Oh, Billy, you just had to do it again. His love affair for grinding forwards is unmatched. Good for Trenin. This is one of the best deals in free agency from the player side. Unfortunately it won't be a big help for us. Trenin helps the PK, but he doesn't address the PK/EV faceoff problem. We have way too many contracts for players that should be playing the bottom-6, and there's plenty of grit there already, so there's little gain in that department. Trenin will help crowd out young players on cheap contracts, but maybe that's Guerin's plan all along.
Getting quality depth players is more important than minimal cap savings, when cap space will not be an issue in less than a calendar year. This is not a role that the Wild have internal replacements for, the prospect pool skews heavily toward the skill department at the current moment.
It's the opposite. If you're going to overpay, you want to do it with top players (and/or shorter term contracts) because there's scarcity in that type. There's a relative abundance of players such as Trenin. There's no need to overpay those types, and when you do this in multiple instances, it hinders or completely eliminates your ability to pay for top talent. This signing makes no sense when you look at the big picture and go back to what we did with Duhaime. He and Trenin and remarkably similar players. Both should be no higher than your 4th-line, physical PK winger, and they have very similar production rates per 60 over the past couple seasons. Yet Guerin kicks Duhaime to the curb, and instead signs Trenin for double the salary and term as what Duhaime signed for. It's poor management, and that's what separates those that contend and those that don't.