In a season of ups and downs for Minnesota, We break down a few trades that could improve the Wild.
It’s no secret that the Minnesota Wild aren’t a perfect roster as it stands now, so today we’ll try to improve the team with Three different trade proposals.
Trade One
The need on the Wild is a Center and Max Domi is a very rugged but skilled Center for the Montreal Canadians and could fit the bill for the Wild. If the Wild are to pursue Domi, they will need pay for his services as the proposed 1st & 3rd round pick being sent back to the Canadians in this mock trade. The Wild can potentially flex the 1st Round Pick they received from Pittsburgh in the Jason Zucker deal and as far as the 3rd rounder is concerned, we flip the 2021 3rd as the Wild don’t own a 3rd in this year’s draft.
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Domi ironically enough was involved in a one-for-one trade with current Wild forward Alex Galchenyuk when the 2 were swapped for one another back in 2018. As far as where Domi fits into the Wild lineup, as previously mentioned he’s a rugged forward and that’s no surprise from where the bloodlines come from as Max’s dad Tie Domi played parts of 18 seasons in the NHL. Max sure has been coming into his own player in the NHL as he had an outburst in the 18-19 season scoring 28 goals and 44 assists in a full 82 game season with the Habs. If Max were on the Wild, he would’ve ranked just behind Eric Staal in FO% with 48.9%. Now, with Max listed as a center, he’s a versatile forward that can also play the wing, power play, and penalty kill.
Trade Two
This one was predictable, the long-awaited Matt Dumba trade finally gets done and the Wild get Anthony Cirelli. Like Domi, Cirelli isn’t an all-star center but he’s a center of significant value in which the Wild so desperately needs. Cirelli has played some critical minutes in Tampa this year averaging over 18 minutes a game and having a FO% of 47.5.
With trading Dumba, the Wild would free up some cap space meaning they can re-sign Cirelli who’s due to be an RFA at the beginning of the off-season and will commend a pricey extension for his ever-improving game and oh did I mention he’s a big center who likes to play in the front of the net? Just like Zach Parise, Cirelli makes his living causing havoc for opposing goaltenders.
Trade Three
Again, another predictable trade, this time comes at the Wild’s expense of sending Jordan Greenway to the New York Rangers for Goaltender Alexandar Georgiev who’s shown promise playing in Broadway with doubling his wins over losses and a .910 SV%. With Igor Shesterkin taking the reigns in New York and not wanting to be wasteful they do right by Alexandar and trade him to Minnesota in this mock trade.
Acquiring Georgiev would be a subsequent move to potentially moving Dubnyk or Stalock for that matter as both are older goaltenders who are starting to slow down. Dubnyk hasn’t shown a shadow of his former self this season and Alex Stalock was riding a career-high in wins before the season was halted due to COVID-19. This move also presents itself with the opportunity down the road to set the Wild up with that 1A/1B tandem as a young Kaapo Kahkonen also is eager for his chance in the NHL and with Georgiev in tandem, this trade may become one of the better moves Bill Guerin makes.
Bonus Trade (For Fun!)
Now for fun, We discuss what it would mean for and take for the Wild to land a franchise center in Jack Eichel. Fellow GonePuckWild Contributor Aaron Heckmann came up with this fun proposal and stated the following about the mock trade offer “Eichel is a franchise center so we will have to grossly overpay” In the words of most, go big or go home with this out of the park lights out offer.
The Wild would have a new leader in the locker room with Eichel as well as a sudden culture change as the number of players departing Minnesota in this mock trade would leave the Wild a bit scrapped, but can we imagine for a moment a top line of Kaprizov-Eichel-Fiala? sure we can and that’s probably all this mock trade is going to be for Wild fans is a Wild imagination happening in front of their faces.
With all these trade ideas above, clearly the Wild won’t do all of them to improve but know one thing for a fact, Bill Guerin knows there’s an improvement to be made.