How do you respond to pressure? Does it make you anxious or are you cool, calm and collected? Do you feel your stomach tighten or do you break out in hives? How people handle pressure is a big difference maker of what makes certain individuals successful while others fall short. Professional athletes are no different. Terms like ‘poise’ and ‘calm demeanor’ as well as ‘doesn’t panic’ are what you want to hear about future prospects. Yet, the pressure of being a prospect is one thing but the pressure of actually delivering on your supposed potential is another. As we finish up our ‘Wild fans speak’ article, it is abundantly clear that expectations are going to be extremely high for Mikael Granlund who is thought by many to be one of the best players outside of the NHL. Some fans are even referring to Granlund as Baby Jesus, is he going to be able to deliver on being the team’s savior? For the most part Granlund has handled the pressure tremendously, and has already accomplished quite a bit by winning a Sm-Liiga championship with HIFK Helsinki as well as a World Championship before he’s turned 20 years old. Yet, could the mounting pressure be catching up to him? Afterall, a guy who has been one of the most dominant players in a tough men’s league like the Sm-Liiiga should just dominate at this year’s U-20 World Junior Championships right? Well yes and no. Granlund did end up being one of the leading scorers in the tournament but in the most pressure packed moment of the tournament for Team Finland, a shootout chance where he could keep his team’s hopes alive just watch what took place.
The five fans we talked to discussed Granlund and many other questions pertaining to the Wild and the franchise’s current direction. The first fan is Brian Mills, a classmate and a hockey fanatic like myself. One of these fans are wild.com message board regulars in KISSArmyMan who you may remember chimed in with his two cents about the Wild’s performance at the 2011 NHL Entry Draft last summer. Our other two respondents are regulars of the Wild portion of the Hockey’s Future message boards. Jarick, a former wild.com regular who along with a few other fans has their own blog called FirstRoundBust.com, and Se7en a California-based Wild fan. I asked each of these fans 8 questions on a variety of Wild related subjects.
This is the second portion of a 2-part fan survey. You can see the first part here which includes the responses about Mikael Granlund. I want to take this opportunity to thank each of these individuals for contributing their views. But I’d like to challenge my readers to share their views as well. Do you agree with these fans’ assessments of the direction of this club or what do you see happening? Please share your comments below. Without further adieu here is their responses to the final four questions of the fan survey.
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How much patience do Wild fans have for Chuck Fletcher?
5. How many seasons do you think it will take for this team to become a consistent fixture in the post-season? How many seasons to be a Stanley Cup contender?
Jarick: Depending on the roster moves this summer, my guess is two years before they are a real threat. They may make the playoffs next year, especially if they can get one of the big free agents like Zach Parise or Ryan Suter. But the team is too thin and prospects too young to have high expectations next year.
I think any team that has a good mix of talent, depth, coaching, and identity can make a deep playoff run. Success in the playoffs is highly dependant on luck and health.
KISSArmyMan: In order to be a consistent Playoff team, you have to have talent throughout the system (in the NHL, in the AHL and in your prospect pipeline). The Wild have none of those. That’s why they missed the Playoffs four years running. Once there is a higher level of talent at all three levels, the Wild will become a consistent Playoff fixture. How long will that take? Depends on if the current scouting department is more adept at finding the players that seemed to regularly and easily elude Tommy Thompson and his staff. The more talent the team unearths, the sooner they are able to say “good-bye” to the Warren Peters and Jed Ortmeyers of the world. Possibly another two or three seasons I could see this team regularly getting into the Playoffs, possibly less depending on what the scouts unearth and possibly longer depending on what they miss (hows that for covering all the bases?).
Once the Wild become a consistent Playoff team, then they may start moving towards that “Cup Contender” label. Most Cup Contending teams have scoring forwards, shutdown defense and solid goaltending. Plus they are able to constantly bringing up talent through their farm system, so when some of their current players start to decline, they are able to trade them away for draft picks or prospects and use the young players to take their place (look what Philly did with Richards and Carter). Once the Wild are able to find and consistently develop talent, they will then be one of those teams that is the proverbial “One Player Away” from a Cup run. How long that will be? How much time you got?
Se7en: Again, a tough one. I cant shake the feeling that Minnesota & sports just do not go hand in hand. Im sure it’s just a fluke but the state as a whole just seems doomed to mediocrity or at best “close but no cigar” type teams. The optimist in me says we could start being a perennial contender as soon as next season & a cup contender within 3 years but the pessimist in me says that we could miss the playoffs for another 2 or 3 years & never really get past that hump if we keeping getting plagued by injuries & if we still have trouble bringing big name FA’s in.
I think this off-season & camp can & will go along way in determining where we stand as a team. If we can swing a Parise & or Suter in FA I will have an amazing sense of new found hope. If we swing & miss on both I will be a little more reserved. I want to see what Fletch does at the Draft & in FA &/or what he can do with trades to make this team better. I feel we’re on the cusp & just with our upcoming prospects I think there’s no way we have a season like this again but there’s just too many variables right now to make a solid estimate.
If I’m pressed I’ll say 1-2 years before we’re back in the playoffs, 3 to 5 years (if ever) before we become a cup worthy team. There’s just too many other factors & of course to much luck that play a factor. We could be like Nashville & make the playoffs every year but take forever to just breakout of that first round, or we could be that team that comes out of right field and is a contender right away. I just hope that we can be a team that is a playoff contender every year like the Red Wings. I can handle losing as long as we play good hockey.
Brian: I think that if they made the right couple moves this off-season we could be consistently there for the next couple years for sure. I know they have interest in Zach Parise, with his talent, and youth, we could maybe get a little more out of that 2nd or third line. Depending on how they would stack those two lines.
Derek Felska: I thin this team is at least 2-3 years away from any sustained presence in the post-season, and that is if just about everything goes right. By that I mean the prospects live up to the hype, and the team makes at least one major move in free agency to acquire either Ryan Suter or Zach Parise. If it fails to land those players or if the prospects don’t live up to expectations (which let’s face its pretty darn high right now) this team could be maybe 5-6 years away.
In 2-3 years I think we will have a good idea just how much of an impact we can expect from Granlund, Brodin, Coyle, Zucker, etc. For this organization as a whole, there is a lot riding on these kids delivering the goods. Especially for Chuck Fletcher, because he hasn’t delivered anything different (apart from hope via the draft) than his predecessor Doug Risebrough. I think most Wild fans are hoping the kids’ match the hype but we also realize that until you see results at the NHL level you really don’t know what you have based on their success in another league or major junior.
As far as becoming a Stanley Cup contender, I think this team is at least 3-4 years away if the prospects are able to become the integral part of the organization the franchise is hoping they’d be. I wouldn’t start planning a parade route yet.
6. The team missed the playoffs for the 4th season in a row, how much more time does General Manager Chuck Fletcher have before the axe falls?
Jarick: Personally, I think Fletcher should be judged on next year. His track record in terms of putting together an NHL team is pretty bad, and he hasn’t been great in trades and free agency. So far his drafting looks excellent, and next year will be the first to see how his kids pan out. But you can’t run an NHL team purely through the draft. You need an eye for NHL talent and know how to handle veterans, and I haven’t seen that from him.
KISSArmyMan: The best way to fix a program is by maximizing your draft picks. Since it may take anywhere from 3-4 years for prospects to show they are NHL ready, the GM that drafted them should be given at least that amount of time (less if he’s making stupid moves or more if the moves he is making show promise).
He came on board in 2009, and if it takes roughly 3-4 years for draft picks to appear, I’d give him until 2014-2015 to show progress. That would give him roughly three drafts to start getting players in the pipeline and making regular appearances in the NHL.
However the fact of the matter is, all of these players he drafts will not turn out. Most drafts provide about 1.5 impact NHLers for the team out of an average of about 10 picks. That’s a little better than 10% success rate. And most of those impact players come in the first round. So as much as I want all these guys to turn out and get the Wild on the same level as Detroit or Nashville or (dare I say it) Vancouver soon, it’s simply not going to happen overnight. I think it’s going to take at least another two to three years to finally start getting real scoring talent infused into this roster. So he should probably get until the 2014-2015 season to show progress before he gets the axe providing he doesn’t make any more “Leddy and Johnsson for Barker” style trades or extending locker room cancers like Zidlicky. In other words he’s had his last Mulligan.
Se7en: I think he gets at least 2 more years. Honestly I think he should get a chance to see at least one wave if not 2 waves of his prospects make the team & have a season or two to grow together. I think he his a capable GM and I think that we need a stable presence in GM for at least the better half of a decade. I don’t like the idea of rotating a new GM in every 4 to 5 years, to me that’s just being stuck in the mud. We need to pick a horse, stick with it & ride it out. As long as we’re seeing a steady improvement in the long term I’m ok with him getting at least a few more seasons to show us what he’s trying to do with this team. If we fired him after this next season & a new GM comes in and has success off the foundation Fletcher started I don’t think it would be right or fair, especially considering the mess Fletcher had here to start with. I think Fletcher has earned at least 2 more seasons if not more.
Brian: I would say if they don’t make a considerable change in the performance next year changes would have to be made. There is only so many bad years you can blame on other factors before you start looking at the guy who makes the ultimate decisions.
Derek Felska: I think Chuck Fletcher is really starting to feel the heat. Its that moment for a poker player where you have to start playing your cards. So how good of a hand has this team managed to deal for itself? 4 seasons without the playoffs will do that to you; especially when you were the choice of a new owner. Fletcher says all of the right things, and for the most part I think he’s owned up to his mistakes. He certainly has been more candid than his predecessor Doug Risebrough who was consistently evasive and with the lone exception of saying letting Andrew Brunette go was a mistake.
Fletcher’s biggest impact by far has been improving the club’s long-term health via the draft. Doug Risebrough set the organization back for years with poor drafts that gave big club little to no help from within. The draft isn’t the only way to build a team but by far its the most affordable and in many ways its a money multiplier. Under the rules of the current CBA, drafted players can be had for far less than free agents and when you have to fill the majority of your holes via free agency you’re going to eat up more space under the cap than you would if you can fill from within. So at the very least Fletcher has set us up for more upgrades by tapping our pool of prospects. The only issue is that waiting for those prospects to develop into pieces you can use take time.
However, the facts still speak for themselves. The team has had 4 seasons of failure in his tenure. He’s had two coaches over that span; and not all of his trades have been good for the organization. Yet, he’s aggressive, much more so than Risebrough. Would Risebrough have made tough but necessary moves by dealing Brent Burns at the draft (especially one where you were hosting it)? Probably not. I think the fans respect Fletcher’s boldness to pull the trigger; even when it doesn’t work out. Yet you can only live on the excuses (i.e. injuries) for so long and I think Fletcher realizes this. He got an extension to his contract meaning he is supposed to have at least 2 more seasons with the team but if his group of kids (i.e. the promising prospect class) really stumbles he may not last that long.
7. What sort of player is this team in the biggest need of, whether through the draft or free agency?
Jarick: There really are two huge needs for this team. One is a big time goal scorer, a guy who can fill the role Marian Gaborik played, getting 40 goals a year, and getting fans to show up or tune in. The other is a stud defenseman who can play in all situations and make big plays on both ends of the ice. At the Wild’s draft spot, they have a better chance to get a potential #1 defenseman than a 40-goal-scorer, but that prospect likely won’t hit his potential for several seasons. So they need to be aggressive in free agency on both fronts.
KISSArmyMan: A scorer. Several scorers. Did I mention they need multiple scorers? This team is afraid to shoot the puck. Reminds me of the old Doug Woog coached Gophers who would make pass after pass after pass in an attempt to get that pretty as a picture tic-tac-toe goal rather than just shooting it getting a deflection, a rebound or a garbage goal. Funny thing is, teams don’t get extra points for pretty goals. A goal is a goal is a goal. Shoot the dang puck!
But scorers are either usually found in the Top 3 the NHL Drafts first round (where the Wild aren’t) and UFA scorers cost money. A lot. If they can land a scorer in free agency it will go a long way towards putting an end to the dearth of goals that have been a Wild trademark since the team’s inception. But overpaying for a premier scorer in free agency now may handicap the team when it comes time to re-sign a Granlund (providing he turns out the way people are projecting him to).
Se7en: We definitely need a 30+ goal scorer & one more stable defenseman. I have no idea whats going to happen with Lats & if PMB will ever play again but regardless we can’t put all our eggs in that basket for a 3rd year. Minnesota needs to get some people who put the puck in the net! Fans are sick of being called “boring” and being a low scoring team. I don’t think we need one player scoring all the goals but we at least need an even amount of threats. If I was pressed I’d say that we need an offensive talent more than a Defensive one right now because I think Yeo’s system can help cover a poor D but I think our fan base is starved for a game breaker or at least a consistent threat. I won’t get into it because its been discussed ad nauseum but I really do think that Parise is the perfect fit for this team & fan base. Signing him would instill a lot of hope & appease a very frustrated & depressed fan base.
Brian: I would say the player that could make the most difference would be a defenseman that scores consistently, like a Shea Weber, or Erik Karlsson. Having that defenseman that scores got teams like Nashville and Florida to be serious contenders for the cup this year. (not that they were the only factors)
Derek Felska: I think this team needs scoring up front. When you’re last in the league in scoring that is the most pressing area of concern to me. Luckily for them, they have a lot of young forwards in their prospect pool but how many of those really look like they’ll be big offensive producers? That I am not as convinced. It is for this reason why many expect the Wild to make a major push for Parise this summer. Do I think they’ll be able to snag Parise? No, I think there are too many other teams that are going to be in that bidding war and while people love to make a big deal about Parise having a home in the Twin Cities area (afterall he’s from the Twin Cities) I don’t think coming back ‘home’ is that big of a deal for him and unless we’re willing to pony up the most dough for him I don’t see him passing up a better offer to be the next hometown kid story. Minnesota sports has a love affair for those types of stories and I think they enjoy feeding the buzz machine about it. Do I think Parise could help the Wild? Certainly, he is fast, great hands and can play with a surprising level of grit and is entering the prime of his career but for whatever reason I think we lose the Parise sweepstakes.
The player I think the Wild will make a major play for and has a better chance of landing is defenseman Ryan Suter. Suter isn’t nearly as sexy as a perennial 30-goal scorer but this team needs an anchor for its blueline and while Jonas Brodin could develop into that, Suter is already proven in that capacity. I think the Predators will make Suter a serious offer but their own limitations will make it very tough for them to convince him to come back with a host of offers that will be offering him more money. Wild owner Craig Leipold owned the Predators when they drafted Suter in the 1st round, and I think he likes bringing back some of those Predators here (let’s not forget like Leipold, Suter is from Wisconsin). The Predators are a model small market organization both in terms of their ability to get bang for the buck and their results via the draft. I think Shea Weber would be great to see in a Wild uniform but if Nashville had to choose I think they’d rather part ways with Suter and thus that gives Minnesota a chance to lure him here.
Adding Suter would bump down Scandella or Spurgeon to a level where they could be really effective as the 2nd pairing. Suddenly the defense doesn’t look so suspect and perhaps the idea is that you make the most of a limited offensive attack by being that much more stingy defensively.
8. Is this franchise going in a positive direction, a negative direction or just spinning its wheels?
Jarick: At the NHL level, they are definitely spinning their wheels. They’ve been shuffling the deck chairs by swapping Martin Havlat and Brent Burns for Dany Heatley and Devin Setoguchi with practically no change in the standings. They went from a team full of decent (but not great) players to a team with a couple great players and a bunch of terrible ones. There’s still no discernible identity or direction on the ice.
But at the prospect level, they are much improved from just a couple years ago. At one point in time, Casey Wellman was the top prospect, followed by Marco Scandella, Tyler Cuma, Colton Gillies, and James Sheppard. Right now the front office is watching Charlie Coyle and Zack Phillips completely tear apart the CHL in the playoffs, not to mention Mikael Granlund, Johan Larsson, Jason Zucker, Matt Hackett, and several other players.
Those prospects need to come up and make an impact with the Wild and the team needs to do a better job attracting free agents and filling holes in the NHL roster. And they better start doing it soon, because fans are losing patience and interest quickly.
KISSArmyMan: I think the team is going in a more or less positive direction. In my opinion they could have been farther along than they are if they had come out after Doug Risebrough was fired and just been honest with the fans and said “We’re a mess, we need to rebuild.” Instead of this “Have your cake and eat it too” team building philosophy. That’s worked so well. Missed the playoffs now four years in a row (after proclaiming the team a Playoff team at the beginning of the season) AND no high end draft picks to show for it. Now it appears that they’re “Building a culture of winning”. Okaaay…if that’s what you want to call winning a bunch of meaningless games when there’s no pressure on the team to perform, knock yourself out.
I kind of wonder what a Matt Duchene, Tyler Hall, Taylor Seguin, Gabriel Landeskog or Ryan Nugent-Hopkins would have done for this team.
Se7en: I think as a whole we’re moving in a positive direction. This season was really a low blow. I don’t think anyone saw what happened this season coming. You could see that up until mid December or arguably into January we had seen a very, very happy fan base. Things just took the worst possible turn & I do believe that with this many solid prospects turning pro & with management hellbent on finding a big name player through FA or trade that we wont be as vulnerable to injuries deflating us like we were this year. I think we as fans really need to let this past season slip from memory and start with a clean slate going into next season. I believe next season will be the true indicator of the future of this team. Being patient sucks but even tho we had a season to forget, I cant remember a time I’ve felt so positive about our future..
Now I just hope that we can make a splash in FA (or even via trade) so that this depressed fan base has a new found hope going into next year. I know everyone says this about where they live but Minnesota deserves a solid team, this state is desperate to have a champion. The Wild seem like they have finally laid the proper groundwork, I just hope they can build up to the potential we all hope for & expect.
Brian: I would like to think they are moving in a positive direction, but i want to see if they can pull in some big money free agents before I would say they are really committed to long-term winning.
Derek Felska: I think the team is moving in a positive direction, albeit rather slowly. The team may have been smart to have just bitten the bullet and been truly bad. Instead they’ve tried to serve two masters and somehow sneak their way into the playoffs but also build via the draft. The problem is one comes at the cost of the other. So the team has needlessly moved itself out of the Top 5 when they had a marginal team as they tried to somehow creep into the post-season. I know fans want a winner, but its very difficult to build if you’re not really bad to begin with. Pittsburgh, Washington, Chicago and soon to be Edmonton were all lousy for quite a while before they turned it around. Yet they built their team with the bluechippers you find from selecting 1st or 2nd in the draft for a few seasons. The Wild have never done that and thus they’ve had to roll the dice a bit more and we all know that worked out, you don’t have a site like Jarick’s FirstRoundBust.com because you’ve had a ton of success.
Here is part 1 just in case you missed it here.
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