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  • Wild's Ryan Hartman Faces Lengthy Suspension


    Image courtesy of © David Banks-Imagn Images
    Thomas Williams

    That's Wild

    The Minnesota Wild lost badly Saturday night to an Ottawa Senators team that is trying to stake a claim to one of the two Wild Card spots over in the Eastern Conference. Surprisingly, the 6-0 defeat and the end of a three-game winning streak was not what was most embarrassing coming out of that match.

    Wild forward Ryan Hartman drove the face of Senators star Tim Stutzle down to the ice, causing him to be cut open at his eyebrow, off of a little faceoff battle. He was promptly given a match penalty and kicked out of the game. But that's not all he will face in punishment as the NHL's Department of Player Safety announced that Hartman will be having an in-person hearing, which opens up the possibility of a suspension over five games.

     

    Hartman has been known to have a hot streak. Not the good kind, don't worry. A streak of play where his head runs so hot that he just has to exert his energy into hurting someone in a non-hockey way.

    He has been fined by the league a total of seven times, most recently on January 2 for high-sticking. And additionally, Hartman has been suspended four times: One game for an illegal hit to the head in 2018; one game for interference in 2023; two games for tripping in 2023; and most recently three games for unsportsmanlike conduct when he threw his stick towards an official in April of last year.

    He has a past and we shouldn't be surprised if the law gets laid down and he is suspended for something close to double-digit games.

    • Yakov Trenin has not been as good as some people hoped, but does the free agent acquisition from last summer look a lot better in the light of the upcoming cap explosion? [Hockey Wilderness]
    • A great story on how Marco Rossi has turned to becoming a first-line center in the NHL; what we all hoped he would become in Minnesota. [StarTribune]

    Off the trail...

    • Boy, there were a lot of trades last week. First, we saw the Flyers send two former first-round picks in Joel Farabee and Morgan Frost to the Flames in exchange for some draft picks, a pending free agent, and an interesting young winger. [Broad Street Hockey]
    • And then the saga over in Vancouver has ended as J.T. Miller was shipped out to the Rangers. While he might just be an uber-competitive guy, he has no ill will towards the Canucks after the trade. [Sportsnet]
    • With some of the return they got for Miller, Vancouver got top-four defenseman Marcus Pettersson as they try to still compete for a playoff spot and not waste another season of Quinn Hughes and Elias Pettersson (while the latter is still in Vancouver). [The Province]

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    Did Hartzy punch his train ticket out of town?  No guarantee's, but I think he made himself a whole lot more expendable than he was before the Stutzle pile driver.  I've been in Hartzy corner based on his passion, grit, and skill set but his transgressions over the years are starting to pile up proving that he doesn't not have the discipline necessary to be an effective NHL'r.  Let's hope he hasn't destroyed his market value.

    Hartzy is the kind of player that Yzerman trades for (or another savvy GM who needs bottom six grit+skill) and then puts him in the bottom six (probably top 6 until DET get's more talent), and Hartzy thrives after the wake up call.

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    Hartman just can't seem to control himself at times.  He expresses regret afterwards but after multiple occurrences it is clear his emotions override his senses.  Not a good thing.  

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    MN has a grit-imbalance. Spread some of the grit around.

    Less intent to injure grizzle and more gritty Euros. 

    Also Stutzle attack or Perfetti in the draws is weak. Why not go after Tkachuk? I'll tell ya why cause he'd probably get up and pound Hartman. Just sayin.

    Guerin has still got a group lacking important qualities. 

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    IIRC, if a player is suspended, his cap number is deducted from the daily ticker.?.?

    I did not know that Hartzy was a Carolina boy, born on Hilton Head Island. Looking at his contract, it is front loaded with $5m this year. He also has that NMC this season, which reduces to a 15 team M-NTC next season and 10 team the following season. 

    I certainly hope Pewter is right and this is the kind of guy Yzerman would trade for. I don't think Detroit would be on his list as this is also an up and coming team. 

    For me, I recommended we not resign Hartzy but give him a nice handshake and thank him for his time here. I thought he had outperformed his contract and value but we should steer clear of that. (Foligno was the only one I recommended a resign on and that was under $3m). In terms of real dollars, a team he is traded to will pay less real dollars while paying more in cap. Unfortunately, the teams that value that, typically are on the NTC list. 

    Hartzy is better than a Boyd or Jones or Shore, but is he better than, say, a Stramel? Looking on the fine print of the back of his nameplate, it looks to me like Aunt Bonnie would say "expired." This one probably happens during the summer, where I think another medium priced name will also go. 

    It's time to turn to the next chapter, and for this we need a visual reminder. I'll plug it again because it is a common marketing ploy, the team needs a facelift visually and there's none better than to switch to the old North Star colors. It is widely, perhaps Wildly, popular in the arenas around the country. It says flashy (like Kaprizov). It also says we've changed, we're not the same old boring trap team, we make defense look flashy. 

    My local grocery store just changed their private label packaging. I don't know if it's better, but it's different. Every product gets packaging updates, and that's precisely what a uniform is. It's time for a drastic change! Who knows, maybe it also helps get a team out of the 1st round too!

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    I've ragged on Hartman a number of times because of the issues with discipline.  Earlier in the season I felt I had to praise him because he was keeping it in check and might've turned a new leaf, but no, he's still a liability.

    With the type of team game we play, everyone has to buy in and everyone needs to be on their game or we're just outmatched skill-wise in many cases.  If he's going to be a liability, he undermines the entire team.  We don't have the PK to withstand his antics.

    Having gritty players is good, but they need to smart about it.  Hartman devolves into an overgrown child and does stupid things.

    Hynes spent multiple minutes trying to dissuade the refs that the embellishment call was wrong.  Boldy was pretty vocal about it too.  Then Hartman gets out of the box and does that and sits and smirks while the match penalty is called.  He undercut all the support multiple were giving him trying to plead his case and made it so we wouldn't have any credibility with the refs the rest of the game.  You could see both Hynes and Boldy were pissed.  Neither really wanted to even look at Hartman.

    If he punched his train ticket out of town, then good riddance.

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    12 minutes ago, raithis said:

    Hynes spent multiple minutes trying to dissuade the refs that the embellishment call was wrong.  Boldy was pretty vocal about it too.  Then Hartman gets out of the box and does that and sits and smirks while the match penalty is called.  He undercut all the support multiple were giving him trying to plead his case and made it so we wouldn't have any credibility with the refs the rest of the game.  You could see both Hynes and Boldy were pissed.  Neither really wanted to even look at Hartman.

    I'd forgotten about the embellishment call. IIRC, Lou Nanne didn't like it either, but I don't remember them showing a replay of it (perhaps it wasn't on camera). But, I'm pretty sure I know what Hartman was thinking: "Embellishment? I'm getting my money's worth on the next infraction!" Let's also keep in mind the game had gotten pretty chippy about that time too.

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    A cool little thing I just saw on Puckpedia. At the bottom of the team page, they had the gear that each player wears. For instance, here is Matt Boldy who is a complete Bauer guy:

    Quote

    Of course it's in a much neater format. I wonder if there is a better stick for Boldy which would help with 1 timers and stop puck fumbles? 

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    I like a tough guy on the team that's willing to drop the gloves when the time is right. I don't have any time for the cheap crap that Hartman's piling up on his resume. If his talent isn't good enough and he needs to find a competitive edge, there are better ways to do it than to be an embarrassment to your team. 

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    22 hours ago, mnfaninnc said:

    Hartzy is better than a Boyd or Jones or Shore, but is he better than, say, a Stramel?

    Until Hartman's current contract is up, I would think definitely yes. Hartman is a top 9 NHLer. He can play up and down the lineup. He's only 30 years old and his contract expires before he turns 33.

    5 v 5, he's inside the top 300 in forward scoring. He isn't dynamic in his skating or shooting, but he has a solid all around game, can win puck battles, and can set up high danger opportunities.

    I don't condone the cheap stuff. He's definitely harder to play against than NoJo. It doesn't seem like Hynes has done him a lot of favors as far as playing with a lot of point scorers, and he certainly hasn't been at his best this season, but when he can control the emotions/penalties, he is a solid forward.

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    1 hour ago, Imyourhuckleberry said:

    but when he can control the emotions/penalties, he is a solid forward.

    But therein lies the problem. He is getting worse with his impulse control. If he is under control he is a solid player.

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