Comments on: Not shocking: the Wild are selling lots of tickets

By: greatminnesotasportsmind

greatminnesotasportsmind — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 01:25:31 +0000

and every Gopher fan hated Zach Parise….

By: greatminnesotasportsmind

greatminnesotasportsmind — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:54:47 +0000

Because even I have seen your posts. And quite frankly, they are moronic and the majority of them sound like they are written from a 12 year old who might know about their local teams top player and nothing else.

By: greatminnesotasportsmind

greatminnesotasportsmind — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:51:22 +0000

While I agree Vancouver is the best team in the Northwest, let’s see how they do when (not if) they move Luongo. Schneider is a good back up, but let’s see how he does before we just hand the Canucks the division.

As far as your top 5, I’d start sliding Detroit. They lost both of their top 2 defenseman and struck out on Suter. Holmstrom (as far as I know) haven’t said he’s coming back or not. Their a team of aging stars, which will probably take another step back this coming season. Here come the thumb downs from the Wing fans who are in denial about that.

By: greatminnesotasportsmind

greatminnesotasportsmind — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:40:34 +0000

What is this idiot trying to say?

By: ThatGuy

ThatGuy — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:37:26 +0000

Its percent of capacity that matters, which the Wild were actually a bit worse at finishing at 18th with 98.4%.

By: ThatGuy

ThatGuy — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:30:33 +0000

atwatercrushesokoye – You clicked on the link from their home page, they haven’t updated that for some reason. They released their new rankings about a month ago and the Wild were two, with the one problem being lack of depth behind of Brodin. Dumba fixed that. Link below

http://www.hockeysfuture.com/articles/72103/hockeys-future-organizational-rankings-spring-2012-1-10/

By: bethgoesglobal

bethgoesglobal — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:29:53 +0000

In a Pittsburgh comparison think of WV. Penn State and UWV are Major rivals, but should a UWV player play for the Steelers, they would be seen as local.

By: bethgoesglobal

bethgoesglobal — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:26:54 +0000

That can’t possibly surprise you. College rivals will always stand, but in the NHL market those from ND,SD,IA,and WI are still considered “locals” in the scheme of things. Much like players from VT,NH,ME,NY (at least parts),CT,and MA could all be seen as local for the Bruins.

By: bethgoesglobal

bethgoesglobal — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 23:16:19 +0000

Your forgetting income that comes from merchandise, concessions, advertisers, broadcasting networks, and more. In addition, they play 42 games a year in their arena, making it just under 550 games over 13yrs. If 17,000 people come to each game and they sell each seat for only $50 that makes them $464,100,000- more than double what they’ve spent (and come on, how many tickets are sold at only $50).
Roughly $465 million plus all the additional sources of income and the actual prices of the tickets is NOT dubious, even with all the other team expenses.

Besides EVERY NHL team incurs hefty expenditures every year, including players with high cap hits, and in the scheme of things a $7.5million cap hit is not earth shattering by any means.

Ex. As of Today:
- Wild- $69/23 players….next year $51/16
- LA- $62/23…. $49/12
- Vancouver- $65/21…. $51/12
- Calgary- $67/23… $48/14
(#’s approximations from Capgeek)

By: danafla

danafla — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 22:37:57 +0000

An average of 17,772 is pretty good considering the X only holds 18,064.

By: capsrockva

capsrockva — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 22:27:26 +0000

granted I don’t know much about Western Conference teams cause I’m a caps fan but it would seem to me that having both on your team would be a great asset to your team

By: bethgoesglobal

bethgoesglobal — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 22:15:11 +0000

More often than not people in MN Know their hockey. Maybe I’m giving them more credit than I should, but when high school hockey is covered almost as much as college hockey (which is HUGE here), they probably should get some credit. As such, I think most Wild fans are a lot more realistic about the Wild’s progress this year. I think they have a pretty good chance of making the playoffs this, but beyond that, well who knows.
We know that ZP + RS does NOT= Stanley Cup, after all it is a TEAM sport. It will still take some time, especially in terms of developing their young players& prospects. BUT, the 2 of them can be good leaders for the youngsters, AND their can help draw in other quality players.
So, no the Wild are not a “lock” for the playoffs, much less the Cup finals. However, it’s progress not perfection and yesterday the Wild took a big jump down that path.
I for one, am excited to see this team Develop over the next few years and hopefully become a perennial playoff team for years to come. (after all once you get into the playoffs anything can happen)

By: atwatercrushesokoye

atwatercrushesokoye — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 22:08:08 +0000

Never mind I just found it, I was looking at preseason rankings, in the updated rankings from May the Wild are now 2nd. Flames have climbed to 23rd, woohoo!

By: atwatercrushesokoye

atwatercrushesokoye — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 22:00:40 +0000

The division is Vancouver then everyone else, not much difference between Minnesota, Colorado and Calgary right now, so if you mean a top team like top 2 in the division I can buy that. The conference has 5 big teams, Vancouver, LA, Detroit, Chicago and St Louis then everyone else, not sure Minnesota is ready to break into that group yet.

Quick question (and I’m genuinely asking cause I don’t know) I’ve read a lot of Minnesota fans talking about the top ranked farm system, but I looked them up and according to Hockey’s Future they’re ranked 17th, so I’m just wondering what site do you guys use? And again I don’t mean that as an attack, I’m genuinely curious, mainly cause I’m hoping someone sees the Flames’ 25th ranked farm system in a better light!

By: malkinrulez

malkinrulez — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:55:18 +0000

I find it amusing that the state of hockey is drooling all over Ryan Suter.when he was at UW I had to listen to gopher fans rip his game, now they think he is the greatest. Ironic a badger and sioux are to be the saviors! Let’s go red!

By: mclovinhockey

mclovinhockey — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:48:06 +0000

Who is fletcher???
Why does he for any reason at all think I am a troll or that he knows even half as much about this religion as I know?

I have been to the birth place of hockey, I know more about this sport than most hardcore fans. FYI I am not going to use google to tell you hockey started with 9 players on each team on the ice at a time and before there was a puck it was a 3 sided square…. I know that sounds odd, it’s hard to describe.

Hockey is my life.

The wild are a good franchise who for some reason the fans started to lose interest in, just like in Dallas. Now the stars and the wild have both grabbed big names to help put their franchises and fan bases back to what they used to be.
Those two fan bases used to be very good. Sorry fletch but to say I am a troll and a clown, and to say I don’t know hockey out of my own teams bubble is absurd.

By: lordfletcher

lordfletcher — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:44:01 +0000

Cheers

Good times for Wild fans no matter what anyone says. If it wasn’t for the CBA, I’d say let’s drop the puck!!!!!

By: surly1n1nd1anapol1s

surly1n1nd1anapol1s — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:37:31 +0000

That’s about $11,000 per seat to match their salaries (forgive me a bit, I’m eyeballing). Over 13 years, that mark seems dubious given other expenses, such as teammates.

By: imacdane

imacdane — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:31:01 +0000

Actually I hope it turns out exactly like that

By: lostpuppysyndrome

lostpuppysyndrome — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:26:00 +0000

@atwatercrushesokoye, While I’d agree that the lineup isn’t immediately impressive, the difference is some of the kids who will be moving up in the near future. This is what really separates Calgary from Minnesota. I’m not too familiar with Calgary’s prospects but the only blue-chip players I see in their prospect pool is Baertschi, Reinhart, and Brodie. I highly doubt that the current Wild roster is what sold Parise and Suter. They didn’t sign 1 year deals here. However, if PMB can stay healthy (I wouldn’t bet on it), I’d say they stand a very good chance of being a top team in the NW div, if not the Western C.

By: lostpuppysyndrome

lostpuppysyndrome — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:17:32 +0000

Fair enough. I just interpreted mclovin’s comment as legitimately ignorant rather than merely trolling. Carry on.

By: atwatercrushesokoye

atwatercrushesokoye — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:12:12 +0000

I’m looking at that lineup and then I’m looking at the Flames lineup and truthfully I’m not seeing much difference talent wise, if anything I’d lean towards the Flames being deeper, but since I’m a Flames fan I’ll admit bias and say the two rosters are probably equal.

Since the Flames are generally the 9th team in the west, I’d say the Wild still have a ways to go before they’re a playoff lock.

By: atwatercrushesokoye

atwatercrushesokoye — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 21:02:39 +0000

Not just Drury and Gomez, most of the time the big free agent signings lead to nothing in the end. I always think back to Colorado signing Kariya and Selanne and most media assuming that the Avalanche would easily win the Stanley Cup, I remember even reading that it was likely they wouldn’t even lose 10 games that year, guess that didn’t work out.

By: bigpara

bigpara — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:37:48 +0000

Good signing but better hope it doesn’t turn out like the Rangers did when they signed Gomez and Drury a few years.

By: greatminnesotasportsmind

greatminnesotasportsmind — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:37:30 +0000

Try 2, they need a center and a defenseman.

Heatley, Koivu, Parise
Setoguchi, Granlund, Bouchard
Cullen, Brodziak, Clutterbuck
Powe, Konopka, Mitchell

Compared to last year, that is much deeper. No longer having to see Jed Ortmeyer and others who don’t belong on NHL rosters playing on the 3rd line is much deeper.

Suter Gilbert
Scandella spurgeon
Stoner Prosser

They could still use another quality defenseman. Suter instantly makes this team deeper.

By: porkchopexpress1969

porkchopexpress1969 — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:36:44 +0000

Coaching.

By: northstars17

northstars17 — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:33:33 +0000

something isn’t the same with Minnesota hockey ever since the Northstars left. I’m a fan of Backstrom in goal but the team is stale in my opinion.

By: lordfletcher

lordfletcher — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:29:32 +0000

@lostpuppy.

You do realize I troll only the trolls right. So in other words that means, soupcanarmy / florida(whatever) / mclovin / obama …… unfortunately they make up 33% of the posters on PHT

come on now.

By: buddysguys

buddysguys — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:23:03 +0000

Wild are still 4 or 5 players away from being a contender… i like that Heatley lied to them about being able to win

By: williplett

williplett — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 20:16:30 +0000

All you have to do is click on that second link for a quick refresher course as to why the team’s sellout streak ended and why they went so long between playoff appearances: bad players, bad draft choices and a reputation for crippling thriftiness. Doug Risebrough and the old ownership group ran this team into the ground and it is pretty damn amazing that Chuck Fletcher has been able to pull it out of such deep mud in just three seasons.

Should be fun to see where it goes from here.