Wednesday Caps Clips: The Roster Is Set

Yep, love you Brads. Anyone that says what they feel to the media has a pass by me. Even Avery, haha

I don’t think this guy is that clever.

that’s a pretty impressive pull

It’s a poor word choice and sentence construction, and for someone who gets paid to use the English language, that’s pretty inexcusable, but he obviously is referring to Ovechkin in relation to himself and not the rest of the League.

When Ovechkin plays in all situation like Toewes, when he plays the most important position on the ice like Toewes, and when he’s coming off leading his team to a Stanley Cup like Toewes, I think you can trumpet him as much as you want. And he deserves it.

AO had 61 ESP, 1 off of Daniel Sedin’s and Corey Perry’s 1st-place 62. 73 the previous year, 10 (!!!) behind Henrik Sedin. The previous year, 63, 7 behind Malkin. Before that, 75, 9 ahead of 2nd-place Malkin.

Now rank them based on value

Still can’t believe Vokoun signed for $1.5m

I’d love it if either of the Caps’ G’s (or any of the three) could choke their way to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals.

He’s all for truth in reporting.

Hmm… reminds me… do they spell it tire or tyre up there?

Personally, I think his passing has always been underrated and that as the years have gone on, he’s just been surrounded with better finishers. But I could be wrong – hard to not be influenced by 20/20 hindsight.

I don’t think it’s a reach to say Sid’s status as the best player on the planet has been compromised by his injury. The dude is one solid check away from retirement, and as much as that sucks for hockey, the fact is that someone so fragile has no place in the current conversation about the game’s best player. Was he the best on Jan. 1 of last year? Perhaps. Is he right now, on IR and with no timetable to return? Says here that he isn’t, and shouldn’t be.

Don’t mean to call him out for getting injured, but the praise he gets for leading his team against the Wings is a reach as well.

Friedman put a bad taste in my mouth last night too. I think it was because he was saying that Ovi is both “to blame” and “not to blame” for the team’s playoff failures. And that he seems to have written him off. I would also have liked a little specificity as to how Ovi is suppose to improve his game.

I’m with you on everything but “not to take anything from Staal”

And I completely agree with your last paragraph… and I’m not sure Friedman would disagree. He clearly notes:

That does not mean it cannot happen. The guy just turned 26 and has years of superb hockey remaining. But it’s time for him to become as single-minded as his elite peers, to modify his game and reach his full potential.

There are positive signs. He was notorious for arriving in North America just before training camp, which cut down his skating time because he had commercial and NHL commitments upon returning. This year, he came back earlier.

And all the while, Malkin’s been the Semin (or Backstrom) to Sid’s Ovi – he’s never really been “the guy” and had that pressure.

glad I’m not the only one scratching my head over the Malkin love. A guy who has fallen off a cliff the past several seasons, coming off reconstructive knee surgery? Yeah, that’s the guy I’m banking on!

I get it. Pittsburgh is the NHL’s personal lap dog on which no limit of compliments are lavished. I’ve never really understood it, but there it is.

I hated this when it was Detroit in the 1990s and I hate it now that it’s Pittsburgh.

If the NHL is going to fall over itself to boost a single city’s team, can’t they at least pick a decent city? Back when the Avalanche was everyone’s darlings, that was much, much more palatable. I’ll take Denver any time.

I took him 8th overall in my fantasy draft, so I’m kind of hoping at least some of it comes true… Just not against the Caps.

Not surprised to see Nikita Filatov on the list. Selfish, uncaring Russian.

And Stephen Peat is 20th?

This.

I don’t think he’s improved much in D responsibility or playing with in the system, personally. Still a lot of lone ranger attack from him. Rink turns in the D zone, etc.

He’s improved defensively… but the bar was set awfully low to begin with. And while he often/usually goes along with the system, there are certainly not-infrequent occasions on which he freelances (not sure how much of an improvement he’s made there – I didn’t think he was too system-averse to begin with). And I’ll defer on the leadership point – I have no real insight into that (though as he is reportedly more of a “lead by example” guy, I obviously didn’t care much for Game 5 vs. MTL… which admittedly is 16 months ago or whatever). Even granting those, I don’t know that any of them has been a “Wow” improvement.

I agree wholeheartedly that the massive point totals he’s accumulated, while incredibly impressive, don’t tell the whole story.

Shootout %!

When Ovi was a rookie, defense was a dirty word. Can anyone seriously say he hasn’t improved the defensive aspect of his game? I know I can’t but then again I’m not an “expert”.

His production dipped after the Olympics. It wasn’t just last year. MON in particular put an off-hand D on him to take away his move, and that seems to have been very successful, and adopted across the league.

I think that skill was already there for Crosby. He had 120 goals in 121 games with Rimouski. But he subordinated that skill within the concept of what the Penguins were trying to do. I think Crosby deserves a lot of credit for that. One adjective that should never attach to his name is “selfish,” save for that he is selfish for winning. I’m not saying Crosby hasn’t put in the work to refine that aspect of his game, but perhaps he saw what cards he was holding in terms of teammates that could put the puck in the net and figured out, “I’m going to have to do more of this myself.” He was able to do that in no small part because he already had that skill in abundance.

Yup, I’ve been hoping for his Shannahan-like transformation. He has time still, but hasn’t shown the inclination.

He cycled when Hanlon was coaching.

He was using a wood stick with a nearly flat curve for his first 3 years. He switched to a one piece with a little more curve, and that seemed to help a lot.

I have one of his extras from when he was a 2nd year player. It’s absurd that he even played with it.

I feel like it had to be more then the big payday

I noticed that as well.

Same thing he has every morning, Frosted Flacks…

Oh, I know, but the “extremely underwhelming” screams snark to me.

It wouldn’t be the Caps if the second line wasn’t fundamentally dysfunctional.

Ohhhhh…. Never mind.

I don’t mind the Steckel trade. It’s just a 4th.

good call

So the only reason I can think of to send Orlov/Collins down was to get them some time training with the Bears cause it’s likely they will be spending most of their season down there.

Other than that, I can only surmise that the team will stop at nothing to deny you any satisfaction, smug or otherwise.

Lundqvist always starts a lot of games, leading to a lot of wins. He posts strong save percentages and GAA. The media thinks the NYR D isn’t all that great, though not porous. He’s been nominated multiple times before. It’s very possible.