No team in NHL history stunk as bad as those guys. I watched a couple of those game live that year. We got boat raced both times. 1 road win all year. Woof.
It's amusing how bad the Caps were in 74-75. The other expansion team that year, Kansas City, was also quite bad at 15-54-11.
In a year where the league average sv% was .890, the Caps had a team average of .855. Caps were worst in GF (181) and GA (446). Caps weren't that far behind the Scouts in goals scored (184 vs 181), but the real issue was defense/goaltending with the Caps allowing 105 more goals than the Minnesota North Stars (2nd worst that season). Caps also had the misfortune of being in the tougher Prince of Wales conference which featured 4 teams over 40 wins (Campbell conference had only one; but to be fair I'm sure the other conference teams feasted on Washington which boosted their win/point totals).
Finally, the 1974 draft wasn't great. Kansas City fared much better with Wilf Paiement (a future 40/40 guy) at the #2 pick than the Caps did at the #1 pick with Joly. Safe to say the Caps fortunes would have been a lot better had they gotten Denis Potvin (1OA in 1973) or Guy Lafleur (1OA in 1971).
Between tough expansion rules, coming in with a second team, and a diluted talent pool, it was tough sledding for both expansion teams that year. Caps didn't make the playoffs of course until 1982-93, and the Scouts [later Rockies and then even later Devils] only made the playoffs once (because someone had to*) until the late 80s.
*The then Rockies made the playoffs in 1977-78 with a 19-40-21 record which was remarkably second in a historically bad division.
