Wilderness Walk: Time to Hang Up the Jersey

No matter how you slice it, the upcoming week is going to be an eventful one for the Minnesota Wild (and the rest of the NHL for that matter). The Expansion Draft is Wednesday and the Entry Draft is Friday. As GM’s around the league rush to put themselves in the best possible position before these events occur, they are under the gun to complete trades and submit their protected lists. As of tomorrow, transactions will be officially frozen for every GM not named George McPhee, with the exception of GM’s that happen to be dealing directly with the Vegas boss.

Selfishly, I’m having a hard time with a couple of particular rumblings going on right now. First, I’m a big Jonas Brodin fan. I’ve been a huge fan of his since he broke into the league at 19 years old and quickly became one of the Wild’s most dependable defensemen. While he hasn’t had a huge impact offensively, I still really like the guy, and since he’s still only 23 years old, I believe there is still plenty of upside there. My admiration of the young Swede led me to selecting a road Brodin number 25 jersey as my gameday attire of choice a few years ago, and it has remained so ever since. Brodin’s name has been the centerpiece of LOTS of trade talk over the past 24 hours, and where there’s this much smoke, there’s typically fire with these things.

The other rumbling (which is really more of an inevitability than a rumbling) is that the NHL’s new Adidas jerseys will be unveiled during the NHL Awards on June 21st. Even if the Wild goes with the same exact look for its road whites, there have to be at least subtle updates to the design, which will undoubtedly render my current sweater obsolete, due to the Five-Year Jersey Rule.

Here’s how the Five-Year Jersey Rule works... If a player gets traded away from a team, there is a minimum five-year waiting period before his jersey becomes cool again in a “retro” style. Similarly, the second that even a subtle change occurs to the design of a team’s uniform, it becomes immediately questionable to wear the previous style (or brand, in this case), unless the aforementioned five-year waiting period has already been fulfilled. Alas, this could be a double whammy for my jersey situation. Sadly, the number 25 Brodin road white, with all of its beer, ketchup, and nacho stains, may need to go back in the closet for a while.

Weezer takes us through today’s very juicy Walk with the perfect song for this situation.

Wild News

Wild GM ‘listening’ to trade offers for Dumba, Brodin before expansion draft
Brodin for Galchenyuk. Despite my jersey allegiances, I say do it.

Wild gets 'quality' trade offers for Brodin, Dumba
Big doings about.

Minnesota Wild have reportedly received "quality" trade offers for Jonas Brodin and Matt Dumba
I swear this is a different story. I appreciate that there seems to be a "sweepstakes" going on for one of the players that we would lose in a few days anyway.

Fletcher: Good news is Wild only lose one player to Vegas
TSN says that the Wild is projected to leave Spurgeon unprotected. This is incorrect.

Evaluating the Cost and Value of a Jonas Brodin and Marco Scandella Trade
A bit flawed, but this is a good writeup from our friends at Die By The Blade.

On Frozen Pond

Professional hockey is coming back to Maine - Stanley Cup of Chowder
Hallelujah!!

Associate head coach Don Granato set to leave Wisconsin for Chicago Blackhawks
On, Wisconsin, even without Don.

Off the Trail

Habs sign Jonathan Drouin: six years, $33M
That was quick.

McGuire to host ‘Round Table Rally’ after Vegas expansion draft
NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Get a sneak peek at adidas' new NHL jerseys with these teaser images
My goodness! They all have such cool logos on the back of the neck!

Blackhawks hire Samuelsson and Granato as assistant coaches
The New Adventures of Ulf and Donny.