You really haven't watch him or wild. Blatantly false when stats prove he was Minnesota's best dman in playoffs also. Dumba has become tremendously better on d last few years

Still not a premiere shutdown defender. Not the way Spurgeon, Brodin, and to a lesser extent, Middleton are

The loss of Suter and Cole are the biggest factors in MN's PK problems. The coaching staff not being good at special teams doesn't help either.

Dumba wasn't the reason for MN's PK being awful.

20-21 PK: ToI/g, ga/60
Brodin: 2:08, 7.8
Suter: 1:59, 4.2
Spurgeon: 1:59, 4.5
Dumba: 1:51, 8.7
Cole: 1:18, 7.0
Soucy: 0:58, 6.0

21-22 PK: ToI/g, ga/60
Brodin: 2:32, 9.7
Dumba: 2:01, 9.4
Spurgoen: 2:00, 9.7
Merrill: 1:57, 7.6
Kulikov: 1:56, 7.7
Goli: 1:10, 9.2
Middleton: 1:28, 7.7

Replacing Suter with Goli/Middleton as Spurgeon's PK partner was the biggest hit to the PK. Dumba is by no means the best PKer around, nobody will argue that fact. But when you look at the adv stats like xga/60 and HDCA/60 his numbers are on par or better than Spurgeon.

There wasn't any single reason MN's PK dropped last season. There were many small reasons: coaching, system, personnel, goalies, playing the entire league not just the awful COVID West Division, etc.

All I was trying to say was that Dumba wasn't really moving the needle in helping to lift where the Wild were struggling systemically

Didn't know hockey was a one player game. Really

You just said it, systematic failure. Brodin is a top tier d-zone d-man, even he couldn't make things work in MN's system.

Dumba really has turned into an all around d-man. He had to since his peck injury a couple of years ago took away his scoring ability. Ideally he's a 2nd pair d-man, not the top pair, big minute, top-line matchup, etc. that MN has used him for the last couple of seasons., He has shown he can play in that role, but he won't thrive in it. He's just the best RD option MN has. The team is definatly better with him than without him. The record with/without him strongly backs that up in his 2 injury seasons.

I never said Dumba didn't move the needle, he just does so in a more offensive manner than defensive. Isn't Spurgeon a superior player than Dumba?

Most will say yes. I say no. Last season Spurgeon was used as a pp specialist, sheltered 6D for MN. Lowest 5v5 ToI/game, highest o-zone start, played the least against other teams' top lines (at least to some chart from Feb. or Mar.), of any of the 6 regular d-men.

Dumba played 8 less games than Spurgeon and had 60 mins more 5v5 time for the season, 3 mins higher per game. PK time was the same between them. Most of their d-zone adv stats are close enough that the quality of opposition and Spurgeon's 50 more o-zone starts and 30 less d-zone starts than Dumba can account for the differences. The difference in points was due to the amount of PP1 time Spurgeon had (the Wild's PP2 was players like Freddy G and Foligno, painful). They were only 4p apart 5v5.

To put it in perspective MN (113p for the season) was a 121p pace team with Dumba and a 98p pace without him this year. They were a 95p pace team with Dumba and a 77p pace team without Dumba the year he injured his peck. This year with Spurgeon in the lineup they were only a 110p pace team.

I see, cause I'm already getting kind of worried about that Spurgeon contract

You're not alone...