#1 Mikael Backlund
Mikael Backlund is a center for the Calgary Flames. The Caps won’t trade for him for two reasons. The first is that they’re good on centers. Well, sort of. They got prospects.
But even if they wanted to trade for a center, Backlund isn’t the option. Because the center turned 34 not too long ago. He did score 19 goals and he’s a decent player. But he’s on the wrong side of 30 and the Caps should be all set on those types of players.
The most goals he scored was 21 in 2018 19 when he was 29. He carries a cap hit of $5.35 million. Mantha has a bigger cap hit and would’ve done a backflip if he even scored 15 goals last season. He had 11 goals.
Now Kuznetsov, here’s where things get crazy.
The Russian center has a big cap hit and apparently wants out. The Caps on top of the stress of finding one more assistant coach to fill out Carbery’s staff has to act on the Kuzy trade sooner rather than later.
These are the top 3 players I would not even pick up the phone for.