Speculation: Trade and Free Agency Talk - LII

[Minnesnota]

The Wild filed for arbitration, so yes, if this results in a 2-year deal that takes Fiala directly to UFA, it will be Guerin’s fault.

This isn’t risky for Fiala whatsoever.

BBB can't force him to sign a contract bud. If he could, the Wild wouldn't have felt the need to file for arbitration just to get him under contract.

Or are you telling me the guy who people have complained non-stop since he's been hired about "overpaying everyone" is all of a sudden a shrewd?

 

[Minnesnota]

It's a question of priorities. What Guerin's (likely) done is collapsed the range of options on term to 1 or 2 years (neither of which is ideal) for the sake of getting this all sorted out before training camp starts. Unless Fiala's camp is being completely unreasonable I have to wonder what made it worth sacrificing the possibility of signing him for more than 2 years.

You're making an assumption that a deal won't be done prior to arbitration.

If Guerin's priorities are to ensure he's not creating a Parise situation all over again, I think it's understandable. It's pretty likely that Fiala's camp is being completely unreasonable given his history and the fact that the team elected to arbitration.

 

[Bazeek]

You're making an assumption that a deal won't be done prior to arbitration.

If Guerin's priorities are to ensure he's not creating a Parise situation all over again, I think it's understandable. It's pretty likely that Fiala's camp is being completely unreasonable given his history and the fact that the team elected to arbitration.

I am making an assumption that signing a deal before arbitration is unlikely since Fiala now has an easy route to UFA. If he wants more than the Wild are willing to offer, why not just take the 2 year deal? His outlook as a 26 year old UFA in 2 years should be very lucrative.

I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I see virtually no upside for Fiala in signing before arbitration.

 

[Dr Jan Itor]

BBB can't force him to sign a contract bud. If he could, the Wild wouldn't have felt the need to file for arbitration just to get him under contract.

Or are you telling me the guy who people have complained non-stop since he's been hired about "overpaying everyone" is all of a sudden a shrewd?

If he has forced himself into that corner? Sure.

 

[MNNumbers]

The cap squeeze is making salaries into a caste system. Every team is going to end up paying 2 or 3 big names way more than they should, and because the cap won't rise in any real way for a long time, teams are all going to have to fill their rosters with low cost players.

Fiala obviously thinks that he should be one of those big fish. Guerin's problem is that his dead cap space limits how many big fish he can actually have on his roster.

Hence, I think we have him for 2 years, and then he's gone.

 

[Wasted Talent]

So they have less than 2 weeks to negotiate a deal or it's a quaranteed 1- or 2-year deal through arbitration?

I'm not feeling all that confident about those odds.

 

[GuerinUp]

reality is fiala was probably gone within the next 4 years anyways.

 

[TaLoN]

Maybe, but looking over his stats on Hockey reference. He has more total goals for on the ice than against. His plus/minus was better than normal only a -1 instead of -12 like last year (useless stat of course though). Over 50 corsi and Fenwick. Only 3 more giveaways than takeaways.

All of this while stating more times in the defensive zone than offensive for the first time since his rookie year.

I didn't watch the sharks much outside our games and even then I play more attention to the Wild than opposing players. Just by reading the stats it almost seems like Kane got a heavier defensive load than past years all the while have a good offensive year for the stinker of the team he was on. If anything it looks like they were fine with him starting in the D zone vs previous years.

Either the Coach is in on the betting making Kane start more in the D zone to give up those turnovers or Kane is play 4D chess by improving his game to have the Sharks trust his defense leading to him to throw a game.

You're assuming it's an all or nothing situation. It only needs to happen once to be true. Season stats don't provide a defense for a single incident.

I'm not saying it happened, just saying season stats isn't at all a defense that it didn't happen.

 

[Dr Jan Itor]

reality is fiala was probably gone within the next 4 years anyways.

Not sure that has to be the reality.

 

[grimmel95]

I am making an assumption that signing a deal before arbitration is unlikely since Fiala now has an easy route to UFA. If he wants more than the Wild are willing to offer, why not just take the 2 year deal? His outlook as a 26 year old UFA in 2 years should be very lucrative.

I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I see virtually no upside for Fiala in signing before arbitration.

How do we know that Fiala's agent isn't asking for a similar deal like Kaps agent is doing which walks them to UFA? Everyone wants to blame Guerin that he F'd this up but there is another side to this and these agents know how to play the game too. Maybe Kap and Fiala's agents don't want their clients in MN any longer and this is the easy way out for them.

 

[Minnesnota]

How do we know that Fiala's agent isn't asking for a similar deal like Kaps agent is doing which walks them to UFA? Everyone wants to blame Guerin that he F'd this up but there is another side to this and these agents know how to play the game too. Maybe Kap and Fiala's agents don't want their clients in MN any longer and this is the easy way out for them.

The funny thing is this is what is most likely given Fiala's contract bullshit a few years ago.

The reality is that people will bitch whether or not Guerin does a good job because they're miserable people who have already made up their minds and there's not a f***in' thing Guerin can do to change their perception.

 

[2Pair]

The funny thing is this is what is most likely given Fiala's contract bullshit a few years ago.

The reality is that people will bitch whether or not Guerin does a good job because they're miserable people who have already made up their minds and there's not a f***in' thing Guerin can do to change their perception.

Care to expand on that?

 

[2Pair]

How do we know that Fiala's agent isn't asking for a similar deal like Kaps agent is doing which walks them to UFA? Everyone wants to blame Guerin that he F'd this up but there is another side to this and these agents know how to play the game too. Maybe Kap and Fiala's agents don't want their clients in MN any longer and this is the easy way out for them.

We don't know what role Fiala and his contract ask is playing in all of this at the moment. We do know that Guerin filing for arbitration is a bad move given the circumstances.

 

[Bazeek]

How do we know that Fiala's agent isn't asking for a similar deal like Kaps agent is doing which walks them to UFA? Everyone wants to blame Guerin that he F'd this up but there is another side to this and these agents know how to play the game too. Maybe Kap and Fiala's agents don't want their clients in MN any longer and this is the easy way out for them.

The only information that we have on that front is from Russo, who seemed pretty convinced that the hangup with Fiala was going to be more term than money. It's definitely possible that he was wrong, though.

But if Fiala's demands were ludicrous enough to rule out him being in Minnesota long term I strongly question why he wasn't traded at the draft. Considering our cap situation for the next 4 years, if this goes to arbitration it's almost a foregone conclusion that Fiala is traded before the end of his next contract. The only upside to hanging onto him is to have him on the team the team for next season, which is pretty dubious considering we have yet to see a single improvement made to the roster.

So yeah, it's definitely possible that Guerin was handed a difficult situation here. That doesn't mean that he's been all that deft in how he's handled it, though. He's gone from trading away a 24 year old first line winger with 2 year of team control to trading away a 25 or 26 year old winger with 1 or zero years of team control.

Fingers crossed that they work something out before the 17th.

 

[Minnesnota]

Care to expand on that?

You've got some catching up to do first.

 

[2Pair]

You've got some catching up to do first.

At least you almost answered this question

 

[16thOverallSaveUs]

I am making an assumption that signing a deal before arbitration is unlikely since Fiala now has an easy route to UFA. If he wants more than the Wild are willing to offer, why not just take the 2 year deal? His outlook as a 26 year old UFA in 2 years should be very lucrative.

I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I see virtually no upside for Fiala in signing before arbitration.

Unless, all of a sudden, BBB ponies up some money

 

[P10p]

We don't know what role Fiala and his contract ask is playing in all of this at the moment. We do know that Guerin filing for arbitration is a bad move given the circumstances.

To paraphrase...

"We don't know one half of the equation but we can draw a conclusion anyway."

 

[Bazeek]

Unless, all of a sudden, BBB ponies up some money

Even then I think there's a strong case for him just taking the 2 year deal in arbitration. At the earliest, any trade protections on Fiala's next deal will kick in on 7/1/23, the summer before we go into two years with $15m in dead cap space. It's not hard to do the math there and see that Fiala would be a prime candidate for a trade before any clauses kick in, so any term on his deal beyond year 2 is pretty likely to be spent on another team anyway. That being the case, why not just take the 2 years that the team has suddenly put in front of him and control his own destiny? It could potentially cost him a few million bucks over the next 2 years, but he'd have a good chance to make that back on his next contract anyway.

 

[2Pair]

To paraphrase...

"We don't know one half of the equation but we can draw a conclusion anyway."

Except I didn't attempt to draw any conclusions.

 

[2Pair]

Even then I think there's a strong case for him just taking the 2 year deal in arbitration. At the earliest, any trade protections on Fiala's next deal will kick in on 7/1/23, the summer before we go into two years with $15m in dead cap space. It's not hard to do the math there and see that Fiala would be a prime candidate for a trade before any clauses kick in, so any term on his deal beyond year 2 is pretty likely to be spent on another team anyway. That being the case, why not just take the 2 years that the team has suddenly put in front of him and control his own destiny? It could potentially cost him a few million bucks over the next 2 years, but he'd have a good chance to make that back on his next contract anyway.

The smart financial move for any and every player in the league is to get to UFA status as quickly as possible. There is usually a give and take between players and GM's where UFA years are bought and sold to get to the best deal possible for both/either side. Guerin just gave Fiala a clear path to UFA, and now Fiala is in a position where he can charge a pretty good price for any of those UFA years.

 

[grimmel95]

The smart financial move for any and every player in the league is to get to UFA status as quickly as possible. There is usually a give and take between players and GM's where UFA years are bought and sold to get to the best deal possible for both/either side. Guerin just gave Fiala a clear path to UFA, and now Fiala is in a position where he can charge a pretty good price for any of those UFA years.

Again you're assuming this is all Guerin's handiwork -- "gave Fiala a clear path to UFA". What if the agent for Fiala flat out told Guerin we'll sign a 1 or 2 yr deal and that's it? What should Guerin do in that situation?

 

[P10p]

Except I didn't attempt to draw any conclusions.

Except you literally did...

"We don't know what role Fiala and his contract ask is playing in all of this at the moment. We do know that Guerin filing for arbitration is a bad move given the circumstances."

We don't know what Fiala's ask is yet some how you can say arbitration is a bad idea.... Without knowing anything about the negotiations. You literally drew a conclusion without knowing AT LEAST half of the info...

 

[2Pair]

Again you're assuming this is all Guerin's handiwork -- "gave Fiala a clear path to UFA". What if the agent for Fiala flat out told Guerin we'll sign a 1 or 2 yr deal and that's it? What should Guerin do in that situation?

There's no assumption. We all know who filed for arbitration. We all know what happens if Fiala decides to let it go to arbitration.

 

[2Pair]

Except you literally did...

"We don't know what role Fiala and his contract ask is playing in all of this at the moment. We do know that Guerin filing for arbitration is a bad move given the circumstances."

We don't know what Fiala's ask is yet some how you can say arbitration is a bad idea.... Without knowing anything about the negotiations. You literally drew a conclusion without knowing AT LEAST half of the info...

Arbitration is a bad idea under these circumstances. There's a possibility that it's Guerin's best move to make at this point, but there's no possibility that it's a good move.