Gear: How the Minnesota Wild can escape salary cap hell
Having a little dead money on your NHL salary cap is not ideal. Having 17 percent of your salary cap occupied by dead money is downright troubling. So when the Minnesota Wild put themselves in a situation to have that happen by buying out the contracts of Zach Parise and Ryan Suter on July 13, 2021, it raised a few eyebrows.
To recap the math, the Parise-Suter cap hits totalled $4,743,588 on Minnesota’s books this season. Next year, that number will swell to $12,743,588. In each of 2023-24 and 2024-25, the combined hit will be an unimaginable $14,743,588. The buyout amounts charged to the cap then fall to a relatively tolerable $1,666,666 in each of 2025-26 and 2026-27.
At the time the identical buyouts were announced, it seemed reasonable to assume that, as the heavy toll of the buyout amounts approached, the Wild would just wave the white flag and commence a massive rebuild. It is still possible they go that route. They could give it their best shot this year (as they demonstrated with the deadline acquisition of Marc-Andre Fleury, and to a lesser extent, Tyson Jost, Jacob Middleton and Nicolas Deslauriers) and then sell in the offseason to commence a rebuild.
However, a deeper analysis of the Wild’s cap situation shows that they just may be able to pull off the unthinkable: that is, continuing to remain a contender while going through their cap nightmare. As Mark Twain might have penned, reports of their death may have been greatly exaggerated.
There is no way to sugar-coat the challenge the buyout numbers present. For three of the six seasons in which the buyout cap hits apply, the amounts are staggering. However, the Wild’s current salary structure appears to be more capable of absorbing the dead money than you would expect of a team sitting right at the cap threshold after being a buyer at this year’s deadline.
The Wild have a chance to weather the storm without engaging in a selling spree in the off-season and tanking for the next three years. Here’s why:
For starters, the club has the majority of its team under contract for at least next season at numbers that are very reasonable in today’s NHL. In all, the Wild have 10 of 13 forwards, six of eight defensemen and one goalie from this year’s roster locked up for next season. Four players, consisting of their captain, Jared Spurgeon, their steady veteran blueliner, Jonas Brodin, and two forwards, Kirill Kaprizov and Joel Eriksson Ek, are signed through all the buyout pinch years, and second-leading scorer Mats Zuccarello is signed for two more seasons. Kaprizov’s $9 million per year may be pricey but looks like a bargain the way he has filled the net this season, currently sitting sixth overall in the NHL points race.
The Wild also have a number of players with cap hits well below what their production would dictate, none more evident than Ryan Hartman, who will very likely score more than 30 goals this year but still hits the books at just $1.7 million for the next two seasons. Marcus Foligno is also having a career year and is locked in for two more years at $3.1 million. And Alex Goligoski just re-upped for two more years at $2M per, offering $3 million in savings over his cap hit this season.
Then there’s Matthew Boldy, the rookie who has scored at almost a point-per-game clip since joining the team as a mid-season call-up. He has another year of entry-level money ahead and will emerge from his first contract without arbitration rights. That means he is someone the Wild could squeeze, signing him at his qualifying offer in 2023-24. That would give the Wild extra breathing room to get through that season, with the promise of a bigger pay day coming for Boldy.
The 2024-25 season is where the real pinch will be felt, when Zuccarello, Foligno and Hartman, among others, have expiring deals and Boldy can no longer be stalled. But a lot can change in 30 months, including three anticipated increases to the current league salary cap during that time.
For 2022-23, the existing contract commitments plus the Parise and Suter buyout charges total $74,316,088. With the cap increasing to $82.5 million next year, that leaves approximately $8.2 million to sign two forwards, one defenseman, two roster reserves and a backup goalie (assuming they start that way and then rely on LTIR for any AHL call-ups). Let’s say they use $1,000,000 on each of Middleton and Deslauriers and then $2.5 million on two reserves and a backup goalie. That leaves $3.7 million for one more forward.
The only problem is that forward happens to be Kevin Fiala. The skilled winger is on pace to exceed career highs in goals and points, and getting him re-signed will require more than that. Fiala is arguably the Wild’s most important player after sniper Kaprizov, so getting him at the right value will be tops on GM Bill Guerin’s offseason to-do list.
Fiala will have considerable leverage as a once-again arbitration-eligible RFA who bet on himself with a one-year $5.1-million deal and backed it up. He currently sits in the top 50 in the league in points and his mix of skill and feistiness is a perfect fit on a Wild roster that plays an in-your-face style each night.
In any negotiation, the team and agent typically look to the internal comparables first. Can the Wild convince Fiala that the $6-million AAV they are paying his teammate Zuccarello is the appropriate landing spot for him? Zuccarello has outperformed Fiala from a production standpoint, but he signed his contract at 31 years old. Fiala is just 25 and has his most productive years ahead of him, so I expect his representatives will be seeking a higher price tag.
The relevant recent comparables for an arbitration (i.e. players who signed while being arbitration-eligible RFAs) appear to be in the Wild’s favor, as they suggest an average annual value below $7M on a deal with moderate term:
| Player | Signing Date | Signing Age | Career GP at signing | Term | Contract AAV | Platform Yr PPG | Career PPG |
| Oliver Bjorkstrand | Jan 2021 | 25 | 302 | 5 | $5.4M | 0.79 | 0.59 |
| Anthony Mantha | Nov 2020 | 26 | 260 | 4 | $5.7M | 0.88 | 0.67 |
| Mikael Granlund | Aug 2017 | 25 | 321 | 3 | $5.75M | 0.85 | 0.63 |
| Pavel Buchnevich | Jul 2021 | 26 | 301 | 4 | $5.8M | 0.89 | 0.65 |
| Sam Reinhart | Aug 2021 | 25 | 454 | 3 | $6.5M | 0.74 | 0.65 |
| Kevin Fiala | – | – | 405 | – | – | 0.90 | 0.64 |
Fiala’s production in his platform year is on par with Buchnevich’s and higher than that of the other listed players, but career-to-platform production is very comparable across the board. A deal between Buchnevich’s and Reinhart’s on a moderate term seems reasonable, meaning the Wild would have to shave $2.5-$3 million or so from their existing commitments to make a Fiala deal work.
If the Wild are less than $3 million away from getting Fiala signed and bringing back almost their entire roster from this season, would they be willing to part with a $3-million player like Jordan Greenway or Marcus Foligno to make it happen?
If they would rather sign Fiala to a long-term deal, they could instead trade blueliner Matt Dumba this off-season. He has one more year at $6 million and seems to be involved in trade rumors every year. Replacing him with a cheaper option would give the Wild the flexibility to give Fiala more term and perhaps a head start on addressing challenges with expiring contracts coming for players like Talbot and Tyson Jost after 2022-23. The Wild and Fiala could look at some post entry-level deals or even some UFA deals for comparison against the RFA arbitration-eligible deals:
Post-ELC Comparables:
| Player | Signing Date | Signing Age | Career GP at signing | Term | Contract AAV | Platform Yr PPG | Career PPG |
| Alex DeBrincat | Oct 2019 | 23 | 164 | 3 | $6.4M | 0.93 | 0.78 |
| Mark Scheifele | Jul 2016 | 23 | 220 | 8 | $6.125M | 0.86 | 0.66 |
| Andrei Svechnikov | Aug 2021 | 22 | 205 | 8 | $7.75M | 0.76 | 0.68 |
| Evgeny Kuznetsov | Jul 2017 | 24 | 259 | 8 | $7.8M | 0.72 | 0.70 |
UFA Comparables:
| Player | Signing Date | Signing Age | Career GP at signing | Term | Contract AAV | Platform Yr PPG | Career PPG |
| Brayden Schenn | Oct 2019 | 28 | 587 | 8 | $6.5M | 0.75 | 0.63 |
| Kevin Hayes | Jun 2019 | 27 | 381 | 7 | $7.142M | 0.77 | 0.60 |
| Sean Couturier | Aug 2021 | 28 | 692 | 8 | $7.75M | 0.91 | 0.64 |
| Logan Couture | Jul 2018 | 29 | 582 | 8 | $8.0M | 0.78 | 0.75 |
Depending on how the club and Fiala approach the negotiation and how much term is offered, something in the $7-$8-million range could be appropriate on a long-term deal. In that scenario, the Wild would need to shave closer to $4M-$4.5M off the books, and a Dumba trade could make that work. Maybe Dumba stays and Zuccarello is sacrificed to give a developing prospect such as Marco Rossi or Connor Dewar an opportunity to fill that spot in the lineup.
Either way, the Wild will have to give up at least one existing roster player to bring the rest of their group back. That’s a pretty good result considering the $12.7 million in dead money next year.
I am not saying it will be easy, and Minny will have to make difficult choices in each of the years where the buyout amounts apply. There is no doubt that the Parise and Suter buyouts started to hamper the Wild this year and will continue to cause pain for four more years.
That said, the Wild are set up well to have a chance at keeping the bulk of their group together during the years of pain. Whether it’s advisable for them to try can be debated. But it’s proven to be a good group, so I expect they will, and it will be fascinating to watch.
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Chris Gear joined Daily Faceoff in January after a 12-year run with the Vancouver Canucks, most recently as the club’s Assistant General Manager and Chief Legal Officer. Before migrating over to the hockey operations department, where his responsibilities included contract negotiations, CBA compliance, assisting with roster and salary cap management and governance for the AHL franchise, Gear was the Canucks’ vice president and general counsel.
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