MN Wild 2017-18 Official Thread

Ask and you shall receive…

Feel free to migrate off season talk onto this 2017-18 thread. And… if you feel so inclined there is an official TB Bolts thread as well courtesy of Pug.

Da Beauty League will be starting soon. Anyone gone and watched? It’s cheap and really fun to watch. I wonder if Haula will be there or if he will already be in Vegas.
DT

Is this an eyes wide open thread, or do you have to put your hometown blinders on and pledge undying alliegence to the State of Hockey?

jeff_huberty wrote:

Is this an eyes wide open thread, or do you have to put your hometown blinders on and pledge undying alliegence to the State of Hockey?

As the starter of the thread I can not guarantee past performance will result in future gains and any thread participant acknowledges/understands the risks associated with social media sports talk at their own peril.

tegg wrote:

As the starter of the thread I can not guarantee past performance will result in future gains and any thread participant acknowledges/understands the risks associated with social media sports talk at their own peril.

Well said plausible deniability

jeff_huberty wrote:

Is this an eyes wide open thread, or do you have to put your hometown blinders on and pledge undying alliegence to the State of Hockey?

Oh I am sure typical Mn sports fans are welcome too. But what would this Bolts fans know.

Russo says wild might have interest in Kunitz, Upshall and/or Boyle. I’ll take one or more of them, but Boyle is first on my list.

mplspug wrote:

Russo says wild might have interest in Kunitz, Upshall and/or Boyle. I’ll take one or more of them, but Boyle is first on my list.

Of those 3 Boyle is first on my list as well. I actually hoped the Wild would have gotten him at the trade deadline last year, but they went with Hanzal instead. Certainly get more offense with Hanzal, but Boyle brings the beef.

What about Jagr?

Jaromir Jagr jokes about why no NHL general managers have called him

I’ve seen interviews and stories on him. He seems like a cool dude.

Looking at the list, I wouldn’t mind Sharp and would be really happy if we could squeeze Justin Williams into the lineup.

I think Jagr ends up in Vegas and maybe even Radulov, although no one should touch Radulov. He wants a 6 year, $7M per year contract. That’s a lot for another Russian with ego problems. But Jagr, that’s a guy who can sell tickets in Vegas and gives them a face.

I want Jagr on this team if for no other reason just to see his flow.
Before the Wild can go after any free agents they are going to have to move someone.

HOLY CRAP!! reports saying Fletcher was able to include Pommer with Scandella trade to Buffalo!!

Fletcher deserves credit for unloading that contract! (even though he was the one to give it)

Ennis is a good skilled little player who can play center on a $4.6 salary for two more seasons and he does NOT have a no-trade clause.. I don’t know much about Foligno, his contract is up so maybe they don’t even offer him a contract.. bottom line, the Pommer contract is off the books!

Yeah I just got that notification as well

Whoa, you guys are good. Hadn’t seen this yet.

Thank you Poms, our only other 30 goal scorer in the last 8 years besides Parise.

You’d think we could get a little more for Marco, but they are eating a salary for us.

I have always liked Ennis and Foligno, but they aren’t anything but bottom 6 forwards. I thought Foligno would have done a little more by now, but he’s 25. Him and Stewart will allow Nino and Coyle to play like pansy forwards.

Saves 5MM which is huge. Now what to do with it.

CaptainMusky wrote:

Saves 5MM which is huge. Now what to do with it.

Granlund, Niederiter contracts, after that I don’t see any 2017-18 roster improvements. I am biting my lip and waiting to see talent additions.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

I don’t know much about Foligno, his contract is up so maybe they don’t even offer him a contract..

If the Wild have no intention of signing him, then I don’t see much reason for Buffalo to throw him in there. He’s youngish (25) and big. His numbers are probably going to get a boost playing with the Wild.

Ennis, well if he stays healthy he’s another guy that can pump 20+ goals into the net. But it is a big if.

This is an interesting site Spotrac

We have $18.5M in cap space. We have 14 players signed and need 9 more to fill out the roster. I’d imagine $10-12M is going to be allocated for Nino and Granlund.

I don’t hate this deal, but I certainly don’t love it either. I get that we need cap space, but how much did we really gain aside from dumping Marco’s contract. The only sure win I see is that we didn’t lose Brodin or Dumba. If we don’t sign Foligno, then I see it as we gave Scandella away (and his $4 mil contract) for nothing.

We only gain $1 mil/year cap space in Pomminville for Ennis. Pommer is a proven vet that put up 47 points in a “disappointing” season last year and can play anywhere in the lineup. Ennis is an injury prone underperformer, has never surpassed 50 points in 7 seasons. The only thing he has going for him is youth and potential to get better. If [ IIFFFF] he can stay healthy and be a consistent contributor to the Wild, then this deal will be a big win for us.

I see Foligno being a big bodied 4th liner for the wild. He’s been a 25 pt/year guy playing 2nd & 3rd line minutes (some time with Jack Eichel) for Buffalo.

I wonder what kind of contract Foligno will get… I’m thinking $2 mil range, in which case we only gain $3 mil in cap space for a big down grade in production.

Foligno had just as many goals as Pominville, so I consider it a push, with us getting cap relief. Plus, Foligno is a power forward, that’s the only reason he didn’t have as many assists. We have enough playmaking set up guys on the squad.

Ennis is a big if. If he stays healthy, he’s a 20 goal scorer.

I think it’s a good trade considering we had to do something to free up cap space. Plus, we got a little younger.

I wish Fletch had Nino and Granlund signed before tomorrow so they knew what they could spend. Not there are any real sexy free agents out there and certainly if there were, we couldn’t afford them.

Hawks bring Sharp back on a 1 year $1M contract.

Wild sign Kyle Quincy. That’s a good signing. I had a feeling they would sign Rau. O’Reilly a decent depth signing. All that is left is Cullen and the Wild are done.

#mnwild have signed 7 players so far today:
D-Kyle Quincey/Alex Grant/Ryan Murphy
F-Landon Ferraro/Cal O’Reilly/Kyle Rau
G-Niklas Svedberg

Bad news. Dallas is back in the mix for the division title with the signings of Radulov, Bishop, Hanzel and acquisition of Methot from Vegas.

The good news is that they are paying that cancer Radulov $6M for 5 years.

I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that one day Radulov and Seguin get into a fist fight at 4am.

CaptainMusky wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>mplspug wrote:</div>
Russo says wild might have interest in Kunitz, Upshall and/or Boyle. I’ll take one or more of them, but Boyle is first on my list.

Of those 3 Boyle is first on my list as well. I actually hoped the Wild would have gotten him at the trade deadline last year, but they went with Hanzal instead. Certainly get more offense with Hanzal, but Boyle brings the beef.

Looks like we got our Boyle in Foligno.

So far the off season moves have done nothing to improve the team, the only improvement was perhaps adding some muscle with Ringo.
Apparently the wild are more handicaped with their Cap space than most reports are assuming.
Unfortunately that situation has them falling behind the rest of the assumed playoff contenders.
So if the Wilds upcoming season unravels and some kind of deal to unload one or both the $90 million twins during the season occurs,would you pull the trigger?

They always knew they were cap strapped. That’s why they unloaded Poms and Scandela?

mplspug wrote:

They always knew they were cap strapped. That’s why they unloaded Poms and Scandela?

ahh yea; they knew,so did every team in the league!
GONE:
1ST-2ND-4TH round picks
Haula
Tuch
Pominville
Scandella
FOLIN
Klemperer
Hanzel and Grettle

Fletcher is still playing a pair of deuces since his all in trade for Hanzel and Gretle.
The Question is, at some point it’s time to sell on a losing stock. So with that in mind do you consider trying to unload one or both of the $90 mil twins?

jeff_huberty wrote:

ahh yea; they knew,so did every team in the league!
GONE:
1ST-2ND-4TH round picks
Haula
Tuch
Pominville
Scandella
FOLIN
Klemperer
Hanzel and Grettle

Fletcher is still playing a pair of deuces since his all in trade for Hanzel and Gretle.
The Question is, at some point it’s time to sell on a losing stock. So with that in mind do you consider trying to unload one or both of the $90 mil twins?

The only one of the two that would have any value is Suter. Would I consider getting rid of him? Well, I wouldn’t say never, but its closer to never than a coin flip for me. There will be a lot of opportunity to improve this team when Koivu’s contract is up which is after this upcoming season. I bet he comes back, but at a lower $$.
They will also be clear of the Vanek buyout which frees up $2.5M right there. So, just between those 2 situations they will have over $9M freed up.
Nino files for arbitration, pretty much expected that he would. I hope we can get both Nino and Granlund for around $5M per, if it gets much bigger than that we will have trouble.
We are still a center short, if that gets filled by Cullen, that would be fine by me, but IDK what else is out there.

jeff_huberty wrote:

The Question is, at some point it’s time to sell on a losing stock. So with that in mind do you consider trying to unload one or both of the $90 mil twins?

I don’t get the premise. Neither is going anywhere, because no one will touch Parise contract and the Marketing Department won’t allow it. And there is no way I would consider getting rid of Suter.

Impossible how to predict how these offseason moves pan out. Cap space moves are especially difficult to judge.

Unloading Pominville now instead of buying him out later could turn out to be a good move or a bad move. What kind of season would he have had? Nobody knows.

Will miss Scandella and packaging Tuch with Haula makes me nervous, but like many I was not impressed with Tuch’s NHL play such as it was, but that’s scant few games to judge anything by.

Not sure also the impact of Kuemper leaving.

I thought last year we were headed for a middle of the pack finish, so much for my predicting how things will work out. Development camp starts this weekend, so will be very interested to see the younger players.

Grouse

mplspug wrote:

I don’t get the premise. Neither is going anywhere, because no one will touch Parise contract and the Marketing Department won’t allow it. And there is no way I would consider getting rid of Suter.

The issue seems to be that Minnesotans believe Parise is untouchable solely for the reason that he is from Minnesota.Yes, its fun to see a guy from Minnesota play on the hometown team and see them succeed, and I am not solely on Parise’s case. IMHO, I would rather see the team built on the best players available, not the best Minnesotans available.
It was at the time a good move by the team to sign them both, but in hindsight
playoff success has eluded them. At some point their value as assets to a playoff contending team becomes more valuable than continuing to keep them.

As the expiration dates of these two contracts get closer, and the top end $per year of the market continues to rise then I think there maybe a window to unload one or both. Suter I think carries more value than Parise at this time.
So lets say the Wild are not playoff contenders as next seasons trade Deadline approaches. Do the wild become sellers? And of the two would Suter be the most desirable for a playoff contender? the caveat would depend on the season Parise has.
On the marketing end Playoff Successes would be much easier to sell than Parise Jerseys.