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One step forward, many leaps backwards: the Wild’s underwhelming free agency pickups

If there was a hockey team that resembled a roller coaster, it would be the Minnesota Wild.  Whenever things seem to be heading in the right direction, progress comes to a complete halt, if not it goes into a tailspin of sorts.  On occasion, it feels like that the fans are supposed to feel ‘grateful’ for the simple fact that the Wild are in town, but the honeymoon is over, and has really been over since season two.  The fans hopped back on the roller coaster with the 2003 playoffs.  The letdown during the following season was hard.  The fans re-boarded the roller coaster for the 2005-06 season, as fans throughout the league were just happy to be back watching the game.  Since the lockout, it has been a continual up and down for the fans, running the gamut from management opening the pocketbook one season and then winning the Northwest Division title this past season.

All season, fans have been well aware of the free agency issues facing the team come the off-season.  Since the end of the playoffs, fans watched Chris Simon go to Russia and Petteri Nummelin go to Switzerland.  While those departures don’t hurt that much, it’s the trading of the rights of Brian Rolston to Tampa Bay (Rolston ultimately signed with New Jersey), Todd Fedoruk signing with Phoenix, and Aaron Voros signing with the New York Rangers.  What makes fans nervous, is that we have yet to hear anything regarding the status of Pavol Demitra and Pierre-Marc Bouchard.

Don’t get me wrong, the Wild haven’t been entirely quiet during this year’s opening of free agency.  However, the signings that have happened haven’t exactly been what the fans wanted or expected.  When one wins their division, you truly expect your team to do whatever it takes to push through to the next level.  At the very least, the Wild should have built themselves to go for the Western Conference title.  Looking at this year’s moves, the Wild would be lucky to even make the playoffs.

Early on day one of free agency, the Wild did make some smart moves.  First they saw to re-signing Houston Aeros goaltender Barry Brust to a two-way deal.  Next, they picked up former Wild forward Andrew Brunette.  I like Brunette, however I do have to wonder at his production without the likes of Joe Sakic, Wojtek Wolski, and Paul Stastny around him.  Yes, he’s strong on his skates and excellent behind the net, but the Wild desperately need offense.  At least, Jacques Lemaire won’t have to teach Brunette “the system.”

Another wise move, was the trade of Wild prospect Ryan Jones and a second round pick to the Nashville Predators for defenseman Marek Zidlicky.  While Zidlicky isn’t going to score you a lot of goals, he is decent with setting other players up.  In his past two seasons in Nashville he played 79 games in each season.  For once, it feels like the Wild have finally addressed the overall weakness at the blue line.  Of course, fans felt infinitely better when Kim Johnsson was picked up.  Fans are hoping that Zidlicky is more consistent that Johnsson and that ultimately, Johnsson finds his game again.  The Wild continued in a positive trend by signing Craig Weller in an attempt to regain some of the toughness lost by losing Todd Fedoruk and Aaron Voros.

While these sorts of mid-grade signings were going on, Wild fans were still salivating at the thought of making a big acquisition.  The first big name that fans were excited about was Marian Hossa.  He had multiple teams throwing money at him left and right.  Wild star winger Marian Gaborik took his fellow Slovak out for coffee and tried to convince him to sign with Minnesota.  It has been reported that Minnesota offered him $8 million a season to come to the Wild.  Hossa ended up signing with the Detroit Red Wings for less (albeit a still hefty $7.45 million).  The Wild also lost out on Olli Jokinen, Kristian Huselius, and Markus Naslund. 

Since the Wild lost out on all four of the above names, they made their next (and according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune) their last free agent move.  The excitement comes with the name of Antti Miettinen.  Back the truck up.  It’s almost as if management thought to themselves, “hey, we’re bringing Bruno back, we better find an ‘Antti’ now.”  With the exception of penalty minutes, he appears to be another version of former left winger Antti Laaksonen.  Cue ‘Time Warp’ now.

Right now, the Wild are currently about $10 million under the salary cap.  The Wild desperately need to throw some serious money at Demitra and Bouchard.  While neither of them were the answer to the Wild’s ills last summer, looking at the roster we have now, you’d hate to lose any part of the team’s offense when things look so bleak.

Things are going to get more restless than they already are on the Wild.com message boards.  Sure, playing a bunch of young players like Benoit Pouliot, Colton Gillies, and Cal Clutterbuck might make for great feel-good stories, but when you get down to the bare facts, fans want to watch wins not hard work.  I’ve always said to the parrots that go on and on about how “boring” the Wild are, that I’d rather watch a close game where the Wild win then game after game where they get buried by their opponent.  The same holds true here.  I want to watch winning hockey not hard work hockey that continually loses.

If you think things are hairy now, just wait until the fans remember that the team raised ticket prices for this season.  Especially if that remembering comes during a long losing streak or when come the end of the season the Wild are out of the playoffs.  New Wild owner, Craig Leipold, is going to have a hard time justifying future ticket price raises is this is how the team is going to approach free agency in the future.  At some point, someone is going to have realize that conservative doesn’t win championships.

If my ankle was in better shape, I would spend tomorrow’s 4th of July holiday by playing nothing the childhood game of hopscotch.  However, I’d only play it blindfolded and hopping backwards, because that’s the direction the team seems to be headed in.  Blinded and backwards.  Not a good combination in any business, but it has to be an even worse combination in professional sports.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 3rd, 2008 at 9:57 pm and is filed under Wild Editorials, Wild News & Notes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.