Management Paul Fenton

[Wabit]

The GM is the guy in charge so every move ultimately falls on his shoulders, but playing a little bit of "what if" game and/or devils advocate.

I put any of the guys with NSH ties that have been acquired squarely on Fenton.

What if Fenton was following the advice of the Wild's scouting staff for the the UFA signings and Nino/Rask trade? Then after seeing the results, he realized they were just bad at their jobs.

How often did we hear about Wild scouts being at other teams' games as the TDL approached? I wasn't paying a lot of attention to it, but I don't recall seeing the Wild show up on many "who is scouting who" reports. It's also entirely possible that he had them go incognito and get tickets from Stubhub or something like that.

There are just random 3am questions that popped into my head.

 

[16thOverallSaveUs]

Dubnyk isn't even in top 15 highest paid ...wwe got a steal on him when we re-signed him (aand most this board thought we overpaid lol)

While his stats make him look like a steal, I’m pretty confident we could put a much less paid goalie in net with bb’s system and he would be just as successful or more. All you have to look at is Dubnyks expected goals against per game. It’s always the lowest in the league or very close to it, and he routinely lets in a lot of goals.

 

[57special]

While his stats make him look like a steal, I’m pretty confident we could put a much less paid goalie in net with bb’s system and he would be just as successful or more. All you have to look at is Dubnyks expected goals against per game. It’s always the lowest in the league or very close to it, and he routinely lets in a lot of goals.

We tried that pre Dubnyk, with less than awesome results. He was a revelation when he came over.
He let in one bad goal last night, but was extremely good the rest of the night.
I think that you are WAY underestimating how hard it is to find an excellent starting goalie. Guys like Price, Lundquist, Quick, Rinne, Fleury, have all had their down periods. all are paid significantly more. Other guys like Schneider and Jones, who used to be really good, are pretty bad right now.

To paraphrase George Constanza, We just can't go to the goalie store and buy an excellent starting goalie, just a bunch of guys who are worse than Doobs.

 

[16thOverallSaveUs]

We tried that pre Dubnyk, with less than awesome results. He was a revelation when he came over.
He let in one bad goal last night, but was extremely good the rest of the night.
I think that you are WAY underestimating how hard it is to find an excellent starting goalie. Guys like Price, Lundquist, Quick, Rinne, Fleury, have all had their down periods. all are paid significantly more. Other guys like Schneider and Jones, who used to be really good, are pretty bad right now.

To paraphrase George Constanza, We just can't go to the goalie store and buy an excellent starting goalie, just a bunch of guys who are worse than Doobs.

You could be right. I just don’t see it with doobie. He was by no means a starting goalie when we brought him in. I think a lot of his success is due to our systems, but I guess we won’t know until he’s on another team.

 

[2Pair]

We tried that pre Dubnyk, with less than awesome results. He was a revelation when he came over.
He let in one bad goal last night, but was extremely good the rest of the night.
I think that you are WAY underestimating how hard it is to find an excellent starting goalie. Guys like Price, Lundquist, Quick, Rinne, Fleury, have all had their down periods. all are paid significantly more. Other guys like Schneider and Jones, who used to be really good, are pretty bad right now.

To paraphrase George Constanza, We just can't go to the goalie store and buy an excellent starting goalie, just a bunch of guys who are worse than Doobs.

What was Dubnyk before coming to Minnesota? Don't compare him to guys like Lundquist, Price, Quick, and Rinne, it just makes you look silly.

 

[Bazeek]

Dubnyk's very capable of making good and important saves, but a lot of underlying numbers support the idea that our defense makes his job relatively easy. I don't think you can just plug anyone in there and they'll have success, but there are probably several goalies out there that are considered worse that would get the same results he has. I don't think it's pressing to kick him to the curb, but there's no reason to cling to him either. If someone wants a goalie and makes it worth your while, take the offer.

 

[57special]

Who knows anything about goalies, really?

 

[Nsjohnson]

I have to say, Paul's strange conduct, his strange moves with no real prediction for the future, his lack of seeming to handle problems, I don't know.

1. I like two of the trades. I was underwhelmed by #64's return, but I am OK with Fiala, he'll be a gamer IMO. We'll see.

2. You already know how I feel about Rask. I didn't want Nino traded. He's too good, even though he wasn't producing. I think Nino should have gotten prospects or picks and could have been waiting on until the draft to move us up the draft board. Because...

3. Zucker is now your movable piece, but we kind of need Zucker. I think we do at least. And now you have a disgruntled Zucker, who by all accounts (Russo), has not even HEARD from Fenton regarding what happened.

4. You don't want the locker room to be against the GM. You just don't. They don't have to be buddies, or even like him, but it's not good to have a locker room who mostly hates the GM. It's unhealthy for the team and product and results.

5. I am afraid of what he will do with JEE. This kid is the biggest revelation this season. Whatever happened in his head after Iowa worked. He is playing as good as Koivu, but is faster. I am serious. And I am afraid Fenton will either trade him, or bury him. Because...

6. We now have a Staal and Koivu back on the depth chart. Unless Fenton keeps JEE, puts Staal as a #2 center, and Koivu as a 3rd, JEE isn't playing as many minutes as he needs to be. Unless this is a blip and JEE goes back to being a nobody, he needs maximum minutes. I honestly see this kid becoming a perfect #2 shutdown center who can also put up 50 points a year. He has 9 points in his last 17 games, while playing a major shutdown role against the best lines of other teams. He has been big for us. This org needs to keep and promote this kid and let him continue to grow. 6'2'' 205 with IQ and skill. For the love of god don't **** that up.

7. Fenton just seems to have no foresight. But, I don't know, I am not there, I don't know him, I don't know if he simply wanted to move a lot of weight at wholesale and then...well I don't know.

8. I am just confused. I have defended two of his three trades. But I can't defend the lack of future foresight.

 

[MuckOG]

^^ Can't argue with any of the points you made.

 

[Bazeek]

I have to say, Paul's strange conduct, his strange moves with no real prediction for the future, his lack of seeming to handle problems, I don't know.

1. I like two of the trades. I was underwhelmed by #64's return, but I am OK with Fiala, he'll be a gamer IMO. We'll see.

2. You already know how I feel about Rask. I didn't want Nino traded. He's too good, even though he wasn't producing. I think Nino should have gotten prospects or picks and could have been waiting on until the draft to move us up the draft board. Because...

3. Zucker is now your movable piece, but we kind of need Zucker. I think we do at least. And now you have a disgruntled Zucker, who by all accounts (Russo), has not even HEARD from Fenton regarding what happened.

4. You don't want the locker room to be against the GM. You just don't. They don't have to be buddies, or even like him, but it's not good to have a locker room who mostly hates the GM. It's unhealthy for the team and product and results.

5. I am afraid of what he will do with JEE. This kid is the biggest revelation this season. Whatever happened in his head after Iowa worked. He is playing as good as Koivu, but is faster. I am serious. And I am afraid Fenton will either trade him, or bury him. Because...

6. We now have a Staal and Koivu back on the depth chart. Unless Fenton keeps JEE, puts Staal as a #2 center, and Koivu as a 3rd, JEE isn't playing as many minutes as he needs to be. Unless this is a blip and JEE goes back to being a nobody, he needs maximum minutes. I honestly see this kid becoming a perfect #2 shutdown center who can also put up 50 points a year. He has 9 points in his last 17 games, while playing a major shutdown role against the best lines of other teams. He has been big for us. This org needs to keep and promote this kid and let him continue to grow. 6'2'' 205 with IQ and skill. For the love of god don't **** that up.

7. Fenton just seems to have no foresight. But, I don't know, I am not there, I don't know him, I don't know if he simply wanted to move a lot of weight at wholesale and then...well I don't know.

8. I am just confused. I have defended two of his three trades. But I can't defend the lack of future foresight.

A lot of this echos what was in Russo's latest podcast, which seems to be driving the discussion in a few places right now. I don't really disagree with any of it, but I do think Russo tends to get a little wound up about this stuff. Or at least he comes off that way in the podcast, which he might just use as an outlet to vent.

All I can think to do right now is watch what happens and not jump to conclusions. I don't like the trades, but the fact is that we've won every game since Coyle was traded and looked pretty good doing it. If they continue to get results largely due to the younger guys that have been acquired/promoted I have to admit that there could be some method to Fenton's madness. I really, really hope that's the case.

But if he goes into the offseason and trades Zucker for Frolik + 2nd, Ek for scraps and spends all our cap space on Brock Nelson and Jordan Eberle? Then yeah, I'm pretty done with him.

 

[MuckOG]

"But if he goes into the offseason and trades Zucker for Frolik + 2nd, Ek for scraps and spends all our cap space on Brock Nelson and Jordan Eberle"

 

[tomgilbertfan]

At this point I'm just hoping Fenton can successfully get Kaprizov over without trading him 1:1 for some other player with Nashville ties. Although Kap is already a LW, so he's got that going for him.

 

[TaLoN]

At this point I'm just hoping Fenton can successfully get Kaprizov over without trading him 1:1 for some other player with Nashville ties. Although Kap is already a LW, so he's got that going for him.

Sounds like CL is pretty high on Kap, singled him out in his video to season ticket holders as someone Wild fans should be excited about having in the organization.

 

[WILDTATE10]

They showed an interview with Fenton before the game against the Jets and he mentioned Kaprizov as part of the young core moving forward. So it doesn’t sound like he has any plans to trade him. I hope not at least

 

[123TripleDoge]

Yeah Russo ripped Fenton pretty good on the podcast. Does one thing, says something that contradicts, then does something that contradicts what he originally did and says something different. Didn't even occur to him to ask for a 2nd rd pick since we're assuming all the risk, bad asset management.

He speculated that Fenton might be thinking Staal can be the Koivu of next year, playing down in the lineup in checking role, which wont work.

ALso that there's no a lot of enticing free agents, cuz all we will do is block development of guys like Ek, who Fenton was apparently trying to give away early in the season.

While Donato and Fiala might be great players going forward, he's gotta settle down and think stuff through. Almost gave away Zucker for peanuts.

 

[ref19]

While his stats make him look like a steal, I’m pretty confident we could put a much less paid goalie in net with bb’s system and he would be just as successful or more. All you have to look at is Dubnyks expected goals against per game. It’s always the lowest in the league or very close to it, and he routinely lets in a lot of goals.

Lol

 

[ref19]

Yeah Russo ripped Fenton pretty good on the podcast. Does one thing, says something that contradicts, then does something that contradicts what he originally did and says something different. Didn't even occur to him to ask for a 2nd rd pick since we're assuming all the risk, bad asset management.

He speculated that Fenton might be thinking Staal can be the Koivu of next year, playing down in the lineup in checking role, which wont work.

ALso that there's no a lot of enticing free agents, cuz all we will do is block development of guys like Ek, who Fenton was apparently trying to give away early in the season.

While Donato and Fiala might be great players going forward, he's gotta settle down and think stuff through. Almost gave away Zucker for peanuts.

Russo has never done one f***in athletic thing in his life. He should shut up

 

[ref19]

"But if he goes into the offseason and trades Zucker for Frolik + 2nd, Ek for scraps and spends all our cap space on Brock Nelson and Jordan Eberle"

I guarantee they aren’t trading Zucker for Frolik, Bennett, 2nd.

 

[melinko]

If Fenton trades Zucker and Zucker's wife is unable to move with him he will risk real damage to his reputation with future players.

I'm pretty sure his wife Carly has joint custody of one child with someone from a previous relationship, she literally might not be able to move due to custody agreements.

 

[TaLoN]

If Fenton trades Zucker and Zucker's wife is unable to move with him he will risk real damage to his reputation with future players.

I'm pretty sure his wife Carly has joint custody of one child with someone from a previous relationship, she literally might not be able to move due to custody agreements.

Zucker's in the wrong business then. Players understand the business side for the most part. That's why Zucker wanted a NTC in the first place. He was unable to get a full NTC, only a limited one... and the fact that it doesn't kick in until mid summer, he's left himself susceptible to trade.

Other players won't bat an eye. Look what happened with Setoguchi in San Jose. Signed a 3yr deal to stay, then traded very shortly after. That didn't hurt the Sharks rep at all.

 

[Bruce Granville]

10. Winnipeg wasn’t the only team that asked about Matt Hendricks. I think both Calgary and Edmonton did, too. People love the guy.
31 Thoughts: How Golden Knights won the Mark Stone sweepstakes - Sportsnet.ca

And our bold GM got a 7th round pick and traded him to divisional rival.
A 6th or 5th round pick doesn‘t sound impossible.
No picks from the Nino trade, either.
And I don‘t even want to start with the missing 1st round pick for Granny.
He really sucks in deal making. Will he run for president some day?

 

[Wasted Talent]

10. Winnipeg wasn’t the only team that asked about Matt Hendricks. I think both Calgary and Edmonton did, too. People love the guy.
31 Thoughts: How Golden Knights won the Mark Stone sweepstakes - Sportsnet.ca

And our bold GM got a 7th round pick and traded him to divisional rival.
A 6th or 5th round pick doesn‘t sound impossible.
No picks from the Nino trade, either.
And I don‘t even want to start with the missing 1st round pick for Granny.
He really sucks in deal making. Will he run for president some day?

Hendricks is barely an NHL player, getting anything in return for trading him is already a win.

 

[Bruce Granville]

Hendricks is barely an NHL player, getting anything in return for trading him is already a win.

Sure. Nevertheless 3 teams wanted him and Fenton got a top 10 pick...from the bottom.

 

[Wild11MN]

If we're complaining about Hendricks only getting a 7th, we're complaining just to complain.

 

[MuckOG]

There's plenty of reasons to question Fenton's judgement, but the Hendricks deal isn't one of them.