2022 MN WILD/NHL THREAD

CaptainMusky wrote:

I have read that there is no signing bonus and the final 2 years have NTC on them with a lower AAV for the purposes of reducing impact of the players escrow. I bet those things are what took a while to figure out.

The final 2 year NTC is a bit perplexing to me??? Why would his agent want that? I seriously doubt we would want to trade him away after 3 years???

The first thing my mind went to when hearing this was if there was any possibility of this being sinister in terms of him telling the team he has ZERO intention of signing an extension with the Wild in 4 years and it then greatly reduces the Wild’s ability to trade him off (he would control where he would go) to get some assets back before he could leave for nothing in 5 years? Hopefully this was just a blip Debbie Downer moment for me after all the good news yesterday?

I can totally understand the no signing bonus rule that it sounds like the Owner has told GMBG to absolutely enforce after the huge bonuses given to Parise and Suter the first few years and then buying them out early but they essentially already got their money…The assumption is players probably lose a bit of motivation AFTER they receive their huge signing bonus checks…

https://twitter.com/mnwild/status/1440498604892770309?s=19

How can anyone be mad at this beauty!
Sounds like he will be at the BG presser and can avoid quarantine.

Joe I was perplexed by the NYC thing too. Maybe they thought that if it would be hard to sign him to an extension they didn’t want him dumped at the end. Not sure.

Damn get him with Rossi in camp and see what happens.

CaptainMusky wrote:

Damn get him with Rossi in camp and see what happens.

I really think they are going to pump the breaks on Rossi, give him 10-20 games of 20+ minutes a night in Iowa to get all of the rust off his game and set him up for the greatest level of success when called up? I know the kid is super confident, but putting him in Iowa to start so when he does make the early rookie mistakes (and he will) they won’t cost the team… I guess we’ll see over the next few days of practice…exciting times either way!

Yeah I agree he will probably start in Iowa and there is no problem in that.

NTC/NMC are not allowed for players during RFA years… that’s why the NTC doesn’t kick in until years 4 and 5. Every player wants no-trade protection.

I don’t get the big deal being made about no signing bonus. Fans and media are celebrating that line it’s a big win for the team. As a fan, signing bonus structure means nothing to me… aside from signaling the owner is being cheap or perhaps a bit cash strapped at the moment. Honestly I thought Leoipold would be rolling in cash after the cleaning supply surge of 2020. Sugar mama must be tightening the reins on him.

tswoboda wrote:

NTC/NMC are not allowed for players during RFA years… that’s why the NTC doesn’t kick in until years 4 and 5. Every player wants no-trade protection.

I don’t get the big deal being made about no signing bonus. Fans and media are celebrating that line it’s a big win for the team. As a fan, signing bonus structure means nothing to me… aside from signaling the owner is being cheap or perhaps a bit cash strapped at the moment. Honestly I thought Leoipold would be rolling in cash after the cleaning supply surge of 2020. Sugar mama must be tightening the reins on him.

Russo hinted on kfan last night that no signing bonuses is just a personal thing to Leopold… They gave Spurgeon a small one for being the captain, but they won’t be handed out anymore as long as Leopold is the owner…

Just read that Alex Stalock is OUT FOR THE SEASON due to a heart condition…

JoeMX1825 wrote:

Just read that Alex Stalock is OUT FOR THE SEASON due to a heart condition…

SOB! That has to be tied to his COVID issue last year much like what Rossi went through.

CaptainMusky wrote:

SOB! That has to be tied to his COVID issue last year much like what Rossi went through.

Didn’t he get back to working out rather quickly vs what Marco went through in terms of required downtime? Perhaps he did some damage by doing so? I know the risk of that damage is why they demanded Marco do NOTHING for so many months…

He did. I was reading Hollands comments and they said he was cleared last year but apparently after the season he had some Dr appts and eventually found the issue. He even played in the Beauty League so this is a very recent development. I like the dude, hoping for the best for him.

Listening to the presser, I am going to give Theofanous a bit of credit here. BG said that he and Kirill coordinated together and got everything taken care of to allow him to not miss time. Got him to FL in time to quarantine, he is also fully vaxxed. This is great. They didnt have to do that, but that makes me think better of him.

what’s so strange is that if the hold up was always just about money and Kirill maintained that direction for his agent, he sure doesn’t appear to be a materialistic person…He’s at the presser in a white t-shirt, no watch or jewelry anywhere and his hair isn’t combed at all….the kid the looks like a rink rat you see playing in the hallways of arenas everywhere in MN…

He even said he wasn’t going to buy anything to celebrate…

Listening on KFAN… This is the best wild presser I’ve ever heard.

fox9 had a video feed

JoeMX1825 wrote:

fox9 had a video feed

On TV or stream? I had the dang TV on that channel, but had it muted because I was listening. All I saw was that Wendy Williams show.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

September 22, 2021 at 10:00 am#2062608
CaptainMusky wrote:
Damn get him with Rossi in camp and see what happens.

I really think they are going to pump the breaks on Rossi, give him 10-20 games of 20+ minutes a night in Iowa to get all of the rust off his game and set him up for the greatest level of success when called up? I know the kid is super confident, but putting him in Iowa to start so when he does make the early rookie mistakes (and he will) they won’t cost the team… I guess we’ll see over the next few days of practice…exciting times either way!

I hope they give Rossi a stint in Iowa as you say. IMO moving him straight to the big team risks a lot for no real gain. For all his other accomplishments, Rossi has never played NHL hockey. Even Iowa is going to be a step up compared to Juniors. No reason to hurry, it’s a long season.

I’m super glad Kirill got in the US and got vaccinated. Couldn’t understand why he would sit in Russia with training camp looming and known delays in getting visas, etc. Turns out the reason is that he wasn’t sitting in Russia at all.

For all the changes this team will still be fun to watch. If Fiala gets going this year, and Kaprizov shows the same stuff, there’s a lot to like. Now if a Boldy and Rossi work their way into the lineup and provide some scoring, the Wild could be pretty dangerous on any given night, not a team you’d want to let hang around with a 3-2 lead going into the 3rd.

Also, it will be nice to get back to the X at real capacity and watch games. I turned down our tickets last year because limited capacity games under COVID rules just felt sad and lame. I’d rather watch on tv under those conditions. Now finally everything is back in place.

Boldy to me is a huge upgrade over Parise or whoever skated when he was not in the lineup.

Does anyone besides me think KK’s translator sounds like Russo?

So he has been hunkered down in Florida for a week or two and nobody recognized him and leaked out a possible sighting?

Pug, you didn’t happen to run into him at the market or beach?

CaptainMusky wrote:

On TV or stream? I had the dang TV on that channel, but had it muted because I was listening. All I saw was that Wendy Williams show.
I saw a small window on their website, took me to a live video stream

Do you get any vibes watching that presser that he’s somebody who was trying to get as much money out of the Wild as he could???

I sure didn’t….

I just looked at the 2026-2027 NHL UFA list….couple of decent names that teams will throw some money at if they don’t resign with their clubs earlier..

Connor McDavid (29 years old)
Jack Eichel (29 years old)
Kirill Kaprizov (29 years old)

Artemi Panarin will be 34 years old and likely only get a short/mid term deal…

2 lines and 2 D pairs looking pretty obvious heading into camp

Kaprizov-Ek-Zucc
Greenway-Hartman-Foligno
Fiala-Rask-Gaudreau-Sturm-Bjugstad-Rossi-Boldy

Goligosky-Spurgeon
Brodin-Dumba
Kulikov-Benn-Merrill-Addison

tswoboda wrote:

2 lines and 2 D pairs looking pretty obvious heading into camp

Kaprizov-Ek-Zucc
Greenway-Hartman-Foligno
Fiala-Rask-Gaudreau-Sturm-Bjugstad-Rossi-Boldy

Goligosky-Spurgeon
Brodin-Dumba
Kulikov-Benn-Merrill-Addison

Sign me up for wanting to see this.

For some reason I saw a slightly different Group B on Twitter.

LOL I looked at that for way too long before I found it.

I think it’s funny how Russo had no clue Kaprizov was in Florida. Billy G even ribbed him a bit about it in the Presser. Dan Myers, the official wild staff writer, also went out of his way to state he got the first in person interview with Kaprizov of any Minnesota sports writer.

I think it’s pretty obvious Russo does not like Theofanous, which sounds pretty normal in the NHL world. But Russo has said how Theofanous would not respond to his texts or calls, and he clearly was not happy about that. He stated writing more and more negatively about this the longer it went on and I think a big part of that was his disdain for the agent. Russo’s negativity affected fan perception which we saw here with posters basically transcribing his podcast lines and tweets.

Sorry for the rambling, just glad it’s finally over and we can all move on from the drama and “he can stay in Russia” talk.

Considering Russo is and has been pretty much “The Source” for anything Wild I think we were all watching his Twitter page and listening to his podcasts. Sure I probably echoed him quite a bit but it just so happened he echoed my own thoughts and I agreed with most of what he said. I still see no reason this came down to the very end like it did.

I’m as happy as anyone KK is here but I would have been fine watching this team without him. I am looking forward to now see him prove it in a full season and more against a full slate of teams.

Btw is there any way to watch the preseason games?