Capitals at Crossroads

Team: 2021-22 Washington Capitals

Initial Creation Date: Feb. 17, 2022

Published: Feb. 17, 2022

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

Capitals are in a really tough spot. You have Ovechkin, so you want to be competitive for the entirety of his new 5 year contract. So, there's a natural reaction to want to go "all in" and get a decently big name or some sort of valuable depth piece every year at the deadline, at the expense of trading away high to mid round draft picks or even some prospects of varying importance in an arguably shallow prospect pool due to being drafting later and trading away said picks and prospects.

On the other hand, the team is old. There are still major contributors, but that contribution is waning as injuries become more frequent and production drops. That's why the Capitals need to hold on to prospects and draft picks, play young guys more. I see a lot of people trading away prospects on here and it doesn't make sense to me personally. This seems like a somewhat lost year.

I think the Capitals should be both buyers and sellers this year, trade deadline and offseason. What they'll do at the trade deadline, I'm not certain. It's been well known the Capitals have been pushing to get MAF, and new reports say they could target a trade with Vancouver and/or Seattle, unclear on the wording but maybe Pavel Zacha from NJD. This probably won't happen at the trade deadline, but I think the Capitals should look to trade or not re-sign players like Eller, Hagelin, Schultz, Kempny. Just getting rid of those four saves us 12,750,000. Plus, the cap is going up 1million next season. Not saying this will happen this season at all, but perhaps Oshie retires early from injuries and that eventually saves them nearly 6million. Capitals should use this offseason and perhaps next to retool quickly, make cap space, and bring in younger players while keeping some valuable prospects and picks.