The isles have a building to open damn it! Give us Laf!

I would disagree with the justification of the sixth team but okay with the first 5.

VAN has had just complete s$%t luck with the draft lottery over the years, and has never had a 1st overall pick in 50 years of existence.... just mentioning in case the hockey gods are perusing CF by any chance...

To benefit the LEAGUE the most:
Best CAN Scenario = MTL
Best USA Scenario = MIN

The metro is already a blood bath. If he goes there let it be to the penguins.
Other than that, try sending him to the western conference. They are weak anyway.

Islanders*

How do you figure? Would it not be weakest fanbases or largest tv area, ny or Phoenix or miami, Vancouver, mtl, tor

Toronto for the simple reason of having the God Line

Laf-Mathews-Marner

I fixed it for you

You sure did

Lafreniere to wpg, so the jets can sell high on laine, or auction lafreniere for a lindros return and window wide open. That’s just a biased opinion or Phoenix for winter spot

The two places I listed as being best for THE LEAGUE (most bang for the buck) are firstly because hockey matters there, and
* MTL is his hometown and the most rabid hockey market.
* MIN is likewise a hockey hotbed (a little less of course) and has never gotten the Cup.

As for the rest:
* PHX will be HOU soon enough (any sun-belt will just be a waste).
* NYI had the dynasty, lots of cups and will be fine.
* VAN will burn Laf to the ground (see 2011 - I saw it live). 50-years of futility and they would screw it up some how 100%.
* TML have their franchise guy already and need DMen...btw it's 4 years and counting before the franchise guy walks...tick tock

My premise is the league get better with improving the weakest link over overkill in a market that sells out for a bubble team year after year, and the need for Large American tv markets to do well to increase American tv deal. So both best for the league not increaseing or improving an all ready bullet proof franchise. Phoenix hasn’t moved in 25 years, i wouldn’t hold your breath any time soon, with a entertainment guru billionaire owner. But we will see after this pandemic is done

No!! The oilers are getting him!

PHX does not move the needle. East coast is in bed when PHX hits the ice (yawn).
* You can put Gretz-Lemieux-Orr and Howe out there and it's 'crickets'.
* Vegas has taken the 'desert' hockey loyalty, if there is a thing...

MIN is central in location, time zone and 'the State of Hawkey'...
* When Minny are relevant it's great for renewing old rivals in massive market CHI & successful STL that'll get the US networks salivating!! And MIN is good for Cdn broadcasts too w a strong WPG club/market just across the border...

Not to mention no cups in two franchises, and the one team that could've was ripped from us the exact year before they won it all.

Our current team has only ever had a top 3 pick once, and that was 20 years ago, in the worst draft of modern history. Couple that with the fact we have phenomenal depth, an elite top 5 defense in the league, but no true high-end players, we're too good to suck bad enough to get high draft picks, and we're too bad to be relevant.

We're stuck in the doldrums of irrelevant mediocrity, which is a far larger pill to swallow if you ask me.

We finally have some hope of high-end talent with the possibility of Fiala and Kaprizov, but the addition of a generational 1st overall player could put this team over the top.

Yes we would still need a legitimate 1C and at bare minimum league average goaltending. But we're closer than most people think.

Would you not say, that’s basically coming from signing two ufas to 13 year contracts. Stuck in purgatory for a good while, no bottoming out and no getting beyond mediocre. Thought they were smarter than the rest of the league and now rewarded for it along with New Jersey, karma in a sense.

Mmmm.... yes and no. There are several reasons why that statement is both correct and wrong at the same time. Not to mention incredibly slanted in it's wording to end up in your favor. So well done. Kudos to you.

First...

The notion that the Parise/Suter contracts are the sole reason why we're firmly entrenched as a playoff bubble team is ludicrous. Two really good players, while good, don't make a team. I already outlined exactly why we are where we are in my prior post. A lack of high-end talent, and phenomenal bottom six depth, which is arguably better than 3/4's of the rest of the league's teams and an elite top 5 defense. Do the contracts play a part? Sure, but only in the grand schemes of things, and it's only a small part.

Second...

Karma? Are you serious? The only reason those contracts get any hate is because they were never supposed to happen. At least as far as Bettman and the league were concerned and ditto that for the ownerships of 30 other franchise's and hockey fans in general.

I mean, c'mon! Minnesota?!?!?! That's fly over country, right? Parise and Suter weren't supposed to sign here, especially not both of them.

News flash. Long term contracts such as the one's in question, were commonplace. Modis Operandi. Standard Operating Procedure. Every team in the NHL did them from time to time. It was nothing unusual. So the notion that the Wild thought they were smarter than every one else, makes no sense.

It's not the Wild's fault for signing the two top FA's in a given year to perfectly legal longterm contracts at the time of their signings, only to have Bettman be so enraged by it that he decided to change how contracts were done in the new CBA and insisted that a cap recapture penalty on contracts that were signed before it took effect, be penalized because of it, instead of grandfathered in.

Third...

More than anything, we are where we are because of Chuck Fletcher. For all the wiffs and misses he had on trying to get high-end talent, he absolutely nailed one of his primary goals as a GM. A good foundation, that every team usually needs if they dont have the good stuff up top, depth. Combine that with an owner who is a 'fan' and wants us to succeed and get the cup because we're only a 'few' short pieces away and always in win now mode when we should've been building?

So Yeah, you do the math.

So they over payed and over termed there base, and defied Father Time at that point, can you name me a dynasty that didn’t draft there base through bottoming out. Or it’s just Minnesota reinventing the wheel and smartest guy in the room. Some teams don’t even have that play in the playbook, but keep going with that they are going to be an actual legit contender in central, 2/3 players away come on, they are questionable to be 4th in the division. New gm hopefully has a long leash

Do you you have no knowledge of how contracts are structured? Specifically, how they they were affected pre-and-post CBA? Or even more specifically, Parise and Suters'?

At the time they were signed the contracts were both front loaded where they were payed more up front during their first six years and after that it goes down every other year until the final two years where they are roughly paid about a Million each. That's their age 39-40 season by the way.

The Wild could have easily moved them both to other teams at this point if their overall play started to decline as they got older. If they retired before their contracts were up then the team wasn't overly effected by it. The contracts just simply came off the payroll. Easy peasy.

This is Pre-CBA by the by.

Following along?

After the changes to the CBA by Bettman.

Teams now have to contend with cap hit's by AAV's not contract payouts. What this means is that instead of Parise and Suter's contracts overall cap hit falling off as they got older and were paid less, again this is legal at the time of their signings, were defined by what the total averaged value was over the course of the 13 year deals. Which is roughly 7.5M until the end of their contracts at age 40, even though they're getting paid less each year. Thus creating a large void of dead money to our overall cap space.

Then try throwing on the monster that is the cap-recapure penalty if god forbid they either retire or get traded were hit with a 20 million dollar cap hit until they're about 3 years out from contracts end.

Look, it's easy to say a team should bottom out and get high draft picks to rebuild and get those types of players. It's quite another to tell a young core group of players that are already on the roster and are in need of veteran leadership to suck some more just so that we can draft higher for a little while longer in order to do it. That just creates a losing mentality that goes contrary to building a winning culture that's necessary to build a franchise dynasty.

Furthermore, at the time of the signings. The Wild were considered to have one of the best prospects pools in the league. A prospect pool that was starting to come together and make their presence felt. But the Wild were too young, we needed some older veteran high-end players to steer the ship.

We weren't trying to game the system as your trying to imply, we just wanted to get better.

Good to know that that's a crime.

After the Parise/Suter signings Fletcher was continually pressured by Craig Leipold to make more win now moves, and selling off picks and prospects when we should have continued building.

I said all that before, for the record. I never said we were 2-3 pieces away during that timeframe. I said that is what our owner routinely tried to sell the fanbase in order to explain all of the win now mentality he continually espouse.

Fair enough, thanks for the information, I do pull for a solid squad being a jets fan a little less solid than the jets. But some new adds to the old Norris division and competitive balance is always good. The division is going to share the cup next few seasons in my opinion, between colorado, st.louis, and Dallas and by the time that is done, hopefully my jets and your wild in that conversation. Being from Manitoba, always tried to get behind Minnesota major sports teams, but could never quite manage too. Love the early 90s jays/twins rivalry, and 98 Vikings, but damn other than 91 and 87 it’s a hard luck city for pro sports. I think new gm might be ready to right it, as long as he’s given some rope, he’s been a few places and put in the work to get that position, so hopefully good things coming.