2009-10 Rink Wrap: Shaone Morrisonn

The Vote: Rate Morrisonn below on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the best) based on his performance relative to his potential and your expectations for the season – if he had the best year you could have imagined him having, give him a 10; if he more or less played as you expected he would, give him a 5 or a 6; if he had the worst year you could have imagined him having, give him a 1.

6 because he performed ever so slightly ahead of my expectations — for awhile there he looked like the formidable defensive player the Capitals needed at times.

He gets a +1 for putting Kunitz? I think, or some Penguin into a headlock and getting away with it as well as just ramping up the violence against the Penguins. He was a wrecking ball for those games.

I thought that while he did pretty well in his own end, he should be able to pick up his game in the other end of the ice a bit more. To get a 10 next season, he will have to substantially improve his 2-way game, and perhaps reduce his PIMs.

I thought he played pretty well this year, don’t think there i much chance of him coming back

Pretty much what I expected. No reason to re-sign him for 2+. We could find a better option at that price. Guys like Shamo have some value as veterans that can play in the NHL, but we need to save money where we can. Juice can be signed for less and give us the same quality minutes with more upside. Shamo isn’t going to solve our top 4 problems so we may as well let him go somewhere else.

Pretty much what I expected. I did want some more offense, but his “extracurriculars” evened that out.

Now that he’s a UFA, will another team look to sign him for an amount close, or more than, his arbitration-awarded salary?

I doubt it. I suppose he’ll look for something similar, but when he can’t find any offer at that price and with good term, he’ll sign for less somewhere.

Valuable though he is in what he does bring to the Caps, how much is ShaMo really worth, and can comparable services be found within, or without of, the organization for a smaller cap hit?

Yes, in Alzner, though that’s not much of a savings. I guess now we’d go into free agent vs Juice vs Morrisonn. I really think that the things that Morrisonn brings outside of general game play is kind of replaceable by anyone, really. Scrum? Call in Poti, Bradley, Knuble, Fehr, etc. Joe Corvo will be gone as well, so Morrisonn isn’t really left with much. Good skater who brings some physicality, but not much else. No thanks.

He was pretty much where I thought he’d be in in most facets of his game. However, his physicality and willingness to stick up for his teammates puts him over the edge. Also, he seemed to ramp things up against the Penguins, which is always a good thing.

Like F&B said, Juice can probably be had for cheaper and has more upside at both ends of the ice. Also, I thought Juice elevated his game nicely in the playoffs last year, so there’s that to consider as well.

6- right now he’s our one physical defenseman. i thought his play was about what i expected, with a little bump for stepping up the physical play. he seemed to be the one guy back there who made it a point to take the body. i like shamo and think he could be one of our top six guys back there. however, he could certainly be the odd man out should we be active in FA (i’m presuming 4 and 89 are already out of the top 6 discussion). i think juice can fill the physical role too, but he doesnt seem to have the inclination to make it a part of his game all the time (nice olympic hit on crosby notwithstanding).

he might get a look from other teams. he’s still relatively young at 27. i cant imagine he sees a long term deal. i could see the caps offering him a one year deal at close to his current salary for starters. first things first is to sign sarge. if they sign sarge for $2M/per, then it would be hard for sarge to argue he deserves more.

Right on target for what I expected. His gritiness/toughness was impressive, but his lack of offense and inability to get the puck to the net evened it out for me.

I snickered when I read that we were asking ourselves in the 2007-8 RR whether this guy was “a legitimate number one shutdown defenseman.” To be fair, I consider him a reach for the second pair on a championship-like team, but he’s serviceable as a 3rd pair defender and I wouldn’t mind seeing him come back. But he’s gonna have to show the Caps some money to do it, and I don’t see that happening. However, if he’s in our unis next fall, a 10 for him would mean full health, 17+ TOI with some successful time on the second pair, half the stick foul PIM’s and three times the goals.

Pretty much bang on what I expected of him. Would’ve gotten higher if he wasn’t so one-dimensional. Serviceable on any team as a 3rd pair, but maybe 2nd pair minutes for short stints at a time. He’s still relatively young, and could improve, but though I think he looked good with Carlson/Corvo, I don’t think the Caps have that kinda luxury to look at him experimentally for another year, and not at 2M or so. Better ways to spend that money (Juice, FA, etc.).

I have the haunting feeling that Morrisonn has improved as much as he is going to improve. That’s not a bade level of play, but what you see is what you’re going to see for the next five years as he plays through the prime of his career. On this team, it makes for a difficult fit. If you assume Schultz is re-signed (and if he isn’t, I’d be shocked), then the defense next year has…

Green-Schultz
Carlson-Poti
Alzner-???

Morrisonn could be that partner on the third pair, but the Caps still have Sloan and Erskine to pay (cap hit approximately equal to that encumbered by Morrisonn last season). I think the Caps could probably upgrade at that 3rd pair and not spend much more to do it. Carlson — right now — does what Morrisonn did on defense (although not with quite the edge Morrisonn displayed this past season) and has a lot more offensive upside. He and Alzner have zoomed past him on the depth chart.

What’s more, if Morrisonn is signed, even at a slight pay cut, you have to play him. The Caps will be paying $1.25M next year for Erskine to be a 7th defenseman, or so it would seem. You can’t have Morrisonn getting paid $1.6 or so (hypothetically) to be the 7th defenseman and bump Erskine to 8th and Sloan to waivers… almost $3 million in cap hit in the press box? Not a good idea. And all that assumes you’ve gone out and found another partner for Alzner by FA or trade.

DO NOT WANT.

I had very low expectations. He exceeded them in a contract year. I wish him well wherever he winds up. Hope it’s not here.

Bout all you can expect from ShaMo I’m afraid.

Lots of better options for next year than him.

 I would rather sign Juice for a little less than what it might take to get Morrison. I think he has peaked here, but his style of play might fit in better with a more “down tempo” team. He might even improve in the right situation.

Slightly above expectations, primarily due to the physical play that he brought. (lack of) offensive contribution was about what was expected, maybe slightly lower.

The Discussion: Now that he’s a UFA, will another team look to sign him for an amount close, or more than, his arbitration-awarded salary? Valuable though he is in what he does bring to the Caps, how much is ShaMo really worth, and can comparable services be found within, or without of, the organization for a smaller cap hit?

I don’t think the caps should or will bring him back, regardless of the salary, so for his sake I hope another team picks him up. He’ll probably have to play for closer to 1.5 than 2.0 next season though. I think the Caps should try to sign a veteran “bottom 3” defender to work with Alzner on the 3rd pairing, rather than relying on Erskine/ShaMo/Jurcina as that 3rd pairing partner. Someone who can mentor him to some extent. It would be nice to bring that player in during the offseason, or at least prior to calendar year 2011, rather than waiting all the way to the trade deadline, but in a pinch they could probably make it until the deadline (and thus save some cap space) using Erskine in the 3rd pairing. I would really much rather we didn’t have to do that though.

In retrospect, i guess I should have gone with 5 because he didn’t perform significantly below expectations, but I had hoped for a more solid season from him heading into his UFA year.

I did get the impression that he’s a more willing and effective (can’t discount the importance of timing and success) hitter on the team than I had previously given him credit for. Boy did he punish anyone who breathed on Carlson in the Pittburgh game I saw live.

So I guess that’s a 7.. Salary apparently isn’t a major factor for me on D this year, maybe because we have the luxury of not having to worry so much about it – at the moment.

I would love to be able to replace him or ghad Erskine with Jurcina, but Juice needs to be more physical – tho I think he know this and is trying.

i will be honest, his name has come up in conversations we’ve had at NM about defensemen the Canucks could pick up over the summer. any thoughts on that?

This is approximately what I expected from ShaMo this season – physical play, but a guy who should really be on the third pair. Is that worth 1.975 mil a season? Not hardly. I thought he was the guy to cover for Mike Green out of everyone on the roster, but it ended up being Jeff Schultz and for good reason: ShaMo isn’t capable of covering Green’s back, even if he is a better skater than 55. Schultz is more likely to make the smart play, while ShaMo too often goes for that big hit. If he grows out of it, I think he becomes a more valuable, more effective defenseman.

Having a bad season at ES with the way this team played is simply not acceptable for a guy making 2 million bucks a year against the salary cap. He’s jumpy with the puck and doesn’t make particularly great passes, but I’m not going to hold that against a guy who’s role is to play defense. What I will hold against him is getting a lot of goals scored on him, regardless of who was on the ice with him.

Now that he’s a UFA, will another team look to sign him for an amount close, or more than, his arbitration-awarded salary? Valuable though he is in what he does bring to the Caps, how much is ShaMo really worth, and can comparable services be found within, or without of, the organization for a smaller cap hit?

I’ll bet he doesn’t make his current salary in his next contract. GMs are going to wonder how a player only ends up 8 playing on a team that finished as strongly on the right end of the plus/minus ledger as the Caps did and I’ll bet most of them have proprietary advanced metrics and scouting staffs. Maybe someone thinks he has more room to grow and signs him at 2 per season, but there’s little doubt he’s underperformed his contract in WSH and that other team’s scouts know that.

I’d pay him maybe Bradley’s contract. Maybe. I don’t even think he’s worth that if he can’t get his ES woes straightened out. Yes, he eats good PK minutes on a team that desperately needs it, but that can be had for not much money. In a world where Dennis Seidenberg and Jan Hejda eat nearly the same space, I can’t give ShaMo much. Bring on Juice.

I pray he is not on this team next season…That is all.

I like ShaMo’s attitude and toughness but the stats are working against him. Given his salary one would expect a much better even strength GOAN/60. Maybe we can find better value with someone else.