Cashing in: Could Wild make Kirill Kaprizov NHL's highest-paid player?
The star winger has one season left on his current contract and can sign an eight-year extension beginning next Tuesday.
The excitement Wild fans feel about their team finally having money to spend next Tuesday when NHL free agency opens will be offset by the apprehension they feel about winger Kirill Kaprizov becoming eligible to sign a contract extension on the same day.
Kaprizov’s contract situation has been on the minds of Wild executives and fans for the past year. Those in charge have attempted to reassure fans, as well as themselves, that the superstar from Russia will be going nowhere.
“My expectations are to get him signed. That’s it,” Bill Guerin told reporters after the Wild was eliminated by Vegas in the first round of the playoffs. “I’d like to get it done as soon as I can. Obviously, everybody knows how important Kirill is to the team and to the organization and to the market. He’s a star player. So, yeah, that’s priority No. 1.”
Kaprizov, 28, has one season left on the five-year, $45 million contract he signed in the summer of 2021. The Wild will celebrate their 25th season on the ice in 2025-26 — the 2004-05 season was lost to a lockout — and Kaprizov is easily the best player to ever wear the team’s crest. He set the single-season franchise record with 47 goals in 2021-22. His 185 career goals are fourth in team history and his 386 points are fifth. Kaprizov’s 62 power-plays goals put him only eight away from breaking Zach Parise’s franchise record.
Parise set the mark in 558 games with the Wild over nine seasons. Kaprizov has played in 319 games over five seasons. Kaprizov got off to a fantastic start last season — he was in the Hart Trophy discussion early on — but was sidelined by a a lower-body injury just after Christmas.
He returned for three games in late January before undergoing surgery and ended up missing 41 games. Kaprizov returned for four games late in the regular season and the playoffs. He still finished second on the Wild with 25 goals and third with 56 points. He also led the team with five goals, including three on the power play, and nine points in the postseason.
Kaprizov has given no indication he isn’t happy with the Wild or that he wants to explore landing in a bigger market or heading to a team that wins more. “This is my agent (Paul Theofanus) job, talk with Billy,” Kaprizov said of his situation after Minnesota’s playoff ouster. “But we will see. I love everything here. But should be all good.”
The hyper-competitive Kaprizov is certain to keep a close eye on what moves Guerin makes during the NHL draft this weekend as well as when free agency commences on Tuesday. The Wild have made the playoffs in four of Kaprizov’s five seasons but have never advanced past the first round.
The Wild had limited ability to participate in free agency the past two years as they carried a combined $14.7 million in dead salary cap hits because of the 2021 buyouts of Parise and Ryan Suter’s contracts. Those have dropped to a combined $1.7 million and the NHL’s salary cap will jump from $88 million to $95.5 million for 2025-26. That will leave the Wild with $15.8 million in cap space, according to PuckPedia.
“We plan to re-sign him. I will tell you nobody will offer more money than us, or longer (years),” Wild owner Craig Leipold said last Oct. 1. “All we have to do is prove to him that we want to win.”
Adding talented pieces to the roster is one way to do that.
Guerin has the freedom to pursue a scoring winger such as Vancouver’s Brock Boeser or Winnipeg’s Nikolaj Ehlers. Toronto center John Tavares also could be a possibility. There has been plenty of speculation that Guerin is going to move on from top six center Marco Rossi, who was demoted to the fourth line in the playoffs and is set to become a restricted free agent next Tuesday.
If Rossi is moved, Guerin is going to need to find a replacement either on the open market or in a Rossi trade. That could be the center Kaprizov ends up playing alongside.
So how quickly might Kaprizov commit to an extension with the Wild?