Équipe: 2022-23 Capitals de Washington

Date de création initiale: 17 mai 2022

Publié: 17 mai 2022

Mode - plafond salarial: Basique

This is what the Washington Capitals could look like if they didn't make any trades and only re-signed players.

Players Let Walk:
-Marcus Johansson (old, little contribution)
-Johan Larsson (old, 4th line works fine without him)
-Justin Schultz (old, Alexeyev looks promising and ready to take spot)
-Matt Irwin (decent but unnecessary, could serve as a 7th D but so can others)
-Michal Kempny (simply not NHL level since leg injuries)

Players Re-Signed:
-Ilya Samsonov, 2 million for 1 year
A "prove it" contract, because despite the regular season, Samsonov did put up good
numbers during the postseason and showed starting goalie talent. He still has untapped
potential.
-Vitek Vanecek, 1.5 million for 3 years
A backup goalie contract. Although he did start 41 games, he seems to be used best as a
backup goalie. Has reached his full potential.

Lineup:
- Lines 1 and 2, Pairs 1 and 2 remain the same
The TKO line and Mantha-Eller-Wilson were both pretty good towards the end of the
season. All 3 D pairs were solid during the regular season and didn't seem to like being
mixed up, so Pairs 1 and 2 will stay the same.
- Line 3
McMichael is much more comfortable in the middle than anywhere else and needs some
more NHL reps before getting more minutes, so Line 3 made sense. Sheary and Snively
were both excellent in their roles last season. Sheary hustles and wins pucks, McMichael
can set up, and Snively can finish. On paper, this line should be pretty good.
- Line 4
AJF fits in perfectly on this line, there was no difference between him and Hagelin/Johansson being on
it.
- Pair 3
Rookie Alexeyev takes Schultz's place on the third pair since it wouldn't make sense to
break up the others.


This roster has a good injection of talented youth into the lineup while keeping the veteran core. Nicklas Backstrom is on LTIR as Breakdown Day reports suggest that he needs serious hip surgery, some analysts even suggesting retirement/LTIR retirement. Carl Hagelin will also remain on LTIR as he will never have 100% vision in his left eye again, although he does hope to return to play. The biggest flaws in this lineup are the lack of a true 2C (although Eller showed flashes of brilliance during the end of the season on the Mantha-Eller-Wilson line) and the lack of a proven starting goalie. In an ideal world, the Capitals will sign or trade a true, likely veteran, starting goalie this offseason, although they did opt to stick with the two youngsters this year and could do so again. Despite these flaws, I think the Capitals could sneak into a wild card spot with this lineup. A lot depends on the goalies and Eller's capability to play as a 2C. A huge plus side is the cap space. If they were to sign people, they could pursue both a starting goalie and 2C. There are also a decent amount of pending FAs on this team, and the space they have would allow them to re-sign most if not all of them.