2022 MN WILD/NHL THREAD

Goli and Spurg is a terrible pairing. Honestly I’d rather have Benn with Spurg and that’s saying something.

tswoboda wrote:

I picked a good weekend to not watch any games

For anyone worried the sky is falling on the Wild… Vegas is 1-3-1 since swapping Eichel for Stone and currently 1 point from being out of a playoff spot.

Wild are having a rough patch but still comfortably in the 2/3 spot of the very tough Central. Redemption tour begins tonight.

You sound like a politician trying to make me feel good about my taxes because he’s raising someone else’s. It’s always worse somewhere else. But I get your point. All teams are going to hit the skids at some point. Things don’t look good for the boys tonight at least not right now but they have the Flyers and Buffalo that they should be able to get back on the rails with. If they struggle with those two teams we have problems. We are not that far from a wild card spot ourselves.

Way too soon to predict how Eichel is going to pan out for Vegas but I’m still glad the Wild didn’t roll those dice.

That might be just the type of goal they needed

Welp. Just kidding.

Ice Cap wrote:

Things don’t look good for the boys tonight at least not right now but they have the Flyers and Buffalo that they should be able to get back on the rails with. If they struggle with those two teams we have problems.

Ottawa is on par with those two teams and they lost to them a week ago.

I am unable to view the game against Calgary tonight but the Flames are probably the hottest team in the league. They have 1 loss in their last 12 games.

Charlie W wrote:

Welp. Just kidding.

That was unfortunate. Seemed to be a momentum builder.

So we dont play well against big teams… 6 of the top 8 teams in the Western conference are monsters (Wild and Avs are not)… that’s a HUGE problem!

Forget about getting a Giroux or Hertl or Pavelski, we need to figure out which of our core D we need to trade this offseason to increase the bulk on our back end… Spurgeon and Brodin will stay but we need to pair them with guys 6’3” and bigger… there’s no spot for Addison on this team in this conference anymore, it will suck to lose him, but with Spurgeon and a non-physical Brodin signed for 6 more years we can’t sacrifice size anymore…

Calgary pushed us around like we were nothing, they got to the front of our net like we were nothing…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

So we dont play well against big teams… 6 of the top 8 teams in the Western conference are monsters (Wild and Avs are not)… that’s a HUGE problem!

Forget about getting a Giroux or Hertl or Pavelski, we need to figure out which of our core D we need to trade this offseason to increase the bulk on our back end… Spurgeon and Brodin will stay but we need to pair them with guys 6’3” and bigger… there’s no spot for Addison on this team in this conference, he’s too small..

Calgary pushed us around like we were nothing, they got to the front of our net like we were nothing…

Jacob Chychrun. 6’3″ 215 or so and 23 years old. 4.5M through 2025. Move Dumba’s salary and give Arizona Lambos one of the Deweys or maybe Greenway and a first rounder. Might work. He fits perfectly in the Wild’s future.

Ice Cap wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>JoeMX1825 wrote:</div>
So we dont play well against big teams… 6 of the top 8 teams in the Western conference are monsters (Wild and Avs are not)… that’s a HUGE problem!

Forget about getting a Giroux or Hertl or Pavelski, we need to figure out which of our core D we need to trade this offseason to increase the bulk on our back end… Spurgeon and Brodin will stay but we need to pair them with guys 6’3” and bigger… there’s no spot for Addison on this team in this conference, he’s too small..

Calgary pushed us around like we were nothing, they got to the front of our net like we were nothing…

Jacob Chychrun. 6’3″ 215 or so and 23 years old. 4.5M through 2025. Move Dumba’s salary and give Arizona Lambos one of the Deweys or maybe Greenway and a first rounder. Might work. He fits perfectly in the Wild’s future.

it’s not out of the question, the only thing I dont like about Chychrun is we most likely cant afford his next deal, so do you pay all of those assets for just 3 years and then trade him for whatever you can get back before he walks away for free as a UFA?

How close is Daemon Hunt? 2-3 years? That kid is a beast.

Goligoski is either playing hurt or straight up gassed from playing so much. Like a lot of our guys.

Ice Cap wrote:

You sound like a politician trying to make me feel good about my taxes because he’s raising someone else’s. It’s always worse somewhere else. But I get your point.

Ha “it’s always worse somewhere else” is the Minnesota motto. Just trying to stay on brand.

But really I tried not to ride the wave of “this team is different” so I’m not going to go down with the “this team is broken” ship either. Every season has highs and lows. Just look how good Calgary is right now and they had stretches of 8 losses in 10 games and 5 losses in 6 games earlier this season.

No doubt that this is some depressing hockey to watch right now though. The cliche heavy interviews after all these losses might just do me in though.

As far as Chycrun in three years we will be out of cap hell. We should be able to find a way to hang on to him if he proves that he commands the money. These buyouts are proving to be a bigger albatross than we expected. They will probably prevent us from signing Fiala. Possibly cause us to lose Boldy should he get offered sheeted. Can’t bring Rossi up because we have to slide his contract past the buyouts. And nothings in stone he’s going to produce at the NHL level.

We can’t bring people up and we can’t bring people in because of the buyouts. By the time we get past this KK will need a new contract and…Ah, I’m getting ahead of myself…

2 positives I took out of last nights whoopin,
1- Kirill is starting to look pissed off and is playing with an edge again that hopefully can kickstart everyone else…

2- The Wild players got dealt a huge dose of reality in terms of how their game needs to improve & evolve if they want to have any playoff success. The good thing is that they have like 30 games to figure that out…it was especially good for our young guys to get an early taste of playoff hockey…

No doubt that this is some depressing hockey to watch right now though. The cliche heavy interviews after all these losses might just do me in though.
[/quote]
I think Evason was whistling through the graveyard a little bit in his post game presser last night. “We played great except for scoring”. “Cam is fine”. Best watch some tape tonight Deano. Ugh I hate this trying to double quote a post stuff!

Well, I guess my Fiala Heart throb t-shirt wasnt the ticket to get them out of the slump. Guess I have to break out the Depth T-shirt and give that a shot.

Ice Cap wrote:

As far as Chycrun in three years we will be out of cap hell. We should be able to find a way to hang on to him if he proves that he commands the money. These buyouts are proving to be a bigger albatross than we expected. They will probably prevent us from signing Fiala. Possibly cause us to lose Boldy should he get offered sheeted. Can’t bring Rossi up because we have to slide his contract past the buyouts. And nothings in stone he’s going to produce at the NHL level.

We can’t bring people up and we can’t bring people in because of the buyouts. By the time we get past this KK will need a new contract and…Ah, I’m getting ahead of myself…

lol, the sky isn’t falling!
There’s always a way to move players/salary around to afford your stars…IF Boldy is part of an offer sheet, the overage of what we would have signed him for anyways isn’t likely very much (If the Wild were going to offer him $4, no team is going to swoop in and offer sheet him for $8, maybe $5-6 and if that’s the case, maybe then we move a Greenway or Foligno, or whomever we want to make the money work)

I’m fine with Rossi marinating in the AHL, he’s putting up numbers never seen before by a 20 year old AND he’s doing it after taking a year off for myocarditis, keeping him in the AHL avoids the issue we’ll have with Boldy in 2 years, why add ontop of it if you can avoid it?

Kaprizov will be given a blank check by the Wild in 4 years if he wants it, it’s his decision though as a UFA, just like every other team has to deal with resigning their UFA stars…the good part about that timing is the Wild should be in a great spot capwise with the expected HUGE jumps in the cap itself and expensive veterans coming off the books and younger & cheaper players filling the voids…

if I was in GMBG’s shoes this trade deadline, i’d look for opportunities to poach any young and physically huge defenseman (like a Nicolas Hague from Vegas) I could from a contending team looking to win right now and perhaps needs the capspace help the Wild can provide this deadline year…perhaps they would even be interested in a vet like Goligoski for their playoff run?

mahtofire14 wrote:

Goligoski is either playing hurt or straight up gassed from playing so much. Like a lot of our guys.

lots and lots of NHL miles on that slight frame…he just looks to be wearing down…super glad GMBG didn’t extended him January 1st…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

he just looks to be wearing down…

That was the upside that Suter always had. He played like half the game and never seemed to wear down. I swear he had the stamina of a thoroughbred race horse sometimes.

gimruis wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>JoeMX1825 wrote:</div>
he just looks to be wearing down…

That was the upside that Suter always had. He played like half the game and never seemed to wear down. I swear he had the stamina of a thoroughbred race horse sometimes.

Suter was wearing down bigtime at the end of last year and in the playoffs….

JoeMX1825 wrote:

Suter was wearing down bigtime at the end of last year and in the playoffs….

I agree. But the best asset of his career as a whole was his endurance/stamina. We both know it wasn’t his wrist shot lol

I was a bit surprised Evason played Addison over Benn last night figuring he’d want Benns size on the ice. Addison was exposed playing against a big team who was ready for a physical game. I agree with Joe he might not be a fit on this team or this conference with his size. Maybe he’s learned something from it and learn to adapt to those style games. Spurgeon has made a career of it. Problem is by the time the Wild get all bulked up the conference will be back to D men that are fleet of foot puck handlers that skate around the big trees. Wasn’t that long ago that was the winning formula.

Boldy had a eye opener too I’m sure, he was getting bounced around as was everyone. KK was clearly frustrated/pissed and was trying to split D men to get to the danger area’s by himself. Problem is he’s not that guy. Dumba and Greenway’s physicality would have helped but I don’t know if it would have put them in the W column. Flames are just infrared hot right now.

Have to get four points the next two games. No exceptions.

If we already didn’t have smaller/non-physical defenseman signed long term I would say for sure Addison makes sense on the Wild, but we’d have too many small guys playing top4 minutes…

During the regular season smaller defenders can survive through the 2-3 games a week grind, but come playoff time, they get worn down quick with repeated pounding and a condensed schedule that doesn’t provide alot of recoup time…

gimruis wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>JoeMX1825 wrote:</div>
he just looks to be wearing down…

That was the upside that Suter always had. He played like half the game and never seemed to wear down. I swear he had the stamina of a thoroughbred race horse sometimes.

Thats because he stood in the same spot in the d zone all the time.

I would be ok trying to get some younger size on our D core but after this stretch I’m sure as hell not parting with any big prospects except maybe Addison or another smaller Dman for some size.

This team as good as it can be cannot survive playoff style hockey. It’s just the reality. We said at the beginning of the year this team wasn’t a cup contender. As much as I love this team and how much they’ve outperformed expectations this year, the reality is they are still where we thought they were in terms of being a serious cup contender. If not for our small D corps, our goaltending.

mahtofire14 wrote:

I would be ok trying to get some younger size on our D core but after this stretch I’m sure as hell not parting with any big prospects except maybe Addison or another smaller Dman for some size.

This team as good as it can be cannot survive playoff style hockey. It’s just the reality. We said at the beginning of the year this team wasn’t a cup contender. As much as I love this team and how much they’ve outperformed expectations this year, the reality is they are still where we thought they were in terms of being a serious cup contender. If not for our small D corps, our goaltending.

we’re not looking for top defenseman, somebody like a Nicolas Hague in Vegas (6’6” 225 lbs) is a young RFA in the range of $2-$3aav, we already have the expensive skilled defenseman, now we need the muscle to pair with them…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>mahtofire14 wrote:</div>
I would be ok trying to get some younger size on our D core but after this stretch I’m sure as hell not parting with any big prospects except maybe Addison or another smaller Dman for some size.

This team as good as it can be cannot survive playoff style hockey. It’s just the reality. We said at the beginning of the year this team wasn’t a cup contender. As much as I love this team and how much they’ve outperformed expectations this year, the reality is they are still where we thought they were in terms of being a serious cup contender. If not for our small D corps, our goaltending.

we’re not looking for top defenseman, somebody like a Nicolas Hague in Vegas (6’6” 225 lbs) is a young RFA in the range of $2-$3aav, we already have the expensive skilled defenseman, now we need the muscle to pair with them…

I didn’t say top defensemen. I just said big defensemen. Either way, it’s looking like we most likely play St Louis or Calgary in the playoffs and until we can match those teams physically it’s not gonna be good.

Speaking of Blues puck drop on TNT shortly. Blues and Rangers. Should be fun game haven’t seen the Blues in action for awhile.

mahtofire14 wrote:

I didn’t say top defensemen. I just said big defensemen. Either way, it’s looking like we most likely play St Louis or Calgary in the playoffs and until we can match those teams physically it’s not gonna be good.

My point simply was that they are attainable, even for a team like the Wild in a cap crunch…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

I didn’t say top defensemen. I just said big defensemen. Either way, it’s looking like we most likely play St Louis or Calgary in the playoffs and until we can match those teams physically it’s not gonna be good.

My point simply was that they are attainable, even for a team like the Wild in a cap crunch…
They aren’t in a cap crunch for the playoffs. Easy peasy to find big wood for the playoff run.

Blues down 2 zip to the Rangers. They put three past Sheshterkin in 2:14 to take the lead at the end of the second. Wow!