Washington Capitals: What If This Day In Caps History Didn't Happen Like This Day In Caps History -- August 4th

When the calendar rolls over to August, you know you are in the deep summer of hockey. Players might be back home or with their families on vacation, the members of the hockey media might take the month to recharge before training camps convene in September. But even while the pace in front office might bend to the rhythm of the summer season, there is occasional activity. Sometimes, it is even consequential.

One of those instances took place on August 4, 2005. Barely a month before training camp started for the 2005-2006 season, the Caps traded a sixth round pick in the 2007 entry draft and a seventh round draft choice in the 2006 draft to the Calgary Flames for a seventh round pick in the 2007 draft and winger Chris Clark.

Clark, who had last been seen in the Stanley Cup final in 2004, before the NHL went dark for a season due to a lockout, was coming off three consecutive 10-goal seasons with the Flames. By the standard of the times, that being the latter stages of the dead-puck era, 10-goal seasons were not bad, but Clark was thought of more as a grinder, a player who would do the dirty work in the corners and in front of the net to create space and chances for more skilled forwards.

No one could have foreseen that upon becoming a Capital, Clark would double his goal output to 20 in his first season with the club and would record his first (and only, as it turned out) 30-goal season in the NHL the following year (including nine power play goals, almost doubling his career power play goal output in his career to that date). It was in that second season with the Caps that he endeared himself to Capitals Nation for demonstrating just what “hockey tough” means. Having been named captain entering the season, Clark was leading by example late in regulation in a November contest against the Boston Bruins. With just over a minute left, he took a puck in the face that knocked out two teeth and crushed his palate bone.  And yet, he finished his shift. He recorded neither a point nor a shot in that game, but it served as an object lesson to his young teammates on toughing it out. He missed just two games before returning to the lineup, further cementing his reputation as a tough player.

The 2006-2007 season would be a career high-water mark for Clark, though. Injuries led to large chunks of lost games, and he recorded just 10 goals and 30 points in 88 games over parts of the next three seasons before being traded to the Columbus Blue Jackets with defenseman Milan Jurcina for forward Jason Chimera in December 2009. Clark finished that season and played one more in Columbus before his career came to an end at age 34.

But what if August 4, 2005 came and went without a trade? Would things have been different? It’s hard to say that keeping those late-round 2006 and 2007 draft picks would have made a difference for the better, or for the worse, for that matter. However, those were the first two seasons in which Alex Ovechkin skated with the club, and he did not have a wealth of offensive talent surrounding him, even with Clark. In his rookie season in 2005-2006, Ovechkin (52 goals) and Clark (20) were two of four 20-goal scorers for the club (Dainius Zubrus and Matt Pettinger were the others). Their 72 combined goals accounted for 25.7 percent of the club’s total. The following season, Ovechkin (46 goals) and Clark (30) accounted for 32.5 percent of the team’s total goal scoring.

The question becomes, did Clark’s presence and production make a difference in the early formative years in Ovechkin’s career, or would his absence have been reflected in more attention focused on Ovechkin with less production as a thinner lineup failed to provide enough offensive support to take the scoring burden off the youngster?  In that first season for Ovechkin, he opened on a line with Zubrus and Jeff Halpern, veterans in their own right.  Zubrus was a veteran of 539 regular season games going into that 2005-2006 season, while Halpern dressed for 368 games before Opening Night in 2005-2006.  In fact, that Ovechkin-Halpern-Zubrus combination also closed the season and was intact for much of the intervening schedule.

The following season opened with Ovechkin on a line with Zubrus and Richard Zednik, while Clark was skating with Alexander Semin and Kris Beech.  That lasted one game, a 5-2 loss in New York to the Rangers.  In Game 2, the Caps’ home opener, Ovechkin scored a pair of goals, Clark assisting on both.  It was, as they say, the beginning of a beautiful relationship.  Clark skated with Ovechkin and Zubrus until the latter was traded to the Buffalo Sabres late in the season, Kris Beech filling in at center for the most part thereafter.  But Clark and Ovechkin were fixtures on that top line. 

It mattered.  Although the Caps struggled overall in the 2006-1007 season, they won just one of the eight games that Clark missed that season (1-4-3).  Ovechkin did fine in Clark’s absence over those eight games, going 5-4-9.  The rest of the team, however, could not make up the scoring, averaging 2.50 goals per game while averaging 2.89 goals per game with Clark in the lineup.

Those eight games missed offer a window into what things might have been like had the trade not been made for Clark.  His influence on Ovechkin’s development, in terms of the raw numbers, appears negligible.  But he provided hard minutes and consistent production, the latter being a rare commodity with those first two teams coming out of the lockout.  One cannot help but think the Caps, unsuccessful as they were in those first two years, might have been worse.  And that is where things could have gone sideways in terms of the timeline.

It is possible that the Caps could have finished more than five points worse in the 2005-2006 season, which could have left them with the third overall draft pick instead of the fourth pick.  Caps fans know that the club selected Nicklas Backstrom with the fourth overall pick.  But picking third, Jonathan Toews (who was taken with the third pick by the Chicago Blackhawks) would have been available.  General Manager George McPhee might still have taken Backstrom, who he preferred to Jordan Staal, taken second overall in that draft by the Pittsburgh Penguins.  But, if there was some uncertainty in which direction the Caps wanted to go, perhaps there was room for a deal to be made to allow the Caps to move down in the order and still get Backstrom.

The 2007 draft might have been more intriguing had Clark never come to Washington.  The 2006-2007 Caps struggled once more and finished only two points ahead of the Los Angeles Kings and thre ahead of the Phoenix Coyotes.  The Caps, without Clark, might well have finished with the second-worst record in the league, and even if the Blackhawks still won the ping pong ball draw to draft first overall, the Caps would have had the third pick, not the fifth with which they selected Karl Alzner.  But before you spend too many brain cells on this, the 2007 draft does not seem, in retrospect, to have been a deep draft.  Chicago would have taken Patrick Kane, as they in fact did, and the Caps might have taken James van Riemsdyk (taken second by Philadelphia in real time) or Kyle Turris (taken third in real time by the Coyotes).  Ot they might have taken Thomas Hickey, who was the first defenseman taken in the draft, one spot ahead of Alzner, but who didn’t become a full-time NHL player until the 2013-2014 season with the New York Islanders.

Then there is the matter of coaching.  Glen Hanlon had the misfortune of trying to guide this young team through the formative stages of its development.  Having a veteran such as Clark helped in ways tangible (goals and assists) and intangible (experience).  In his absence, the team might not have been hard-working but unsuccessful, just bad.  Worse seasons than the ones the Caps had might have hastened a coaching change (Hanlon was relieved by Bruce Boudreau in late November of the 2007-2008 season).  Perhaps Boudreau, who was coaching the Hershey Bears, is elevated in the off season following the 2006-2007 campaign.  Or, with more time to deliberate and consider possibilities, the Caps go in an entirely different direction in favor of a head coach with more experience.  Would Claude Julien, who was fired late in the 2006-2007 season, come up on the Caps’ radar (he went to Boston that summer)? Would free agent head coach Mike Keenan have been considered (he went to Calgary)?

Chris Clark had his greatest team success with the Calgary Flames, reaching the 2004 Stanley Cup final, but he had his most successful years individually with the Capitals.  His 20 and 30 goal seasons are largely lost in what was at the same time part of an unsuccessful stretch in team history but the first years in the spectacular career of Alex Ovechkin.  However, his work ethic, consistency, and toughness allowed him to carve out a couple of fine seasons in the midst of the team’s struggles and gave the club some ballast, a foundation upon which the young guys could learn what it takes to play at this level.

The odd part about speculating on what might have happened had Clark never come to Washington is the scope of possibilities and the consequential nature of them.  The Caps might have looked very different on the ice with the high draft picks they might have made and behind the bench, depending on the timing of coaching changes they might have made.  One cannot help but think that the Caps are better today for having had Clark pass though Washington, although in ways that might not be immediately apparent.

Photo: Al Bello/Getty Images North America

Washington Capitals: If Players Were Presidents -- Chris Clark

By the time Ulysses S. Grant became the 18^th President of the United States, he was no stranger to difficult situations, be they of the military sort or of the political variety.  He was something of a reluctant military man as a youth but eventually climbed to the pinnacle of his profession – command of all Union armies in the American Civil War, answering only to the President – after earning a reputation as a skilled commander in battles in western states during the early phases of the War.  Later, as a civilian, he had conflicts of conscience with President Andrew Johnson over his position as an interim appointee in the Johnson administration.  He would emerge from that as a favorite to win the Presidency and did just that in 1868.  In Grant’s simplicity of style, reputation for honesty, and his role in being a leader in difficult situations, there is a comparable Washington Capital, one who would enjoy success “out west” before coming to Washington and assuming the role of team captain through a difficult period in franchise history: Chris Clark.

Born Hiram Ulysses Grant, the Ohio native became “Ulysses S. Grant” as the result of a paperwork snafu.  It was the name used to place him in nomination to the United States Military Academy by his congressman.  The name stuck, but the idea of military service did not.  It was not a life he intended to pursue after his post-graduation commitment was fulfilled.  Nevertheless, whether as product of his success in his assignments during the Mexican-American War or becoming comfortable with the life, he chose to remain in the military.

After an interlude as a civilian, brought on by his own behavior (he was given a choice of resignation or court martial when his commander received reports of his intoxication when he was stationed in California), he returned to military service to help lead recruitment of soldiers in response to the attack on Fort Sumter in April 1861.  He did not carry a military rank during this effort, though, his episode in California hindering his efforts to obtain a field command.  He eventually was commissioned as a colonel and was given a command in Illinois.  After being promoted to Brigadier General he added to his resume with a series of increasingly important engagements.  Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, and then Shiloh, although in the latter Grant was once more accused of intoxication and was removed from command.  Despite the image of Grant circulating at the time, though, President Abraham Lincoln could not be convinced to believe Grant’s critics.  He is said to have stated at the time that "I can't spare this man; he fights."

Grant continued to fight and continued to earn victories, and he was eventually promoted to lieutenant general and given command of all armies of the Union.  With his new command Grant established headquarters in Virginia, which led to a long series of battles with General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia.  From the Overland Campaign to the Richmond-Petersburg Campaign, Grant fought a long battle of attrition against Lee, eventually forcing the latter’s surrender at Appomattox on April 9, 1865.  It was the first of several surrenders over the next seven weeks that brought the Civil War’s active phase to an end. 

Grant remained a commander at the end of the war, and his views on reconstruction aligned (to a point) with those of President Andrew Johnson, who assumed office upon the assassination of President Lincoln in April 1865.  While Johnson and Grant were in agreement on much of the reconstruction question, though, Johnson appreciated Grant’s appeal as a potential presidential candidate and political rival.  With the idea of keeping enemies close, he moved to replace Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, a Lincoln appointee aligned with the “Radical Republicans” that took a less charitable view toward reconstruction, with Grant.  Under terms of the Tenure of Office Act, Johnson would be able to remove Stanton from his position with the approval of the Senate.  However, the Senate was out of session, and Grant (against his own views) accepted an interim appointment.  The Senate reinstated Stanton when it reconvened, but Johnson ordered Grant not to vacate the office.  Grant could only reply that the Tenure of Office Act required him to do so, and he did, earning the wrath of Johnson.

This was all part of the run-up to the election of 1868 in which the incumbent – Johnson – was a damaged commodity.  Impeached (but acquitted by the Senate), his relationship with Congress in tatters, he could not win the nomination of his own party.  Meanwhile, Grant, a war hero and favored by “Radical Republicans” from his break with Johnson, won his party’s nomination and went on to win a convincing victory over Democrat Horatio Seymour in the general election. 

His presidency did not resemble his military career.  The qualities that made for steady, earnest progress made on the battlefield that led to victory fell victim to inconsistent, and some might argue corrupt practices in his administration that had some successes and significant failures.  The 15^th Amendment to the Constitution was passed during Grant’s first term in office.  The Department of Justice was established under his administration.  He signed the Amnesty Act of 1872 to grant amnesty to former Confederates, thus permitting them to hold public office.  But there were also setbacks that, among others, included scandals that plagued his cabinet, the Panic of 1873 to which the Grant administration responded slowly and ineffectually, and his signing legislation that would have doubled his own salary (a provision tucked away in a standing appropriations bill).  His was a presidency that ranks as mediocre or poor in many quarters, but given the historical context in which Grant had to operate, perhaps a “great” presidency was a goal too high to reach.

Chris Clark had somewhat modest beginnings on his journey to the NHL.  A third-round draft pick of the Calgary Flames in 1994 (taken between Alexei Krivchenkov and Adam Smith, neither of whom ever played in the NHL), Clark went on to play four years with the Clarkson University Golden Knights in the ECAC, putting up good numbers along the way (142 games, 63-65-128).  He graduated to the Saint John Flames of the AHL.  After spending a full season in the AHL, Clark split time between the AHL and NHL the following two seasons (winning a Calder Cup with Saint John in 2001). 

It was not until the 2001-2002 season that Clark earned a full-time spot, at age 25, with the Calgary Flames.  It was a difficult time for the Flames, who missed the postseason in each of Clark’s first two full seasons with the club.  In his third full season with the team, though, Clark and the Flames made it all the way to the Stanley Cup final.  Clark had modest numbers in that postseason (3-3-6, even), but he was one of just 11 members of the team to dress for all 26 postseason games.

After a year of the NHL going dark due to a labor-management dispute, the Flames traded Clark and a seventh-round draft pick to the Capitals for two lower round draft picks in August 2005.  None of the players taken with the draft picks exchanged ever made it to the NHL (for the record: Andrew Glass, Devin Didiomete, and Jens Hellgren), but Clark found a home right away in Washington.  In 2005-2006, his first season with the Capitals, Clark scored 20 goals, matching his output from his previous two seasons in Calgary combined.  On a very young club in the midst of a rebuild he was a scoring forward (tied for third in goals, fifth in points for the Caps) averaging a career best 15:24 of ice time per game. 

The following season Clark was named team captain and became the 31^st player in Capitals history to record 30 goals in a season.  He topped 20 assists (24) and 50 points (54) for the first time (and, to date, only time) in his career, and he posted a new career best 18:25 in average ice time.  His nine power play goals equaled his total from his previous four seasons combined. 

But while Clark was posting career highs on a personal level, the team for which he played was mired in the growing pains of rebuilding.  In each of Clark’s first two seasons with Washington, the Caps managed only 70 standings points, missing the playoffs each season.  It was not until Clarks’ third season in Washington that the club returned to competitiveness, using a wild rush to close the 2007-2008 season to snare a playoff spot they had not earned since 2003.

It was bittersweet for Clark.  In his 17^th game of the season, in late November against the Florida Panthers, he suffered a groin injury that would keep him out of the lineup for almost two months.  He returned in mid-January, but after skating just nine minutes in a 6-4 loss to the Philadelphia Flyers, he reinjured his groin.  It ended his season.

Things would not improve much for Clark in 2008-2009.  He suffered a wrist injury in the preseason and tried to play through it.  He managed to dress for 32 games, but he scored just one goal, and in early February underwent surgery to end his season prematurely for the second straight year.

The injuries were too much and sustained too closely together in time to one another for Clark to overcome.  In 2009-2010 he got off to an agonizingly slow start – one goal in his first 23 games.  It was not clear that at age 33 and after the series of injuries he suffered, if he would ever return to form.  With the Caps in the midst of what would become their best regular season in franchise history, Clark was traded on December 28, 2009, along with defenseman Milan Jurcina to the Columbus Blue Jackets for forward Jason Chimera.  Clark finished the 2009-2010 season playing 36 games with the Blue Jackets and dressed for 53 games the following season, but the 2010-2011 season would be his last in the NHL.

Ulysses S. Grant started as an obscure soldier, himself uncertain of his desire to pursue that career when he was young, but he rose through the ranks through hard work, determination, and an adherence to principles.  He rose to the top of his profession as one of the most successful generals in American history.  He seemed to be a natural to lead the country from its top civilian office.  However, circumstance and his own shortcomings contributed to a presidency that might be charitably described as of “mixed” success.  Chris Clark started as a mid-round draft pick who rose through the college route and minor league hockey to carve out a successful role as a checking forward for a Stanley Cup finalist in the NHL.  Upon arriving in Washington he realized considerable personal success, but the team he would eventually lead as captain could find little success of its own.  And, when his club finally did become competitive, his own body betrayed him, leaving him to look on as the Capitals returned to the postseason.  “Mixed” might not be the term to describe Chris Clark’s success in Washington, but his stay here certainly could be described as “two-edged.”  It is not hard to see how it is that these two modest, hard-working individuals might be linked in this look back to the past.

Top Ten Stories of 2009 -- Number 8: Oh Captain! My Captain!

O Captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;

So begins the poem by Walt Whitman. The prize the Caps seek has not yet been won, yet as in the poem their Captain will not be with the team to reap that reward, should it come this spring. Chris Clark was dealt to the Columbus Blue Jackets with defenseman Milan Jurcina for forward Jason Chimera just before the end of the year.

In the cold light of truth, the move cannot be criticized on its face as a bad business move. Clark clearly lost a step, either through age (he is 33), the accumulation of injuries, or both over the past couple of years. And, the deal saves the Caps about $2.2 million in salary cap (annualized), thus giving the team additional flexibility to pursue a trade down the road. The trade comes with enough lead time so that the team can take a long look at the remaining pieces and see how they fit both on and off the ice.

And that brings us to the elusive concept of “chemistry.” George McPhee is no stranger to flipping the switch on a big deal in the midst of good times. This deal, coming as it does in the midst of a three game winning streak, has the faint echo of a deal he made on March 13, 2001, when the Caps were on a 16-2-2-1 run (and five-game winning streak) and were coming off perhaps their most electrifying comeback in team history – a 6-5 win over the Ottawa Senators when the Caps came back from a 5-2 third period deficit. McPhee traded Richard Zednik, Jan Bulis, and Washington's 1st round choice in 2001 Entry Draft to Montreal for Trevor Linden, Dainius Zubrus and New Jersey's 2nd round choice in 2001.

The trade in 2001 did not work for the Caps as intended, the club finishing the post-trade portion of the regular season 4-7-0-2, then going quickly and quietly in six game in the opening round of the playoffs against Pittsburgh. This deal isn’t that big, perhaps, but it has a similar feel in that it the effects on team chemistry cannot be overlooked. And the biggest part of the chemical equation has to do with the dealing of the team captain. The Caps are no strangers to this, either…

1995: Kevin Hatcher — replaced by Dale Hunter as captain in 1994, traded to Dallas
1999: Dale Hunter — traded to Colorado
2002: Adam Oates — stripped of captaincy in 2001, traded to Philadelphia
2003: Steve Konowalchuk — traded to Colorado
2009: Chris Clark — traded to Columbus

It is a stark reminder that this is, first and foremost, a business where jobs and reputations are measured in wins and losses. It is the responsibility of team management – any team’s management – to make every effort to ice the most competitive team possible with an eye toward winning the Stanley Cup. If it means dealing a player – a captain – widely respected in the locker room and among fans as a player’s player, one who will do whatever it takes to win, then that is the price one pays from time to time to take the next, and perhaps the last step needed to winning the Cup.

For fans, it is another rite of passage for those who perhaps have not followed the Caps or any individual team for very long. Players come, and players go, sometimes suddenly and without warning. The attachments that fans develop with those players – and Clark was a player anyone who appreciated the sport could root for – makes for some trying times and bitter responses (The Boss will probably be getting some e-mails now). But this is how it is in professional sports. Nevertheless, another part of what makes this a top-ten story is the nature of Clark as player, teammate, and representative of the club. In all of those respects, his time here has been memorable. As a player, he introduced himself to Caps fans by setting, then breaking personal highs in goal scoring in his first two years here on clubs that were otherwise difficult to watch at times. He was a stand-up sort of player who did not suffer liberties taken with teammates lightly. And he gave every indication of being honest and forthright in his dealings with the media, often serving as the voice of the team after a win or a loss.

Clark also served as the sort of role model of the tireless, they’ll have to drag me off the ice sort of player that inspires. Taking an Alex Ovechkin slap shot off the ear or a puck in his mouth, requiring a repair with the aid of a cadaver’s palate and screws, or playing through a wrist injury that would ultimately require surgery, Clark was the epitome of the tough as nails teammate.

This has to be especially hard for a player like Clark, who can see the end of his career in the distance. He came to the Caps having played (and lost) in a Stanley Cup final, skating for a new club that was in a self-inflicted burn-it-to-the-ground rebuild. He played just about every role a forward could have – scorer, checker, keeper of the peace, grinder – serving as an example for a team that played hard every night, even when it was only a 70-point team. Then the injuries started coming, and the Caps had skilled kids who passed him on the depth chart. He did not seem to be able to get over the hump, even as his health returned, and his ice time and responsibilities were cut back. But he was still the “Captain,” who carried himself in such a fashion that did honor to himself and the club on and off the ice, despite being reduced to fourth-line status much of the time. At 33, he can see the end of his career on the horizon, and now he goes off to a team that is itself at least a couple of years from contending in a tough division. In the back of our mind, we think a guy like “Clarkie” deserves better.

This trade would perhaps be a bigger story in 2009 if the effects were better known. We can’t know that at this stage, neither team having yet welcomed their new players. For all we know, this could be the equivalent of a Dainius Zubrus-for-Jiri Novotny trade. But for the seismic shocks that will ripple through the team that sees its captain, and arguably its most heart-and-soul player, traded away, it has to be a top-ten story for 2009.

2009-2010 Previews -- Forwards: Chris Clark

Chris Clark

Theme: “Welcome back, to that same old place that you laughed about...Well the names have all changed since you hung around...”

John Sebastian might have been singing about a former student turned teacher, but the Caps are welcoming back a healthy (we hope) captain to a team that is considerably different from the one on which he scored 30 goals the last time he played more than 70 games in a season.

From the team Chris Clark scored 30 goals for in 2006-2007, only 12 skaters (neither goaltender) remains. And Clark is likely to play a different role on this team (perhaps third line right wing) than he did on that 2006-2007 team (first line right wing). 30 goals on a team that won 28 games and finished with70 points is nice, if not especially important from the broader team perspective. Getting half of that and doing the little things he does to help a team – checking, penalty killing, providing leadership on and off the ice – that could be a critical ingredient in winning a championship.

We’re betting the latter would be more satisfying to the player.

That 30-goal season for Clark is probably going to sit in Caps fans’ minds as something of a standard for Clark if he should complete a reasonably healthy season. It isn’t likely, and here is why. In 2006-2007, Clark netted nine of his 30 goals and seven of his 24 assists on the power play. One would think it unlikely he will be getting as many chances in those situations this year, as Mike Knuble mans the top line right wing spot and probably the top power play unit.

Even the 20 goals he scored in 2005-2006 would seem to be something of a stretch, given that he’s likely to be skating with David Steckel and take-your-pick on left wing, rather than Alex Ovechkin, as he did in that first season spent with the Caps.

Then there is the matter of health. Clark has missed 114 games over the past two seasons. Even if he is reporting in the picture of health, getting 70 games in this season would seem to be a bonus. Frankly, we’d take less, if there were more (as in, “more than the Caps played the last two seasons”) in the post-season. You’re up, guys…

Fearless: Alex Ovechkin is the big hitter among forwards. Whether you think that’s a good thing is a subject for another time. However, last year Clark finished seventh among forwards in hits, despite playing in only 32 games. He has averaged at least a hit a game in each of his four seasons, including the last two abbreviated campaigns (1.3/game over his 202 games as a Capital). He’s also been pretty efficient in the turnover measure overall – 92 takeaways and 93 giveaways in 202 games (although he was on the plus side of that only in his first season in Washington), and he has 81 blocked shots in those 202 games, which is a respectable number for a winger.

Cheerless: Well, as long as your doing that stats thing, cuz, take a look at that stat named for the former football coach (not Lee Corsi, you putz…Jim Corsi). Clark only played in 32 games last year, but the difference between his 5-on-5 Corsi rating on the ice (-4.95) and his Corsi rating off the ice (13.27) was second worst on the team among forwards playing in at least 30 games. That behindthenet.ca site is really neat, ya know.

Our idiot cousin does raise a point of concern, but there are two things to note about that. First, he compiled that number playing with a lower quality of teammates than all but four forwards for the Caps. And, he was largely crippled by a wrist injury he played through, but which ultimately ended his regular season in January.

Clark’s contributions are not likely to be of the sort that make fantasy hockey fans happy. But they will appeal to old school fans. His ability to play through and around injuries is already the stuff of legend with the Caps… taking a puck in the mouth and having to have his palate rebuilt with the aid of a palate from a cadaver… his taking a puck in the ear from an Alex Ovechkin slap shot, nearly having his ear severed, and coming back after missing nine games.

There has been considerable discussion in Caps Nation about whether Clark should remain as captain. He isn’t as productive as Alex Ovechkin; he might not be the quote machine that is Brooks Laich. But we ask another question, which Cap would you be most likely to follow up a hill into battle? We don’t intend to demean Ovechkin or Laich, or any other Capital for that matter, with respect to the answer to this question. But for our money, Chris Clark is that guy we’d want at our side going into a battle. He does all the little things without announcement or complaint; you get the feeling he’d sell beers at intermission and resurface the ice with a wet mop in his bare feet if it would help get a win.

The question will be whether he is healthy. We’re confident he could contribute on the right side on any of the four lines, but whether he can get 65-70 games has to be considered a question mark given those 114 games he missed over the past two years. Nevertheless… welcome back.

Projection:

65 games, 11-16-27, even

The 2008-2009 season, by the "tens" -- Wingers: Chris Clark

Chris Clark

Theme: “…regards to Captain Dunsel”

Chris Clark is the kind of player any team with Stanley Cup aspirations has – needs to have – on its team. He hits, he checks, he forechecks, he stands up for teammates, he pays a price to make a play, he doesn’t take a shift off. He’s also missed 114 games the past two seasons, 50 of them this year (plus six of 14 in the playoffs). For the team captain, that has to be agonizing, doubly so for a player with Clark’s work ethic.

But while Clark was dressing for only 32 games this year, the Caps were setting a franchise record for standings points, tied a team record for wins, and finished third in scoring. Clark’s having scored 50 goals over 152 games in his first two seasons with the club looks like a distant memory. What’s more, Clark’s presence in the lineup this year was something of a drag on the club. In his 32 games, the Caps were 17-15 (losses including those in extra time). His ten-game splits lack any sense of continuity…



We didn’t think Clark would come all the way back from his career years in 2005-2006 and 2006-2007. But we couldn’t have foreseen his having another season that looked hauntingly like last one. In this nightmare of a season…

- Clark returned from his injury plagued 2007-2008 season to play in 20 of the Caps’ first 21 games. But he was only 0-3-3, -5 in those games, then missed 14 games with a fractured forearm.

- Clark scored his only goal on New Year’s Day, in the midst of a stretch in which he played in 12 of 14 games.

- Then, he finally succumbed to a problem he’d had since training camp – a torn tendon sheath in his wrist that required surgery and put him on the shelf for the last 33 games of the regular season.

It all ended up reflected in his final numbers – second worst among forwards (minimum 30 games) in his Corsi rating, second worst in goals scored per 60 minutes, worst in primary assists per 60 minutes, second worst in goals scored for the Caps per 60 minutes of ice time, second worst in penalties taken per 60 minutes of ice time (although he was second best in drawing them). In 2006-2007, when Clark was on his way to a 30-goal season, he skated less than 15 minutes in only four of 74 games. This past year, he skated more than 15 minutes only four times in 32 games and only once after October 23rd.

And perhaps most disturbing, in the last 23 games in which he skated this season, he accumulated 30 minutes in penalties (10 minors, two five-minute majors). In was a trend that emerged in his injury-stunted 2007-2008 season (43 PIMs in 18 games). That might have been “cheating” of a sort as a product of the injuries through which he was trying to play. But discipline has been a problem for these Caps for two years, and the Captain being a part of that is not the sort of “lead by example” the team needs, either.

And what had to be especially frustrating for Clark and the Caps was that on both occasions he went on the shelf for long stretches, he appeared to be coming out of his points-scored funk, if not his goal scoring drought. He had assists in consecutive games on November 19th and 20th against Anaheim and Los Angeles before going down to injury two games later. Then, he had consecutive games with assists once more on January 20th and 27th against Ottawa and Boston before going down for the remainder of the regular season after the Boston game.

Clark has two more seasons on a contract that will pay him $2.633 million a year. At age 33, one wonders if the injuries haven’t taken a disproportionate toll on his game, which relies on toughness and a grinding style. He was getting the ice time of a fourth liner at the time he went down to injury, which really is no place for the captain. He has shown an ability to be opportunistic, evidenced by his netting those 50 goals in two seasons playing the opposite wing from Alex Ovechkin. Whether he can regain his health to be something approaching that player next year will go a long way to determining how far the Caps go. For now, though, you don’t want to downgrade a player because of his injury absences, but this wasn’t the Chris Clark Caps fans had become accustomed to when he was playing, either. Has his absence and lack of production the last two years turned him into "Captain Dunsel?" Hopefully, he can heal this off season and put the bad taste of the last two years out of his memory.

Grade: C-

stats from behindthenet.ca

Prelude

According to Capital Insider, Chris Clark could be done for the year...

"GM George McPhee just said that captain Chris Clark could miss the remainder of the regular season with the wrist injury that has been dogging him since training camp. Clark is at the doctor's office right now. I should know more later, but McPhee said it's looking like Clark will, in fact, need surgery on the wrist."

We've suspected there had to be something wrong with Clark. A player that scored 50 goals in two seasons, even if it was as the opposite winger from a guy scoring almost 100 of his own, doesn't just forget how to play hockey, even if he spent most of last year on the shelf with an injury.

But the timing of this has a fortuitous aspect to it as well (not for Clark, but for the roster). Clark hasn't been playing, and now we have the reason why and why his production has been down as much as it has been. Meanwhile, the Caps have the kinds of roster needs a contender has -- not major reworkings of the roster, but the kinds of tweaking a team might need to prepare for what amounts to a whole different season that starts in April. We are now 30 days from the trading deadline (March 4th, 3:00 EST).

The Caps have a wish list that might include a stay-at-home defenseman or some more grit among the forwards. The timing of Clark's surgery might give the Capitals the cap wherewithal to pursue such a move. Until now, it seemed unlikely the Caps would do much at the deadline other than see what return a Michael Nylander might fetch. This changes the game.

Clarks work for kids

In yesterday's Capitals Insider, Tarik El-Bashir wrote about an effort by Chris Clark and his wife, Kim, to raise funds for a playground in their summer home in Henderson, NY. As Tarik quoted from the team's web site...

The centerpiece of the Clarks' fundraising efforts is a raffle in which the winner will enjoy a one-of-a-kind Capitals experience at a 2008-09 home game. The package includes a two-night stay at the Westin Arlington Gateway Hotel and two tickets to the winner's choice of three games: Nov. 8 against the N.Y. Rangers, Jan. 3 against the N.Y. Rangers or Jan. 17 against Boston. After the game the winner and their guest will be escorted to Verizon Center's event level to meet Chris and get autographs from the Capitals' captain and his teammates.

Raffle tickets are just $20 and entry forms can be found online at http://www.aplacetoplayhenderson.com/. Entries are due Oct. 15, with the winning ticket drawn Oct. 19.

See the team's web site for more details.