking to hit a home run and cash in, would turn it down. Just this offseason, superstars like Mitch Marner and Mikko Rantanen took discounts to be on teams they felt would win. Sam Bennett, the reigning Conn Smythe winner, did the same to stay with the Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers.
Intentionally or not, refusing a $16 million AAV but accepting $17 to $18 million sends a signal that Kaprizov isn't impressed with the direction the team is taking. If that's the route he goes, it suggests that all Bill Guerin and Mr. Leipold could offer him -- after four years to prepare the conditions that would entice him to stay -- was money.
Unfortunately, it'd be hard to blame Kaprizov if that's his thought process. He's spent five years in the organization, playing at an MVP level, and hasn't been able to advance past the first round. It wasn't for a lack of effort, either. Kaprizov has 15 goals and 21 points in 25 playoff games with the Wild. That 0.60 goals per game mark is the highest among any player in the Salary Cap Era with 25 games or more.
Hell, reduce that threshold to 10 games, and Kaprizov's still at the top of the heap!
But even with historic goal production, even with dominant playoff series against the St. Louis Blues in 2022 and the Vegas Golden Knights this spring, it wasn't enough to get them out of the first round.
Now, are there mitigating circumstances here? You'd better believe it. The Zach Parise and Ryan Suter contracts bit the franchise at the exact worst moment, hobbling a franchise that should have been in win-now mode with their superstar in tow. It's a tough break, and it is impressive that the Wild have continued to make the playoffs despite their dead cap space woes.
That doesn't erase the fact that, as much as the team noted that a hand was tied behind their back, as much as they tried to downplay their inability to get past the first round, that lack of success plays into their reputation. They're not serious contenders, not in the eyes of the NHL.
We saw it on July 1 -- a day that might go down in infamy among Wild fans as "Christmas Morning." With all of Minnesota's new cap space, they were never seriously in the hunt for big fish like Marner, Bennett, Nikolaj Ehlers, or anyone else. Home-grown players like Brock Boeser and Brock Nelson -- historically, reliable targets for the franchise -- elected to stay put rather than join forces with the Wild.
We know what Minnesota wanted their pitch to be. That they had the roster, personalities, and culture to play winning hockey. That their prospects -- including blue-chippers like Zeev Buium, Danila Yurov, and David Jiříček -- were NHL-ready and primed to take them to the next level. That even after coming up empty this summer, they'd kept their powder dry for the next big superstar to come up on the market.
It doesn't look like that pitch was attractive to Kaprizov, just as it wasn't alluring for Nelson, Boeser, or any other big fish this summer. Without a buy-in to the pitch, all the Wild had was money, and Kaprizov just said no to that.
How do you fix that problem? How does Mr. Leipold, the front office, and the organization convince Kaprizov -- or any other top player in the NHL -- that they're an organization to be taken seriously, and not the perpetual also-rans of the league? That's the issue at the root of their biggest crisis in the Wild's 25-year history, and unless they can find a solution, it also threatens to define their next quarter-century.
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