Dustin Byfuglien signing with his hometown Wild is very much a longshot at this point.
First, Big Buff needs to be all-in, and right now he’s showing little desire to end his respite from the National Hockey League after not playing last season and having his contract mutually terminated with the Winnipeg Jets. The hard-shooting, enormous defenseman seems perfectly content to continue fishing, hunting and raising his three children for the rest of time.
Second, a few months ago when Wild general manager Bill Guerin sat down with Byfuglien and his agent, Ben Hankinson, in an attempt to gauge Byfuglien’s desire to come out of semi-retirement, the Wild had a lot more cap space and were potentially on the verge of trading Matt Dumba.
After all, Byfuglien, even at age 35, conceivably would have been a perfect, short-term replacement.
Weeks later though, Dumba trade talk has quieted and the Wild’s cap space for next season has shrunk to…
