Could Minnesota Wild GM Bill Guerin still swing a trade for Minnesota born Brock Boeser? Let’s dive into the Positives and Negatives.
Well folks, here we go again, this time we talk about Bill Guerin bringing Brock Boeser to the State of Hockey. It all started one day when former Wild GM Paul Fenton was attempting to trade former Wild forward Jason Zucker. Fenton had apparently decided to ring Canucks GM Jim Benning in an attempt to swap Zucker for Boeser 1-for-1, although Jim Benning didn’t like that idea and supposedly hung up the phone on Fenton (Who can really blame the guy?).
One thing to understand is that in no way, shape or form are the Wild equipped enough to make this deal now or even a year from now. Timing would be key as GM Bill Guerin will want to see how his roster changes from last season play out and see if other key players on the roster play out such as Jordan Greenway and Mats Zuccarello.
Positives
Say in classic Minnesota Wild fashion that they whiff on the 8-ball this season and find themselves on the outside looking in next off-season, if production is the issue, Guerin and company should absolutely bring in a guy like Brock Boeser.
First of all, moves would have to be made such as dealing Greenway and/or Zuccarello (easier said than done) in order to free up the necessary cap space to bring in Boeser. As far as what assets go to Vancouver in the deal, we’ll save for a rainy day.
Boeser would have an immediate impact on the Wild’s top six and imagine how good he would look being on a line with Kirill Kaprizov? Or fellow North Dakota Alumni Zach Parise? One way or another, Minnesota would come out on top in this deal no matter what the (reasonable) price tag might be.
Negatives
Now with the more realistic approach to this, Minnesota wouldn’t be able to pry away Boeser from the Canucks without giving up the farm of whatever we can salvage as far as value the Wild have in the system trade wise. There is a significant chance that a Boeser trade to Minnesota would be a bad thing for the Wild in two different ways.
One would be the significant cost of acquiring a player of Brock’s caliber and Two is what if Boeser comes to Minnesota and can’t translate his game from how he has played in Vancouver? The fact of the matter is that Vancouver’s top 6 beats the Wild’s top 6 any day and by that it also means that Boeser thrives more off his teammates such as Bo Horvat and Elias Pettersson.
While it would be outrageously fun to see Boeser brought back home to Minnesota, it can be safely said that it is a move that is unlikely to benefit the Wild long-term with the assets they’d have to give up.