Bill Guerin not sure if Minnesota Wild can bring back Kevin Fiala

After the Minnesota Wild have been eradicated by the St. Louis Blues, it opened a key offseason for Common Supervisor Invoice Guerin, none extra within the eye of the general public than the way forward for Kevin Fiala. 

“I imply, we would like to have Kevin again,” Guerin mentioned Tuesday. “I do not know if it will be potential. However we now have to dig into it a bit of bit and to see what we might probably do. However there’s uncertainty.”

On the floor, it seems to be like a simple choice. At 25 years previous, Fiala is coming off a profession yr with 85 factors (33 G, 52 A) in 82 video games. He additionally hit an additional gear when Matt Boldy was known as up on Jan. 6, recording 64 factors and 26 targets over the ultimate 51 video games.

Any such manufacturing has been the usual for Fiala within the common season. Over the previous three years, he has averaged 0.91 factors per sport, however the challenge has been Fiala’s lack of manufacturing within the playoffs.

Since Fiala recorded 4 factors (3 G, 1 A) throughout a 2020 play-in collection in opposition to the Vancouver Canucks, he has simply 5 factors over his final 13 playoff video games. That features a no-show in opposition to the Blues, the place Fiala did not rating a aim and had simply three assists in six video games. 

The efficiency is paying homage to Jason Zucker, who ranks fourth in Wild historical past with 132 profession targets however had simply 4 targets in 31 playoff video games. That features the 2017-18 season, the place at age 26, Zucker scored a career-high 33 targets throughout the common season however didn’t report some extent in a five-game collection in opposition to the Winnipeg Jets.

Two years later, Guerin traded Zucker to the Pittsburgh Penguins and it is honest to marvel if Fiala might have the identical destiny.

After taking part in final season on a one-year, $5.1 million deal, Fiala is a restricted free agent. Of this yr’s pending free brokers, solely Johnny Gaudreau, Matthew Tkachuk and Nazem Kadri recorded extra factors final season. 

If we add Filip Forsberg, who recorded 84 factors with Nashville, the typical wage of these 4 gamers in response to Cap Pleasant was $5.8 million. If we take out 31-year-old Kadri, that quantity jumps to $6.2 million.

If the Wild have been to conform to a cope with a median annual worth of the latter quantity, Fiala would turn into the second-highest paid participant on the staff behind Kirill Kaprizov ($9 million).

That might be doable for a staff in a standard cap state of affairs, however not for the Wild.

After shopping for out Ryan Suter and Zach Parise final offseason, the Wild are heading into the brunt of the monetary influence of that call. Minnesota can have $12.7 million in useless cash for the 2022-23 season and that quantity will enhance to $14.7 million throughout the 2023-24 and 2024-25 seasons.

With simply $5.6 million in cap area heading into the summer season, the Wild must resolve if it could be simpler to switch Fiala or commerce somebody like Matt Dumba and Jonas Brodin, who’ve matching $6 million salaries for subsequent season. 

“Hey look, we are able to do something,” Guerin mentioned. “However at what value?”