Prior to the Seattle/Dallas game last night, the studio analysts said that every player on the Stars active roster had at least 1 point in the 6 game series against the Wild except 3 players. And one of those players was Pavelski, who only played a brief amount of time in game 1.
I thought the Kraken were going to run away with that game last night but Dallas hung around and forced overtime. Florida is going to be a tough out now. Bob found his game and they are scoring relatively easily. They are built for a long run. Getting by the Bruins was a huge test.
I see a lot of people saying that the Wild are not built currently to be a cup contender. I tend to disagree. They could easily have made a run had they not had such terrible special teams. They were pretty good during the regular season, top 10 in both PP and PK I believe, but were ghastly in the playoffs again. That is what killed them. If they played 5v5 they held the edge in play.
I thought the Kraken were going to run away with that game last night but Dallas hung around and forced overtime. Florida is going to be a tough out now. Bob found his game and they are scoring relatively easily. They are built for a long run. Getting by the Bruins was a huge test.
yep, confidence is a big thing to find this time of year…
I wonder what it would take to move up into the top 10 of the draft from the 20-22 range? The NHL really doesn’t have a widly accepted draft pick value chart to reference like the NFL kind of does…
I like the idea of pooling players/picks together to move up and get a single player who might only be a year or 2 away from the NHL vs getting 3 players who are more likely 3+ years away…especially in this draft…
I think I heard the stat before but it never stuck with me, but in Dean Eveson’s professional coaching career (AHL & NHL) he is a combined 0-8 in playoff series (9-27 W/L record in those series)..that to me points to he gets in over his head and can’t make adjustments to adversity…
Dean got out coached. There ain’t no 2 ways about that.
He got out coached last year with the same basic issues.
The game plan was awful after game 4. Game 5 and 6 imo were 2 of the worst coached hockey games I think I’ve ever seen.
He’s to afraid or just incapable of adjusting.
BG’s press conference still bugs me. He kept reiterating the cap hit is no excuse but kept going right back to it as an excuse. And the whole cup being the goal and getting past the 1st round isn’t important, bull schnitzel Bill! If that’s the case why bring in all the Swedes? He wanted to get past the first round and is to chicken ch!t to admit it. Yeah we are stuck with Dean, the cap hit and sucked having Ek injured. There was way more than a chance to win that series and it did matter to the players and fans. And to BG as well. If it didn’t, why was it disappointing to loose it? And why bring in rentals? And if it’s the goal to win the cup after the cap hit, better let all the great prospects like Rossi and Addison start getting some full seasons under their belt, mistakes and all. Imo the young player development and prospects aren’t as deep or great as everyone thinks. The coaching staff has a bizarre way of not teaching through mistakes and helping players. Boldy in the playoffs looked uncoached and so did KK.
I personally don’t want to get to the playoffs next year and would rather start getting all the deep young prospect pool up on nhl ice.
Lost a lot of respect for BG and the coaching staff after this series loss. Very little if any ownership for anything. To much complimenting the stars and whining about injuries, ref’ and cap hits. To many sports slogans and bs. The last 2 games were disgusting, disappointing and yawners from an effort or coaching strategy standpoint. No effort. No change. Just more of the same. Gus took ownership of his role. Would like BG and Dean to show something similar. But no, it’s hard because of the cap hit, but I’m not using that as excuse but if you press me I’ll keep using it as a crutch. You had a fricken chance to get past the first round and completely screwed the pooch. If not getting past the first round isn’t important, why is it so d@m important to get to the playoffs? BG is shoveling hope and there’s a lotta bs in those shovels full of empty hope. There’s nothing magical that’s going to just happen once the cap hits are over. There’s no chance KK is going to want to stay after his contract is up unless they bring in some seriously tested and proven talent vs just giving lip service to this deep unproven prospect pool. Look at Rossi for an example. If that’s the kind of players we are selling as cup contenders, holy schnitzel are we in trouble. You can talk about it all day long and twice on Sundays about how bright the future looks after the cap hits are off the books, but all BG is selling is an empty bucket full of nothing but words hope. When first round exits, whether he likes it or not, are the ever growing history of this franchise. It’s a repeating pattern.
Holy schnitzel relax it’s just sports.
Curios where you think he is going to find these magical unicorn of players to bring in to make a difference with no cap space.
The only thing he has is developing a prospect pool. Keep competing and when the money is off the books find the right players to go after.
I think you guys are taking his I don’t care about getting out of the first round a little to literal. I took it as the goal every year is to win the cup and that should be every teams goal if they are a playoff team. Losing in the first round or second round is the same thing. You lost and didn’t reach the ultimate goal.
Don’t disagree on the Dean getting out coached however.
Long time reader, first time contributor to this thread (I think..) The Rossi progress, or lack thereof has bothered me so I took some time this morning in a very important work meeting to take a look at the center draft picks 9-18 from 2020.
Pick # Centers GP G A P +/-
9 Marco Rossi MIN 21 0 1 1 -8
10 Cole Perfetti WPG 51 8 22 30 10
12 Anton Lundell FLA 138 30 47 77 34
13 Seth Jarvis CAR 150 31 48 79 21
14 Dylan Holloway EDM 51 3 6 9 0
15 Rodion Amirov TOR Russian
18 Dawson Mercer NJD 164 44 54 98 -3
How different would this team look with Lundell, Jarvis, or Mercer? I don’t follow the league all the much, but are either of those 3, which have over 1.5 seasons under them, a 1C candidate?
May hamper our expectations for Rossi a bit…
Lundell 3C Barkov 2nd overall pick Bennet 4th overall.
Mercer 3C Hughes first overall. Hirscher first overall.
Both have legit 1C on their teams. Honestly 1C and 2C on there teams.
Jarvis playing wing.
Would they look better now? Of course they are in the NHL contributing Rossi is not.
All the wild fans didn’t want Lundell because he was an Ek clone. LOL.
I still think Rossi will be fine, however to expect any player outside of the top 3 maybe 4 to be a true 1C superstar is asking a bit much.
I think you guys are taking his I don’t care about getting out of the first round a little to literal. I took it as the goal every year is to win the cup and that should be every teams goal if they are a playoff team. Losing in the first round or second round is the same thing. You lost and didn’t reach the ultimate goal.
This. The goal should always be to win the cup. I dont consider this season a failure like BG said, but they could have easily flipped the script but as always seems to be the case injuries to key people have major impacts and for some reason it seems to affect the Wild moreso than other teams. Not sure why but it does.
Long time reader, first time contributor to this thread (I think..) The Rossi progress, or lack thereof has bothered me so I took some time this morning in a very important work meeting to take a look at the center draft picks 9-18 from 2020.
Pick # Centers GP G A P +/-
9 Marco Rossi MIN 21 0 1 1 -8
10 Cole Perfetti WPG 51 8 22 30 10
12 Anton Lundell FLA 138 30 47 77 34
13 Seth Jarvis CAR 150 31 48 79 21
14 Dylan Holloway EDM 51 3 6 9 0
15 Rodion Amirov TOR Russian
18 Dawson Mercer NJD 164 44 54 98 -3How different would this team look with Lundell, Jarvis, or Mercer? I don’t follow the league all the much, but are either of those 3, which have over 1.5 seasons under them, a 1C candidate?
May hamper our expectations for Rossi a bit…
if we’re doing hypotheticals, what would Rossi look like right now had he not got Myocarditis and missed basically a year of the most critical hockey development age a young player has? Apprarently Kaprizov turns into a 4th liner if he misses a month…
Probably because other teams have more scoring depth than the Wild. Definitely more center depth. Why…Cuz we are paying 2 players 42 billion to be playing elsewhere.
Why…Cuz we are paying 2 players 42 billion to be playing elsewhere.
This seems to be an exaggeration.
BG just trying really hard to spin the narrative away from the first round obsession. Obviously it didn’t work – We Minny fans are too smart..
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Ripjiggen wrote:</div>
Why…Cuz we are paying 2 players 42 billion to be playing elsewhere.This seems to be an exaggeration.
Math checks out, I even put it in my spreadsheet 
Long time reader, first time contributor to this thread (I think..) The Rossi progress, or lack thereof has bothered me so I took some time this morning in a very important work meeting to take a look at the center draft picks 9-18 from 2020.
Pick # Centers GP G A P +/-
9 Marco Rossi MIN 21 0 1 1 -8
10 Cole Perfetti WPG 51 8 22 30 10
12 Anton Lundell FLA 138 30 47 77 34
13 Seth Jarvis CAR 150 31 48 79 21
14 Dylan Holloway EDM 51 3 6 9 0
15 Rodion Amirov TOR Russian
18 Dawson Mercer NJD 164 44 54 98 -3How different would this team look with Lundell, Jarvis, or Mercer? I don’t follow the league all the much, but are either of those 3, which have over 1.5 seasons under them, a 1C candidate?
May hamper our expectations for Rossi a bit…
I’ll do you one better. Of the top 20 picks in 2020 there’s 4 prospects without an NHL goal. 1 is a monster russian defenseman, one has cancer, one a goalie, and one is Rossi.
Mercer is gonna be a player. Everyone below Perfetti would have been an off the board pick to take over Rossi; hindsight drafting isn’t fair either.
Im not ready to give up on Rossi yet. He had some major setbacks which really hurt his development. Hes nearly a PPG in AHL just needs to beef up a bit and play angry which he did the last half of this season. I expect him to stay in MN this summer and train with staff and will come out with his hair on fire and force BG to keep him here.
Im not ready to give up on Rossi yet.
Completely agree. He’s young, and he’s had a ton of pressure since being drafted… a lot of it brought on by himself. The myocarditis stuff is unfortunate but he’s not the first prospect to lose 6-12 months due to injury.
The myocarditis stuff is unfortunate but he’s not the first prospect to lose 6-12 months due to injury.
The difference though is that if you blow out a knee or shoulder, you can do other things to work out and try to stay in shape the best you can. Mycarditis can friggin stop your heart if you move too fast going up some stairs…There’s then the huge mental side of recovery in terms of constantly asking yourself “am I pushing myself too hard, will my heart stop if I do?” I just don’t think his ailment has got the respect it deserves and it took alot longer for him to get over it…The only thing I now worry about with Marco is he seems like a take what’s given to him kind of player sofar vs somebody who pushes and dictates the play…hopfully that changes, sounds like alot is riding on this offseason for him…but it makes me think of how everybody wanted Greenway to play like this runaway freight train mean sob to play against and that’s just not who he is…so the coaches would talk to him about it, he would play 2-3 games like that but then slide back into his comfort zone of playing the way he wants to…
I just don’t think his ailment has got the respect it deserves and it took alot longer for him to get over it…
Yeah 3 years later and we’re still talking about it. A million articles about it, gets brought up just about every non-game interview with him. I think the dwelling on it has hurt him more than the injury. Coaching/management staff made it a point coming into last season to stop talking about it. It became crutch and likely always will be. There’s always the ‘well maybe he scucks right now because he got myocarditus’. Yeah maybe, but who cares, always coming back to that does no good – we gotta move on.
Stalock and Archibald both missed significant time from myocarditis, twice for Stalock, and pretty much no one talks about it. Maybe it’s just a Minnesota thing?
Yeah, I think continually bringing it up to him is bad for his psyche. I mean that was a very dark time. Those articles that Russo wrote about what was going through his mind when he found out are just heart wrenching. I mean he asked his parents to sleep in his bed because he thought he was going to die. That aside from not being able to work out is extremely difficult to overcome.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Ripjiggen wrote:</div>
Why…Cuz we are paying 2 players 42 billion to be playing elsewhere.This seems to be an exaggeration.
Ok so I was off by a couple 100k. 
I’m still laughing Rip
I’m still laughing Rip
Same
I hear some of the arguments on DeanE getting outcoached, but I also wonder how much he got outcoached vs outrostered. We lose Ek. Dallas loses Pavelski. Who do we have to step up to replace vs who stepped up to replace Pavelski?
We’re already missing probably 2 high end salary players that we could even roster due to Suter & Parise buyouts. Second, where is our payroll tied up? We’ve got $29M in defense payroll vs $23M in defense payroll to Dallas. Where are we spending our money vs where are they spending theirs?
So when push comes to shove DeBoer has more options to call on. DeanE the Wienie is going to to AHL players to replace the top line players.
Could Dean have done better? I think so. Would it have resulted in a series win vs Dallas? I don’t think so.
Yeah give Deano credit, he’s gotten more out of this roster than anyone expected every regular season. But having a good regular season team comes with the expectation being a good postseason team – and he’s come up short there 3 times. Ironic their best playoff series under Dean was with their worst roster and against their best opponent.
I hear some of the arguments on DeanE getting outcoached, but I also wonder how much he got outcoached vs outrostered. We lose Ek. Dallas loses Pavelski. Who do we have to step up to replace vs who stepped up to replace Pavelski?
We’re already missing probably 2 high end salary players that we could even roster due to Suter & Parise buyouts. Second, where is our payroll tied up? We’ve got $29M in defense payroll vs $23M in defense payroll to Dallas. Where are we spending our money vs where are they spending theirs?
So when push comes to shove DeBoer has more options to call on. DeanE the Wienie is going to to AHL players to replace the top line players.
Could Dean have done better? I think so. Would it have resulted in a series win vs Dallas? I don’t think so.
Yes & No, absolutely he’s been coaching without a full deck, but as TSW mentioned, they’d had 2 of the top 4 regular seasons in team history, so there’s enough talent there. They’ve had 2-1 leads in the playoffs before the other coach made adjustments and he didn’t until it was too late and even then the changes made were laughable… Look a Deano’s career playoff coaching record in the AHL/NHL, it’s about as bad as you can get, those were all different teams/players with 1 constant variable, Dean was the coach…he also seems to be a bit too immature for the job imo, constantly crying about calls during and after games..that does nothing but drain down to the players…I don’t think he gets fired this year because he just signed a 3 year deal and Leopold won’t want to just throw that just spent money away…but next year is do or die for his Wild coaching career (fair or not)
I don’t like the excuse of the buyouts personally. If you’re a good enough team to be in contention to win the division, you have enough talent to win a playoff series. The ‘worse’ team wins playoff series all the time in the NHL, more so than probably any other major market sport.
Yes, the Wild have $14MM of dead money. But the reality is every team has dead money to some degree. Yes, $14MM is ‘enough’ to afford Nathan MacKinnon, it’s also enough to have Seth Jones and Ben Chiarot on your roster…It’s not like there’s a locker room full of MacKinnon caliber players waiting for a team like the Wild to sign with this $14MM. Especially at the center position.
Having $14MM is not a guarantee that you will spend it wisely and get $14MM worth of value out of it.
Is it a disadvantage? Absolutely. Does it mean the Wild can’t win a playoff series? No way.
If the Kraken can beat the Avs in a game 7 on the road in their first every playoff series as a franchise, then the Wild should be able to get out of the first round at some point.
For ANY team to be successful in the NHL they need younger cost controlled players to outperform their contracts, and they need the expensive vets to live up to their contracts. We have some young guys doing that, but in this series our expensive guys didn’t play well enough:
– Kaprizov $9M
– Spurgeon $7.5M
– Zuccarello $6M
– Dumba $6M
– Foligno $3.5M
– Fleury $3.1M
We got 4 goals and 1 game of 7 goals against out of that group in 6 games. That’s your headline.
I know we bring up Center depth as a huge issue and something that holds us back, but can we talk about our defense?
Our PP sucked, and our three highest paid defenders combined for 4 assists TOTAL in 6 games. I know not every defensemen is offensively focused or gifted or what not, but you gotta contribute more than that don’t you think?
Couple of Wild nuggets:
Kaprizov is staying is the USA all summer (not sure if he’s staying in MN) but you should probably get your DaBauty league tickets asap…
Wallstedt, Rossi and Walker playing in the World Hockey Championships next few weeks..
The buyout is definitely a factor…but it’s one GMBG chose. So I have no patience for that as an excuse out of him or Evason. A lack of talent wasn’t (and hasn’t been) the issue in these 1st round series since they did the buyouts. Suter and Parise seemed to have fairly productive seasons this year as well, so if anything it’s a double whammy negative on GMBG. Excuses are like a-holes, everyone has one and they all stink. Win, or it doesn’t matter why you didn’t.
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