Thursday Roundup - The $4.875 Million Question

1) Essentially agree with your points here. Its silly to think that there is much if any chance he’ll be traded during the season so it makes sense to try to make the most of what they have.
2) Nylander’s biggest gripe has been his lack of linemate consistency and ice time. So your idea to give him what he’s asking for, for a decent length of time makes sense. If he continues to do little then he can’t complain when he’s watching the playoffs from the press box. If on the other hand he starts to produce then the caps have an additional weapon just when they need it most.
3) Meanwhile how much longer does Bruce keep Clark in the lineup/when does he officially relinquish the C to #8?

A couple other things:

He’s eighth in PP TOI for forwards this year, and was second last year. His TOI has gone from 19:09 to 14:36, and his PP TOI has been reduced by over half from 5:14 to 2:35.

I also think this was something that was frankly unavoidable when Fedorov re-signed. there was going to be a 3rd line center making at least $4m per and was going to be overpaid. Fedorov’s around 17 minutes per, I think giving Nylander another couple of minutes can’t be harmful. I wholeheartedly agree with 16 and 14 as linemates, for sure.

I really like this line combo. A lot.

That would leave us with:

theMachine-Backstrom-Kozlov
Semin-Fedorov-Laich
Flash-Nylander-Fehr
Brashear-Gordon-Steckel/Clark/Bradley

That’s a sweet lineup and I don’t want to give up on Nylander. Like you said, give him a chance with this line and appropriate minutes for the rest of the season and then we can judge.

" . . . .the question isn’t whether or not the Caps can make lemonade out of this apparent lemon, but rather whether or not a team with aspirations as lofty as those the Caps hold whether or not they can even float the wedge in their collective glass of water without fear of what it might do to the rest of the drink.
JP I think this clause needs some re-thinking. Clearly you have weather on the mind after the last few days?

We can complain all day long about Nyl’s 4.8M and his production. We’ve got another C who’s playing at a point-per pace for 4M. We’ve got another who’s even better than a point per, at only 2.5M or so. In the same breath that someone complains about Nyls’ 4.8, you have to also praise Backstrom’s production at his reduced role? This isn’t Baseball, this is a team game. As JP mentioned, time with man advantage and consistency with linemates goes a long way. Look at what happens in football, typically on the first snap, when a Center gets hurt and has to be replaced mid game.

To expand some more on what I mean, I posted this on WaPo a week or so ago but most got lost during a game-night post:
In an ideal world, the one my wife lives in when she watches the Caps play, every player would produce the kind of points Ovie does. In reality, the first, second and third (and fourth) lines will produce differing amounts of points. Most of this is due to match-up issues vs talent, and a good portion is due to playing time and chances with the man advantage. Right now, the caps are paying decent cash to their top 3 centers, with one getting 3 min more ice time per game than the other 2.

One gets paid 4.8, another 4 and another 2.5M per year. That’s 11.3M of this team’s cap room tied up in our top 3 centers.

Looking at PIT. THIS year alone, they have 12.5 tied up in their top 2C’s. Next year, they’ll have 18 in their top 2, and 21.5 in their top 3.

NYR: 15 tied up in just 2C’s.

NJD: 12 in their top 3.

TB: 11.4.

CAR: 10.9…

I’ll do a few more.

Detroit, the model of excellence in this league is so excellent because of the value of their contracts and the paycuts players are willing to take to play there.
They have 11.5 tied up in their top 3C’s (per their depth chart, not listed position).

SJ: 15.1

BOS: 11.9

Sure, we want all our players to produce up to their pay grade. We get elated when players produce above their pay grade. We have also said that a blind monkey could get 50 points a year playing with AO. The reality is, of the top 4 teams in the league we pay out the lowest $$ for our top 3 C’s. Why does this matter? The team is winning. If we weren’t winning, it would not be Nylander who we’d be angry with. It would be the lines where the points are SUPPOSED to come from, not the 3rd line.
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Nylander has the distinction of being the only Cap this year to have played with EVERY other regular cap (minus hershey call-ups, but I’m sure he’s played with most of them, too). That’s not a recipe for success.

Gonna go through all 30 teams here. I’m going to list the production numbers for each of the teams 3rd leading scoring center (arbitrary, I know). I will investigate instances where I feel a C is misrepresented based on line combos (Det, 5 “Cs” who have skated in 40+ games). Will use game notes to determine even-strength line combos.

Player (Games) – Goals, Pts, +/-

ANA: Neidermeyer (45) – 10G, 15 pts, -6
ATL: (everyone’s a C on ATL) Peverly (30) – 3G, 15 pts, +2
BOS: (Kessel is 3rd on team, but plays on line with Savard.) Bergeron (31) – 4G, 18pts, +1
BUF: Mair (46) – 5G, 12P, +2
CAL: Lombardi (32) – 4G, 19P, +5
CAR: Cullen (42) – 10G, 17P, +1
CHI: Frasier (44) – 3G, 11P, +2
COL: Hensick (33) – 3G, 13P, +5
CBJ: Williams (43) – 8G, 19P, -9
DAL: Modano (44) – 13G, 28P, -3
DET: Franzen (40) – 21G, 32P, +11 (Confusing as hell finding their 3rd C)
EDM: Gagner (42) – 4G, 17P, E
FLA: Campbell (40) – 9G, 21P, +7
LA: Handzus (44) – 7G, 17P, -5
MIN: Belanger (42) – 9G, 21P, -9
MON: Plekanec (44) – 9G, 20P, 1 (Deceptive, 3rd leading C behind Koivu who’s been out 1/2 year)
NSH: Bonk (44) – 5G, 14P, -7
NJD: Madden (40) – 5G, 16P, -5
NYI: Comrie (29) – 6G, 15P, -5
NYR: Dubinsky (47) – 7G, 24P, -3
OTT: Vermette (43) – 5G, 14P, -10
PHI: Metropolit (41) – 1G, 10P, -1
PHO: Hanzal (47) – 9G, 23P, -1
PIT: Staal (47) – 14G, 26P, -3 (something’s fishy with the lines here, 4 “C’s” with more than 40 games, 1 with more than 35)
SAN: Pavelski (42) – 13G, 31P, +3
STL: Steen (45) – 6G, 17P, -5
TB: Stamkos (44) – 6G, 18P, -8
TOR: Moore (46) – 9G, 23P, -2
VAN: Wellwood (41) – 14G, 19P, 4
WAS: Nylander (45) – 4G, 22P, 2

So folks, what do we have:
League Average Points/Game (PPG-3rdC): 0.46
Nylander’s PPG: 0.48
Nylander’s league rank in PPG-3rdC: 14th

Could he be doing better for his 4.8M/year? Absolutely. We came into this season feeling like this team was deep at center. When healthy, we are very deep at center. But as soon as one of our top 3 goes down, how deep are we really? Fedorov has not gone uninjured since before the lockout. If we trade Nyls and something happens to Backstrom or Feds come playoff time, are we really going to be comfortable making a deep push in the playoffs with Stecks on our 2nd line and a Hershey call-up on the 3rd?

Agreed that Nyls isn’t going anywhere, so let’s see what he can do with consistent ice time and linemates. These are likely the last 33 regular season games Nylander will play in a Caps uniform, so at the very least the team has to maximize his curb appeal for a possible trade this summer. More to the point, the guy is a talented player and it’s Boudreau’s job to bring out that talent to its fullest. If he can get Michael to start producing at his career level, it makes the team and his linemates that much more dangerous.

Say Nylander agrees to moving and is moved, what do you do?

Hope you resign Fedorov (who just turned 39) and expect him to be your #2 center?

Move one of the vets (Kozlov, Laich) to center with the hopes they’ll play the role well enough to…

Give a long look to one of the Bears in camp or just generally free up a whole lot of space?

Make a run at Connolly, Comrie or one of the other 2nd tier UFA centers?

Other?

Man, am I getting old.

I think that Gabby could meet Nyls halfway by agreeing to stabilize his linemates for a month. That doesn’t seem to me to be doing much more than Gabby should be doing as a coach anyway. I mean, Gabby doesn’t have to like Nyls, he just has to maximize what the team gets out of him. (And stabilizing linemates doesn’t give of the appearance of favoritism or liking the guy or anything like that.)