Wait until the playoffs when Pronger starts our forwards around like rag dolls. Mike Green needs to be moved to forward, he is not an NHL defenseman. Isnt it telling that Mike Knuble stood up for Ovechkin, and not one of our D ?

Ovechkin many nights is the most physical player on the team. He leads the team in hits and goals. When was the last that happened ? Messier on the post-Gretzky Oilers or when Messier was with the Rags ?

Gripe about Sloan or Erskine or the others, but I guarantee they gets picked up if he has to pass waivers. The Pens grabbed Chris Bourque from us the second we had to cut him. Got him back, thankfully.

BTW, I LOVE the quality of hockey blogging around here these days. Thanks.

I’m not quite sure where you’re getting your bit on not having a fair margin in 5 on 5 situations. From the team stats on the Caps over at Yahoo! Sports you’ve got:

230 Total Goals
3 SH Goals
60 PP Goals (231 attempts)
167 Even Strength goals

159 Total Goals Against
6 SH Goals Against
48 PP Goals Against (236 attempts)
95 Even Strength Goals Against

They’re at about 1.76 : 1 Goals For to Goals Against at even strength and about 1.25 : 1 PP Goals For to PP Goals Against. Granted that’s just a superficial look at the goal scoring stats.

I’d also disagree with your second post. I think that you’re over the top on that one. If we had looked horrible against the Pens, that series would have been over in four games. I don’t believe that taking the eventual Stanley Cup winner to seven games is an indication that the team is not built for playoff hockey. With another year of playoff experience under their belts, I think the roster as it stands has a great shot at the cup. And if we don’t dish out pieces to pick up rentals, that will be true for a few years to come.

BTW, that thing about Alzner in my first post wasn’t meant to be towards you, just to the Caps franchise in general. It’s so frustrating watching Karl go back and forth between DC and Hershey while we have guys he’s clearly better than playing each night. It makes no sense to me at all.

i agree with everything you said. while i would like to see some sort of tweak (especially on d), it’s kinda hard to argue with the results we’re seeing right now.

with that being said, you know we will come back down to earth soon…i just hope this streak doesn’t hide our deficiencies to the point where McPhee thinks we’re the favorite to win the cup right now. There’s always something that can be done to bolster the lineup, and I have a feeling something will happen. It probably won’t be anything mind-blowing, but just hopefully just enough to get this team over the hump.

But I’ll let George McPhee and Bruce Boudreau make the tough decisions on the roster and reserve any judgment for later. I also agree that Semyon Varlamov is most likely “the guy,” but no one knows if he’ll be able to stay healthy this season and, if nothing else, Jose Theodore’s play of late has at least earned him a seat at the table.

Is this team flawless? Of course not. But I’m simply saying that no team in the NHL is perfect and this team has just as good of a shot at the Cup as anyone else out there. Even if they don’t do anything else to the roster between now and the trade deadline.