Alexandron

Completely agree. I am thinking , that our team will look even better in 3-4 years, when the most drafted promising players will be playing for the big club. Regarding Barkov's play as a top center for the team, it is sounds intriguing perspective. I am still hoping , the NHL will start the new season on December 1, but not next year. As sooner as better. From my current 9 months experience under COVID pandemic by working at 7 hospitals, masks do not help a lot. I already was sick 3 times (March-July-October) despite of using mask all the time at work, at stores, at gas stations, but , from my observations, good the most important news, it goes easier and easier every time (3 weeks-10 days- 1 day respectively). It seems active antibodies against COVID initially are working about 3 months, and this is why we have spikes of disease every 3 months. Next spikes, probably, will be in January and then March-April. Sincerely, kind of skeptical regarding future vaccine longevity effect , because of a short terms of antibodies life against Covid. In my opinion, we need to live as we are living a regular normal life despite of all these difficulties. And be optimistic.

Good news!!! Just found out that the Wild organization signed 4 hours ago forward Marco Rossi to a 3 year, entry-level contract. Here is a link to read about it: [Hidden Content]

Yes, I think Fiala-Rossi-Kaprizov is going to be a very intriguing top future Wild line. These 2020 playoffs finals showed which team could be a real Stanley Cup contender, if they will decide to reach such a difficult historic goal in their life. Team should be extremely mobile, fast in any lines plus to have a goaltender capable to allow in his net less than 2 goals per game in most cases. We already talked about this before, but current Tampa team is fitting into that rare category : tremendous speed coming from all lines; smart puck control; talent on dictating their dominating game; talent to place puck into the net coming from all their very offensively minded lines including defense lines too. And the defense coming from the entire team should be selfless also. Still remember how 4-5 Tampa players were blocking shots with their bodies at the same time/at the same seconds towards their net during the finals. Hope, at least our 1st future line Fiala-Rossi-Kaprizov will have that potential at the beginning. And then our other future lines we be build by these principles in the next 3-4 years. I believe, GM Bill Guerin will be able to do that difficult work on selecting the right players with the right time. Do not know, why, but, so far, I trust him more than to any other previous Wild GM-s. Maybe because he is a brave person for changing the team his specific way for just to see more positive results coming out of the team. Time will show. Certainly, defensive as well as slow heavy style of the game with rare goals into the net is not effective anymore for a long run of these exhausting but famous playoffs.

I agree regarding Anas. He should be signed for 1 year deal at least instead of signing Cramarossa. As well as agree regarding Greenway too by knowing that BG did not liked the current outcome of the Greenway's production despite of having all tools for it. Probably, this season will be crucial for Greenway if he wants to be here. We have plenty of promising prospects to fill his space. I am glad (just found out from the Michael Russo tweeter) that promising defenseman Belpedio was signed for one year deal. Only our other defenseman Menell remains unsigned, but he is playing now in KHL. Hope, they will sign him next year. Definitely, that talented Minnesotan player will be much more experienced after playing there, and who is having 1 goal and 9 assists in 10 games already with Dinamo Minsk team.

Thanks. Nice article. Finally they found a place for the offensively minded and a nice size prospect Fedor Gordeev (6'7"; 225 lbs) at Iowa team who played for 5 seasons in OHL. Hockey eliteprospects.com still not showing him in Iowa, probably, not updated. Agree, team was a Calder Cup contender and created a lot of interest in Iowa history. I think team lost not only Menell, but a 70 points player(20 goals;50 assists) Sam Anas to St. Louis. Still the Iowa Wild team is remain, in my opinion, as a Cup contending team, but without Kaapo Kahkonen maybe not, if he will be moved to the main club. Interesting to read about Khovanov communication problems with coaching staff from Ak Bars Kazan team, which is loaded with experienced veterans. Probably, they could not find for him a constant space in the big club. That team is doing pretty well so far this season in KHL. Hope, he will learn something good there too. Regarding his nickname "Cheeseburger" - explanation is very simple. He loves American cheeseburgers and eating them a lot. Maybe that affecting his overall conditioning or maybe not at all. LIG. Thanks about mention Sid Hartman - a lifelong legend - a legendary sportswriter, who had a nice long (100 years) life filled with a lot of excitements especially in sports, as well as with multiple people communications. Not as many people around the world did and will do this during their life. A rare personality.

I wish to see that, but, unfortunately, I do see the opposite movements. I do not think the Iowa team will be younger after losing Anas(27 y.o.) to St. Louis. Here are the recent re-signings and signings: 1. Oct.8. Rau re-signed, 27 y.o.; 42 NHL games(2 goals;3 assists); 2. Oct.8. Bartkowski re-signed, 32 y.o.; 255 NHL games in 10 seasons (8 goals;40 assists); 3. Oct.9. Cramarossa signed; 27 y.o.; 59 NHL games (4 goals;6 assists); 4. Oct.9. Mermis signed;26 y.o.; 20 NHL games (1 goal;3 assists); 5. Oct.19. McCoshen signed, 25 y.o.; 60 NHL games (4 goals; 3 assists). We can see their stats are not very impressive by playing in NHL. So many questions came up again like we had last season regarding those difficult to explain multiple signings. Why did we signed them (especially the last 4 players)? And definitely, they will use those valuable minutes in Iowa. And where our young promising prospects will play if the space is already occupied by others older players? We had this fall such a best drafting season, but what we will do with those prospects if the space is filled every year by someone? They will start looking for the place in KHL or to look for a place in other NHL club? Something should be changed.

Agree, he wasted his time from the age of 23-27 y.o. by playing in the Minnesota Wild organization without having any games in NHL. Anas is a smart talented playmaker consistently showing that through his entire career. Hopefully, St. Louis will use him in NHL too. Unfortunately, the Wild organization did not see this, but was confused about his frame. Greenway has a very good frame, but his talent is still questionable. 154 NHL games was not enough to see it yet. Talent is impossible to build. Player must to be born with it. Frame is easier to create than talent. And then what we need more? Talent or the frame?....

Still the question who is better? The example is our Spurgeon . Smartest player for the team, but his size is small. Greenaway did not showed me much in 154 NHL games and even in a few AHL games he did not showed me much too. Is he playing for money or to make fans happy with his play? Hope for his future improvement. Sorry, my tablet automatically changed his last name. Too difficult for me to make the correction with my fingers at the end of this message.

I have heard that he has offensive mentality as players from the Old Red Army team, which is a rare advantage to have this prospect in our team.

Greenway ...

How do you know that without trying him at least one game in NHL? Player had 70 points last season and was merit to have that attempt. I think it is a shame for the Wild organization and lost him for nothing. I liked the chemistry built in the line Rau - - Anas - Mayhew in the Iowa Wild team. Why we did not tried that line a couple games in the Wild team?

I found a link to a 7 minutes highlights of our 2020 draft Khushutdinov. I like his goal at 1'47". [Hidden Content]

In my opinion, if Brennan Menell signed for Dinamo Minsk team then we should take from OHL our other talented prospect defenseman Fedor Gordeev to the Iowa Wild team first of all. Like I said before, it is a time to move him up to a more professional hockey, at least to AHL. He has important traits - size, talent, speed, a nice puck control and a good game reading.

I am not sure if it was a smart decision. He played plenty of games in NHL (154 )during 3 seasons, but produced only 20 goals. Hope he will start on using his size to go the net and to produce consistently. I am not happy about recent new signings Cramarossa and Mermis too, which are not presenting for me any interest. But we lost stupidly a nice smart consistent playmaker Sam Anas, who signed a contract with a St. Louis team. I looked through his stats during different ages, and he always showed pretty consistent play in his production . He played for the Iowa Wild team 4 seasons in a row and always impressed me. Last year he had 70 points in 63 games (20 goals and 50 assists). What else do we need from the player if he is so productive? His size was small, but even with that size the player could be a treasure for the team like our Spurgeon. And in opposite way, huge size of the player does not give much advantage for the team if the player is not smart enough. The most sad part for me (I hate that part) from the Wild organization that they did not find 1 game to play Sam Anas for the big club in 4 seasons. He was really merit that tryout. I was proposing his tryout for 3 seasons in a row as well as Brennan Menell, Mayhew and Belpedio. Are we a generous organization? If we will lose a valuable prospects for nothing then we will never see a Stanley Cup finals that way of scouting, developing, wasting, diminishing. Any smart productive prospect player should have at least 50 games of tryout in the big club before trading him somewhere else for nothing. In general, the Wild organization is full of surprises this fall. Not sure how far we will go this season with a current team roster. Just always hoping for better because our life is too short.

Maybe other GMs will bait the hook if we will combine him with Greenway or EEK? Probably, no one has an interest to those players, because of their poor production for the team. Interesting, just looked to Greenway stats and elite prospects.com says he is not signed. How is that could be? In 154 played games in 3 seasons for the Wild team he has 20 goals. A good size player is not using his size to go often to the net and to produce. Sounds strange to see it in NHL, especially from the youngster. Maybe he feels to comfortable in the Wild uniform?