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<\/p>\nVladimir Tarasenko\u2019s name probably wasn\u2019t on Minnesota Wild fans\u2019 bingo cards when it came to expected offseason acquisitions.<\/p>\n
But Tuesday\u2019s free-agent market is lean, to say the least, especially with most players re-signing (including seemingly every Florida Panther). In searching for a scoring winger, Minnesota likely would have had to pony up a lot, and more term than it was comfortable with, for the likes of Nikolaj Ehlers, Burnsville\u2019s Brock Boeser and company.<\/p>\n
So the Wild felt good about taking a one-year bet on the two-time Cup winner, acquiring Tarasenko on Monday from the Detroit Red Wings for future considerations. Tarasenko\u2019s production has taken a sizable dip over the past few years, but president of hockey operations and general manager Bill Guerin believes a \u201cfresh start\u201d and a bigger role could help the motivated winger regain his old form.<\/p>\n
What made him a fit?<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a lot \u2014 his track record of winning,\u201d Guerin said. \u201cHis track record of scoring. He\u2019s a bigger body. He\u2019s got a lot of experience. He\u2019s a player that is in need of a fresh start. The contract and money and everything kind of fits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, teams usually don\u2019t give up scoring wingers for \u201crelatively nothing,\u201d as Guerin put it, so there\u2019s some risk there. Detroit cleared some cap space to potentially make some bigger moves Tuesday. Tarasenko had just 11 goals (33 points) in 80 games for the Red Wings last season, playing primarily on the third line.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s been four years since the last of Tarasenko\u2019s 30-plus-goal seasons, back in 2021-22 with the St. Louis Blues.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a little bit older than his St. Louis days \u2014 that just happens,\u201d Guerin said. \u201cBut sometimes it\u2019s just not the right fit. Sometimes you\u2019re not in the positions that you\u2019re used to being in. How do you handle that? How are you handling it personally? How is the team helping you cope with it and understand the role you\u2019re in now?<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more you communicate with players and help them understand where they are now is helpful to them. They appreciate that relationship, and they flourish.\u201d<\/p>\n
Guerin said coach John Hynes has already talked with Tarasenko about potentially spending some time with him this summer in Florida. The relationship between player and coach is important, Guerin said, and \u201cthere\u2019s a lot we can do to help him.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Tarasenko is likely to slot into a second-line role; his linemates remain to be seen, likely dependent on whether the Wild keep Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy as a dynamic duo on the top line. Guerin said that although Tarasenko\u2019s offensive contributions in the past have been fantastic, \u201cthe experience of winning the Stanley Cup is more important than that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Wild see Tarasenko as a strong influence, especially considering their younger players coming up, such as Danila Yurov and Liam Ohgren. They lost Marc-Andre Fleury to retirement, but with Tarasenko, they\u2019ll at least have two Cup champions in the room (with Zach Bogosian the other).<\/p>\n
Why does that matter?<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause they know,\u201d Guerin said. \u201cYou think you know, but if you haven\u2019t been through it, you really don\u2019t. For him to share his stories, his experiences in a room that doesn\u2019t have a lot of Stanley Cup winners, it\u2019s different, and that\u2019s something he can bring to the table and help our guys with.\u201d<\/p>\n
Guerin said adding another Russian wasn\u2019t really about making rookie Yurov or superstar Kaprizov more comfortable; Kaprizov is eligible to sign an extension as early as Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think it hurts,\u201d Guerin said. \u201cBut I know in my past meetings with Kirill, he doesn\u2019t care if you\u2019re Russian, Swedish, American, Canadian, whatever. He just wants guys to help us win.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Wild still have around $12.96 million of cap space for next season, depending on who makes the team. Guerin said he didn\u2019t want to blow it all in one day, knowing how useful it could be for impactful moves next season and beyond. But Minnesota still plans to sign some players during Tuesday\u2019s opening of free agency, with the focus now on a bottom-six center\/faceoff guy like Nico Sturm, Sean Kuraly, Radek Faksa or Christian Dvorak. The Wild are also on the lookout for a third goalie to play in AHL Iowa but serve as NHL insurance, as well as a depth defenseman after trading Declan Chisholm on Saturday, knowing Jonas Brodin will likely miss the start of the season.<\/p>\n
With Tarasenko\u2019s cap hit and expiring contract, the Wild still have some money to play with, and this gives them a year to evaluate their young players and what\u2019s on the market, where they can potentially take bigger swings.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still believe having flexibility is going to be really important, now and moving forward,\u201d Guerin said. \u201cI think the one-year deal gives us that. Who knows? Vladdy could come in and play great, and that could be something different down the road. But right now, we still have quite a bit of flexibility in our payroll, and that\u2019s a good thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other Wild news, the club made qualifying offers to Marco Rossi and Michael Milne and did not make qualifying offers to Ryan O\u2019Rourke, Graeme Clarke, Adam Raska and Luke Toporowski.<\/p>\n
(Photo of Vladimir Tarasenko and Yakov Trenin: Matt Blewett \/ Imagn Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Vladimir Tarasenko\u2019s name probably wasn\u2019t on Minnesota Wild fans\u2019 bingo cards when it came to expected offseason acquisitions.…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":30033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[3112,293,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-30032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-minnesota-wild","9":"tag-nhl","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114778401968752701","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}