Game #9: Minnesota Wild vs Washington Capitals, Thursday October 28, 2010 at 7:00pm (CDT), Xcel Energy Center [GAME PREVIEW]

Drama.  Soap operas.  Angst.  If one were able to be a fly on the walls of the Wild locker room or the offices of management, ones imagination could run “wild” just thinking of the things that one might see or hear.  Right now, there seems to be so much going on with the team, and little (if any) of it is positive.  For fans, it’s become extremely painful to watch.

First off, there’s the issue that is affecting many hockey fans in general.  If you’re like me, and are a Dish Network subscriber you’re feeling the loss of televised hockey.  While I live four hours away from St. Paul in Wisconsin, I’m technically still in Fox Sports-North territory.  Because of the dispute between Fox Sports and Dish Network, I see very few Wild games.  Because I’m in FS-North territory, I can’t even watch the opposing feed if it’s being broadcast on one of the select unaffected Fox Sports regional channels.  Tonight’s game against the Capitals is going to be nationally televised on NHL Network.  However, because the game is still be locally broadcast on FS-North, I will be unable to watch the game.  Having read some of the information surrounding this dispute, I blame Fox.  They are looking for a 55% raise in price.  The irony in all of this, is that Fox is a minor owner of Dish Network’s competitor, Direct TV.  If there’s no battle between Direct TV and Fox in a few years, you can’t tell me there’s not an example of a conflict of interest.  Also, a note to my fellow Dish Network subscribers.  If you have done so already, take a chance and ask for money back on your Center Ice package if you haven’t already.  I did an online chat with them, and got a significant portion of our Center Ice fee back due to this dispute.  However, you’ll have a better chance of getting money back if you pay your $179 in one lump sum.

Angst reared its ugly head during an abysmal pre-season, in which the only game the Wild won was the exhibition game in Finland against Ilves of the SM-Liiga.  The struggles continued into the losses against the Carolina Hurricanes in Helsinki.  Much like last season, fans have witnessed lack of consistent effort.  It got ugly enough that the Sunday prior to the first game against the Vancouver Canucks, Wild head coach Todd Richards held a much dreaded “bag skate.”  The immediate result of the tough practice reaped rewards a huge win against Vancouver.  Yet the results were short lived with losses in Vancouver and at home against the Los Angeles Kings.  What is somewhat alarming regarding the loss against the Kings, is that Wild had the lead and ended up losing in the shoot out.  At this point, I would suggest that Wild try to avoid the shoot out at all costs, simply because we don’t have the talent to win through the shoot out.

The newest soap opera in Minnesota is simply a repeat of one from the past.  The Wild have found success in the past.  However, with success often comes greed.  If you think back, the turning point (for good or bad) was the Cinderella season of 2002-2003 when the Wild went all the way to the Western Conference finals.  The following season started with huge amounts of drama, most notably in the form of wingers Marian Gaborik and Pascal Dupuis as contract holdout.  Their agent was one Allan Walsh.  Negotiations between Walsh and then General Manager Doug Risebrough were a failure.  Eventually Gaborik got sick of not playing and fired Walsh and hired Ron Salcer.  Of course we all know how later Gaborik negotiations turned out.  Walsh also had a public war of words with the new Wild administration over Petr Sykora in January of this year.  That dispute ended up in Sykora getting his unconditional release.  The war of words is back in full force, this time in regards to Martin Havlat.  Instead of reaching out to Wild management to discuss the role of his client, Walsh decided instead to go public with his complaints.  Walsh’s lack of professionalism should become a major red flag for the Wild in that they avoid acquiring players who are represented by Walsh.  What’s even more disturbing about this latest installment of “As the Wild’s World Turns,” is that General Manager Chuck Fletcher mentioned that coach Richards and Havlat had a positive meeting on Tuesday regarding his play and role on the team.  After that meeting, Wild management are having to put out another Walsh fire.  As has been stated by Fletcher, it’s not only Havlat who’s had limited icetime lately.  Because of the rash of penalties the Wild have taken lately, Andrew Brunette, Guillaume Latendresse along with Havlat have all had less icetime because they’re not penalty killers.  If the team as a whole can figure out how to avoid the march to the penalty box, Havlat’s icetime and role on the ice will greatly increase.

With all the negativity whirling around the Wild and the whining coming from an agent, I am reminded of that classic line of Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own, “there’s no crying in baseball.”  I feel like some of that can apply to the Wild right now.  Added to that, is the also classic “save the drama for your mama.”  Yes, I’m sick of drama.  I just want to watch hockey and enjoy doing so.  I don’t want to have to scramble for a way to watch it.  I want to see a team who looks like they give a damn.  I don’t want to hear the complaints of an agent of a player making more money than any of us ever will.