Wild 2015-16

WTF, just checked out Zuckers ice time. I know he was on the 4th line, but 8 minutes last game? Hmm. That don’t sit right with me. Yeo must go.

The tickets are for the most part sold and paid for so the message can’t be sent by not buying tickets until the off season. The booing will come soon if they play poorly. The last game wasn’t a bad game, so the fans were positive. I think the majority of people in the building are true fans. I am a fan, but I don’t have blinders on that will never say anything bad when they are under performing. I dumped my season tickets back with the prior owner that didn’t try to win, and just cashed the checks of season ticket holders. I returned when CL took over and wasn’t afraid to spend money and truly is trying to win. I think that fletcher is under the gun and will be gone if the wild don’t make a run.

Dutchboy wrote:

When will fans start to stay away?
When will the fans start to boo?
Are there any Hockey fans at the X or are they the trendy team in town?

When is “we are trying hard” not enough when they charge what they charge to watch this team?

As expected, going to be hard to stomach this whole game. Keep sending the same guys out on the powerplay. Definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Put Haula, Coyle, fontain, and Dumbar on the powerplay. See what happens. Yeo is a complete idiot and needs to go now!!! I don’t care if Duggy Houser replaces him, it can’t possibly be any worse

I am predicting he’s gone by Saturday after this “effort”. Pending a miracle.

I think when Fletcher and Yeo are booted they should take the entire scouting team with them? When was the last time the Wild scouts have hit on a great player? Gaborik maybe? Look at Chicago or Washington or other teams who pick high in the draft who constantly get young studs picking as high as they do? We need better scouts!

31lifer wrote:

I think when Fletcher and Yeo are booted they should take the entire scouting team with them? When was the last time the Wild scouts have hit on a great player? Gaborik maybe? Look at Chicago or Washington or other teams who pick high in the draft who constantly get young studs picking as high as they do? We need better scouts!

Ovi went #2 overall in a dual year lottery draft and Backstrom went #4 overall, Chicago sucked until they got Kane and Toews in back-to-back years, so it’s hard to miss on those picks…

Pug, I actually thought this was overall a fairly solid game. I saw lots of effort out there. In fact, Pominville had a pretty decent game even though he didn’t show up on the box score. Ovies 3rd goal should have been overturned. Take away that goal and it’s a tie. Holtby lost one game regulation in 32? That’s insane. The caps are the best in the league.
No moral victory. A loss is a loss but I think the team played pretty decent tonight. they have been playing much better. Hopefully this western Canada road trip will treat us well and beat the Bruins saturday!

I’m hoping we keep losing, this season is lost and the more we lose, the better chance we have of drafting a player who can impact this team (this draft has 3 studs who are pure goal scorers)

Yeo is a joke, I love his intensity for drawing up a play with 3.6 seconds left in the game….lol…. Where is the deer in headlights drinking from a water bottle stare?

31lifer wrote:

I think when Fletcher and Yeo are booted they should take the entire scouting team with them? When was the last time the Wild scouts have hit on a great player? Gaborik maybe? Look at Chicago or Washington or other teams who pick high in the draft who constantly get young studs picking as high as they do? We need better scouts!

when was the last time the wild had a pick near where the capitals or blackhawks superstars were drafted? Probably when they got gaborik. They have picked mid to late 1st round in every draft for years. It supports what many of us have said, they haven’t sucked enough to get a top pick. The hawks were terrible for years and ended up getting kane and toews in consecutive drafts. That’s a huge deal. Look at Edmonton, they have what 3 of the last 4 overall #1 pics and are still terrible.

I realize the main guys the Caps or Hawks have were taken high in the draft when they were bad team but look at some of their rookies that are studs this year.

31lifer wrote:

I realize the main guys the Caps or Hawks have were taken high in the draft when they were bad team but look at some of their rookies that are studs this year.

like who? Kuznetsov was drafted many years ago but stayed in Russia and played in the KHL, Tarasenko for the Blues was in a similar position. The risk with them is they could have said “FU” to the NHL and stayed in the KHL (The NHL didn’t have a transfer agreement with the KHL at the time) thus a wasted 1st round pick. Chicago’s rookie I believe was a European free agent who could pick his team to sign with (who wouldn’t want to play for chicago?)

CaptainMusky wrote:

Look at Edmonton, they have what 3 of the last 4 overall #1 pics and are still terrible.

That’s about to change. Conner McDavid is probably the first legit player you can compare to Gretzky since he retired. The west just got harder. And now those #1 picks just got better because of it. Crazy, Eberle has been in a bit of a funk the last 2 years and Benoit Pouliot, come on, he’s a 3-4th liner. McDavid comes back and those 3 guys are just lighting it up.

Yep,mcdavid is the real deal. There are some crazy good rookies in the league this year. Certainly fun to watch.

Edmonton’s problems never had anything to do with scoring goals, they just totally neglected their defense for 5 years and give up a ton of goals…They’ll get good quickly as it’s easier to find defensive players to fill the gaps… They will be good for along time…you just wonder if they can work all those high offensive drafts picks under the cap…

All of the top tier teams (with the exception of Redwings who continue to find diamonds in the late rounds) had really crappy teams for many years allowing them to load up on top talent picking top 5 of the draft year after year…The Wild had maybe 1-2 years of picking top 5 (non expansion draft) and even then they always seemed to be 1 pick away from the surethings…

I don’t feel so bad now. Yeo must go.
Minnesota deserves better.

31lifer wrote:

I think when Fletcher and Yeo are booted they should take the entire scouting team with them? When was the last time the Wild scouts have hit on a great player? Gaborik maybe? Look at Chicago or Washington or other teams who pick high in the draft who constantly get young studs picking as high as they do? We need better scouts!

A couple of things I think a lot of Wild fans don’t realize about the draft.

– The HIGHEST pick the Wild have ever had in franchise history was the #3 pick where we got Gaborik. We have never had the #1 overall pick.

If you look at the top players in the league like Towes, Kane, Ovechkin, Crosby, etc, etc, etc, they almost ALL were 1-3 overall picks. The rare exceptions are that they fell as low as #5.

This the downside of the way the draft is structured now. You don’t just have to be a poor team to get up into that top tier in the draft. You have to completly and utterly go in the sh!tter and be a true cellar dweller team for multiple years like Chicago and Edmonton did.

Then, on top of that even, you have to be “lucky” enough (if that’s the right expression here) to BE in the crapper as a team when one of those future Superstars comes on the block.

That’s a tall freaking order with a lot of luck involved. I hear a lot of guys saying, well the Wild just need to get their scouts to find a stud like Ovechkin and then problem solved. Yeah, great, but that’s missing the part about the fact that EVERYBODY knew that Kane, Ovechkin, etc were studs, but only one team was in the position to grab them when the came on the market.

Like I’ve said before, there’s really a Round 0 when it comes to the NHL Draft. The REAL top tier is picks 1-4. After those picks, there’s a dramatic drop in the levels of talent at picks 5 onward and it’s also far less reliable in terms of knowing what you’ll be getting.

Bottom line is the Wild have never been in the position to get these pics. And that’s mainly because, if you look at the history of the franchise, we’ve been relatively successful many years and when we haven’t, we’ve been just successful enough to miss out on these highly valued top 4 picks.

The Wild played better than I expected last night, but the power play is still a hot mess.

The contrast could NOT be more clear when you look at Washington’s PP structure vs MN. The Caps CONSTANTLY had 2 or even 3 guys in the triangle between the dots and the goal at the same time or they are driving the puck toward this area. The Wild, by contrast are constantly backing OUT of this area. Every Wild player that gets the puck takes it and then starts backing up! They are always moving backward with the puck and that means less traffic in the middle disrupting lanes and taking away vision which means shots and passes are telegraphed and predictable.

When the Wild finally scored on Suter’s drive it was ONLY because the finally collapsed the traffic in the slot enough and TA DA! took away vision so the shot got through.

Grouse

Well said Grouse!
The one other dramatic difference I saw with the Caps PP was the fact that they focused heavy to one side, passes back and forth, point, halfwall, slot, halfwall all the while Ovie sits on the “weak” side waiting for the chance.
It almost lulls the D to sleep the passing back and forth, no real threat then the puck goes all the way across and its money.
They got some lucky bounces last night. The 3rd goal IDK how much luckier you can get. Dubnyk didn’t stand a chance IMO. The one that deflected off Parise then right over to Ovie? He fans on it and still scores. Probably more because he fanned, but what are the chances that puck ends up right on his stick?
There are a few guys playing well, Haula and Coyle namely. I just hope they don’t get too discouraged that their hard work isn’t paying off with wins. Those two have looked pretty good recently.

Lemaire did more damage to this team than anyone. He IMO being one of the best coaches in history knew what he had, and got more out of the team than anyone could have expected. In the first 5 years that we should have been picking in the top 3 or better he had us picking at best 4th. Here is where we picked in the 1st round. first year 3rd Marian Gaborik , 6th Mikko Koivu, 8th Pierre-Marc Bouchard, 20th Brent Burns, 12th A. J. Thelen , 4th Benoit Pouliot, 9th James Sheppard, 16th Colton Gillies, 23rd Tyler Cuma, 16th Nick Leddy, 9th Mikael Granlund, 10th Jonas Brodin, 7th Mathew Dumba, no 1st in 2013, 18th Alex Tuch, 20th Joel Eriksson Ek. You don’t have to be a hockey genius to see why we don’t have a franchise scorer. Couple that with our scouts don’t seem to be able to find that diamond in the rough, let alone a great 1st rounder.

Pominville finally demoted to the 4th line.

Should be on 5th line…

OK, Yeo has to go. I don’t care who they put in there. Put Donny Fuller in.

They are chasing the puck,breaking coverage and have no urgency.

It literally, and I mean literally, depressing to watch.

Not to mention the fans are quiet and completely apathetic. I think they only booed once. I get the feeling Yeo must go chant is coming.

Yeo is gone!
DT

Star trib says he texted them that he was fired.
DT

I hope they find a coach who can handle Suter. I want a coach who will cut his time and not give him the ability to manage his own ice time. He shouldn’t be on the PP. I have a feeling Suter is a “quiet” problem in the lockeroom.

Hopefully someone who is also good at scheming and adjusting power plays. I put that squarely on his shoulders.

Mike Yeo was 173-132-44 with the #mnwild

Good luck new coach. You are inheriting a mess.

After 14 seasons, this year may be enough for me to dump NHL Center Ice and start following the Lightning for free. I don’t know, ask me in the morning.

I am guessing whomever is coaching the rest of the season will just be a interim coach. Torchetti seems like the obvious choice.

Thank god “something” will change

I wouldn’t want to touch this team with a 10 foot pole. There has to be a huge culture problem in that locker room. Just look at the things that kept repeating themselves, the slumps, the 1 good playoff series and then lay an egg. The lot of them are head cases.

I’m not quite sure what to hope for at this point. I do truly hope they can salvage this season. All this talk about tanking, I think is far more unlikely than the wild making the playoffs.

It’s hard to feel bad for people that make that much money. The more you make, the higher the risk of not working tomorrow.

That record is quite startling for a guy that just lost his job.