By Tom Schreier -
There’s an alternate universe where people called South Florida’s hockey team the “Block Busters.”
The Florida Panthers’ founding owner, Wayne Huizenga, wanted to name them after his video rental chain. However, aside from their early success, the Panthers mostly languished at the bottom of the league. For years, it felt like Huizenga should have named them after his other companies. AutoNation because they were made up of spare parts, or Waste Management because they were mostly garbage.
However, the Panthers started to transform from prey to predators during the quarantine season. They qualified for the bubble playoffs in 2019-20, marking only their fourth playoff appearance since reaching the Stanley Cup Finals in 1996. Five seasons later, they’re back-to-back champions.
Nobody was talking about sunshine and tax breaks when Brad Boyes was Florida’s leading scorer in 2013-14. However, unlike many of the NHL’s best teams, the Panthers aren’t homegrown. They picked Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Bennett off the dysfunctional Calgary Flames. Florida also grabbed its leading scorer, Sam Reinhart, from the Buffalo Sabres, who haven’t been to the playoffs since 2010-11.
Florida is the kind of team that would capitalize on Minnesota’s longstanding mismanagement of Marco Rossi.
The Rossi saga becomes increasingly perplexing the longer Minnesota drags it out. The Wild drafted a nearly NHL-ready player at a position of need. During the quarantine, he suffered from a COVID-related heart condition but returned to playing condition in 2021.
Then things got weird.
In 2021-22, Rossi had 53 points in 63 AHL games but only played two games with the Wild. A year later, he started the season in St. Paul but only had one point in his first 19 games. The Wild sent him down to Iowa and never recalled him, even though he had 51 points in 53 AHL games.
Rossi has produced 100 points in the past two years and played 82 games in each season. He centered the first line when Joel Eriksson Ek was out and had two goals and an assist in the playoffs this year. Still, the Wild haven’t committed to Rossi long-term. A team that needs center depth is turning him into the next Matt Dumba, a skilled player perpetually on the trade block.
Bill Guerin was a 6-foot-2, 22o lbs. power forward who played well into his 30s. That’s likely why he tends to prefer large, experienced players; Rossi is a 5-foot-9, 180 lbs., 23-year-old center. The Wild also has team control over Rossi because he’s a restricted free agent. Perhaps there’s tension between Guerin and Rossi’s camp, who can’t be happy with how they’ve managed him, and it’s bled into their negotiations.
Regardless, Rossi fits a need for the Wild, and they’ve treated the former ninth-overall pick like a player they took a late-round flyer on.
Danila Yurov is one of Minnesota’s first-round selections in 2022 and is coming over from Russia next year. Even if Yurov takes over the No. 2 center spot next year, he’ll likely have an adjustment period. Still, if Yurov takes over the second-line center spot, Rossi is an ideal third center. He can play in the top 6 if Eriksson Ek or Yurov get hurt, or solidify a viable third line.
Even if the Wild must play him on the fly during road playoff games, deploying him over the boards during the course of play, they can play matchups at home. Rossi proved that he can score in the postseason, even though he was on the fourth line this year. Imagine what he could do on a line with a goalscoring winger.
Guerin has managed the roster well in some capacity. He has Matt Boldy, Brock Faber, and Eriksson Ek on favorable contracts. However, like every general manager, he’ll have to balance offering a competitive contract to players who will want more money with the rising cap, while also considering the players he has under contract whom the Wild signed at a lower average annual value.
Rossi also isn’t his top priority this offseason; he must re-sign Kirill Kaprizov. Still, Rossi is part of the formula for breaking out of the Wild’s first-round spell.
Good teams are deep at center, and Rossi is the perfect 3C. Still, Guerin appears to be concerned about his size, despite his production. If the Wild don’t commit to Rossi, some other team will come in and scoop him up. If that happens, Minnesota would lose talent because of mismanagement.
They would be acting more like Calgary or Buffalo than Florida.
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