I disagree about the clearing waivers part. I think someone takes a chance on him

pretty safe bet Copley can be sent down.

It doesn't really fix the cap issues on the team though. This team is getting really old as well.
I still don't get the decision to sign Oshie till he's 38. They must be praying for LTIR with his concussion issues. The dude already blinks like a crackhead.
They need to start injecting some youth on this team. I think this might be one of the oldest teams in the league this year.

Oshie gave his heart and soul for that Stanley Cup, I wouldn't ding him if he took an early LTIR "retirement" -- that said, he's getting close to healthy from the skull and collarbone issues and has been working out in DC already so don't count the guy out. He's a real hard working guy.

The real PROBLEM on the Capitals is Carlson and Orlov...they are in no way worth $13M between them. They are the most mistake prone defensemen on the team an Carlson phones in his play half the time, especially on the PP. We will also see if Kuzy has a bounce back year or if he's wildly overpaid (a la Alex Semin back in the day).

Don't lay this at Oshie's feet his AAV is pretty decent compared to some other contracts out there, and the length is suspect sure...but anyone can get hurt at any time.

I never said the cap issues is on Oshie, I said I don't get why they signed him till he's 38. I don't care how you flip that, it's a bad contract unless he retires early.

The real problem on this team is there is no youth. You have to balance out those older players with some young fast hungry players who are on the cheap and got some skill.
OV is gonna be 34 this year, he's not a strong skater to say the least. Oshie is gonna be 33, Backstrome is 32, Hags is 31.
Vrana the only guy there under 25, and he's 24 this yer.
Holtby is gonna be 30 and he's gonna want 7-8 years on a contract probably at big money. My god, no. Be paying him till he's 38 too.

This team needs to start injecting it's players from the AHL and hope some of them are good. They can't go out on the ice as one of the oldest teams in the league.
They are probably in the top 8 as far as age. The only one of those teams that is even remotely close to good other than washington is Boston and they are trying like mad to inject youth into the team.

We all know the core of a team is going to age, but you have got to find ways off adding those younger players to the periphery. Washington just hasn't done it. It's one of their biggest cap issues.

Then that's okay. Not the end of the world to lose a backup goalie.

Carlson and Orlov are beasts. Totally worth their money. Though maybe Carlson is slightly overpaid. Orlov is underpaid. So it evens out.

Don't get the concern here. They aren't old geazers. They might be "old" but they are very very good. Plus we have so much young talent that's going to be injected over the next few years: Samsonov, Alexeyev, Johansen, Fehervary, Leason, Fjallby, Pilon, etc. They'll be fine.

Carlson at $8M is nutty, and would be overpaid at even a $6M AAV. He is not an Elite defenseman. He doesn't do what Doughty, EK65, and many others do...he benefits from his assists numbers because he gets to play with Ovi, Backie, and Kuzy. Put him on a lot of other teams and his issues would be very apparent.

But hey, maybe I am the only Carly hater...so be it.

The Caps don't have NHL talent at forward in the minors right now. They did a nice job restocking this draft, but it's going to be a few years before they're ready. And Oshie just put up 50+ points, and there's no reason to think he can't do it again with Backstrom and Vrana. You're obsessing over their age when they are all still very talented players. Yeah, being signed to 38 isn't ideal, but it's what it took to get a guy who came off a 33 goal year to sign for less than $6mil a season. The Caps are aware that they do not have Ovie and Backstrom forever. They needed to bring in and keep NHL talent now instead of waiting for someone to MAYBE produce from Hershey. As for the cap, it's really just this year that's a problem. Next year when Holtby is gone and they don't have the performance bonus overages, they'll be in good shape.

The Caps did what they had to do to win a Cup, and as far as I'm concerned, that makes every contract worth it, regardless of age. They're still going to be very good this year.

Yeah, you are a Carly hater. $8mil is not bad considering the market for top RHD defensemen who can put up solid point totals.

lol what?! Carlson led ALL NHL defensemen in GAR last season. All of them. He is absolutely an elite defensemen. He plays in every scenerio at all strengths and does it well. Yeah he isn't great at 5v5 defense but he's so elite at everything else he's elite.

the problem is the cap as I stated. You can't pay everyone up and down the roster 2.5+ million. There just isn't that kind of cap space on teams. At some point you need those young players to lower your cap hit.
That's what the whole conversation is about.
You have an aging team where everyone is getting paid fairly well. Then you wonder why there is no cap space. Well duh, you don't have any 20-23 year old players at 700k a year or so on the team who are capable of playing any real ice time. Of course you won't have any cap space.

It's really just about figuring out this seasons cap. Next year Caps will have a crap load of space once Holtby leaves. I predict it about $8M if the cap goes up another $2M like it did this summer. In fact it will be more than that as they start slowly replacing players with our prospects. Kempny, Djoos, and Orlov (sadly) will start to be replaced by Alexeyev, Johansen, and Fehervary.

Your argument might make sense if Carlson made anywhere near what those guys make, but they make $3mm AAV more than him. In the same signing year, Keith Yandle, Cam Fowler, and Marc-Edouard Vlasic got 7-8 year deals with $6.35-$7mm AAV. Based on the market at the time Carlson's contract was signed, it was (and still is) a good deal.

Well for starters, Holtby is not staying. We're going to resign Backy and Ovi and cant afford all 3, so there's one young player coming up. With the expansion draft, we'll probably lose a defenseman, so there's another young one coming up. We need to continue to draft a solid forward here and there so we can continue reloading the farm system with talent so we can keep our team young

tl;dr: holtby isnt staying, just give it time and we'll slowly get younger

I don't think losing Holtby is in the best interest of the team. Not that I think giving him a 7-8 year deal is either. But I think washington takes a step back without him. I would at least try a 4-5 year deal on him.
So that's why I don't give that thought process much room. It's hard to find a solid goalie and Holtby has been that.

The issue i have with keeping Holtby is that the only way to get him is to overpay him since we all know somebody is going to throw a Bobrovsky-esque contract his way and there's not much else we can do besides hope samsonov shows the world he's ready otherwise we're going to have to scramble for a rental while we wait for him to be ready

see that's a bad plan in finishing out OV last years. I'm sorry, that's just the way it is. They either have to find a replacement which will probably cost a bit, or resign him. Because winging it, really is not an option.
I think they trade someone else out to make room. Eller, Hags, Djoos. What ever it takes but they got to have a decent goalie otherwise, just fold the tend up.

We have Samsonov who is going to be a top 5 goalie. He'll be NHL ready then. Hell, he'll probably play some games this season.

Look I'm not going to knock some kid on here. But he played 37 games last year and had a 0.898 save% in the AHL.
Lets not make him to be all world yet ok?

I think if you're going to take a risk in sending Copley through waivers and losing him for nothing, why not try to trade him to another team that needs a capable backup goalie?

I was hearing some push-back around trading Copley because it means that we would have to find another veteran goaltender to expose in the expansion draft. I don't think that's much of an issue - you can sign pretty much any of the free agent goalies out there to a low AAV contract.

He had the best KHL season EVER as a 19yo, better than Vasivelskiy. Then he followed it up with a fantastic 20yo season. As for the AHL last season, he started behind one of the youngest teams in the AHL in Hershey and it took a couple months for them to get their crap together. In the last 23 games Samsonov put up a .925sv% and a 1.88GAA with 3 shutouts. He's going to shred the AHL this season and probably get a handful of NHL games.

like I said, lets not make him all world yet ok?

two things.....capitals need to inject youth and they are one of the oldest nhl team?

we have a pretty descent young core and we have a ton of pretty solid young prospects that needs to develop....."we need to introduce youth" isnt the smartest take..... capitals don't currently have any bad contracts... everyone is signed to a fair or great deal. oshie may be the worse contract we have and when you compare it to guys like horny it looks amazing. long story short we don't have any contracts like jack Johnson or Gudbranson or "jugs" or tanev.....wherre we gave out too much cash for terrible term..


carlson is a top 5 defenseman in the nhl? and hes a rhd which makes him rare and fantastic.... 8 million is what trouba just got and hes not nearly as good as carlson. his deal is going to look great in a few years... orlov is also a top pairing dman who's cap hit isnt high at all... capitals could trade him the habs for a massive return if needed or any team that needs a lhd that can play top 4 minutes and has offensive upside.. caps have guys like alexeyev coming up and need to make room for him so with orlov and holy leaving plus the cap going up we are far from cap trouble

Your carlson comment is obviously directed at someone else.
And if there were solid young prospects, they would be playing.
We can talk about bad contracts if you want. Hags is a bad contract. I'm sorry, I know his game well. He couldn't score a goal to save his life. He's useless out there to generate offense.
Oshie contract is worse than Hornqvist. They are both the same injury prone player with head issues. The only difference is one doesn't last till the player is 38.
They both have the same issues. They don't play up temp games. They are both the same age. And if you are basing it off the number over the last two years it's about equal production. So lets just end that argument.
Gudbranson isn't a bad contract. So that's done. I'm more then willing to accept a defense man with an even strength corsi of 54-55% range when they spend 60% of their faceoffs in the defensive zone.
He played well. You just judge him for what he did on a team that wasn't using him properly.

You don't even know what Tanev will do yet. You just assume. You can easily look at a contract like Eller and call it just as bad a contract.
Not even know how you get jugs as a bad contract. but you troll constantly so there is that.

Like I said. This is one of the oldest teams in the league. That's a true statement. I'm gonna guess its top 8 in age.
You are tight against the cap, and you will feel that next year. It's ok it happens to all teams. But it could have been avoided by playing more youth instead of signing aging vets like Hags for millions.
But go on with your bad self.