With all the remaining free agents signed, the Minnesota Wild’s roster is now set for the season, barring some completely unforeseen deal. With the large amount of dead cap from the buyouts, the Wild are dangerously close to the salary cap ceiling, but the fact that they have been able to put together a competitive roster with such a large impedance is a testament to how efficient they have been at giving out contracts. An in-depth ranking of every contract on the roster, excluding entry-level contracts (ELC), shows exactly how they’ve gotten to this point.
The players have been grouped into tiers based on their current contract in relation to their importance to the team, evaluation criteria included cap hit, length, and added bonuses such as no-trade or no-movement clauses.
S-Tier = Absolute Steal
| Rank | Player | Years | Cap Hit |
| 1 | Matt Boldy | 7 | $7,000,000 |
| 2 | Joel Eriksson Ek | 6 | $5,250,000 |
| 3 | Ryan Hartman | 1 | $1,700,000 |
| 4 | Kirill Kaprizov | 3 | $9,000,000 |
These four players are the ones that have taken massively team-friendly deals, whether they knew it at the time or not. Without these four players, the Wild are going nowhere and are likely not even close to being a competitive team.
The best contract on the team belongs to Matt Boldy. He entered the league halfway through the 2021-22 season and has become an offensive force for the Wild. As his ELC was coming to an end, there were rumours of a short-term bridge deal in the works, but instead opted for a longer term at a steal for the Wild of just $7.0 million. Boldy has the potential to be a point-per-game player as early as this season, and as he improves and the cap increases, this deal will get better over the course of the seven years.
Joel Eriksson Ek is another core player that got locked in long-term with six seasons left at just $5.25 million. Eriksson Ek’s development has been slow at times, but he is now one of the best two-way forwards in the NHL. Utilized in basically every facet of the game, Eriksson Ek has started annually gathering Selke Trophy attention, and with Patrice Bergeron out of the way, he may have a realistic shot at it. Talk about a player every team wants to have at that price point.
There isn’t much else to say about Kirill Kaprizov other than the superstar’s next deal is likely to be significantly more than his current $9.0 million. The man will go down as the best player in Wild history and is currently a top-ten player in the NHL, with the ability to control the outcome of a game by himself. He is worth paying whatever he wants to keep him happy and in Minnesota.
A-Tier = Great Value
| Rank | Player | Years | Cap Hit |
| 5 | Jared Spurgeon | 4 | $7,575,000 |
| 6 | Mats Zuccarello | 1 | $6,000,000 |
| 7 | Jacob Middleton | 2 | $2,450,000 |
| 8 | Marcus Johansson | 2 | $2,000,000 |
| 9 | Freddy Gaudreau | 5 | $2,100,000 |
We are geting into the territory where not everyone will agree, and the biggest proponent of that is captain Jared Spurgeon. The second-highest-paid player on the team with four years remaining at $7.575 million, Spurgeon is critically underrated around the league and even by his own fans sometimes. The king of strong, consistent defensive play with a spark of offense to his game, he is a high-end top-pair defender but not quite an elite status. He does more every night than most people realize and is the defensive backbone of the team, making him well worth the dollar amount.
A top-line winger that provides some jaw-dropping highlights and Kaprizov’s best friend, Mats Zuccarello, has 146 points over 148 games in his last two seasons with a cap hit of just $6.0 million. There are concerns about his ability to continue at his current pace as age starts to catch up with him, but with this being his last season on that contract, I don’t believe he drops off so hard that it isn’t still a solid deal.
The remaining trio on this list of Jacob Middleton, Marcus Johansson, and Freddy Gaudreau, all come in from $2.45 million to $2.0 million, respectively, and carry a much heavier load than the dollar amount would lead you to believe. A top-pair defender, a second-line winger, and a player so versatile I think he might actually try being a defenseman next are all critical elements to a strong team, so to get them locked in so low is some nice work. Gaudreau’s contract is a little longer than I would like, but if he stays a 30 to 40-point player that works well on every single line, I have no issues with it.
B-Tier = Right Where It Should Be
| Rank | Player | Years | Cap Hit |
| 10 | Jonas Brodin | 4 | $6,000,000 |
| 11 | Filip Gustavsson | 3 | $3,750,000 |
| 12 | Brandon Duhaime | 1 | $1,100,000 |
| 13 | Connor Dewar | 1 | $800,000 |
| 14 | Pat Maroon | 1 | $800,000 |
| 15 | Calen Addison | 1* | $800,000* |
| 16 | Marcus Foligno | 1 | $3,100,000 |
The bulk of the team exists in this section for right now, which is a great thing. You want the players to feel like they are getting what they are worth, and the team wants to feel like they are getting what they pay for, which is exactly the case with these players. A few outliers in this section are Jonas Brodin and Marcus Foligno.
Related: Minnesota Wild 2023-24 Opening Night Lineup Predictions
Brodin is one of the best defensive defensemen in the entire NHL, and at a $6.0 million cap hit, he has the potential to step up a tier if he puts together a modicum of offensive flair. In the 2021-22 season, he had 30 points in 73 games, and while it might be pushing it to ask for a repeat, it proved he is capable of being a solid puck-mover in the offensive zone as well.
On the opposite side of the fence is Marcus Foligno coming in at $3.1 million. Foligno is known for his energy and presence on top of his power-forward abilities. He brings a large amount of intangibles to the table that are just not easily quantifiable. That being said, he took a big step back from 2021-22 and went from a 23-goal scorer to netting just seven in 65 games. With him entering the last season of his current contract, I would like to see him step up before the Wild offer him an extension at a similar price range.
C-Tier = Overpaid
| Rank | Player | Years | Cap Hit |
| 17 | Marc-Andre Fleury | 1 | $3,500,00 |
| 18 | Jon Merrill | 2 | $1,200,000 |
| 19 | Alex Goligoski | 1 | $2,000,000 |
One player stands out here, and that is Jon Merrill. He has a hilarious personality and is a fantastic human being off the ice, but his play last season took a hard nose dive after he was on IR to start the season. He has just two years left at $1.2 million, and if he is able to work enough this offseason to become a reliable bottom-pair player, I would have no problem bumping him back up a tier; however, until he shows he has done that he is overpaid.
I don’t think it is a coincidence that the two oldest players on the Wild ended up down here at the bottom. Marc-Andre Fleury at $3.5 million and Alex Goligoski at $2.0 million are not bad contracts, even with their full no-movement clauses, and on a team not struggling to breathe at the cap ceiling, they may not be at the bottom, but here we are.
Fleury is still a solid goaltender that will be in the hall-of-fame, but Gustavsson’s emergence and Jesper Wallstedt’s existence make him dispensable at the end of the season. Goligoski fell off hard, and paying that much for a player that is more often than not a seventh defenseman hurts when you don’t have enough room to carry a 13th forward.
Zero Horrible Contracts Allows Wild to Compete
The fact that there are no contracts currently on the team that need to be dumped for nothing or even pay another team to take is a testament to how well the Wild’s management has set them up to stay competitive through the worst of the buyout penalties.
Players across the roster are consistently playing way above their pay grade, combine that with an influx of skilled rookies on ELCs, and you have a recipe for a team that can continuously outperform expectations and reach the playoffs year after year, although it would be nice if they could hang around a little longer than the first round for a change.
*Contracts and active clauses via capfriendly.com
