Hockey Wilderness, a Minnesota Wild community

The Wild are starting to resemble the model of what an NHL franchise has to be in the salary-capped world – efficient at drafting and developing young players, patient while those youngsters learn the ups and downs of the pro game and prepared to step up and pay up when a golden opportunity arises. They’re not yet a threat along the lines of Sidney Crosby’s Penguins or Claude Giroux’s Flyers, but they’re much closer to that point today than they were yesterday. So here’s to the Wild and their fans. The patience, politeness and persistence Minnesotans are known for have landed their team the biggest free agent fish to hit the market in quite a while. Despite what we see on the news every day, this shows you that great things can still happen to great people. Put that in your carpet-bagging pipe and choke on it, Mr. Green.