Rumor: Kaprizov has rejected two major offers from the Wild.

The Minnesota Wild have quite the dilemma on their hands when it comes to the future of rookie sensation Kirill Kaprizov and although the solution to this dilemma would appear to be an obvious one from a fans perspective, things may not be so simple for Minnesota Wild general manager Bill Guerin. That solution would of course be to simply give the player more money and more term than what has been previously offered, but the Wild may have already exhausted that potential option. 

Last week Minnesota Wild insider Mike Russo was a guest on the Daily Face Off podcast and it was there that he revealed that Guerin and the Minnesota Wild had already made a very significant offer to Kaprizov in the offseason. In fact, Russo revealed, it was his gut feeling that the team had actually made multiple offers of this nature to Kaprizov, only to see those offers rejected outright by a rookie sensation that at the end of the day has just 55 career games under his belt in the National Hockey League.

"My gut says they were offering around $9 million on an 8 year deal and probably $8.5 [milion] or $8 [million] on a 7 year deal," said Russo on the podcast. "Right now that has not only not been accepted but its been pretty much rejected from Kaprizov's camp. So this is like one of the first negotiations I have ever covered where the team is throwing the world at a player that has played 55 games and he's like 'No I want a lot less money and a lot less term.'"

The problem here from the Wild's perspective is that they don't want to give Kaprizov a short term deal and for rather obvious reasons. Kaprizov is looking for a short term deal that will walk him to unrestricted free agency, either because he wants to play in a different market or perhaps because the player is comfortable betting on himself and expects that in 3, 4 or even 5 years when his short term deal runs out the cap will have increased and he will be able to secure a major payday.

Kaprizov is represented by the same agent that represents NHL forward Artemi Panarin, and after seeing how Panarin used a similar situation in Chicago to secure a short term bridge deal before signing for mega bucks with the New York Rangers the Wild are right to be wary here. Combine this with the rumors suggesting Kaprizov could be seeking a return to the Kontinental Hockey League and this is starting to look like quite the puzzle for Bill Guerin to solve in the offseason.