Ditto on Gump PS post. Thank you Dan for providing content about the Wild even with the season that it has been.
I hope that Fenton has some type of magic up his sleeve for this off-season. As I have said before, I think Spurgeon and Zucker have now played their last games in a Wild sweater and will be used in trades this off-season. I can see JEE being a part of package as well. They should really bite the bullet and buyout Rask. He was ungodly terrible in that last game. I know Tweaterben is not going to be truly happy with this off-season, as I don't really see a complete teardown of the roster. Just a few moves (though not minor I hope) to get them moving. Needs? A true #1 center, and another right handed RW. I know Parise is left handed, but I was reading somewhere (cannot remember where) that he is actually more comfortable playing RW than LW. If that is true, Parise and Kunin are next years RWs. Some players need to move from LW. As it stands right now, the Wild have Parise, Greenway, Zucker, Donato, Fiala and Foligno at that position. Move Parise to RW, trade Zucker and they have their 1-4 lines covered at LW.
If Fenton can somehow work with the Leads and get Nylander and Kapanen from them, say for something like Spurgeon and Zucker, that would be an excellent start. I know more would need to be headed back to Toronto, and the money doesn't work out...but the Leafs are sitting tight against the cap whenever they do Marner's new contract..and we all know they are not trading away Marner.
I haven't spent enough time looking over other teams rosters yet as I have been pretty locked into the Leafs roster and cap situation. But getting Nylander as the #1 C (Staal #2, Koivu #3 and Sturm #4) works perfectly. Then having Parise, Kunin and Kapanen on the RW, roster has really been cleaned up now. 4th RW I actually would give Gerald Mayhew (down in Iowa) a chance at that spot. I don't know much about him, but stats-wise, doesn't appear to be a slouch.
So even with having to give new, decent contracts to Donato, Fiala, JEE, Sturm and Kapanen (in my dream scenario), I think the Wild would still have plenty of cap space to get a decent 2nd pairing right handed Dman. So roster could look like this....yes, this is turning into a really, really long post.
Fiala - Nylander - Kapanen
Greenway - Staal - Parise
Donato - Koivu - Kunin
Foligno - Sturm - Mayhew
Pressbox spot
Suter - Dumba
Brodin - ?
Seeler - Pateryn
Hunt
Dubnyk/Stalock |