Originally, one of the first offseason topics we were going to tackle was taking the How can the Wild re-sign Kevin Fiala? piece we wrote in February and penning an updated How can the Wild re-sign Kevin Fiala, 2.0?

After all, a lot has changed since that story ran.

Fiala’s February/March eruption of nine goals and 24 points in 20 games turned into an April explosion of 10 goals and 24 points in 13 games, and more significantly the Wild’s already limited cap space got even tighter after acquiring Tyson Jost and extending Alex Goligoski turned $12.183 million of available cap space this summer into $8.183 million.

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But honestly, why waste our time and get anybody’s hopes up?

The math just doesn’t work for what the Wild would be willing (and can afford) to pay Fiala versus what Fiala, a year from unrestricted free agency and coming off a career-best 33-goal, 85-point season, could command on a long-term deal on the open market a year from now.

It’s time to examine what the Wild could fetch for a 25-year-old talent like Fiala and which teams may be interested in him this offseason.

After all, the writing is on the wall.  To be blunt, so many hints have been offered by general manager Bill Guerin this past season and already this offseason that if we read between those lines, we’d have digested a 1,000-page novel by now spelling out that the Fiala era with the Wild is likely over.

It’s clear as a Minnesota summer day that Fiala, who recorded the second-highest point total in a single season in Wild history, will be on the trade market this offseason.

Fiala sure seems to know this.

Asked last Monday, minutes after his exit meeting with Guerin, if he wanted to stay in Minnesota, Fiala didn’t even give the standard, “Yes,” most players would provide when their futures are unclear after a season.

Instead, he simply said, “There’s no other answer than we’ll see.”

Then there was this past weekend when Fiala not so subtly changed his Instagram profile picture from him in a white Wild uniform to him in just shoulder pads, with no uniform, along with posting a picture of himself celebrating a goal with the caption, “Thank you Minnesota,” followed by green heart.