Speculation: Caps Roster General Discussion (Coaching/FAs/Cap/Lines etc) - 2023 Off-season

[RandyHolt]

You don’t choose to sink by playing kids you don’t believe in. I think that’s where we’ve been for a while.

GMs shouldn't get endless get out free jail cards for his inability to grade draft AND develop players because we won a cup 5 years ago. I think that’s why we’ve been sucking for 5 years now.

Latest stunt trading away 2 picks to bump AA to 7 who looked decent enough to me? I love the toughness of JE but can he get even stay healthy? If he feels that strongly about toughness he should have been drafting bigger meaner D for years among his years of neglecting taking forwards.

 

[Langway]

It's not like they're completely asset poor to be so easily resigned to being stuck. The Islanders dumped Josh Bailey for a 2nd in '26 and he had less cash owed than Mantha. Meanwhile they're sitting on three 2nds in '25.

Maybe there's more to come. You have to believe they're not done because some of MacLellan's previous statements about the top six don't jive with a buy-low post-injury Pacioretty being the answer. And yet it's totally believable if this does end up being all that they do. They've had some very bean-counter type off-seasons lately thanks to the flat cap. But Don Fishman could just as well execute off-seasons like that. It's completely uncreative. Again, this is not an asset poor franchise. They're only boxed in by their own lack of creativity IMO. We'll see what they come up with but even if they do have a $9.2M elephant in the room there's plenty within their control that they can focus on and improve. To be resigned so easily speaks very poorly for what sort of results they'll manage to get when they don't have the GOAT to prop their asses up. Do better.

 

[SherVaughn30]

I accepted a few months ago that the next two years are going to be rough. If they can surprise me and be a playoff contender then great, but I am expecting them to be kind of brutal until they get out from the contracts of Mantha, Kuznetsov, Oshie, and Backstrom.

It’s just not that complicated and I don’t see why people are getting worked up. They are paying Kuznetsov and Backstrom like they’re Jack Hughes and Brayden Point but instead of having two top six centers they’re getting Jay Beagle-in-Vancouver results.

The depth is fine, the blueline is fine, the goaltending is fine. The top six is a total mess and they don’t have room to make moves unless someone takes shitty players on expensive deals off their hands which no one is lining up to do. This is the price you pay for loyalty contracts, be thankful it’s only two years. It wouldn’t suck as bad if it wasn’t the twilight of Ovi’s career but since it is it makes it tougher to accept.

Just a correction, the Caps are overloaded with good goaltending at the Collegiate, ECHL, AHL and NHL levels. If anything they could probably use one of their goalie prospects and package it with something else for a good return. They clear cut have the best goaltending factory in the NHL! No team even comes close.

 

[YippieKaey]

I don’t have many more bits. It’s hard to come up with other scenarios to improve the team when the obvious one is just sitting there and no one is having it.

Toronto is going out and adding Ryan Reaves tomorrow. They’re looking like they might add Connor Brown. I highly suspect that they would not only straight up trade William Nylander for Tom Wilson, but that they would add a non-negligible asset to the trade as well. They’re clearly looking for toughness and grit. Negotiations with Nylander aren’t going great, and Treliving already has bad memories of Gaudreau leaving for nothing and Tkachuk leaving as well. There’s motivation from Toronto to make a deal.

Is this a trade you’d turn down? We’re not going to reach common ground if you’re turning down that trade. It works money-wise: Nylander only makes $1.8 million more than Wilson this year, Mantha is off the books next year which gives them room to extend Nylander. It works production-wise: Nylander has outscored Wilson every year of their careers. It works advanced-stat wise: Nylander is vastly more impactful than Wilson at driving goal differential. It works asset-wise: Washington would give up nothing in terms of futures. It works younger/faster-wise: Nylander is younger and faster. It works fit-wise: Nylander is an outstanding transition forward with the puck on his stick, a key weakness of the Capitals forward corps.

I’m not really interested in hearing that Capitals fans would be ok with moving Wilson on the right deal and then turning down that deal. It doesn’t square.

If you want another idea I guess trade Fehervary before the league finds out he’s not very good. Maybe they can eke value out there. But then again he’s only 23 and 7 years away from his prime so I guess you can’t trade him, especially after the stellar season he had this year.

I guess you could trade the 2024 first round pick and hope it’s enough for DeBrincat or someone of his ilk. I don’t know how the money works in that case unless you ship yet another asset out to move Mantha, for instance. I don’t particularly like the DeBrincat fit either, despite his skill level.

But it begins and ends with Wilson. Moving on from him now is strategically the best and most impactful move they can make. If you’re bored with me saying that, I guess be bored. You only have a few more days until he signs for like 8 x $7.5 million, so please bear with me until then.

Nobody is trading away Nylander for Wilson. Sorry. It's a bizarre overestimation of a fan favourite we all love.

 

[Calicaps]

I accepted a few months ago that the next two years are going to be rough. If they can surprise me and be a playoff contender then great, but I am expecting them to be kind of brutal until they get out from the contracts of Mantha, Kuznetsov, Oshie, and Backstrom.

It’s just not that complicated and I don’t see why people are getting worked up. They are paying Kuznetsov and Backstrom like they’re Jack Hughes and Brayden Point but instead of having two top six centers they’re getting Jay Beagle-in-Vancouver results.

The depth is fine, the blueline is fine, the goaltending is fine. The top six is a total mess and they don’t have room to make moves unless someone takes shitty players on expensive deals off their hands which no one is lining up to do. This is the price you pay for loyalty contracts, be thankful it’s only two years. It wouldn’t suck as bad if it wasn’t the twilight of Ovi’s career but since it is it makes it tougher to accept.

This. I think they'll probably be a bit better than last year, based on freak injuries alone. The injuries last year were nuts. Sure some of it was old guys being old, and those guys are now older. But the Carlson injury took a huge toll on the team and had zero to do with age. Willy's and Connor Brown too.

New, more modern coaching will hopefully be at least interesting to watch.

 

[SecretaryofDefense5]

One foot in trying to compete and one foot into rebuilding rarely bears good results. Pick a side and go for it.

 

[RedRocking]

One foot in trying to compete and one foot into retooling rarely bears good results. Pick a side and go for it.

 

[Kuz]

At least Pac and Edmundsson could be flipped at the deadline.

 

[Holtbyisms]

 

[SecretaryofDefense5]

This thread:

 

[HTFN]

One foot in trying to compete and one foot into retooling rarely bears good results. Pick a side and go for it.

I think we pretty recently established that they can't make that decision yet based on the players they have to make it around.

What happens to Backstrom alone could swing them hard in one direction. If he LTIRetires they walk into next offseason with some incredibly stupid amount of money just between that and Mantha leaving.

 

[BiPolar Caps]

Weird victory lap, you know the saying about plans and first contact.

1.) maybe wait for ice time to actually happen
2.) just like you preached about trading up, there are two sides to each deal and no guarantee a reasonable ask was made
3.) so far I basically count a very cheap warm body D that they needed from somewhere either way, and a pretty low risk, high reward option that almost seems built exactly like the Backstrom plan if they don't do it stupid

like, they already said Pacioretty isn't going to be ready for the opener, they still get to do the kid thing, Pacioretty comes back at his own speed wherever he fits, tries to hit his bonuses, and depending on how the Caps are doing (likely not well) they see if he has deadline value.

or alternatively his ankle completely evaporates and nothing really changes

I'd have preferred somebody besides Edmundson but after looking at some of the contracts today him with retention is not much different than the going rate. This is one where I can see him just annoyingly clogging up the works if overplayed but we don't really know how that shakes out yet.

I believe that I read that the Pacioretty deal includes a NMC. That being said, if he does have a good bounce back season prior to the TDL, he maybe amenable to waiving the NMC in order to play on a playoff team.

This board today:

 

[Jags]

Latest stunt trading away 2 picks to bump AA to 7 who looked decent enough to me? I love the toughness of JE but can he get even stay healthy? If he feels that strongly about toughness he should have been drafting bigger meaner D for years among his years of neglecting taking forwards.

If Alexeyev gets bumped, that's between him and Carbery. What Mac did was spend a bit more to make sure we upgraded Irwin and had real, non-Hershey insurance for AA because the kid has a habit of getting hurt.

We got a 7D that can compete with the kids for a spot, and one that might still be good if he can heal up. If he can't and is brutal, AA plays regardless. If he can't and he's hurt, he goes to IR and has no cap impact.

Worst case we're out one decent pick. Best case he's healthy, plays well, and we flip him at the deadline.

 

[HTFN]

I believe that I read that the Pacioretty deal includes a NMC. That being said, if he does have a good bounce back season prior to the TDL, he maybe amenable to waiving the NMC in order to play on a playoff team.

This board today:

I genuinely can't imagine it would obstruct anything, I don't see the point in baking one in outside of being able to choose your deadline destination and avoid waivers if you're truly awful (was discussed above).

It's way more likely to not matter because he's hurt or bad enough that nobody wants him than for him to be shooting down good trades only to keep a couple extra months in Washington before starting the whole FA process over again anyway, with no playoffs to show for it and likely all of his bonuses hit by then.

 

[Misery74]

Here is how I see the division:

NJD
CAR

NYR
NYI

CBJ
WAS
PIT

PHI

Youth and coaching is the only way out of this mess. Ovechkin wants to compete, it’s just not possible when you are paying 19, 39, and 92 $23m. Math is math.

With our draft, things are looking up. Really hope we let Carberry have a good look before we make any huge mistakes.

 

[SecretaryofDefense5]

I still want to see Kuzy and/or Mantha gone. I’m holding out hope.

 

[twabby]

I still want to see Kuzy and/or Mantha gone. I’m holding out hope.

Barring an unexpected trade happening they pretty much have to lose one of Kuznetsov/Mantha/Backstrom in order to become cap compliant.

 

[SecretaryofDefense5]

Barring an unexpected trade happening they pretty much have to lose one of Kuznetsov/Mantha/Backstrom in order to become cap compliant.

I had them as being compliant when I played with the numbers as long as Fever signs for 2.2 or less I thought.

 

[twabby]

I had them as being compliant when I played with the numbers as long as Fever signs for 2.2 or less I thought.

They have 10F now not including Pacioretty. If they use Protas and McMichael to fill out 11 and 12 then they’ll have $1.9 million to sign Fehervary. But that leaves them with no extra forward. And I still kind of doubt Fehervary goes for less than $2 million. He might not be good but he’s played 20 minutes a night for the last two seasons.

 

[Rayquaza64]

They have 10F now not including Pacioretty. If they use Protas and McMichael to fill out 11 and 12 then they’ll have $1.9 million to sign Fehervary. But that leaves them with no extra forward. And I still kind of doubt Fehervary goes for less than $2 million. He might not be good but he’s played 20 minutes a night for the last two seasons.

or, another option that seems more likely is they trade fehervary. Wouldn’t be as much of a hassle and probably has decent value around the league. Or who knows, they could use him as an asset in a trade for a top six forward, then either dumping mantha or just buying him out. Or I could just be dumb!

 

[HTFN]

or, another option that seems more likely is they trade fehervary. Wouldn’t be as much of a hassle and probably has decent value around the league. Or who knows, they could use him as an asset in a trade for a top six forward, then either dumping mantha or just buying him out. Or I could just be dumb!

I don't really remember all the rules but I'm not really seeing the appeal of buying Mantha out and keeping dead cap space around next year as a result when they just have to cope with him for a year under a new coach and then be free of the whole thing entirely

 

[SecretaryofDefense5]

I don't really remember all the rules but I'm not really seeing the appeal of buying Mantha out and keeping dead cap space around next year as a result when they just have to cope with him for a year under a new coach and then be free of the whole thing entirely

I have no idea how he will feel about it but I do wonder how cool Ovi will be with the we aren’t going to make the playoffs approach. One would think he realizes they need changes and he wants to win but who knows. I don’t pretend to know what matters to him at this point.

 

[Rayquaza64]

If they want to win, there are gonna have to be some changes. They saw how this team plays healthy last year in a stretch where if they played well with the whole band together they make a playoff push, and absolutely fell flat on their face. I don’t know how keeping the band together shows they are trying to win more than willing to make some changes would.

 

[WanderingCapsFan]

If they want to win, there are gonna have to be some changes. They saw how this team plays healthy last year in a stretch where if they played well with the whole band together they make a playoff push, and absolutely fell flat on their face. I don’t know how keeping the band together shows they are trying to win more than willing to make some changes would.

They are in No Man's Land.

I'm not sure how they get out, and I'm not sure that GMBM knows how to get them out.

I assume the future will be ugly. I hope my expectations are proven wrong.

 

[Hivemind]

They are in No Man's Land.

I'm not sure how they get out, and I'm not sure that GMBM knows how to get them out.

I assume the future will be ugly. I hope my expectations are proven wrong.

They're sailing into a storm. They've been sailing in it for a while, actually. They could turn the ship around hard and return to port (a full rebuild), but they don't want to. They could attempt to sail around the storm (retool), even if its an arduous path thru some uncharted waters. But they're afraid to do that as well. So instead they're just continuously pushing straight thru the storm, hoping that the weather breaks soon, despite the fact the ship is taking on water.