With the 2025 NHL Draft in the rearview mirror, it's time for Bill Guerin and the Minnesota Wild executive staff to start focusing on the 2025-26 season. The draft, especially without a first-round pick, is all about the distant future. No one selected on Saturday is making this season's roster. Heck, they're probably not making next year's either. Still, the moves that the Wild made leading up, and throughout the draft can shine a little light on what Billy G plans on doing over the next few days.
The Wild are happy with their defensive unit
The Wild traded a pending restricted free agent. It just wasn't the one everyone expected them to trade. Midway through the day, they sent Declan Chisholm and the 180th pick in the draft to Washington for Chase Priskie and the 123rd pick.
Priskie is a pending unrestricted free agent and there is a good chance the Wild don't re-sign him. Moving Chisholm out, along with the news that Jonas Brodin is likely to start the season on injured reserve, means the Wild will be leaning heavily on a couple of their young blueliners in Zeev Buium and David Jiricek.
Guerin seems comfortable with the defensemen left on the roster, and defense remains one of the organization's biggest strengths. Still, the first few months could be interesting if the younglings struggle to adjust to a full-time workload in the NHL. Even if Guerin likes the defensive corps make-up, it wouldn't be surprising to see him add a veteran on a low-cost, short-term deal as insurance should Buium or Jiricek need a little AHL seasoning at some point.
Guerin isn't going to panic trade Marco Rossi
If Bill Guerin's heart was set on trading Marco Rossi, the draft would have been the best time to do it. Teams with first-round picks or high second-rounds might have been enticed to pick up the restricted free agent, but nothing materialized over the weekend. After Buffalo's underwhelming return for J.J. Peteka, a player in a similar position a Rossi, perhaps Guerin became more open to working out a solution to keeping the center on the roster.
The main complication that arises as this moves into the summer is that, starting on July 1, Rossi is subject to offer sheets from other organizations. The once taboo subject that was discussed more in theory than practiced in reality, got a boost in interest when St. Louis offersheeted Edmonton's Philp Broberg and Dylan Holloway last summer.
For Rossi's camp to have any interest in signing with another team, the offered contract would probably have to be in the $6.5 to $7.0 million range, a considerably larger investment than what St. Louis had to part with last summer. According to PuckPedia the compensation for an offer sheet valued between $4,680,077 and $7,020,113 is a first-round pick and a third-round pick.
With the rumor of Guerin turning down Vancouver's offer of a 2025 first-round pick for Rossi prior to this year's draft, it is questionable if the Wild would match any offer in that range. There are 18 teams that have the draft pick compensation to extend an offersheet in that range, but two of those teams (Montreal and St. Louis) don't have the current cap space to make it work.
If the Wild do decide to keep Rossi, it would help solve the third issue on this list.
Center depth is the number one priority on July 1
It's the reoccurring theme of this endless summer. The Wild have to figure out who is going to play in the middle of the ice. Joel Eriksson Ek is a lock. Danila Yurov is going to get a look in training camp, and will likely have a spot, but exactly where is a question. As currently constructed Yakov Trenin and possibly Ryan Hartman would be the other options.
Signing Rossi immediately plugs up a gap and gives the Wild a chance to manage Yurov's entry into the NHL. It seems the simplest solution, and if the two sides can work out the financial situations, probably the perferred solution.
The market for depth centers is going to be fierce on Tuesday. Sam Bennett is the latest free agent to take himself off the market as he is staying in Florida. With Claude Giroux (who has played on the wing as well) staying in Ottawa based on recent reports, the chances of landing an impact 2C in free agency are getting increasingly smaller. There are still several veteran options available, but the likes of Luke Kunin, Pius Suter, and Robby Fabbri project more to a bottom-six role.
The Wild have a few days left to finalize their free agency plans. Only time will tell if the moves they make will pay off witha deep run in the playoffs next spring.