Will the Core be Shown the Door after the 2018-19 NHL Season?

The Minnesota Wild have made the postseason for 6 straight seasons. They are 1 of 3 teams to have that current playoff streak. You’ve heard that a ton this offseason. You don’t care.

Minnesota Wild fans are tired of hearing about regular season success. They want some success in the postseason. Any success? Would the fans be happy if their team got past the first round only to be ousted in the 2nd round, even if they took it to a Game 7? Maybe, but I doubt it. Happier? Yes. Happy? No.

Because of this, the majority of Wild fans wanted a drastic change to be made to this team with a blockbuster trade or two during the offseason. That didn’t happen and the word, “Tweak,” has been overused to describe what the Wild did (or do) to try to get this team over the postseason hump.

The Eyes Have It!

The drastic change the Wild fans were looking for may have happened at the top of the organization when they fired General Manager Chuck Fletcher and hired a new one in former Nashville Predators Assistant GM, Paul Fenton. Wild fans were excited because they thought the new GM would see what they see, that this team needed to be blown up. But, the new guys came in and realized this is a pretty good team and it’s not easy to make the playoffs consistently in today’s NHL.

Paul Fenton did put out feelers to every team in the league trying to see if they could make a trade to improve the team but nobody was offering anything of value so Mr. Fenton said no, “We’re not going to make a trade just to make a trade.”

Paul Fenton and the rest of the new hires to the personnel staff want to see how this team plays and go from there. Owner Craig Leipold wanted some “new eyes” to see his team and make adjustments (or tweaks) accordingly. How long will they watch this team before trying to make a move? Weeks? Months? Obviously, that will depend on how they begin the season. If they start hot and are winning, they’ll likely leave it for a while. If they start slow and look bad, the phone might be off the hook quickly.

In With the New

So, tweak it is! When the Frenzy of Free Agency began on July 1st, the Wild did most of their work on day 1: It was more quantity than quality, thus, the tweaking had begun:

• D Matt Bartkowski – 1-year, $650K 2-way deal
• F Mike Liambas – 2-year, $1.35M 2-way deal
• F Eric Fehr – 1-year, $1M deal
• F Matt Hendricks – 1-yr, $700K deal
• F J.T. Brown – 2-year, $1.375M deal
• D Greg Pateryn – 3-year, $6.75M deal
• G Andrew Hammond – 1-year, $650K 2-way deal

They signed F Matt Read to a 1-year, $650K 2-way deal later in July. They added veteran depth to a team that needed some size and physicality but these signings should also help in the locker room.

If you remember last offseason, the Wild signed a lot of players that were on the edge of making an NHL roster. It was meant to make sure every player knew they had to earn their roster spots. Competition makes everyone better. A lot of those players are still with the organization, players like F Kyle Rau, F Landon Ferraro, D Ryan Murphy and not so young F Cal O’Reilly. Add to that some prospects that might be able to help if needed in F Sam Anas, F Justin Kloos, D Carson Soucy and even D Louie Belpedio and F Dmitry Sokolov, even though they are just starting their careers. You never know how they’ll do and if they could provide anything in their first season.

Also, they still have F Luke Kunin whose recovering from a torn ACL suffered late last season. He’ll need some games in the AHL in Iowa to get back into playing shape but he was with the big club for a reason when he suffered that injury.

There is also the additional presence of big 6’6, 227-lb Jordan Greenway that might make a difference this season. He’s been playing center between Charlie Coyle & Joel Eriksson-Ek and that line has looked very good in the preseason.

This is a Restricted Area

The Wild also had to sign restricted free agents D Matt Dumba & F Jason Zucker to new deals and with both players coming off great seasons, they had to be paid. Dumba put up 50 points on 14 goals & 36 assists including 2 goals and 10 assists on the power play in 82 games so the Wild signed him to a 5-year, $30 million deal. Zucker scored 33 goals and added 31 assists for 64 points including 7 goals & 9 assists on the power play in 82 games. He had only 6 power-play points in the 6 seasons (248 games) prior to last season. For that kind of output, the Wild signed him to a 5-year deal worth $27.5 million.

Those contracts mean everyone expects further growth from both players. Dumba can be a huge threat on the power play with that shot from the one-timer spot that Ovechkin & Stamkos have made famous over the last several seasons. He may have finally taken a step towards better defense as well. That’s something that has really propelled Zucker to more ice time. He now has the trust of his coach that he’ll play in all 3 three zones.

They also re-signed D Nick Seeler to a 3-year, $2.175M deal. He came up late last season and showed he was ready for a 3rd pair role with a simple defensive game with a little physicality added in, too.

Out With the Old

Out are Tyler Ennis, Matt Cullen, Daniel Winnik and a slew of minor-league forward depth players that should be able to be replaced without too much trouble. Losing Matt Cullen hurts more from a “wished for more” standpoint meaning we wished the team would’ve done more so he could’ve done the whole Won & Done thing for his career. Cully signed with Pittsburgh looking to do the Won & Done there.

The last year of Tyler Ennis’ contract was bought out which kind of hurts both in the salary wallet and on the ice. He just looks like he should be a better hockey player but, through mostly nobody’s fault but his own, he couldn’t find a role with the Wild last season so it wasn’t a surprise to see that happen. He signed a 1-year, $650K deal with Toronto and has made the team. That may have more to do with the William Nylander contract situation than what he’s provided but, to give him credit, he has looked pretty good with 3 points in about 4 games.

Winnik joined the Bruins on a player tryout deal and didn’t make the team so he just signed with a Swiss League team.

The Wild also traded D Gustav Olofsson to the Montreal Canadiens yesterday, getting back a forward in Will Bitten who’s 20-years-old, 5’10 and 170 lbs but he’s got a motor and, maybe more importantly, he has a 2-way deal so the Wild can add him to the Iowa roster without having to pay him NHL money.

How’s Your Health?

Staying healthy will go a long way to helping the Wild this season but, honestly, when is that not the case and how do you stay healthy playing a game like hockey?

Injuries ravaged the Wild last season. Zach Parise, Mikael Granlund, Nino Niederreiter, Charlie Coyle, Marcus Foligno, Jared Spurgeon, Jonas Brodin and the biggest one in their #1 defenseman Ryan Suter with that major ankle injury and that may have been the final straw.

This is the first time in 3 seasons that Zach Parise is healthy at the start of training camp, but now, “I feel like I’m back to the player that I was before this started a couple of seasons ago. I feel normal again.” A healthy Parise is a good thing but getting Ryan Suter back from that horrific ankle injury might be the biggest comeback. Will it take him a while before he’s back to the Suter everyone expects? He looked alright in his one preseason game but he was either a little worried about the ankle or his skating is still a ways away. It’s probably a little bit of both.

What can a healthy Parise, Niederreiter and Coyle do this season?

TRIAge?

One thing that might help the Wild stay healthy and/or get healthy when they need to is their new training facility. Can a new practice facility play a part in getting the Wild some playoff success? The Wild believes it’s a critical piece to the championship puzzle. With TRIA Rink at Treasure Island Center, the entire way the Wild prepares is about to change. Everything from the way it practices, to the way it dresses, eats, recovers, prepares and trains is about to take a massive step forward. It’s always nice to have the best money can buy, especially when it comes to training and medical facilities and it’s just 6 blocks from the Xcel Energy.

Bruce Boudreau on TRIA Rink from the Town Hall Meeting:
“This is a phenomenal place. I mean, what Craig did to build this thing for this team. If you can’t be happy in there…with this facility, you can’t be happy anywhere. I’m surprised some of the young guys aren’t going to see if they can live there during the course of the winter. It has everything that we need to be successful and we’re getting everything that we do need to be successful so there’s no excuses at all.”

How’s Your Core Strength?

The core of a team is one of the biggest reasons why it does or doesn’t succeed. This why the Wild signed Zach Parise and Ryan Suter back in 20012. They felt these two would mark the beginning of getting the Wild to the promised land of winning a Stanley Cup. It definitely hasn’t worked out like they had planned. Is that because of them and/or the rest of this team’s core? Their problem has been getting over the hump in the playoffs and for various reasons, that hasn’t happened.

It’s unfortunate but it doesn’t mean they will stop trying, that’s for sure. Chuck Fletcher is blamed for having the Wild in this position. Should he be blamed? Since signing #11 and #20, he was in a Win Now mode so he was always doing what he could to help the big club. Well, there were only so many prospects and draft picks and dealing those killed the team’s depth. Had they won a Cup, nobody would be complaining about this or, if they did, the response would be to just point at The Cup. Argument over.

The Wild’s AHL club, the Iowa Wild, has never made the playoffs in their 5-years in Iowa. This new regime is adamant about making the baby Wild into a winning team so they’ll do everything they can to keep their draft picks and use the draft and development model that new GM Paul Fenton used in Nashville.

New Team, New Season!

Every year is a new year with a new team. Minnesota fans are notorious for believing their teams will never win anything because “It’s the Wild. They’ll lose again.” Well, believe it or not, it’s a new team every year. If there’s just one new player, one new coach or some other change to the organization then, well, that makes it a new team.

This team made several changes from last season’s team. There are new players, a new assistant coach in Dean Evason, a new practice facility and new people in the management department. Yes, there are a lot of the same players but they also have another year of experience and they learned from that experience so, even they aren’t the same.

The big question is can any or all of those changes make a difference in turning this team into a contender for the Cup? Can a healthy Zach Parise, Nino Niederreiter & Charlie Coyle, veteran depth at the bottom of the depth chart & in the locker room and young players like Nick Seeler and Jordan Greenway be the difference this team needs?

What clicked last season for the Washington Capitals, a team that battled for 9 years in the playoffs with nothing but disappointments to show for it? They failed so often that people started expecting them to fail but they finally got over the hump last season and they now have a championship, a banner, rings and A LOT of videos to show for it. Does that sound familiar?

Can that happen for the Wild? Why can’t it? Everyone is expecting this team to fail but they have the talent to win and to win now. They have good goaltending, a great group of defenseman and good to great forwards that should produce more this season. They just have to get over the hump.

Gotta Win the War Before You Dance

The Central Division is stacked this season. You can make an argument for every team to make the playoffs from the Central but, at least two of those teams will not make the dance. Nashville Predators defenseman Ryan Ellis may have said it best when describing the Central Division:

“The West and especially our Central Division, each game’s a war and you have a little bit of a rivalry with every team. You can’t guarantee yourself a playoff spot. You really have to go out every night and compete and the divisional matchups are even more key from there.”

The Wild have to be ready from the start because the first game is against a Central Division foe and the Colorado Avalanche know as well as the rest of the league knows that there are no easy games, especially in the Central so…

Let’s Dance!!!

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