Wild’s priority is a center but will not make the wrong trade
Minnesota Wild General Manager Bill Guerin joined Judd’s Hockey Show with Judd Zulgad and AJ Fredrickson on Tuesday and was asked whether his team is complete now, whether there will be another move similar to the Quinn Hughes one later in the season, and whether that trade will involve a center.
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
NHL Rumors: Where Things Stand with Quinn Hughes and the Minnesota Wild
Judd Zulgad: “I know that you can’t talk in particular about Larkin at all because he’s not your player, so that would be tampering. But my question is this: How confident are you that there might be a center out there that you could still get? And I’ll again preface this by saying, there seems to be a panic that if you don’t have this guy by opening night, it’s over, it’s all done.
You got Quinn Hughes in December, and you know last July 1st of 2025, we’re all like, well, what happened? And by December, the answer to the question came. So, do people need to be more cognizant of the fact that the Hughes trade itself sort of proved that your roster might not be finished on opening night, and that that player or a player of that ilk could still come along at some point in the season.”
Bill Guerin: “Yeah, I mean.”
Zulgad: “Is that fair?”
Guerin: “Yeah, that’s fair. That’s exactly, I mean, that’s exactly what happened last year. I mean, last year I remember, I mean, hey, look, a year ago in July, nobody was more disappointed on July 1st than me. Like it was really slow. It was really not what we expected. But you have to be patient. You have to, you have to wait, and you can’t jump at something that doesn’t make sense just to do it.
And this year’s a little bit more, or kind of like that, and in a way, I don’t know what or who’s going to become available at what time or when. But there really wasn’t much to do. We made the one trade, and I think that made us better. We had to say goodbye to a couple guys, but all in all, it wasn’t that active of an offseason just because of all the money that’s in the system now, and teams can sign their own players.
So, the one thing we don’t want to do is take steps backwards, and I think when there are bad signings or not bad signings, but signings that can kind of get you in trouble. That’s when that happens.
Can Dylan Larkin Remain With the Detroit Red Wings Next Season?
But no, listen, with this organization, the focus on that piece has been so big, and I understand it. It’s really listen, nobody wants it more than me, but that’s really a tough piece to come up with, and you just got to stay patient and diligent, and stay aggressive, but you got to be smart and try to be smart and patient.”
NHLRumors.com Note: As it has been documented, the Wild are looking to get a number one center. Center depth was an issue for the Wild when they lost to the Colorado Avalanche in the playoffs. They have been linked to Dylan Larkin, but the Detroit Red Wings don’t want to get picks and prospects for him. But Larkin would make the Wild better. However, as Guerin stated, a center trade could come later in the season because, until you ask, you don’t know who is available.
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