Minnesota Wild: Eriksson-Ek’s Demotion is Due to Carrying Eight Defensemen

At the beginning of the day the Minnesota Wild looked to have their lineup set for their season opening tilt in St. Louis on Thursday.  That lineup looked to have rookie Joel Eriksson-Ek making his NHL debut, until the Wild made the unexpected move to assign him to Iowa in the AHL to clear room to get their salary total under the salary cap limit.

At the beginning of yesterday the it looked like the Minnesota Wild opening day roster would include Christoph Bertschy and Joel Eriksson-Ek.  Then the Wild claimed Teemu Pulkkinen off waivers, and to make room on the roster Bertschy was sent down to Iowa.  That was a predictable move as Bertschy did not require waivers to go down, but just yesterday Bertschy looked like a lock to make his first opening day NHL roster.

Then the even stranger news came later in the afternoon that Eriksson-Ek would be assigned to Iowa.  The young Swede seemed to be a roster lock with a strong training camp showing excellent results and potential.  Unlike Bertschy who was moved down due to the acquisition of another player, Eriksson-Ek was moved down because his immigration paperwork was not approved yet, and also more importantly because having he and Zac Dalpe on the NHL roster at the same time puts the Wild over the salary cap limit by $462,753.

Related Story: The Opening Day Roster Looks to Be Complete

That is a problem that will need to be addressed in the coming days.  For the first day of the season only having 12 forwards on the roster will not be such a big deal as everyone is fresh and healthy.  But if there’s an injury to one of the forwards the Wild will need to act quickly to remedy the situation.

The Wild still plan to have Eriksson-Ek in their lineup for at least his nine games allowed before burning the first year of his deal.  That means to make sure that the Wild can do that and have Dalpe or even Bertschy up at the same time as Eriksson-Ek, the Wild will need to clear some cap space.

There’s a lot of reasons that the salary cap situation is this tight, and most of it has to do with the defensive situation currently.  With the Wild carrying one more extra defender than they planned that means that an unexpected salary is on the books as a consequence.

In the case of Mike Reilly, he may have earned a spot on this team but having him up is a cap hit of $925,000.  That might not seem like a lot, but Reilly makes about $300,000 more than Nate Prosser so he’s not the cheapest option.  Add to that the salary of the extra defender in the form of Christian Folin at $725,000 or Prosser at $625,000 you can see where the Wild just incurred an extra cap hit of just below or above $1 million.

That’s more than enough alone to absorb Eriksson-Ek’s $894,166 cap hit.  Even if Reilly stays the current cap room plus Folin or Prosser’s contract is enough to make room for Eriksson-Ek.  So the Wild have really three options to make the room they need to get Eriksson-Ek on the roster.

First is demote Reilly to Iowa.  He can be sent to Iowa without having to go through waivers, so it’s very little risk.  He can be sent down after the opener and would likely stay their till Eriksson-Ek finishes his nine game trial period.  If the Wild keep Eriksson-Ek for the season, they can continually swap Reilly and him to get each time to get each player time in the lineup but that is ridiculous to keep up over time.

The second option is much better, and that is to demote Folin or Prosser to Iowa.  The issue with this choice is that is that both players require waivers to get to Iowa and have an above average risk of being claimed.  Still if the Wild want Reilly in their lineup regularly, they might need to make that sacrifice of losing one of these players.  But losing Folin or Prosser for nothing is not even close to a desirable outcome.

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So that’s why choice three makes the best sense.  The Wild can trade Folin or Prosser.  This would be a move that would ensure that the Wild get something for these players vice if they were to lose them in the waiver process.  This also fixes the salary cap issue that caused this situation for the season and still allows for one extra defender and one extra forward to be up with Minnesota.

The market for Prosser might be very low, but there are rumblings that the market for Folin is actually stronger than most would think.  So if the Wild move Folin for a prospect or draft pick, they can shed that extra salary they need to keep the roster the way they want it with Reilly, Dalpe/Bertschy, and Eriksson-Ek up at all times.

Next: Minnesota Wild Make Solid Waiver Pickup of Pulkkinen

GM Chuck Fletcher doesn’t seem to be worried right now as he explained to Michael Russo “Early on it’s no big deal, but obviously we’ll accrue space as we go along and in a couple of weeks we’ll have enough to carry 23 if we want to.  Our goal is to create enough space through the year for later on.”  What that space accrual will comprise of is hard to tell, but until that space is opened up the Wild will need to continue to play a shell game that could get difficult and tiresome quickly.