Also Digital pointed out this is going to be a very lean next year unless something really drastically changes. It's a death by a thousand cuts.
Minnesota Wild General Discussion - 2022-23
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As much as i hate to feed your pessimism, we have been getting fat off of some mediocre to bad teams. The next 2-3 weeks should be more indicative of where we are at as a team, when we play some some better opposition.
For me, it's same old, same old. Good, not great D. Forwards deep, but lacking in skill, especially at the Center position. Goaltending is wild card. Poor to start the season, good recently, though i do think that part of the reason for their improvement is a renewed commitment to defense by the team.
Isn’t the general rule of thumb for good teams something like .500 against playoff teams and crush the non-playoff teams?
Some mercurial teams can beat anyone, but play down to weaker teams, but yeah, in general you're right. I think we are a team that will likely make the playoffs, but will be hard pressed to win one series, nvm more than one.
Going into this year there was a chance that Rossi would step in and play top 6/PP C minutes, giving us a chance to become something more, but that scenario doesn't seem all that likely for this year.
Raise your hands....How many here thought Boston would be as good as they have been?
How many here thought the Blues would win the Cup a few years ago?
See where I'm going? Sure, there is a sense of "we need another piece or two", but there is also a sense, especially in hockey, of "You never know."
That's not blind, rose colored glasses. That's the nature of the game. Play last year's playoffs all over again, and I bet you get a different result.
How many here thought the Blues would win the Cup a few years ago?
See where I'm going? Sure, there is a sense of "we need another piece or two", but there is also a sense, especially in hockey, of "You never know."
That's not blind, rose colored glasses. That's the nature of the game. Play last year's playoffs all over again, and I bet you get a different result.
Dr Jan Itor
Registered User
I think the simple answer is to trade Boldy and re-sign Steel and Gaudreau.
- Dec 10, 2012
- 41,375
- 19,500
Yeah cause if you keep Boldy you have to move 2-3 other guys and that just doesn't make any sense.
Here's the difference. In the past 2-3 years, Bergeron was playing hurt, and Krecji/Rask was retired, or injured. Right now Krecji and Bergeron are playing well, and Coyle, for all his faults, is a damn good 3C who eats up minutes. Add in a top 2 Dman in Lindholm who is having a fantastic year, and good goaltending...
Bergeron and Krecji are playing for something like 3M/yr for the two of them, when they should be getting at least 12M. Meanwhile, we have a 12.7M cap penalty.
They have two wingers that are Kaprizov level in Patrnak and Marchand. Bergeron is a better C than we have ever had in our entire history.... a legit #1C who is a perennial Selke winner. MaCavoy is a better Dman than Spurgeon. Lindholm is better than Brodin (this year, anyway).
Throw on top of that that those guys actually know how to win in the playoffs, compared to us who really only know how to lose... I just don't see any cause for optimism. We are not a bad team, but with the trade of Fiala we are overly reliant on one line to carry us offensively, and even with him we couldn't win a series. There have been no significant additions... Addison has been good for the PP, which is good, I guess, but the loss of Fiala more than offsets that. Hartman, and Foligno aren't even close to matching last year's production... the play of Shaw and Dewar is nice, i guess?
Please answer the question. In September would you have seen this?
The same guys were on Boston last year, and went out in Round 1 as well.
This is what I am saying. Little things like a niggling injury here and there, or the up and down cycle of how dialed in a goalie is, or.....in the words of one general sports columnist one time about hockey "It's an energy game."
It just is. Unexpected things happen.
Personally, i think Fiala should have been signed long term in summer of 2021. That's a huge miss on Guerin's part. I think that, had he been, his effort and results in the 2022 playoffs would have been different.
I also think the handling of the goalie situation was abymal last year. There is no doubt that Talbot was jobbed. That's something that affects energy.
I'm not saying we could have won the Cup. I'm not saying we might this year. I am saying that, for example, a team with Kaprisov, Zuccarello, Fiala, and Boldy is a threat, assuming the other pieces of the puzzle go together.
Am I predicting they will? No. Do I want us to tank so get a high draft pick? No. Those aren't guarantees either.
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- Dec 10, 2012
- 41,375
- 19,500
I don't think many people disagree that if Fiala was here we'd be a better team.
In September I didn't know that Krecji was coming back, that Bergeron had so much juice left, and that Lindholm would be having his best season ever, BUT, and this is a big BUT, all three of those guys have won a lot in the playoffs. It was a reasonable assumption that, if healthy, those three would provide a big lift. I don't think anyone could have foreseen Krecji and Bergeron re-signing for the same cumulative amount that Reaves and Hartman are making, which freed up a lot of money for other things.
Anyway, i am not sure what you are saying. If you are saying that we could've had a chance to compete this year if we found a way to keep Fiala, then I agree. If you are saying that we have a chance to go far in the playoffs as we are presently constructed, I don't.
Neither STL winning a Cup or BOS being good surprise me. Both teams keep making trades and FA signings at key positions to improve.
I'd say 80%-90% of the time COL wins the Cup if they replayed last year's Playoffs. They were just that much better than everyone else.
BOS got a new coach, Lindholm isn't injured, and the Zacha/Haula trade.
It's hard for me to compare the Wild's 1st round exit with BOS 1st round exit, because the East was so much better top to bottom. I'd say for last season every Playoff team (well maybe not TOR because they don't know how to win) in the East beats every Playoff team in the West except COL.
What I am saying is that more along the lines of......
You don't gut a team just to get a high pick, because there are little unexpected things that adjust how big your window is, or how much chance you have in a particular year. And, the business is to make money, so if you're bad a long time you really suffer.
I'm also saying, as I have for a long time, that you don't give away offensive talent of Fiala's level. Guerin "Kevin had a good 3 months." Well, he's PPG this year, too. He's the kind of guy you want, even if you have to discuss attitude with him.
Would you sign Fiala if it meant this lineup for a few years:
Kap-Eriksson Ek-Zucc
Boldy-Hartman-Fiala
Duhaime-Gaudreau-Steel
Shaw-Dewar-Reaves
Middleton-Spurgeon
Brodin-Faber*
Merrill-Addison
Gus
Wallstedt
* = some AHL player until Faber is signed
Two 1st lines, two 4th lines, a pretty underwhelming defense and a goaltending group that shows potential.
Kap-Eriksson Ek-Zucc
Boldy-Hartman-Fiala
Duhaime-Gaudreau-Steel
Shaw-Dewar-Reaves
Middleton-Spurgeon
Brodin-Faber*
Merrill-Addison
Gus
Wallstedt
* = some AHL player until Faber is signed
Two 1st lines, two 4th lines, a pretty underwhelming defense and a goaltending group that shows potential.
Dr Jan Itor
Registered User
Because the lineup is somehow locked in stone? A bad GM put MN in this spot it's not just Fiala or Foligno/Greenway it's a bunch of different things that could/should have been done differently: no buyouts, sign Fiala (Pasta type of contract) a year earlier, no Middleton/Kahk trade, draft Lundell over Rossi and Raty over Lambos, trade Spurgeon as a rental and not re-sign him. I can keep going...
Obvious Fabertism
Registered User
2-3 years from now and this is a fine lineup (though impossible when Hartman’s deal expires) but it couldn’t work this year, that gap in D is a 20 minute/game defenseman, we don’t have an internal guy remotely capable of that yet. And then the goalies would be a total crapshoot, GMs don’t run two rookies at goalie, and a single injury there ends any chance at all.
Having a structure where your entire center corps makes under $10MM per is just not a long term viable strategy, the wings look great on this team and the offense would be fun to watch, but it has the same flaws as currently and you are now locked into 7 years of never solving the center problem. Fiala is worth his current contract, but with the cap penalties, we need players that can outperform their contracts by significant margins if we are to be successful.
BagHead
Registered User
If I'm being honest, it looks like six in one hand and half a dozen in the other to me. Different setup, and a different method of getting there, but probably the same overall result in terms of wins.
You're right that there would be differences in the roster if Fiala had been signed long-term in 2021. That said, I doubt any of the drafting goes differently, and expecting them to nail it on draft day just because we can with hindsight isn't really fair. A good GM may have done some things better, but certainly not all.
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Is this supposed to be some sort of gotcha?
Blues had a one-two punch of O'Reilly and Schenn down the middle. They had Tarasenko on wing, but more importantly they had Pietrangenlo at defense. Before that, they were out of the playoffs in 2017-2018 (barely) but had gone to the 3rd and 2nd round respectively before that. So, they proved that they could win. They made some adjustments in the offseason in 2018 bringing in O'Reilly, made a coaching change (we know that Yeo was a problem) and brought up Binnington who caught lightning.
While they had a lot of things go right, they were a very talented team that under performed the year before. They made some changes and upgraded their centers and brought in some depth like Perron and Maroon.
Finally, and this is important, THEY HAD WON PLAYOFF SERIES BEFORE.
You can't tell me that Spurgeon/Brodin is the same as Pietrangelo and that O'Reilly and Schenn are the same as Hartman and Eriksson-Ek.
There is nothing remotely the same as to what is going on with Minnesota.
What if the lineup would have been:
Kap-Hart-Zucc (16.7)
Boldy-Steel-Fiala (at 7M) (14 with Boldy at 5)
GREEF (10)
Scrubs on 1M contracts (3)
Parise buyout. (7.5). total: 50
Spurgeon (at 7M, not 7.6), Suter (7.5)
Brodin (6M), Soucy (3)
XX, XX at 1.5M each (3 total) total: 77M
Goaltending at 5M
82M total. This is next year's lineup. 83,5M cap.
All you had to do was NOT give Spurgeon the house, the farm, and the business. NOT buyout Suter so that Dumba was chosen in the expansion draft (was there a reason he had to be kept, I forget), and sign Fiala when it was a good signing.
And, to be clear, Middleton and Goligoski don't so much for me. Especially Goli for 2 years. Yuck.
Kap-Hart-Zucc (16.7)
Boldy-Steel-Fiala (at 7M) (14 with Boldy at 5)
GREEF (10)
Scrubs on 1M contracts (3)
Parise buyout. (7.5). total: 50
Spurgeon (at 7M, not 7.6), Suter (7.5)
Brodin (6M), Soucy (3)
XX, XX at 1.5M each (3 total) total: 77M
Goaltending at 5M
82M total. This is next year's lineup. 83,5M cap.
All you had to do was NOT give Spurgeon the house, the farm, and the business. NOT buyout Suter so that Dumba was chosen in the expansion draft (was there a reason he had to be kept, I forget), and sign Fiala when it was a good signing.
And, to be clear, Middleton and Goligoski don't so much for me. Especially Goli for 2 years. Yuck.
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I'm going to be honest here. I was completely floored that the Blues won the Cup. Hot rookie goalie. etc.
I must admit that if you saw the potential of such, you are much more insightful than I am.
I'm merely pointing out for myself that hockey is a weird game. Strange things happen. Strange years happen. Not to suggest that this year's Wild have a big Cup chance. Rather to suggest that assuming, in the first year of an 8 year contract, that Kaprisov is never going to see a Cup run in Minnesota, and therefore, we should tank this year and next....I don't think that is good thinking.
Yes, though I think Rossi should be in there somewhere, if you are assuming Faber is good enough to play in the NHL also. Also can see at least one more dman(let's say Hunt, who is playing well at a higher level of hockey than Faber is playing in), and maybe Walker. I can see at least one of Marat, Yurov, and Ohgren being in the lineup within the next year or two, also. They are much better prospects than the Giroux/Beckman types that we have now.
Reaves can go away, unless he is good with being a mimimum salary/13th forward.
Obvious Fabertism
Registered User
Just a reminder that Faber and Yurov/Ohgren were the return for Fiala, it is not possible for us to have them all and the proposed lineup probably seems better because it is including both Fiala and his trade value.
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