He was, before the freeze. As of Friday or Saturday teams rosters are frozen.
The NHL is pretty smart how they are handling the expansion draft. The NHL award show will get it’s highest rating ever. I never watched one before. They will be announcing the Vegas selections throughout the show.
Of course I have to work Wednesday night. Ugh!
DT
OK, the Knights can make deals before the draft with clubs. So potentially they could come to Fletch and say, we are taking Dumba, or even Stall, unless you want to work something out. The problem of course is what are we going to offer? Draft picks we don’t have? Maybe a Reilly or Olofson AND Haula? It’s going to be interesting.
Better get use to it. Bettman will want to add another team within 2 years.
We can enjoy a slight advantage in the central having 7 teams (top 3 make playoffs) for a few years.
Even if Staal isn’t taken, I think that’s a #ick move by Pommer not waiving his NTC… I can understand him not doing that if there was even the slightest chance he could be taken, but there’s not his case… if Staal does get taken (likely traded to another team via Vegas) then that squarely falls on his shoulders. The only consolidation I would grant would be if Pommer dropping his NTC for the xpac draft ALSO drops it for the rest of his contract? if that’s the case, I can see how he probably wouldn’t want to move his family again and why he wanted the NTC in the first place (Again nobody is going to touch that contract though) so the point is moot…
You would think the smart move by Vegas would to either take Dumba as the cornerstone offensive dman of the franchise or Staal and immediately trade him for high pick(s) Vegas and can find Scandella and Huala type players on other teams, offensive defenseman are more rare.
(I doubt Staal wants anything to do with an expansion franchise in the twilight of his career)
Funny, because those are some of the exact things I was pondering this morning.
(I doubt Staal wants anything to do with an expansion franchise in the twilight of his career)
I think (and hope) that feeling is mutual.
My hope is that there will be better centermen available and they will have longer career potential. I would think the veiw on Staal would have to be he’s got 2 seasons left. Counting on more would be a gamble.
With that said, I’m going to be really p1ssed if Staal gets taken. First, why are we protecting Coyle? With his low numbers and inconsistent play, it seems to me he’s way less likely to be taken than Staal. And if he were taken, so what? Not hard to replace a winger with his numbers and probably at less salary.
Grouse
Just looking at the weird list of who teams chose to protect and expose. It’s really tough to make sense out of this, mainly, I suppose because most of it’s an attempt to predict the future.
The good news for Vegas is this is going to turn them into at least a middle of the pack team from day 1.
Grouse
yes they will be good for an xpac team, I think that was part of their argument to the NHL (We’ll pay the hefty entrance fee, but we’ll need a good team out the gate to hold the public’s interest) as there are lots of shiny things in Vegas to grab you attention 
I think they’ll take Dumba, young kid who’s energetic and a bit cocky, he can get a fanbase (with little hockey experience) excited with his skating ability and hard shot. Staal doesn’t have the personality for Vegas imo…
You answered your own question. Staal is 32 and Coyle 25. There would be a higher probability that Vegas or a team willing to work a deal with Vegas would be interested in Coyle than Staal. Fletch kind of has to play the percentages and who is most likely to be nabbed, even if the most likely scenario is that Vegas is targeting a defenceman.
The whole idea around another team arranging a deal with Vegas to pluck them a player from the unprotected list isn’t being talked about enough, I suspect you’ll see alot of that…TSN guys said they might even grab a player or two with the whole intention of re-selling them higher at the 2018 trade deadline (Staal & Neal come to mind)
lots of scenarios, should be interesting to watch, it’s gotta be fun to be the Vegas GM right now, hectic 72 hours to try and get everything figured out what’s best both short & long term…
I wonder if after all is said and done that some GMs are going to be really ticked off because Vegas and another team screws them while be kind on a divisional rival.
Just throwing this out as an example and not taking anything into consideration. Could you imagine if the Hawks basically deal to be virtually protected in exchange for a say a draft pick in the future, while Vegas takes Scandella, then trades them to Chicago for prospects/picks.
Why does no one talk about Parise waiving his NMC? Just get past the point that he’s a MN fan favorite and better player than Pommer. His contract is much worse, his production is not much better than Pommer (if at all) even though he’s playing more minutes and pp minutes, and he’ll likely be injured for a good portion of every season the rest of his career. Don’t get me wrong I like Parise just like everyone else in MN… But the odds of Vegas taking him are no better than taking Pommer.
Impressions of the new wild jerseys?
Me: butfugly
Word is Haula and a prospect to Knights in exchange they lay off Dumba, Marco and Staal.
There is also a lot of talk that it will be very active after the show and freeze with GMs making deals and Vegas trading players they selected to fulfill deals they made.
Impressions of the new wild jerseys?
Me: butfugly
I don’t think they are all that awful. At least they have the Wild logo on there this time instead of just “Minnesota”. Definitely not my favorite but I can look at them for a few years.
Word is Haula and a prospect to Knights in exchange they lay off Dumba, Marco and Staal.
There is also a lot of talk that it will be very active after the show and freeze with GMs making deals and Vegas trading players they selected to fulfill deals they made.
This too, I honestly have been hoping they could work something out to keep all 3 “big” guys. I like Haula but wouldn’t be butt hurt if they took him. Where as with Staal and Scandela, I’d probably be a little sore in the ars. Also, all the the stuff that will happen afterwards will be very interesting. a lot going to be changing over the next week or so I’d assume
Vegas already claimed to have 6 trades set also saying that they have a surplus of defensemen.
Haula…AND TUCH? WTF let them Scandella, Dumba or even Staal for that matter.
I’m pretty happy with this move. We were never going to have the cap space to re sign Haula anyways so to lose Tuch to have Vegas lay off Staal, Scandella and Dumba is a plus. Tuch was the one bigger prospect we have that I was ok with losing between Greenway, Tuch, Kaprisov and Kunin.
With that said, I can see us being very active in the next few days trying to move Brodin for a little salary cap relief to help re sign Nino and Granlund and a bottom 6 forward to replace Haula’s production. Without Brodin we still have a pretty solid top 4 defensive core and Olofsson or Reiley should be ready for regular 3rd pairing minutes this year.
So after Koivu and Staal does Ek become the 3rd line center? Who centers #4 with Graovac gone?
Haula is gone??? I am done with the Wild! 
I am now a Preds fan Grouse 
Most reports i’ve been reading said Vegas has been fleecing teams in trades as they are in the position of power.
Haula, Tuch and a possible future late round pick…I guess we won’t know exactly how good/bad this is until we see who Fletcher gets back for trading Brodin, Dumba or Scandella???
Oh well…it’s over until 2020 expansion when we’re hoping another young stud isn’t taken for nothing.
First, why are we protecting Coyle? With his low numbers and inconsistent play, it seems to me he’s way less likely to be taken than Staal.
Grouse
Not sure why you’re so down on Coyle. Here’s some stats for Wild players for the last two years. Pick Coyle out of the line up:
39G, 59A, 98Pts, 14 +/-
39G, 74A, 113Pts, 13 +/-
35G, 79A, 114Pts, 33 +/-
45G, 55A, 100Pts, 26 +/-
44G, 51A, 95Pts, -6 +/-
24G, 59A, 83Pts, 12 +/-
41G, 63A, 104Pts, 14 +/-
35G, 35A, 70Pts, 29 +/-
Just thinking. We have 4 players 2-3 seasons from the league average for forwards to peak. 3 of those 4 guys have legit shots at scoring 30+ goals. That would be something. And in Granlund I think we have a guy on wing who has a legit shot at being a 35+ goals.
Sorry to see Haula go. He was fun to watch when healthy. Wish him the best of luck in Vegas. 
after seeing what other teams paid, i’m happy with how it turned out for the Wild. Fletcher did well with his hands tied behind his back and he still has all of his defenseman available to trade now.
Haula wasn’t going to be signed long term when they have entry level contract guys a year away to take his place. I was originally excited with Tuch, but after watching him play those 8 or so games, he looked slow and lethargic.
Give Fletcher kudos when it’s warranted, this is one of those times..
And now which defenseman do they trade and for what/who?
I’m not opposed to a Scandella or Brodin for Galchenyuk trade…there’s about a 2 million difference in salary that we would have to make up though…look at it this way, his salary would just replace Pommer’s in a year (I suspect if we can’t unload him sooner, we’ll buy him out next year at eat the reduced cap hit)…I still like Galchenyuk’s upside, there was too much pressure on him in Montreal…I like him at center more than wing…have him fill in at 3rd line center this season and then move into top 6 role when Koivu or Staal leaves…
I’m completely fine losing Scandella, Brodin would hurt a bit, but I think Olofsonn can be just as good IF he can stay healthy, big IF….
Not sure why you’re so down on Coyle. Here’s some stats for Wild players for the last two years. Pick Coyle out of the line up:
Two reasons. First, when it was looking like Coyle was going to be protected and Zucker was going to be exposed, I had to question why the lesser performer was being protected. Secondly, Coyle hasn’t shown much in the way of development and to be honest I don’t think there’s much more there. He’s a 3rd line guy and that’s all we’re going to get.
Zucker, to me, has much more upside potential so it made zero sense to me to expose him as he’d almost certainly be taken by Vegas whereas Coyle IMO would be much less attractive. Turned out that neither scenario played out.
Grouse
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