Surprise: MN Wild Sign Charlie Stramel; Do NOT Burn Year

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Charlie Stramel - Minnesota Wild
Credit: Nick King/Lansing State Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

In the National Hockey League, it has become customary for teams to burn the first season of most top college prospects, when their final year of college hockey comes to an end. We’ve seen the Minnesota Wild do it with Matt Boldy, Brock Faber and Zeev Buium, among others.

That way, not only can they can get their feet wet in the NHL and get to know new teammates, but if they are good enough and sign with a playoff team, they can even help on a postseason run. Originally, the Minnesota Wild’s plan for Stramel was no different.

Of course, that was before he broke his ankle during his final game at Michigan State. Once that happened, president of hockey operations Bill Guerin was never going to put his top non-NHL asset on the ice at less than 100%, when there’s virtually no chance he would have helped them during a playoff run.

That’s why, when Michael Russo (The Athletic) reported that the MN Wild were planning to burn the first year of Stramel’s deal anyway, I couldn’t help but question what in the world president of hockey operations Bill Guerin was thinking.

The Minnesota Wild were never going to play Stramel on a broken ankle, which is why burning a year of his deal made absolutely no sense. I appreciate Guerin’s willingness to bend over backwards to make those who play for him feel seen.

Minnesota Wild sign Charlie Stramel; Do NOT burn year

But at the end of the day, the NHL is a business and you can’t be lighting rookie years of a first round pick’s contract for… literally no reason whatsoever. Thankfully, Billy saw the light on the situation. On Monday evening, Stramel signed his entry level contract, which doesn’t kick in until next season.

Stramel was selected No. 21 overall in the 2023 NHL Draft, after a difficult start to his college career at Wisconsin. After the Rosemount, MN native was drafted by his hometown team, he struggled yet again across the eastern border.

When the dust settled on his first two collegiate seasons as a Badger, Stramel had totalled just 20 points between his freshman and sophomore years in Madison.

So he packed up his bags and transferred to East Lansing, where he quickly got his hockey career back on track — totalling 71 points (28 goals, 43 assists) in his two seasons at Michigan State.

As I pointed out last week — after Russo suggested Stramel might “be available” for the playoffs — there was no proverbial gun being held to Guerin’s head forcing him to burn a year of Charlie Stramel’s contract, especially once he went down with his ankle injury.

Wild made the logical decision

Unless Charlie was going to go full Eli Manning and refuse to play for the team that drafted him (then waited out a rocky start to his collegiate career at Wisconsin) the Minnesota Wild had options to sign him and NOT burn any years, which is what they ultimately did.

Unfortunately, I have yet to receive my apology letter from Mr. Russo, but I’ll update this article if anything changes on that front.

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