Expansion Draft Preview: Minnesota Wild

The Minnesota Wild are facing a difficult situation at the upcoming Seattle Kraken Expansion Draft.

The team has five players with no-movement clauses in their contracts, three of which are defenders, that will automatically be protected unless they waive or are bought out.

Minnesota’s decision ultimately boils down to finding a trade for Matt Dumba or buying out the final few years of Zach Parise’s contract in order to avoid losing the defender for nothing.

Eligible Forwards

@Zach Parise (NMC), @Mats Zuccarello (NMC), @Victor Rask, @Kevin Fiala, @Marcus Foligno, @Jordan Greenway, @Nick Bjudstad, @Ryan Hartman, @Joel Eriksson Ek, @Nico Sturm, @Will Bitten, @Mason Shaw, @Marcus Johansson (UFA), @Nick Bonino (UFA)

Eligible Defencemen

@Jared Spurgeon (NMC), @Ryan Suter (NMC), @Jonas Brodin (NMC), @Matt Dumba, @Carson Soucy, @Ian Cole (UFA), @Matt Bartkowski (UFA), @Brad Hunt (UFA)

Eligible Goaltenders

@Cam Talbot, @Kaapo Kahkonen, @Andrew Hammond (UFA)

Exempt Players

Kirill Kaprizov, Marco Rossi, Adam Beckman, Matthew Boldy, Daemon Hunt, Damien Giroux, Alexander Khovanov, Ryan O’Rourke, Hunter Jones

What should they do?

Five of Minnesota’s decisions are already made for them due to the amount of no-movement clauses they have on their roster. Up front, Zach Parise and Mats Zuccarello hold no-move clauses and, on the blueline, Jared Spurgeon, Ryan Suter, and Jonas Brodin must be protected.

The odd man out would then be Matt Dumba, who Seattle would surely select.

Of course, the Wild could use a buyout on somebody like Parise, who only scored seven goals and 18 points over 45 games in 2021.

If Minnesota was to buy out Parise, they could use the eight-skater protection scheme. They could protect Zuccarello, Kevin Fiala, Marcus Foligno, and Joel Eriksson Ek up front, while also protecting all of the defenders with no-movement clauses along with Dumba.

That would leave Seattle with their choice of a decent bottom-six forward, like Victor Rask or Ryan Hartman.

The other play for the Wild would be moving Dumba for a forward or for a collection of draft picks ahead of the Expansion Draft. But it obviously won’t be easy to get full value for Dumba given the fact everyone knows Minnesota is desperate in this situation.