2021 MN Wild/NHL Thread

Found where I read it. Guess I didn’t realize he was a FA.

According to The Athletic’s James Mirtle, Ron Francis already has his target in goal. The Panthers Chris Driedger is someone he wants manning the nets for the Seattle Kraken’s inaugural season.

This year, Driedger has been impressive with a 13-6-3 record to go with a 2.17 GAA and SV% of 923. It makes you wonder why Florida would expose him? That’s because Sergei Bobrovsky and his no move clause must be protected. With Spencer Knight signed and in the fold, the 26 year-old Driedger is expendable.

That Bob contract is going to haunt them for a very long time. Spencer Knight could be special. It’s wild how many teams have these haunting contracts. The Wild have their’s but it really seems like most teams have at least one. Will Toews ever play again?

Did anyone see the cheap shot by Tom Wilson last night? He had his stick under a Ranger player’s neck and punched him in the back of the head while he was down and then things really escalated. Eventually he and Panarin got into it. Panarins season is over now because of it. Wilson got find 5 grand. That’s it. No suspension. That is a complete travesty. He should be suspended indefinitely considering he’s been suspended how many times already. They play again tomorrow night. I expect fireworks.

gim wrote:

Did anyone see the cheap shot by Tom Wilson last night? He had his stick under a Ranger player’s neck and punched him in the back of the head while he was down and then things really escalated. Eventually he and Panarin got into it. Panarins season is over now because of it. Wilson got find 5 grand. That’s it. No suspension. That is a complete travesty. He should be suspended indefinitely considering he’s been suspended how many times already. They play again tomorrow night. I expect fireworks.

Yep, it was discussed 2 pages ago. Things move along quickly when there’s lots to talk about. Lol

CaptainMusky wrote:

Yep, it was discussed 2 pages ago. Things move along quickly when there’s lots to talk about. Lol

Lol oh, thanks

gim wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>CaptainMusky wrote:</div>
Yep, it was discussed 2 pages ago. Things move along quickly when there’s lots to talk about. Lol

Lol oh, thanks

I’ve been caught up by it myself!

Rangers released an official statement calling for Parros to be fired. Probably won’t change anything but that’s pretty wild for a team to call for an NHL execs head.

tswoboda wrote:

Rangers released an official statement calling for Parros to be fired. Probably won’t change anything but that’s pretty wild for a team to call for an NHL execs head.

Crosby got into a kerfuffle last night and Caps fans were comparing it to what Wilson did. LOL
Regarding Parros, its pretty ridiculous that the head of DPoS was a former goon in the league. Was a gift appointment since he got his clock cleaned by Orr when he fell headfirst to the ice or??

Wilson incident is really blowing up.

Rangers have taken the extraordinary step of calling out both the league and the DOPS George Parros in a press release (from The Athletic):

The full statement read: “The New York Rangers are extremely disappointed that Capitals forward Tom Wilson was not suspended for his horrifying act of violence last night at Madison Square Garden. Wilson is a repeat offender with a long history of these type of acts and we find it shocking that the NHL and their Department of Player Safety failed to take the appropriate action and suspend him indefinitely. Wilson’s dangerous and reckless actions caused an injury to Artemi Panarin that will prevent him from playing again this season. We view this as a dereliction of duty by NHL head of Player Safety, George Parros, and believe he is unfit to continue in his current role.”

This statement despite the fact that the Rangers can (and probably will) be fined a huge amount for public critisim of the league and its officials. Wow.

The problem that the league has is that this incident PROVES beyond a shadow of a doubt that:

1. There IS a real league policy of minimizing the impact that any disciplinary actions will have on a certain number of League-Favored Teams.

2. #1 is even more true when those discipline actions would impact one of The Favored Teams that is playoff-bound or in the playoffs already.

3. There is no consistency or real policy behind player discipline. Every case is being handled on a one-off basis whereby league officials are getting together in a back room and negotiating the league’s punishment based not on player safety, but on how the actions will impact The Favored Team, the league’s finances, and the direction the league wishes to steer which teams win and lose.

Isn’t it time for Bettman to go? The league has come off the rails and now fans everywhere have Bettman unwittingly confirming what we suspected all the long. He is steering who wins and loses in the NHL by the actions of the NHL front office instead of what happens on the ice.

Wilson needs to get targeted. But everyone knows that.

I agree on the lack of consistency argument, but the Rangers are one of the most important franchises in the league in the worlds largest market, who recently “won” the generational player draft lottery when they had a low % to do so…so the favoritism argument falls flat there….

Bettman’s job is to grow the league, he just signed the NHL to the largest TV deal in league history (3 times the value of the previous contract and got on 2 national networks) DURING A GLOBAL PANDEMIC, I think his job is safe for awhile….

I dont think the league front office has any bearing on player punishment. They let that fall in the hands of the DoPS which is led by Parros. That is a way for the NHL FO to distance themselves from these decisions. The DoPS HAS to work within the confines of what is in the CBA with the NHLPA. The max fine punishable is $5000, but they also could have levied suspension which is what people are upset about.
Grabbing someone’s hair, throwing them to the ice and then smashing their head in the ice without a helmet on is beyond a “Scrum”.
He was fined ONLY for the punch on Pavel. Nothing regarding Panarin.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

I agree on the lack of consistency argument, but the Rangers are one of the most important franchises in the league in the worlds largest market, who recently “won” the generational player draft lottery when they had a low % to do so…so the favoritism argument falls flat there….

Not really.

The decision not to suspend or not suspend Wilson only impacts the Caps in any real way. Beyond the question of fairness, the decision does not impact the Rangers one way or the other going forward.

Bettman’s TV contract tracks right along with the general value of TV rights for major sports. He didn’t do any better or worse than any other major professional sport in the US. In general, the value of TV rights has been skyrocketing.

I don’t believe for a second that Bettman has nothing to say about player disicipline. The fact that there are no “sentencing guidelines” that automatically lay out the punishments and fines if the DOPS agree there WAS an infraction shows that the league wants maximum wiggle room to make sure favored teams and players don’t “get hit too hard” when it might impact other league goals or income.

Queue the conspiracy threads, Rangers just fired both their President and GM! Chris Drury taking over both positions…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

Queue the conspiracy threads, Rangers just fired both their President and GM! Chris Drury taking over both positions…

Guess I was wrong in predicting that statement wouldn’t change anything, but not exactly what I was thinking lol.

Rumors I saw was the owner pushed the statement through, GM and president distanced themselves from it, and he canned them for that. All this caused by a few seconds of Tom Wilson black out rage.

Tonight’s game should be interesting, does Vegas come out super physical to try and set the tone early? They are clearly in a funk vs the Wild, i’d guess you might see the gloves dropped early on…

What a crapshow this rangers caps game is.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

Tonight’s game should be interesting, does Vegas come out super physical to try and set the tone early? They are clearly in a funk vs the Wild, i’d guess you might see the gloves dropped early on…

It’s going to be physical no doubt. I wouldn’t be surprised if there aren’t a fight or two. Vegas has to do something.

CaptainMusky wrote:

What a crapshow this rangers caps game is.

Players handled their business, i’ll give credit to the heavyweights of Washington (Chara and others) for staying out of the fisticuffs and letting the less experienced guys fight it out…Chara could really hurt somebody and the Rangers lack tough guys…

Holy moly the puck movement on that powerplay!

Um what is KK97 getting a 5 min penalty for and what is being reviewed? For defending himself after getting boarded and some guy jumped him?

Where is Fiala?

Just switched from the rangers game to the wild game, right after the Kaprizov melee. Buchnevich just got a game misconduct for exactly what Whitecloud just did to Kaprizov. What is going on the NHL right now?

The playoffs are coming! The playoffs are coming!

This game is intense! The Wild can adapt their game to whatever is needed, you want to bang? We can bang! You want to run? We can run!

This is so much fun!

mahtofire14 wrote:

Where is Fiala?

Lower body no idea when it happened.

What in the hell is going on with these refs????? They have let McNabb cheap shot our team for the last four periods.

Just realized 6’2″ Whitecloud was the Vegas player all bloodied up after his wrestling match with Kaprizov.

tswoboda wrote:

Just realized 6’2″ Whitecloud was the Vegas player all bloodied up after his wrestling match with Kaprizov.

A tampon in each nostril in the box.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>CaptainMusky wrote:</div>
What a crapshow this rangers caps game is.

Players handled their business, i’ll give credit to the heavyweights of Washington (Chara and others) for staying out of the fisticuffs and letting the less experienced guys fight it out…Chara could really hurt somebody and the Rangers lack tough guys…

Agreed but as solid of a guy Chara is I would fight Wilson and none of this would happen. No reason for all these other guys to fight when the target is on one guy.

That 10 seconds or so when the camera stayed on Parise sitting on the bench was painful knowing he’s on the books for 4 more years as one of our highest paid forwards and there’s no place for him but the 4th line…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

The playoffs are coming! The playoffs are coming!

This game is intense! The Wild can adapt their game to whatever is needed, you want to bang? We can bang! You want to run? We can run!

This is so much fun!

Agreed playoff hockey is like no other.
I am caught up on this thread now. I can’t get myself to pull away from the tube long enough to comment to much.