Are the Minnesota Wild still a contender, or just a pretender with a big dose of denial?

[rottenrefs]

1 hour ago, CreaseAndAssist said:

 

For as bad as Heatley got I never hated him.  Vanek, I hated seeing the loafing...

Had I captured video footage of Heatley loafing like I did with Vanek would that have changed your mind?

 

I mean really, I was pissing and moaning about Vanek being a slug half-way through his 1st year here (loafing) and got all kinds of flack for it. Supposedly I was off my rocker, not a true fan, etc., etc. and upon capturing him on video and posting it on the board... Initially some took it as bad taste, some even defended him... Still polished his balls, etc., etc. And it wasn't until about 6-8 games later when others began to see the same thing I had seen.

 

IMO Heatley wasn't any different. Like Vanek they each started out half okay but late in the year and during their 2nd year there was a notable decline. Are you sure you didn't already dislike Vanek from his outings during the Olympics the night before a game (going out drinking all night) that influenced your initial dislike for him? 

[CreaseAndAssist]

Just now, rottenrefs said:

Had I captured video footage of Heatley loafing like I did with Vanek would that have changed your mind?

 

I mean really, I was pissing and moaning about Vanek being a slug half-way through his 1st year here (loafing) and got all kinds of flack for it. Supposedly I was off my rocker, not a true fan, etc., etc. and upon capturing him on video and posting it on the board... Initially some took it as bad taste, some even defended him... Still polished his balls, etc., etc. And it wasn't until about 6-8 games later when others began to see the same thing I had seen.

 

IMO Heatley wasn't any different. Like Vanek they each started out half okay but late in the year and during their 2nd year there was a notable decline. Are you sure you didn't already dislike Vanek from his outings during the Olympics the night before a game (going out drinking all night) that influenced your initial dislike for him? 

 

(sigh)  Heatley was playing as well as he could play; at least that's how I saw it.  Vanek was loafing simply because he could...I didn't like Vanek before he got here, that's correct.  The Olympics thing with Team Austria told me to avoid that guy like the plague...but we still wasted a ton of money on him.  

[rottenrefs]

7 minutes ago, CreaseAndAssist said:

 

(sigh)  Heatley was playing as well as he could play; at least that's how I saw it.  Vanek was loafing simply because he could...I didn't like Vanek before he got here, that's correct.  The Olympics thing with Team Austria told me to avoid that guy like the plague...but we still wasted a ton of money on him.  

Yeah, that sounds about right. I was trying to recall the timing of each of their 'failings' and such. One thing for sure, I know neither of us liked seeing the Wild keep giving them preferential treatment - to nowhere.

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

BOTH Heatley and Vanek are a big pile of Glad-They-Ain't-Playing-For-Minnesota-Anymore as far as I am concerned.

 

I don't care if Heatley was playing "as well as he could"....THAT was the problem.

His "best" at that point in his career wasn't even really good enough for him to man a 4th line position.

And yea, Heatley COULD float with the best driftwood out there....

 

At least Thomas Vanek made himself a bit useful to other teams after he left Minnesota..... still glad HE is gone too though.

 

I actually supported Heatley when he first got to Minnesota. But after a while, as much as I thought he might 'get it back', even I realized he needed to go well before he actually did.

Vanek? Meh...I was lukewarm on him at best at first. He just seemed to embody what the Wild were doing at the time:  I.E., getting veterans who hoped to relive their past glories while with Minnesota.

 

Just glad the Wild moved on to a better crop of top six type guys....and has tried at least to do it mostly internally.

 

I'd LOVE to see Minnesota revamp their bottom six though....I think that could be an underrated aspect to their ability to compete on a nightly basis.

It could do without guys like Daniel Winnik, Tyler Ennis, or even Marcus Foligno….though I would take Fols ahead of the other two.

[CreaseAndAssist]

41 minutes ago, TropicalFruitGirl26 said:

BOTH Heatley and Vanek are a big pile of Glad-They-Ain't-Playing-For-Minnesota-Anymore as far as I am concerned.

 

I don't care if Heatley was playing "as well as he could"....THAT was the problem.

His "best" at that point in his career wasn't even really good enough for him to man a 4th line position.

And yea, Heatley COULD float with the best driftwood out there....

 

At least Thomas Vanek made himself a bit useful to other teams after he left Minnesota..... still glad HE is gone too though.

 

I actually supported Heatley when he first got to Minnesota. But after a while, as much as I thought he might 'get it back', even I realized he needed to go well before he actually did.

Vanek? Meh...I was lukewarm on him at best at first. He just seemed to embody what the Wild were doing at the time:  I.E., getting veterans who hoped to relive their past glories while with Minnesota.

 

Just glad the Wild moved on to a better crop of top six type guys....and has tried at least to do it mostly internally.

 

I'd LOVE to see Minnesota revamp their bottom six though....I think that could be an underrated aspect to their ability to compete on a nightly basis.

It could do without guys like Daniel Winnik, Tyler Ennis, or even Marcus Foligno….though I would take Fols ahead of the other two.

 

That's not really Heatley's fault.  The Wild traded for him...if anyone its no Fletcher.  Winnik wasn't a problem.  We didn't have anyone that would do Winnik's job in the organization.  Gabriel couldn't do it.  Ennis was the toxic contract we had to take since Buffalo took Pominville off the books.  A little cheaper...but basically the same bad contract.  

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

The thing with the Wild remaining a contender is that EVERY single decision they make is critical. 

They reside in, top to bottom, the toughest division in hockey and have absolutely no margin for error.

 

One quick look at the Central, and I believe one can easily see how any of the teams can be placed 1-7 in just about any order, depending on decision made to personnel, guys stepping up, and other guys regressing a bit, on any of the given teams.

That's how close things are in that division.  Yes, even Chicago, Dallas, and Colorado.

 

So a couple miscues on signings here, a couple of over reliance on the "wrong" players there, and the Wild can easily find themselves in the 6th or 7th position in the division.

 

A true number one C is still needed (Staal will do for now, but the Wild need to think beyond him as well), a search for a new number one goalie has to at least begin (if it hasn't already), another top pair type defender needs to be found (or at least a pair of sold 2nd pair types), and the bottom six, as I said, needs to be revamped some.

 

Sounds like a lot of work....and well, it is.

But the free agent market has some promising players available....perhaps not elite players (except John Tavares, whom the Wild, even if they wanted to, simply could not pursue at this time), but good enough players that maybe makes the whole of the team greater than the sum of its parts.

 

Zach Parise, Charlie Coyle, and Nino Neiderreiter need to be driving forces on this team once again too. Whether than can happen is debatable, but they represent quite an investment in money and ice time for the Wild.

If those three can get their schtick together, LOTS of other things fall into place and guys like Staal, Granlund, and Zucker won't have to feel they need to carry the offense every single night.

[McMahon 6]

Pretenders. And looking at the Western Conference as a whole, even those days may be numbered.

 

Much as I'd hate to see us give up guys like Zucker and Granlund, that may be the ticket to starting a legit rebuild. As things stand now, Fletcher's boat anchor salary cap mismanagement prohibits the team from even thinking about rebuilding for several more years. But if gutting the supporting cast gooses the Three Stooges into waiving their NMCs in search of a Cup elsewhere, it's a necessary evil IMO.

 

I for one would have a helluva lot more patience with a team trying a rebuild than a team that gives fans 7 more years of "tweaks" to above-average regular season mediocrity translating into a 6, 7 or 8 seed and a first round playoff exit.

[Tomdog]

I don't think I would blow this team up until trying a few changes.

#1 Stall Zucker Granlund

#2 mikko on the 3rd line

#3 suter lower his minutes and shortenhis shifts. No more energy conservation

#4 change to a higher pressure fore check. Not necessarily heavy fore checking, but quick in your face attack.

#5 base ice time and power play time on 5 on 5 production. Comparing the production of 2 players isn't fair if 1 has pp time and the other doesn't.

 

If their game doesn't improve after that we'll at the trade deadline.

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

1 hour ago, Tomdog said:

I don't think I would blow this team up until trying a few changes.

#1 Stall Zucker Granlund

#2 mikko on the 3rd line

#3 suter lower his minutes and shortenhis shifts. No more energy conservation

#4 change to a higher pressure fore check. Not necessarily heavy fore checking, but quick in your face attack.

#5 base ice time and power play time on 5 on 5 production. Comparing the production of 2 players isn't fair if 1 has pp time and the other doesn't.

 

If their game doesn't improve after that we'll at the trade deadline.

 

Lots of sense in this post. Thank you.

[Tomdog]

Unfortunately it's easier said than done.

[63firebird]

On 5/28/2018 at 6:18 PM, Tomdog said:

I don't think I would blow this team up until trying a few changes.

#1 Stall Zucker Granlund

#2 mikko on the 3rd line

#3 suter lower his minutes and shortenhis shifts. No more energy conservation

#4 change to a higher pressure fore check. Not necessarily heavy fore checking, but quick in your face attack.

#5 base ice time and power play time on 5 on 5 production. Comparing the production of 2 players isn't fair if 1 has pp time and the other doesn't.

 

If their game doesn't improve after that we'll at the trade deadline.

Those are the exact right moves.

 

[Davey J]

I am not interested in being a Cup contender next season.  Whether dish!t Leipold signs off or not, I would trade Staal, Zucker, and Spurgeon this summer.  I would consider Brodin if I was confident Suter was going to be healthy and/or if I could acquire a LHD more to my liking (Darnell Nurse, for example).

My reasons are: Staal will never have more value and will turn 34 early next season.  I would take advantage of his 42 goals to set this franchise up better for the future.  Zucker is almost 100% speed dependent and when he loses a 1/2 step, his game will plummet quickly.  He might have 10 more fast years in him, he might have one...no one ever knows.  I prefer to be proactive, especially when it comes to a player so dependent on one particular attribute.  Spurgeon - see explanation for Zucker.  With that said, Spurgeon is trickier to project. One one hand, he is much smaller and that might lead to his game going to sh!t even more quickly...but, he is also an incredibly smart player so he might be able to figure out how to maintain his level of play.  Either way, I prefer to be proactive with him too.

 

I'm sure these ideas will come with some indignation, but they make perfect sense to me.  Fire away.

 

[Tomdog]

2 hours ago, Davey J said:

I am not interested in being a Cup contender next season.  Whether dish!t Leipold signs off or not, I would trade Staal, Zucker, and Spurgeon this summer.  I would consider Brodin if I was confident Suter was going to be healthy and/or if I could acquire a LHD more to my liking (Darnell Nurse, for example).

My reasons are: Staal will never have more value and will turn 34 early next season.  I would take advantage of his 42 goals to set this franchise up better for the future.  Zucker is almost 100% speed dependent and when he loses a 1/2 step, his game will plummet quickly.  He might have 10 more fast years in him, he might have one...no one ever knows.  I prefer to be proactive, especially when it comes to a player so dependent on one particular attribute.  Spurgeon - see explanation for Zucker.  With that said, Spurgeon is trickier to project. One one hand, he is much smaller and that might lead to his game going to sh!t even more quickly...but, he is also an incredibly smart player so he might be able to figure out how to maintain his level of play.  Either way, I prefer to be proactive with him too.

 

I'm sure these ideas will come with some indignation, but they make perfect sense to me.  Fire away.

 

I won't disagree with your take, it all has very good merit, and if the right players are available we just might see that.

Would love to see Staal, Zucker stay, or go for a pair of centers.

Spurgeon could bring a right shooting winger.

[Davey J]

10 minutes ago, Tomdog said:

I won't disagree with your take, it all has very good merit, and if the right players are available we just might see that.

Would love to see Staal, Zucker stay, or go for a pair of centers.

Spurgeon could bring a right shooting winger.

I would like a bigger RHD, a center, and a right-shot wing.

[Tomdog]

Yes if we give up Spurgeon we will need another rhd.

We also need another center besides Staal.

Right now Coyle is the only thing wing.

Going with your plan I would trade Spurgeon, Stall, Zucker, and Nino for a rhd, and a rhw and 2 centers.

[63firebird]

All of that would require a owner prepared to make big changes. He’s only interested in tweaks. The new GM is Suters and Leipolds little buddy. I would expect more of the same as this year. Probably get cold sooner and get a Wild card. 

3 hours ago, Davey J said:

I would like a bigger RHD, a center, and a right-shot wing.

 

[Math]

15 hours ago, Davey J said:

I am not interested in being a Cup contender next season.  Whether dish!t Leipold signs off or not, I would trade Staal, Zucker, and Spurgeon this summer.  I would consider Brodin if I was confident Suter was going to be healthy and/or if I could acquire a LHD more to my liking (Darnell Nurse, for example).

My reasons are: Staal will never have more value and will turn 34 early next season.  I would take advantage of his 42 goals to set this franchise up better for the future.  Zucker is almost 100% speed dependent and when he loses a 1/2 step, his game will plummet quickly.  He might have 10 more fast years in him, he might have one...no one ever knows.  I prefer to be proactive, especially when it comes to a player so dependent on one particular attribute.  Spurgeon - see explanation for Zucker.  With that said, Spurgeon is trickier to project. One one hand, he is much smaller and that might lead to his game going to sh!t even more quickly...but, he is also an incredibly smart player so he might be able to figure out how to maintain his level of play.  Either way, I prefer to be proactive with him too.

 

I'm sure these ideas will come with some indignation, but they make perfect sense to me.  Fire away.

 

 

After the first read, I was like "Are you nutz or what ?!?!".

 

Then after the second read, I thought: "well let's read that another time".

 

And after the third read, I think that this makes sense.

 

I just have got two concerns: first, Parisé and Suter contract. I still think that a major rebuild should take place once they and their whale contract are gone. The Wild will still be handcuffed by these and therefore not allowing full liberty to act in that way. My second concern: the scouting personnel. If we get a good bank of picks, this will be useless if we don't draft good. And if we do good, picking Leddy and later trading him away is the kind of thing that has to be avoided either.

[CreaseAndAssist]

2 hours ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

 

After the first read, I was like "Are you nutz or what ?!?!".

 

Then after the second read, I thought: "well let's read that another time".

 

And after the third read, I think that this makes sense.

 

I just have got two concerns: first, Parisé and Suter contract. I still think that a major rebuild should take place once they and their whale contract are gone. The Wild will still be handcuffed by these and therefore not allowing full liberty to act in that way. My second concern: the scouting personnel. If we get a good bank of picks, this will be useless if we don't draft good. And if we do good, picking Leddy and later trading him away is the kind of thing that has to be avoided either.

 

Only problem with waiting for those deals to be done; is we have 8 more seasons to go by before we get there.  

[Tomdog]

I think you may have misunderstood my ideas on trades. I would not trade for picks. Any players traded need to return an nhl ready player. 

[CreaseAndAssist]

13 hours ago, Tomdog said:

I think you may have misunderstood my ideas on trades. I would not trade for picks. Any players traded need to return an nhl ready player. 

 

Not that everything Russo says is gospel, however he did feel that any move of #24, #3, #25, #16, #46, #22 or #64 would have to be players and not pick-premised if this team is looking for tweaks and not a rebuild.  Sending out any of these players and just getting prospects and picks in return screams rebuilding; but you can bank on Fenton figuring out what this team is really worth to other teams or trying to figure out what that market value is for what we have.  

[Lonkkis]

Many sites seem to agree on one thing; Wilds veteran core starts to show its age.

 

In my opinion, their age started to show 2-3 seasons ago. Sadly, until things change, we'll continue to be a first-round-exit team.

[IllaZilla]

On 6/12/2018 at 3:15 AM, Lonkkis said:

Many sites seem to agree on one thing; Wilds veteran core starts to show its age.

 

In my opinion, their age started to show 2-3 seasons ago. Sadly, until things change, we'll continue to be a first-round-exit team.

If they keep letting Parise, Koivu and Suter coach the team, they won't have to worry about being a first round exit team, because they won't make even it to the Playoffs...

[63firebird]

I didn’t expect them to make playoffs this year and by their performance had no business being there. There is very little room for improvement with the cap and lack of prospects or picks. Enjoy watching Koivu and Suter play catch and kill the power play. Parise is a warrior but I think his body can’t tske any more punishment.  

[rottenrefs]

@63firebird quite true.

 

The year before Fletcher re-signed Yeo to his 3-year contract extension (in other words, during his 2nd year here as head coach) I said no one kills a Wild PP better than Mikko Koivu. Since then it's probably been repeated a thousand times and that still hasn't changed. Along with many others we wondered who the hell was the PP coach and during the end of that year it was made known Andrew Brunette was going to be the new PP coach. It went from bad to even worse. Since then it really hasn't changed until Staal got an opportunity alongside Zucker and Nino... With anyone else not named Suter on the point. It picked up a bit and as everything with the Wild goes (it seems) if there's success and Mikko's name isn't all over it; it goes away.

[63firebird]

43 minutes ago, rottenrefs said:

@63firebird quite true.

 

The year before Fletcher re-signed Yeo to his 3-year contract extension (in other words, during his 2nd year here as head coach) I said no one kills a Wild PP better than Mikko Koivu. Since then it's probably been repeated a thousand times and that still hasn't changed. Along with many others we wondered who the hell was the PP coach and during the end of that year it was made known Andrew Brunette was going to be the new PP coach. It went from bad to even worse. Since then it really hasn't changed until Staal got an opportunity alongside Zucker and Nino... With anyone else not named Suter on the point. It picked up a bit and as everything with the Wild goes (it seems) if there's success and Mikko's name isn't all over it; it goes away.

Exactly correct. 

 

Btw. I don’t hate Mikko.  But his slowness and predictability on 1:40 of PP are maddening. Suters floater wrist a close second. 

 

Obviously Bruce has been told or has no stones.