ST. PAUL, Minn. — Oh, what a time to be Michael McCarron.The 31-year-old spent years fighting just to stay in the NHL, accepting league-minimum deals and bouncing from the Montreal Canadiens to the Nashville Predators as he carved out a niche as a hard-nosed, defensive-minded, faceoff-winning center who was coveted by many teams at the trade deadline.He found a strong fit with the Minnesota Wild, and now, at the exact moment most teams, including the Wild, are desperate for centers — with virtually none available in free agency — McCarron has a chance to strike it rich.But here comes the quandary.While the Wild have cap space and badly want to re-sign him, McCarron almost certainly could make more on the open market since it just takes one team to throw a boatload of cash and term his way.So McCarron will have to decide in the upcoming weeks whether he prioritizes a good hockey fit on a team that looks like it’s a contender or wants to wait until July 1 to see what he can get in terms of long-term security and money.Bill Guerin hopes he can provide McCarron with plenty of reasons to stay.“We have a ton of interest in bringing Mac back,” the Wild president of hockey operations and general manager said. “We thought he was a really good fit. He delivered on everything that we knew about and was told about him. … I think everybody was really happy. I know everybody was really happy.”In the NHL for parts of nine seasons, McCarron has never earned more than $900,000 in a season. He talked candidly about what he’s weighing in his decision at his end-of-year exit interview with reporters last Friday.“Obviously, you have a GM and coach (John Hynes) who wanted me to come in here and help the team, and when someone gives up what they gave up to get me, I think it shows how much they wanted me,” said McCarron, who was acquired for a second-round pick. “So (you want to) try to return the favor.“At the same token, I think I’m at a point in my career where I haven’t really taken that next step financially, or had quite the security, I’d say. I guess that’s what I’m looking for.”There’s a lot to like about McCarron.He’s 6-foot-6. He’s a right-shot, which every team covets, especially Minnesota. He was one of the Wild’s best penalty killers — on the ice for four goals in 20 regular-season games and five in 11 playoff games. And after winning 51.4 percent of his draws for Minnesota in the regular season, he won 54.5 percent in the playoffs.He also showed in the postseason that he’s not just a fourth-line center. He can comfortably center the third line and was elevated to the second line in the final game. Scoring goals is certainly not his bread and butter, but he scored three in the regular season and two in the postseason.Would it be a difficult decision to turn down a Wild offer and test free agency?“I prioritize winning,” McCarron said. “I haven’t won anything. I’ve won a World Championship and a Memorial Cup, but that was 15 years ago, and a men’s World Championship — (that’s) just a short little stint in your long career, where the success of my NHL career hasn’t really been what I’ve wanted. So, winning a Stanley Cup has always been my goal. Coming here, it was a great opportunity, too. It feels like if you got past Colorado, you’d have a really great chance to do that. And obviously, we came up against the juggernaut. So those are things I definitely have to think about and weigh, and it’s going to be some hard conversations with my family and figure out where that goes.”It’s a problem every depth player dreams of. There will be a market if he decides to wait and test free agency, but he also knows he has it good in Minnesota, coached by Hynes, who previously coached him in Nashville and is a big reason the Wild were willing to spend a second-rounder on him.“He played solid, and obviously, he was good in the faceoff circle,” Hynes said. “He brings a lot of emotion. Great details. Fit in well with the team. Was good on the penalty kill. I think when you look at even when we did get the injuries moving forward in Colorado, we moved him around on different guys. The thing that we liked a lot about Mac was he played with a lot of different guys, but his game never changed.“… And that’s the value that he brought. He was just a very consistent player playing to his strengths, regardless of the circumstances.”As much as there was a sticker shock for some when the Wild paid a second-rounder for him, there could be more if the Wild re-sign him or he signs with a new team.McCarron projects to be worth a market value of $1.1 million, on average, over the next four years, according to The Athletic’s Dom Luszczyszyn’s model. But with the dearth of free-agent centers available and how coveted McCarron was at the deadline, the reality is that McCarron’s agent will be looking for much more.AFP Analytics and Evolving-Hockey both project a two-year deal in the $2 million range, whether he extends in Minnesota or signs elsewhere. And those projected numbers to re-sign with a Wild team desperate for centers seem light, especially in this rising-cap world. Some teams could be willing to invest even more — a longer-term deal with a four-year term could kick his cap hit up a notch, to the $3 million tier — according to Evolving-Hockey.The Wild currently have $15 million of cap space available this offseason, with only eight forwards, five defensemen and two goalies signed, and decisions to make on other unrestricted free agents, including Mats Zuccarello, Marcus Johansson, Vladimir Tarasenko, Nick Foligno and Zach Bogosian.So, unless the Wild plan to give McCarron what his agent deems market value and trade somebody else at a later date to free up cap space, it seems unlikely the Wild could give McCarron what he can get from another team in free agency.“I know some teams are strapped, and it is what it is, but I would love to be here,” McCarron said. “Coming back into the Midwest, I grew up in Detroit — I’m a Detroit kid — so being back in the Midwest has been eye-opening. It’s fun to be back. The weather is not all that great, but you can put those things aside when you have a really good hockey team and a great group of guys. And my family and I have loved it where we’re at.”It was obviously a disappointing end to the Wild’s season, not following up on an impressive Game 3 performance in Game 4, then blowing a 3-0 lead to lose Game 5 in overtime. In hindsight, McCarron wondered if players took too big a sigh of relief after advancing past the Dallas Stars and moving on to the second round for the first time in 11 years.“I know it was a big thing in the Minnesota sports world to get out of the first round,” he said. “I think maybe a lot of guys who have been here for a long time, and including me — I’ve never been out of the first round, but just coming off that emotional high in the first round, I think really it starts with Game 1 and 2. I don’t think we were quite ready to emotionally invest in the series when a team has gone through what the Wild have gone through the past 10, 11 years.“It’s almost like we maybe take a breath. But in saying that, I think when we were playing well, we were a really good hockey team. It was fun to be around the rink and be around this crew of great guys.“It starts with management, and then goes to the coaches and the guys. I think Billy really emphasizes winning in this organization. I think the winning culture here, or the try-to-win culture, is a breath of fresh air, really. Not to say where I was in the past wasn’t trying to win, but I feel like he’s putting pieces in place to try and win the ultimate prize, and the determination around the group, the guys seem like a lot of them have been together forever. When I came in here, it was great, great to come into this room. It was refreshing and really easy to come into, so just shows the character of the guys and the leadership in the room, and obviously Hynes is leading that as well.“This organization is top-notch.”— Shayna Goldman contributed to this story.