While the Washington Capitals made some moves at this year’s trade deadline, sending Nic Dowd to the Vegas Golden Knights and John Carlson to the Anaheim Ducks, it was on the surface not a bad return for a pair of pending unrestricted free agents, but also was a pair of moves that essentially pulled the plug on a season that never got a chance to get going.
While Washington was busy in the summer of 2024 to move up to the top of the Eastern Conference standings, last summer was quiet, under the reasonable assumption the unrestricted free agent market was overheated and the team was better off waiting until later to address some issues and make another run into the playoffs.
The team was thin in the middle, and that didn’t get any better when Pierre-Luc Dubois was injured in October. While the team still thrived in the month after that, rising to the top of the Eastern Conference standings by the first week of December, Ryan Leonard was injured in a game at Anahiem and things started to go sideways.
Although Washington General Manager Chris Patrick had promised to upgrade the team’s forward corps since the summer lull, the team didn’t pursue any moves with Leonard out. In fact, even though the team had seen some potential in their AHL farm club, the Hershey Bears, of that crop, only Ivan Miroshnichenko got a cup of coffee in January to try to bolster a team that went nearly two months after back-to-back wins dating back to that California road trip that ended in Orange County.
While Washington played better with Leonard back and Dubois’ return just before the Olympic break, going into the trade deadline, the Capitals dropped a pair of games to the Montreal Canadiens and Utah Mammoth heading into the deadline, four points out of a playoff spot.
While that wasn’t a great scenario for Washington, they also had 19 games remaining, just 8 against playoff teams, and would have two shots each at two teams they were chasing in the Boston Bruins and Pittsburgh Penguins. Most, the players included, expected the team to add that missing piece up front they had been lacking, particularly when the club had been banking cap space all season long to slot in a forward.
Washington elected to send Dowd to Vegas, which wasn’t a huge surprise since the center had struggled this season, and they would need some space for what presumably would be an add up front. Although Dowd was a longtime Cap, arriving in Washington just after the team’s 2018 Stanley Cup Final win. Dowd had one year left on his deal, allowing the Caps to pick up a second-rounder and a fourth-rounder for the depth center.
While Dowd was a popular player in the locker room, it was clear he was struggling a bit with the added responsibility with Dubois out most of the season, and a deeper lineup in Nevada would help give him a change of scenery.
However, the Capitals in the overnight hours Thursday then elected to send pending unrestricted free agent John Carlson to Anaheim for a first- and third-rounder. Carlson, one of just three players left from the 2018 title team, had reportedly been negotiating with Washington but unlike players like Nicklas Backstrom who got a deal done fast, apparently couldn’t come to an agreement on term and salary with him turning 36 in January.
Hockey-wise, it was a decent move to pick up a pair of high picks for a pending UFA, but devastating to the team’s thin playoff hopes, as the trade of the longtime vet was a gut punch to the roster.
Under Brian MacLellan, the Capitals had really taken care of its veterans, particularly Alex Ovechkin, Backstrom and T.J. Oshie. Instead, they shipped off their assistant captain off in the middle of the night without consulting him, and not actually talking to him before announcing the trade.
While Carlson was certainly seemingly not in Washington’s long-term plans, and his performance in last year’s playoff series against the Carolina Hurricanes was well below his standards, the handling of the situation was magnified by a failed attempt to reach Carlson, and while they were under no obligation to discuss a potential landing spot with Carlson, it certainly would have gone a long way to discuss the possible destination before pulling the trigger.
Caps Add Ex-Leafs
While there was talk the Capitals would still add after the Carlson trade, Patrick’s two trade acquisitions were underwhelming at best, adding a pair of depth rentals, adding Vancouver Canucks center David Kampf for a sixth-rounder, and San Jose Sharks defenseman Timothy Liljegren for the fourth-rounder Washington got in the Dowd trade.
Both played under Capitals coach Spencer Carbery with the Toronto Maple Leafs, and while the price for the two weren’t steep, the fact Washington now will have ample cap space to acquire other talent over the summer to replace these rentals.
Not surprisingly, after the deadline, Washington played its most important game of the season in Boston, and turned in an uninspired loss to the Bruins, leaving them six points out of the playoffs with 18 games left to play.
While Washington was on the outside of the playoff race coming into the deadline, a lot of that is due to the fact the Capitals had not properly filled holes in the roster, instead pushing the fix to the trade deadline. Then, once the deadline arrived, instead of delivering on a promise to acquire help for a playoff push, instead the Capitals traded two of their three most tenured veterans for picks, and only brought back a pair of depth players.
While the Capitals were able to sell at the 2024 trade deadline and still sneak in, that sell-off was a bit more expected and also was the product of the teams around them failing to secure playoff spots. This time around, while the playoff field isn’t very daunting, the damage to the team’s psyche is probably enough to ensure an uninspiring finish, and not even calling up some of the prospects from Hershey.
Although top defensive prospect Cole Hutson could be available to Washington as soon as Wednesday night, the failure of management to deliver a legitimate push to fix the roster issues ended Washington’s playoff hopes before they even could start.
In addition to that, the communications snafus with both Dowd and Carlson of having trades leak before the players were informed – usually a pretty standard task for most NHL teams, particularly since they both involved just one player – could have negative impacts on retaining players and signing others down the road.
One of those players that apparently is deciding his time in Washington is Ovechkin, who called it his roughest day of his career, certainly not a great sign for the team keeping the NHL’s leading goal-scorer as he hits UFA status on July 1.
Not to mention should the team’s final stretch resemble the 2023 collapse out of the deadline, it could be an ugly finish to Ovechkin’s tenure in which he took the Capitals to the top of the NHL’s mountain in 2018. And while Ovechkin hasn’t quite passed the eye test this season as he looks like the 40-year-old that he is, he still has 24 goals and 26 assists to lead the team with 50 points.
It’s hard to argue any aspect of this season under Patrick hasn’t been a failure, because the fact the promised addition never materialized despite ample cap room, plus delivering a self-inflicted wound on the eve of a critical contest that resulted in an expected loss that likely sealed Washington’s fate.
Under former GMs George McPhee and Brian MacLellan, the Capitals had usually been on the aggressive side at the deadline, not usually selling off unless Washington was well out of a playoff spot. Under the circumstances, Patrick taking a knee just four points out of a spot without really making any real attempt to use the cap space they had banked all season long, and then not making any effort to actually improve was a disservice to Ovechkin in perhaps his final season, as well as the roster coming off a top spot in the East last year.
Certainly Patrick will have his shot over the summer with a lot of cap room and a chance to remake the roster, but clearly he underestimated the trade market and while that first-rounder from the Carlson deal may help, it could come at a pretty steep cost trying to lure teams to Washington as well as at the gate should Ovechkin decide to leave what now appears to be a rebuilding club.
