A Wild and crazy bunch of Guys!

[yave1964]

My take on the 2013-14 Minnesota Wild

Last off season the Wild made a massive splash by signing Parise and Suter to massive long term contracts, after being boring and irrelevant they became expensive and irrelevant, limping in as an eight seed after being a five seed with less than a month to go, barely beating out the Jackets and the Stars. When Backstrom went down in warmups forcing the heroic Josh Harding to tend net in the series against eventual champion Chicago the die was cast.

So now, the Wild who have been touted as having the best bunch of young talent in the game by many (not me) must fuse this youth into the roster this season, because with the cap eating contracts belonging to Suter and Parise a lot of veteran players were shown the door in the offseason due to financial reasons, including

Cal Clutterbuck

Tom Gilbert

Matt Cullen

Devin Setoguchi

Pierre-Marc Bouchard

Danny Heatley was attempted to be bought out to save at least a few of these guys but coming off an injury did not qualify.

So coming in to replace five of he teams top fourteen scorers are

Nino Niederreiter

Matt Cooke

The kids have to put up or shut up period for this team to have anything resembling a chance. Last season to be generous was a mixed bag, Jonas Brodin came out of nowhere to play big time minutes on defense and established himself, other than that nobody grabbed the bull by the horns. Mikael Granlund a preseason pick by many for the Calder was not good, Charlie Coyle scored 8 goals but was a healthy scratch often, and they were the BEST of the kids.

Granlund is a hell of a prospect and needs to be a top six forward as does Coyle with Bouchard, Setoguchi and the underrated Cullen moving on. Defensively Matt Dumba will get a crack at top four minutes while Spurgeon continues to develop and the pressure is on Marco Scandella to not get pushed aside by the next wave. On the forward ranks Jason Pominville who came over at the deadline will jump into top six minutes but the hope is kids like Jason Zucker and Brett Bulmer can step up.

Backstrom was resigned to a long term deal over the offseason, so he is the man in net, very capable but like Lehtonen and Pavalec until he does something he is just a regular season goalie.

I didn't like this team as much as a lot of other folks last year and still don't, but see a nice future. The problem as I see it is the division which has:

Blackhawks

Blues

These two are mortal locks for the playoffs

Everyone else.

Nobody on paper stands out as either really good or really bad, three through seven could finish third through last. Nobody stands out. I think the Wild will make the playoffs leaving the 4th spot for everyone else, but think they are still a year away from being a true contender.

[hf101]

Nice write up @yave1964.

Of the 5 who will not be with the Wild next year:

Cal Clutterbuck

Tom Gilbert

Matt Cullen

Devin Setoguchi

Pierre-Marc Bouchard

I think they will miss Cullen the most. Cullen was just one of those players that could fill in and step up his level of play where needed. Clutterbuck was a fan favorite, but Cooke (ugh...) probably provides some veteran leadership that will help the team due to Cullen's departure to the team.

Pominville will be an upgrade to Bouchard, unfortunately his injury last season came at an unfortunate time. I'm not worried about Heatley as he was an important factor on the PP last year stationed in front of the net.

The player who was the biggest disappointment last season was Granlund. He just wasn't ready for the NHL in his first season. Zucker was far more useful. So I'm curious to see if these two can deliver in their second year.

Defensively I think the Wild are sound. If anything I'm most concerned about goaltending. An injury to either Backlund or Harding could easily keep this team out of the playoffs.

The Wild are really a team that can be one of the top 4 teams in the West.

[yave1964]

Agreed, they SHOULD be a top four team in this division, but in a long season bad things can happen, if Heatley had went down when he did in a full season with the Jackets beingas hot as they were, this team would have been on the outside looking in. Veteran calming depth is a problem, The influence of the five veterans who just left upon a young club is enormous. How they deal with adversity, be it injuries, a slump or whatever else will be the telling factor with this team. IMHO they are a razors edge club that could easily go either way.

[jammer2]

  Matthew Dumba looking to follow in Brodin's footsteps and give the Wild a really nice 1-2 punch in young d-men with flair and energy. Things looking up for the Wild, a nice group of forwards on the way also!

 

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