Washington Capitals: 5 players who won’t be back in 2021

Michael Raffl

The Caps acquired Michael Raffl as a depth forward at the trade deadline from the Philadelphia Flyers. He didn’t get a lot of playing time until later in the season when the injury bug decided to finally take a bite out of the Capitals at the worst possible time.

Raffl is now a member of the Dallas Stars and we are completely jealous of him that he gets to see Braden Holtby on a nightly basis next season. We miss you Holtby!

Raffl appeared in 10 games with the Capitals and recorded a goal and two assists for three points. Even though he scored one goal, it was a memorable goal in an otherwise unmemorable game.

The playoff matchup was already set when the Boston Bruins and Washington Capitals took the ice in Game 56. No matter what happened, they were going to see each other in the first round. Even so, Raffl scored the biggest goal of his life to give the Caps some early momentum heading into that series.

With the clock ticking down to the buzzer, Raffl had the puck and unleashed a sharp angle shot that went into the net with just 1.8 seconds to spare. It was like the Caps had a winning Raffl ticket at the time (okay I’ll stop, onto the next slide).