Minnesota Wild prospect depth beginning to thin

[Sarge58]

It wasn't easy for Fletch to rid the team of the blunders DR had accumulated during his tenure. Fletch didn't exactly have much if anything to work with both in our NHL and AHL teams, he cleaned house slowly by getting rid of players and inserting his own. Still a lot of work to do, but seems to be on a good path although Iowa will take some time to straighten out. Also Tuch will be a big time scorer when he makes the team.

 

[thestonedkoala]

You gotta remember that DR was given the keys to a brand spanking new franchise. Some of his best trades were before the Wild even played a game.

He made some good trades in the beginning and in the middle of his tenure as Wild GM. He simply got hamstrung near the end due to a combination of bad drafting and being unable to move players. Fletcher hasn't even made it that far...

CF started slowly, made a howler with the Barker - Leddy deal, but has gotten better and better with time. That is the trend worth noting. He's been nothing short of stellar the last few years.

I see a lot of parallels between GMCF and GMDR up until this point. Fletcher has made a few more splash trades but the question becomes does Fletcher has the guts to push this team over the top. What ultimately got DR fired was his God-awful trade deadline moves. Fletcher has the opportunity to change that but does he have the guts to do that? It remains to be seen. If this organization stumbles down the stretch and going into the trade deadline, does Fletcher have the guts to move a guy like Koivu? Like Dumba? Like Tuch? to make this organization and franchise better or will he make some conservative moves like DR. Good organizations are always active and moving pieces around. Look at a team like Los Angeles and how active they were last year...they were't just moving pieces for their team then (Gaborik) but pieces for the future (moving Fasching and Deslauries for draft picks/young players). Fletcher hasn't really done ANY of that in his career here and I think that separates him from some of the other GMs that are always and constantly tinkering with their roster because they aren't satisfied with their roster.

This is a huge year for Fletcher; does he stay pat at the deadline or does he start moving pieces (and maybe big pieces) around? Do we have the players to move at the deadline? Labbe? Olofsson? Phillips? Graovac? Tuch? Dumba? Bulmer? Bussieres? Does an organization outside of Minnesota think highly of their development to trade for them?

Furthermore, we haven't seen any big movement within the organization in terms of the front office. Iowa has been God-awful. Our best player only played 31 games before he was called up...Our best player after that had 33 points and barely edged a DEFENSEMAN as our best player, who we traded at the deadline.

This organization has struggled to actually develop forward prospects for more than a year. I think Zucker is the only one? Fontaine? Haula barely had a year in the AHL, Granlund and Coyle as well had half a season. Guys like Bulmer, Bussieres, Phillips have looked like busts and haven't developed at all. You have to ask yourself is it the organization or the players they are picking?

 

[thestonedkoala]

Edmonton's drafting has not been good recently.

2009-11, Edmonton drafts Hall, RNH, and Nail. Nobody else has made the NHL and stuck.

Same time frame, Minny drafts Granlund, Larsson, Zucker, Brodin, Dumba. One of those guys is moved for a top line winger, one is a top line center, one is a top pairing D man, and there's a lot of prospects that can still pan out nicely.

Martin Marincin, Anton Lander but it's hard to compare a dumpster fire with an up and coming organization.

 

[DANOZ28]

unless we have a major injury i hope we dont "panic" and over pay at the trade deadline. this team is getting better we can all see it. we just need to let the young guns develop and we're set. im not worried if we dont win the cup this year. this year i consider us a top 10 team, hopefully next year we bump upto a top 5 team then seriously challenge for the cup next year and beyond. rock & roll good times are here (about friggin time j/k)

 

[Sarge58]

Not necessarily - drafting is only part of the game, good development is the other. Minnesota has mediocre development outside their goaltending coach.

Can't say much about the other guys that were hired after Fletcher - though Cher...whatever his name is in Winnipeg looks like a disaster...but that's not saying much.



Uh what?

Dwayne Roloson for a 1st and 3rd
Pavol Demitra for a 1st and Patrick O'Sullivan
4th round pick for Cliff Ronning
Manny Fernandez for Petr Kalus and a 4th round pick
Pascal Dupuis for Adam Hall
Willie Mitchell and a 2nd round pick for Shawn Belle and Martin Skoula
Zbynek Michael for Erik Westrum and Dustin Wood
Todd White for a 4th round pick
Marek Zidlick for Ryan Jones and a 2nd round pick

DR was not trade shy. In fact, he was constantly tinkering with the roster.

With that list maybe he should have been more shy. Seriously DR had zero balls to make any trades that had any significance. Compared to what Fletch has done in his 5 years trying to not only straightening out what DR left him but he's also in that time built a serious contender and IMO a much more fun team to watch. Maybe I'm going overboard but in comparison between the two DR is a joke.

 

[Minnewildsota]

He made some good trades in the beginning and in the middle of his tenure as Wild GM. He simply got hamstrung near the end due to a combination of bad drafting and being unable to move players. Fletcher hasn't even made it that far...



I see a lot of parallels between GMCF and GMDR up until this point. Fletcher has made a few more splash trades but the question becomes does Fletcher has the guts to push this team over the top. What ultimately got DR fired was his God-awful trade deadline moves. Fletcher has the opportunity to change that but does he have the guts to do that? It remains to be seen. If this organization stumbles down the stretch and going into the trade deadline, does Fletcher have the guts to move a guy like Koivu? Like Dumba? Like Tuch? to make this organization and franchise better or will he make some conservative moves like DR. Good organizations are always active and moving pieces around. Look at a team like Los Angeles and how active they were last year...they were't just moving pieces for their team then (Gaborik) but pieces for the future (moving Fasching and Deslauries for draft picks/young players). Fletcher hasn't really done ANY of that in his career here and I think that separates him from some of the other GMs that are always and constantly tinkering with their roster because they aren't satisfied with their roster.

This is a huge year for Fletcher; does he stay pat at the deadline or does he start moving pieces (and maybe big pieces) around? Do we have the players to move at the deadline? Labbe? Olofsson? Phillips? Graovac? Tuch? Dumba? Bulmer? Bussieres? Does an organization outside of Minnesota think highly of their development to trade for them?

Furthermore, we haven't seen any big movement within the organization in terms of the front office. Iowa has been God-awful. Our best player only played 31 games before he was called up...Our best player after that had 33 points and barely edged a DEFENSEMAN as our best player, who we traded at the deadline.

This organization has struggled to actually develop forward prospects for more than a year. I think Zucker is the only one? Fontaine? Haula barely had a year in the AHL, Granlund and Coyle as well had half a season. Guys like Bulmer, Bussieres, Phillips have looked like busts and haven't developed at all. You have to ask yourself is it the organization or the players they are picking?

Pretty sure he did this when we acquired Pominville, but sure we can discount that trade to make your point seem valid.

Right, Phillips hasn't gotten any better since we drafted him. Bulmer didn't look like a lock to make the team before he got injured. Sometimes I wonder man...

 

[Dr Jan Itor]

I see a lot of parallels between GMCF and GMDR up until this point. Fletcher has made a few more splash trades but the question becomes does Fletcher has the guts to push this team over the top. What ultimately got DR fired was his God-awful trade deadline moves. Fletcher has the opportunity to change that but does he have the guts to do that? It remains to be seen.

If there is one thing Fletcher has shown, it's that he is definitely not afraid to make a move:

Pominville... worked
Moulson... didn't work
Burns, Havlat, Clutterbuck trades could be viewed as "shake ups" to varying degrees.

If this organization stumbles down the stretch and going into the trade deadline, does Fletcher have the guts to move a guy like Koivu? Like Dumba? Like Tuch? to make this organization and franchise better or will he make some conservative moves like DR.

If you're locking him into those type of moves, you're likely to be disappointed. Again, he has had 2 years where we were in contention at the TD and he's made larger moves at both deadlines.

Good organizations are always active and moving pieces around.

Which Fletcher has done for literally his entire tenure here. You complain about his misfires constantly, but nobody bats 1.000

Look at a team like Los Angeles and how active they were last year...they were't just moving pieces for their team then (Gaborik) but pieces for the future (moving Fasching and Deslauries for draft picks/young players).

Again, Fletcher has made an equivalent move as the Gaborik deal (Pominville).

Fletcher hasn't really done ANY of that in his career here and I think that separates him from some of the other GMs that are always and constantly tinkering with their roster because they aren't satisfied with their roster.

This is just blatantly false, as explained above.

This is a huge year for Fletcher; does he stay pat at the deadline or does he start moving pieces (and maybe big pieces) around? Do we have the players to move at the deadline? Labbe? Olofsson? Phillips? Graovac? Tuch? Dumba? Bulmer? Bussieres? Does an organization outside of Minnesota think highly of their development to trade for them?

You're already complaining that our organizational depth (Iowa) sucks, but now you're in favor of gutting it even further to add to the NHL roster? Which is it?

Furthermore, we haven't seen any big movement within the organization in terms of the front office. Iowa has been God-awful. Our best player only played 31 games before he was called up...Our best player after that had 33 points and barely edged a DEFENSEMAN as our best player, who we traded at the deadline

.

Iowa sucks because half of our NHL roster is under 25 years old and we've been drafting fairly heavily on NCAA prospects.

This organization has struggled to actually develop forward prospects for more than a year. I think Zucker is the only one? Fontaine? Haula barely had a year in the AHL, Granlund and Coyle as well had half a season. Guys like Bulmer, Bussieres, Phillips have looked like busts and haven't developed at all. You have to ask yourself is it the organization or the players they are picking?

Yeah, maybe those guys were bad picks. **** happens.