Capitals Managing Director Brian MacLellan did its annual post-trade deadline presser on Friday, trying to detail exactly why it tipped caps more toward the sellers. It’s a position he’s never been in before while in charge of the team’s roster.
That became clear when he answered questions about the process. MacLellan was clearly not happy about having to grapple with what were once the most important cogs of a winning machine, but also expressed a desire to continue competing this season, despite adding more future assets than anything.
It was almost as if the team were caught in two minds.
The Capitals started their sell-off this season on Feb. 23 when they sent Dmitry Orlov and Garnet Hathaway to the Boston Bruins. This sell-off continued and eventually included Marcus Johansson, Erik Gustafsson and Lars Eller. All five players are pending unrestricted free agents.
“I think we probably had to make some tough decisions a little sooner than we would have liked,” MacLellan said. We had some good guys, good players that we didn’t really want to part with, but we ended up parting ways. I don’t know if we showed the consistency we had to show to become a team that would make it. I think we had to draw a line about what’s best for the future and try to still add players and stay competitive.”
Capitals have certainly added more assets for the future. In exchange for those five names, they ended up getting four extra draft picks and talented 22-year-old defenseman Rasmus Sandin. However, MacLellan adds that the team is still eyeing this season.
That’s perhaps most evident in the fact that the team also brought in veteran forward Craig Smith, extended Nick Jensen and Nicolas Aube-Kubel, and didn’t include Conor Sheary or Trevor van Riemsdyk in the sale of upcoming unrestricted free agents.
“I still think we want to be competitive this year,” MacLellan said. “I still think we have a pretty good team. We have some injuries. Our backend is a bit decimated. We tried to add a good young defender in Sandin so we’ll see where we are when we get out of here.”
A team still trying to be competitive this season won’t trade a player like Dmitry Orlov as his future contract demands don’t matter until it’s over. This is where the lines get a little blurry and confusing. It can even be just lip service. It’s clear that since this year’s caps are going nowhere, MacLellan was aware that he had to pawn some of the “now” in favor of the future.
MacLellan spoke about flipping some of those futures for a more impactful roster player in the offseason. The confusing part is: you’d have more of those futures if you were more committed to an outright sell. But MacLellan seems happy with what they got.
“Our strategy was to try and get some assets or draft picks that we can use to attract players that we like in the future,” MacLellan said. “We’re trying to get players that we’re interested in and you need players and draft picks to trade those guys. I think we’ve improved our ability to do that and going into draft gives us a chance to make that happen.
MacLellan echoed some of those sentiments when asked if it was important to wave the white flag this season to build a more competitive team in the near future as Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom’s contracts continue to expire. Ovechkin is signed for the 2025-26 campaign while Backstrom’s contract expires after 2024-25.
“We have some design capital that we can use going forward,” MacLellan said. “We’ve acquired some picks – as we move into the off-season and into the draft, we have more flexibility to trade for players.”
It’s clearly a very strange time for team members and fans alike. The Capitals haven’t found themselves in a situation like this in nearly two decades. MacLellan was asked how the process could have been annoying for fans and a bit difficult to gauge and if he had any news now that the deadline has passed.
“I hope it’s not confusing,” MacLellan began. “We have an older core that we will continue with. We could make some changes to that. Our goal is to add some younger players. We did that with Sandin. Marty Fehervary arrives. We’ll see where [Alex] Alexeyev is finished. We called [Vincent] Iorio. We added [Sonny] Milan. We added [Dylan] Electricity. And you complement them [Tom] Wilson. You complement them with Kuzy, Ovi and [TJ] Oschi. I think it’s still a competitive team. I’m not watching it as we’re taking a big step backwards. I think we might even take a step forward.”
We will see.
Screenshot about capitals