State of the Capitals and the quest for a top six
In exactly two months from now it will be Friday October the 13th and the Washington Capitals will be embarking on a new season. They’ll open at Capital One Arena against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The cool part about opening against the Penguins is you have no idea how good or bad either team will be but there will be no denying this. Both teams won’t be younger, only older.
We kind of know now a little bit of what the Capitals roster can look like but a lot can change between now and Friday the 13th. Training camp begins on September 20. The rookies arrive from September 16-19.
After the Caps extended Tom Wilson for seven more seasons after next season, Brian MacLellan hinted to the media that he wasn’t quite done yet constructing the roster.
Does that include a top six forward? He was asked.
“Yep.”
To recap it’s been difficult executing a trade this summer but MacLellan hasn’t given up. In July a report came out from Sporsnet’s Elliotte Friedman that the Nashville Predators and Washington were working on a deal for Evgeny Kuznetsov.
A few weeks later Mike Vogel, the Capitals team website’s senior writer, published an article saying the center indeed requested a trade. Though there was a recent Russian interview where Kuznetsov said it might not be true.
Honestly I’m not sure what to believe. My hunch is both Vogel and Kuznetsov were right in a way. There was probably some point down the line that Kuznetsov wanted out. Maybe he’s having second thoughts given how unkind the trade market has been this summer.
MacLellan said this in his most recent interview which came after the Tom Wilson contract:
"“We had a few discussions at the draft; it might carry forward or it might not carry forward. We’ll see where it goes.”"
light. Related Story. Grading the Tom Wilson extension
Right now we’re in the dog days of summer. So I don’t expect a trade to happen quite yet. Maybe when everyone gets back from the beach and trickles back into MedStar Capitals Iceplex to gear up for training camp, MacLellan will take another look at his roster to see what he can do.