It's Sept. 1 (happy Labor Day everybody), meaning in 17 days, Wild players report to training camp for physicals and fitness testing. On Sept. 19, players take the ice for the first time. The only question right now is whether Nino Niederreiter and Darcy Kuemper will be there with the rest of their teammates.
As of now, both restricted free agents remain unsigned, meaning their contract squabbles with the Wild threaten their on-time arrival to camp. General Manager Chuck Fletcher said Friday at the State Fair that conversations remain ongoing but gave no indication that either is close to being signed. There's more than a dozen quality restricted free agents around the NHL still unsigned, including (per capgeek.com) Niederreiter's junior linemate Ryan Johansen (Columbus), St. Louis' Jaden Schwartz, Boston's Torey Krug, Colorado's Tyson Barrie (Edmonton just signed Justin Schultz to a one-year, $3.675 million deal, so there's a potential comparable), Dallas' Brenden Dillon and Cody Eakin, Boston's Reilly Smith, Anaheim's Devante Smith-Pelly, the Rangers' John Moore, Nashville's Ryan Ellis and Detroit's Danny DeKeyser.
Usually, this stuff works itself out right before camp begins. Kuemper is 24. Niederreiter turns 22 on Sept. 8, so at such young ages and with such competition in camp, it certainly won't help matters if they miss the start of camp.
From the Wild's perspective, Fletcher is at least painting this as, "not a concern," because goalies Josh Harding and Niklas Backstrom are healthy and ready to go. Up front, the Wild has a number of forwards competing for top-6 or bottom-6 roles. For instance, Niederreiter's late arrival could open the door for Jason Zucker, who has a big camp ahead of him. If you remember, last year, Zucker had a sub-par camp and then injured his groin at the same time Mikael Granlund began to excel in camp. That pretty much set in stone Zucker's start in Iowa. Justin Fontaine has the ability to play any role. This year, the Wild also has players like Cody Almond, Stephane Veilleux, Kurtis Gabriel, Brett Sutter, Michael Keranen and Jordan Schroeder that will battle for roster spots up front. So, there's some insurance.
"We'd rather have a contract done, but these things happen. You'd like everything to be clean and simple, but it doesn't always happen that way," Fletcher said. "We'll continue to try to etch into it."
The Niederreiter negotiations, to me, are the most compelling because of how many Wild forwards can become restricted free agents next summer – Granlund, Charlie Coyle and Erik Haula. Fletcher said again that in the next couple months, he'll talk to the agents of all of next summer's potential RFA's (including Jonas Brodin and Marco Scandella) to "try to get ahead of it." (aka, extensions). "In some cases, we may need to wait until next summer."
But with so many young players to re-sign soon, Fletcher feels he has to get the Niederreiter deal right or it'll affect the others.
Also, Fletcher told me as of now he's not anticipating signing any more unrestricted free agents. It's too early to say if he'll invite any unsigned free agents in for tryouts. Few unsigned players would accept tryouts at this early juncture anyway (last year, the Wild invited David Steckel. He didn't make the team, started in Iowa and eventually signed with Anaheim). Fletcher says he's probably at least answered the phone call of agents for more than a dozen unsigned free agents. Some I know of include Ilya Bryzgalov, Ryan Malone, Paul Bissonnette and George Parros.
