Wild Hurting With Injuries, What Can They Do?

from Michael Russo of Russo’s Rants, After GM Chuck Fletcher informed the media that Cal Clutterbuck will be out a matter of “weeks” with a sprained ankle, that Pierre-Marc Bouchard is still out indefinitely with a concussion and that Petr Sykora is doubtful Wednesday against Anaheim with a sore groin, I sat down and watched practice. In a 5-minute span, Martin Havlat crashed into the boards, Mikko Koivu crashed into the goal and Benoit Poiliot crashed into a teammate. At the end, Jaime Sifers’ skate hit a rut and he crashed backwards onto the ice. All four are OK, but the scenes were pretty much par for the course for what’s been going on with the Wild since the start of training camp… So while Fletcher can probably trade draft picks for players, how do you justify that when you need to somehow use those picks to hopefully add skill to this organization. In other words, if you trade your draft picks like yesteryear’s Wild, how do you ever catch up? Fletcher just doesn’t have a lot of options that I see. I know I’ve harped on this before during some very critical columns last season of the previous regime, but I’ve watched a lot of hockey in the last few weeks. The Wild are so far behind other organizations right now in terms of bright young talent on the roster and in the system, it is downright frightening. more