Tuesday was a tumultuous day in the NHL for lots of reasons, but only one of those reasons was rife with dramaaaaa.
Having lost to Vegas in the first round, the Minnesota Wild decided buy out two veteran players, Zach Parise and Ryan Suter, the latter of whom has been linked with the Capitals. GM Bill Guerin says he was in anguish about the buyouts. “It was a very difficult decision [made] over lots of time and lots of meetings,” Guerin told the media. “Lots of things went into this decision, but it’s a big decision that I feel we needed to make in order to keep moving forward.”
Writing for the Athletic, Michael Russo breaks down how Guerin communicated the buyouts to Parise and Suter, which gets downright sassy. Russo reports that Suter ended his buyout call by abruptly hanging up on his former General Manager.
Russo’s story is delightful, but I’ve attempted to dramatize the order of events for you below.
Cast of characters
The following events take place in rapid succession.
1. Guerin calls Suter
Guerin was going to tell Suter that his contract has been bought out, but Suter misses the call.
2. Guerin calls Parise
Parise is “caught off guard” when Guerin tells the 36-year-old that his contract has been bought out.
3. Parise calls Suter
Reeling, Parise calls his best pal on the team for comfort.
Suter consoles his friend by being like “lol that sucks, btw I missed a call from him.” I’m paraphrasing here.
4. Guerin calls Suter again
The Parise-Suter call is then interrupted by Guerin-Suter attempt number two.
According to Russo, Suter is “blindsided” by the buyout. The call is tense and terse, and then Suter hangs up on Guerin.
“These calls are not fun to make,” Guerin told the press on Tuesday. That checks out, though I have to admit I took a bit of pleasure from reading about them.
Screenshot courtesy of NHL.com
