The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Eastern Conference Quarterfinals, Game 5: Caps vs. Rangers

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

OK, Caps fans, with the boys down three games to one, it’s time to break out all the good luck charms you have lying around or any you find, for that matter. So, if you’re out and about today, enjoying the fine spring weather, look out for…

Acorns. For those of you familiar with Norse folklore, the acorn brings good fortune. A lone acorn is also thought to ward off lightning when placed in a windowsill. OK…save that one for next year when the Caps play Tampa Bay.

Stray Eyelash. As the story goes, if a stray eyelash should fall upon your cheek, place it on your finger and make a wish. Then blow the eyelash away. Your wish will come back to you. No word on if plucking eyelashes works…we might see hundreds of “lashless” Caps fans tonight.

Coins. If you see one lying on the sidewalk, look at it before you pick it up. If it’s “heads” up, pick it up – it’s a sign of good luck to come. If it’s “tails” up, leave it be – that’s a bad luck sign.

Crows. One is bad, two are a sign of luck, three signifies health, four – wealth, five means illness, six is death. No word on seven, maybe a hat trick.

Wood. Know where that whole “knock on wood” thing comes from? Seems there is a long history of believing that spirits live in trees, and knocking on them or touching them would bring good fortune, or (in the case of Celtic tradition) thank spirits for a bit of luck. Go forth and find a tree, Caps fans.

As for the game, we have that 3-1 deficit thing to think about. The last time a team down three games to one came back and won a series was in 2004. Montreal turned the trick against the Boston Bruins in the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals. In game five of that series, Montreal was faced, not only with having to crawl out of a deep hole, but they had to do so after an especially bitter game four.

In that game four, Montreal gagged on a 3-1 lead that they took not two minutes into the second period. Mike Knuble scored a goal in the last minute of regulation for the Bruins to send the game into overtime, and the Bruins won in a second overtime when Sheldon Souray and Alex Kovalev collided in the neutral zone, allowing Glen Murray to skate in alone on – gulp! – Jose Theodore for the game winning goal.

Forward to game five. Beaten, beat down, and having to go on the road to Boston, Montreal got a masterful performance from, that’s right – Theodore – in holding off the Bruins while building a 1-0 lead after one period and a 2-0 lead after two. The Bruins cracked, and Montreal poured in three goals in the third on their way to a 5-1 win that featured 43 saves by Theodore.

Montreal won game six at Bell Centre, 5-2, then traveled back to Boston to close out the Bruins in shocking fashion – a 2-0 shutout by Theodore.

The point of all of this is that, as the great Senator John Blutarsky famously put it, “Nothing is over until we decide it is!”

But deciding it’s not over and making it so are two different things. To achieve that, some things are going to have to change. So far, the “young guns” have been good. Alex Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, Nicklas Backstrom, and Mike Green have a combined four goals and 16 points in four games -- four points a game. But each member of this foursome averaged more than a point a game this year in the regular season. The Alexes have averaged more than a point a game in this series (five points apiece), but all four must be better than good. In game three – a 4-0 win – they combined for eight points. Split the difference – the Caps need six points out of this group.

The Caps have received almost nothing from anyone else in this series. Outside of the “young guns,” no Cap has more than one point. Tomas Fleischmann, Viktor Kozlov, Brooks Laich, Sergei Fedorov…you guys have one point apiece. That simply isn’t going to do.

Mike Green has had a difficult series. He just doesn’t seem himself, frankly. He’s been on the ice for four of the seven goals scored by the Rangers and has only two assists at the offensive end in compiling a team-worst minus-3 rating (tied with Eric Fehr). If Green doesn’t snap out of it, this isn’t likely to end well for the Caps.

If that Montreal-Boston series from 2004 is instructive, the best players need to step up in a big way. Montreal scored 12 goals in the last three games of that series. Richard Zednik had three; Alex Kovalev, Yanic Perrault, and Saku Koivu had two apiece. Koivu led the scoring with seven total points in those games. Zednik had five points. Perreault and Kovalev had four apiece.

But there were also the chip-ins. Darren Langdon and Jan Bulis had goals. Sheldon Souray and Andrei Markov contributed a pair of assists apiece from the blue line. And there was the goaltending.

That series provides an eerie echo to what is going on in the Caps-Rangers series. Montreal could not solve Bruin goalie Andrew Raycroft in the first four games, beating him only seven times in 134 shots (a .948 save percentage for Raycroft). Goaltending (yes, by Theodore) was not the problem, having allowed Boston only 11 goals in those four games, two of which went to overtime – Theodore had a .912 save percentage in those first four games.

But in the last three games, the Habs found their stroke, beating Raycoft on 12 of 79 shots (.848), while Theodore bettered his early series numbers in the last three games (97 saves on 100 shots faced). And here's the thing...it was the first time in the storied history of the Montreal Canadiens that they recovered from a 3-1 series deficit.

This isn’t, as they say, “rocket science.” The Caps need to get more out of their best, get something – anything – out of the next wave of players, and keep stuffing the Rangers’ offensive chances. Do that three times, and there is hockey in May in Washington, after all.

229 teams have faced a 3-1 deficit in Stanley Cup playoff series. 20 of them have come back to win those series. If the Caps are to be the 21st, they have to win one before they can win another, and that starts tonight…

Caps 4 – Rangers 1

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!! -- Your First Round Prognostications: Caps vs. Rangers

The Peerless Prognosticator is ON THE AIR!!!

The Caps will face the New York Rangers in the first round of the 2008-2009 playoffs that starts this week. On paper, the Caps should dispose of the Rangers in short order. Now it’s time to look at why they will…or won’t.

As much as any series in the first round, this one’s theme will be the irresistible force meeting the immovable object. The Capitals are a top-third ranked team in the offensive statistics and have the fire power to spot a team a lead and come back to win as often as not. On the other hand, the Rangers are a top-third ranked team in the defensive statistics and boast the league’s top penalty killing group. The raw numbers look like this…


If one digs a little deeper into this goop, you can start to see things each team wants to take advantage of, and things they'd like to avoid...

What you find here is that the Caps are a team that starts fast and finishes that way, illustrated by their league's second best first and third period goal scoring. That third period scoring might be something to watch here, given that the chinks in the Rangers' defensive armor seem to appear later in games.

There is also the matter of the Caps being almost a third-of-a-goal a game better than the Rangers at five-on-five. This appears to be a reflection of the Rangers' overall lack of offensive depth and the Caps ability -- even willingness -- to trade haymakers with teams. The Caps have more weapons for that sort of a contest. How the Rangers deal with that -- or how the officials do (more on that in a bit) -- will be a significant factor in this series.

Now, if you read the collective hockey punditry, you will find a common theme, that being that you can throw these numbers out, that with the addition of Sean Avery, Nik Antropov, and Derek Morris – none of whom have played against the Caps this year while wearing a Ranger jersey – plus the fact that John Tortorella (not Tom Renney) coaches this team now, the Rangers are a different team. In a sense, they’d better be, since the Caps won seven of a possible eight standings points in the head to head competition, and the Rangers won no games in the “hockey” portion of the series (winning their only point by virtue of coming out on top in the Gimmick in the last meeting of the teams, on February 11th).

But are the Rangers a different team after all those changes? The dividing line we might look at to answer that question is the trading deadline, since it is at that point that the Rangers had all the new ingredients – coach and players – in place to effect this supposed phoenix-like transformation. Here is how the Rangers break down, before and after…

Clearly, the Rangers performed better after the additions, not so much on special teams, where their efficiency didn’t change appreciably, but in 5-on-5 play. They scored more and allowed fewer goals. But we have a suspicion that in an odd way, that will mean that this series will turn on special teams. Bear with us.

Even with the improvements, the Rangers are not an especially fearsome team at 5-on-5 play. So, for the Rangers, the object might be to “shorten” the game – play fewer minutes at 5-on-5, let the superior penalty killing unit frustrate the opponent, and/or score on the power play by virtue of getting more chances.

With that in mind, here is the single number you might keep in mind when watching this series…

Five.

Look at that second table above, the one that includes a reference to the teams' record when receiving five or more power plays/PK situations a game. When the Rangers received five or more power plays this year, they compiled a record of 24-8-1. Even when having to kill off five or more penalties, they had a .500-plus record (13-10-2). And when the Rangers were in a tightly-called game all around – five or more power plays for both teams – they were 9-3-0 (although three wins came via the Gimmick). If this series turns into a march to the penalty box, it will not be good news for the Caps, especially given that the Caps averaged just over five minor penalties taken per game for the season.

A tightly called series for both teams is a high risk proposition for the Rangers, given the effectiveness displayed by the Caps on the power play this year – at 25.2 percent, they were second in the league to Detroit. That means that for all the attention being paid to who is in the Capitals’ net, the Rangers’ only chance to win this series, it would seem, is for Henrik Lundqvist to keep the Caps at bay until the Rangers can generate just enough opportunities to scratch out a goal or two.

And again, for all the pixels and ink being devoted to how inconsistent Capitals’ goalie Jose Theodore is, there is a curious history about Lundqvist in the playoffs. Namely, he hasn’t been that good, at least not as good as one might expect a three-time Vezina finalist to be. In 23 career playoff appearances, Lundqvist is 11-12, 2.57, .907, all numbers being significantly inferior to his career regular season record. Seven times in those 23 career playoff appearances he has allowed four or more goals, including three times in his last eight outings in last year’s playoffs.

If there is something in the Rangers’ season record that could cause concern among Caps fans, it is in their ability to frustrate offensively gifted teams. Of the top five goal-scoring teams in the NHL this season, the Rangers have a record of 9-6-2. They have a .500-or-better record (based on points earned) against four of those teams. The one team they do not have a .500 record against – the Caps (1-2-1).

How the Rangers will win

Stan Fischler’s faith in the Rangers’ offense delivering aside, the Rangers have to keep games from getting past six goals combined for the teams. If games get to seven, eight, nine goals, chances are the Rangers aren’t going to be on the long end of them. They don’t have enough weapons to consistently win high-scoring games.

The Rangers’ realm is the one-goal game. No team still playing in the East has played in more one-goal games than have the Rangers (43). Only New Jersey among playoff teams in the East has more one-goal wins in the regular season. On the other hand, no team in the East played fewer one-goal games in the regular season than the Caps (34), although the Caps’ winning percentage is virtually identical to that of the Rangers (.559 to .558). The Rangers need to win games 2-1 and 3-2. They won’t win games, 5-4 or 6-5.

You’d like to think Scott Gomez and Chris Drury are going to show up for the Rangers. Their respective playoff pedigrees suggest that they will. But that isn’t likely to be enough. The Rangers need Nikolai Zherdev and Nik Antropov to show up, too. The problem is, Antropov has a grand total of five points in 28 career playoff games, and Zherdev is making his first playoff appearance.

The wild card – literally – is Sean Avery. There is perhaps no player in the NHL who has such an outsized reputation as a game changer relative to his actual production. But that’s the problem, too. That reputation, which centers mostly on his antics directed toward opponents, disguises a resume that suggests a productive player. He had 22 points in 41 games this year, 12 in 18 games for the Rangers. That’s not a total that will impress folks who watch the Caps treat the scoreboard like a pinball machine, but 0.67 points/game for the Blueshirts is better than Markus Naslund or Brandon Dubinsky put up this year, too. Avery’s ability to contribute within the rules can’t be overlooked.

How the Caps will win

What the Caps are going to want to do is make this “Showtime” in the NHL sense. The Rangers had the worst winning percentage of any of the remaining 16 teams in games decided by three or more goals (8-14, .364). This is the fault line upon which this series will be decided – the ability of the Caps to impose a fast-break style on the Rangers, pounding them with their superior offensive depth, or the Rangers making this a war of attrition, shortening the game by virtue of their suffocating penalty kill and goaltending.

The constants for the Caps are Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom. Ovechkin has had consecutive games without a point only twice this year, and none since early January. Backstrom endured a four-game streak without a point in late January, but since then has registered at least one point in 27 of 33 games. Then there is Mike Green, who in the last two years has gone 5-3-8, +6 in seven games against the Rangers.

The wild cards are Alexander Semin and Brooks Laich. While Semin has matured as a player, he is still given to bouts of inconsistency. But in his last 22 games to close the regular season, he was 13-16-29 with three game-winning goals. If that Alexander Semin shows up – the one of sublime talent who, when he is on, is the most gifted offensive talent on this team – this will be a short series. For Brooks Laich, it is not likely to be so much a matter of talent as will. When Laich is rooting around the crease for a puck like a pig after a truffle, he is the perfect complement to the other talent on this team. In his last 16 games, Laich was 8-9-17. Maybe for the duration, that should be our nickname for him – “Truffles.”

Like most playoff series, we think this will turn on goaltending. The hockey “market,” in a sense, has already factored in the alleged inconsistency of Jose Theodore and has tagged the Caps as the most vulnerable favorite in the first round. Our suspicions are about Lundqvist, who has had more problems in playoff settings than one might expect.

The Rangers won’t score enough to keep them alive into a second round, and Lundqvist doesn’t have four sub-three goal games in him.

Caps in five

Caps stink, have no defense, no goaltender, caused global warming

Well, maybe not that last part about global warming, but as for the first three, you would think the Caps were perusing the local golf course web sites for tee times based on the commentary from Keith Jones at TSN.ca on post-season awards...

"The only defenceman for the Washington Capitals is [Mike] Green and and he should win the Norris because he has no help on the blueline. Milan Jurcina is the second highest scoring defenceman on the Capitals with 14 points and the Bruins gave him away. Tom Poti is the third highest scoring defenceman with 13 points. Green is +24 on a team without a goaltender."

No other defensemen and no goaltender. Green shouldn't win the Vezina, he should win the Hart and maybe the Nobel Prize for Hockey (hey, create the award for him...he's that good, apparently) for good measure.

A TWO-point night: Caps 5 - Islanders 3

Last night, the Caps surged…well, surged isn’t quite the word. Let’s say that they crawled over the 100-point threshold for the season in defeating the New York Islanders, 5-3.

It was a game we might call an “ISO” game. No, not some personals “in search of” kind of thing, more of an “in spite of” sort of effort…

In spite of looking for all the world for the first 40 minutes as if he had downed a bottle of NyQuil before the game, Mike Green ended the night with a very splashy score sheet – two goals, an assist, two hits, four blocked shots, a franchise record for power play goals (season) after netting his 17th and 18th, and becoming only the eighth defenseman in NHL history to register 30 goals for a season.

In spite of never having engaged in an NHL fight, and having only two on his resume – one in the WHL and one in the AHL – Jeff Schultz dropped the mitts with Tim Jackman. We have to give it to Schultz, he didn’t tangle with a lightweight. That was Jackman’s 19th fight of the NHL season and 33rd of his NHL career. It would be nice to say Schultz won, or even held Jackman to a draw. He didn’t. But the kid gets marks for competing out there last night. It was something that seemed curiously lacking in his game the last month.

In spite of being the guy with the reputation for wadding up like a cheap suit when he gets hit, there was Tomas Fleischmann standing in front tangled with Brendan Witt when Mike Green floated the puck in for the game winner.

In spite of being only 5-6-1 this season when recording at least 40 shots on goal, the Caps managed to get the win in this one after getting 43 shots on goal.

In spite of looking like they were spraying shots like an actor doing a spit take all evening, the Caps were credited with only 19 missed shots. It seemed like 39.

Some other stuff…

The Caps had only two shots on goal on the power play…they scored on both of them (Mike Green getting both shots and both goals).

The centers schooled the Islanders in the circle. Nicklas Backstrom (16-for-24), Sergei Fedorov (11-for-18), Keith Aucoin (7-for-9), and David Steckel (5-for-6) were a combined 39 up and 18 down on faceoffs on the way to a 45-24 overall edge.

On the other side of that coin, Josh Bailey…1-for 12. Doug Weight…4-for-17. Guys, you do know you can use a stick in the faceoff circle, right?

The Islanders’ Joel Rechlicz is nicknamed, “The Wrecker.” Think he comes by the name accidentally? In four seasons (and counting), starting in the QMJHL through last night’s game, he’s had 63 fights. That’s what makes John Erskine’s tussle with him all the more impressive. Choreographed fights of the sort a lot of heavyweights engage in these days are side shows to the game – they really don’t seem to have much of an effect. But there was a distinct change in the energy level in the Caps’ play after Erskine beat Rechlicz. With the Islanders leading 2-0 when that fight took place, you have to wonder if Rechlicz shouldn’t have skated away. Alex Ovechkin scored five minutes after the bout, and the Caps had their feet back under them again.

Give Keith Aucoin credit for recognizing an opportunity and pouncing on his own rebound to get his first goal as a Cap – he was one of the hardest working guys out there all night. But give Eric Fehr credit on that one, too. His persistence in forechecking and using his reach to deflect a pass to Aucoin’s stick started that play.

Is it me, or does it just seem as if Richard Park plays his best hockey against the Caps? Park had 12 shot attempts (Parkvechkin?) and a goal in just over 16 minutes of ice time.

Speaking of Park, how did the puck end up on his stick to be able to split the Caps defense and walk in alone on goalie Jose Theodore? Well, along the boards Michael Nylander got tangled up with Tim Jackman, and Nylander kicked the puck to the center of the ice at the Caps line and onto Park’s stick. Nylander did not see another shift for the rest of the game.

How many times do you see three unassisted goals in a game (ok, one was Backstrom’s empty-netter)?

One looks at Kyle Okposo and sees a little bit of Alex Ovechkin (circa 2006) in this respect…if the Islanders can ever get some talent around this guy, watch out.

How lackadaisical were the Caps over too much of this game? How does 24 giveaways sound? And the Caps lost the turnover battle, 31-16.

Hey, we get the “Unleash the Fury” thing to rouse the crowd in the third period. What we don’t get is having to announce it. Just play it…the crowd knows what to do.

Admit it, the Caps shouldn’t have won this game. For most of the night, the Islanders outworked the Caps in all three zones, and Joey MacDonald had, for the most part, a fine game in goal. But the Caps just have too much skill for that team to cope with. Even when the Caps tried – at times quite literally – to give the two points away, the Islanders couldn’t put it away. And when Green tied things up mid-way in the third, one had the feeling that the Islanders, even with the effort they were expending, were going to fade in the stretch.

That’s not a recipe for success, but then again, the Caps are now 7-2-1 in their last ten games. That’s only one point fewer than the media’s darlings of the month – Carolina and Pittsburgh over the same span of games. The Caps haven’t done it as prettily as Pittsburgh or as confoundingly as Carolina. But two points (or 15) is two points.

In a way, how the Caps are doing this is encouraging. They are finding ways to win games when they don’t have their “A” game, when they have to struggle, be it from illness running through the team or a general lack of intensity given their opponent. Winning when things are going peachy is comparatively easy. Figuring out how to win when you don’t have your best stuff is how a long playoff run could be built.

Hmm...

...imagine that.

And now...yet another word about Mike Green

Much is being made of Mike Green lately, and with good reason. He is riding a six-game goal-scoring streak. He leads all NHL defensemen in total scoring. He’s fourth in plus-minus. J.P. takes a look at Green’s Norris credentials over at Japers' Rink. James Mirtle asks, “Is Green the NHL’s best defenseman?” What’s unanswered is whether Green can keep this up.

Well, if there is one thing that has characterized Green’s young career so far, it is explosive improvement (we like that term). Two years ago in his first full NHL season, Green played in 70 games, finishing 2-10-12, -10. He had a rather brutal end to the season though (as did the rest of the Capitals), going 0-4-4, -11 in 22 games after the end of January.

OK, let’s move on to last season. His season-long numbers improved dramatically – 18-38-56, +6. The improvement over the previous season (16-28-34, +16) would have made for a nice season in itself. But his improvement as a player might have been most meaningful in those post-January games. In his first 52 games last year, Green was 14-18-32, -5. What he had that he didn’t have in 2006-2007 was a big finish… but not in the goal-scoring sort of way. In his last 30 games last year from February 1st forward, Green was 4-20-24, +11. If he wasn’t getting the goals he might have been getting to earn the nickname “Game Over” Green, he was getting it done in other ways. And, two of those four goals in the last 30 games were game-winners (equaling his total in the first 52 games).

Looking at this graphically…

His pre-February numbers this season equaled or surpassed last year’s in every category, except game-winners, despite playing in 15 fewer games. He has already surpassed the number of post-January goals he had last year in the post-January phase of the season. One couldn’t predict (at least not while sober) that Green will average better than a goal a game and better than the two points per game pace he’s been on in the four games of February, but here is perhaps the number that serves as a good indicator that he won’t slow down much, either… two.

Green has not gone more than two games this season without recording a point. He’s had four pairs of consecutive scoreless games this year. On the other hand, he’s registered a point in 27 of 41 games played this season and 11 of his last 12 games.

While there are no certainties in such things, the arc of improvement in Green’s young career thus far suggests that he should be a prolific point producer from the blue line through the rest of the season. Is that enough to get him serious Norris consideration? Probably, given that in the last ten seasons no Norris winner has had fewer than ten goals or 50 points in his Norris-winning season.

Groundhog Goal

"[Alexander Semin] sauced it right onto my tape. I just had to go upstairs with it."

-- Mike Green, commenting on the goal he scored last night

...it seems to happen a lot.

Sittin' at the end of the bar...

From our "did you know (Young Guns Category)?" file...

Did you know that Bruce Boudreau is 67-32-10 in his first 109 games? Not bad for a guy who took over little more than an expansion team (with a lot of young, but green talent, to be sure). Just by way of comparison, Scotty Bowman was 49-35-25 in his first 109 games, taking over an expansion franchise in St. Louis.

Yeah, yeah, Bowman went to the Stanley Cup finals in those first two years in St. Louis, but that was when the "original six" were in one division (and they were divisions back then), and all the expansion teams were in the other. OK, he's not a "young gun," but hey, we're just sayin'...

*****

Did you know that in his 291-game career, Alex Ovechkin is 194-175-369? As for players to whom he has been compared in style over roughly comparable stretches to start their NHL careers...

- Maurice Richard (first six seasons): 275 games, 187-123-301

- Mark Messier (first four seasons): 302 games, 133-157-290

- Gordie Howe (first five seasons): 298 games, 113-144-257

Different eras? Absolutely, but it's safe to say his name can be mentioned in the same sentence as the others.

*****

Now, here's the odd one. Did you know that in this, his third full season with the Caps, Mike Green is 33-71-104 in 209 career games? Well, let's compare that to the three season totals of another defenseman...

174 games, 45-91-136

True, Green trails this player in all the scoring categories as an "offensive" defenseman, but it isn't that unfavorable a comparison... to Bobby Orr. OK, in Orr's fourth season he would have the first of five consecutive 100-plus point seasons. We're going to go out on a limb here and say that Green doesn't have a 100-point season in his future. But he still could become the premier offensive defenseman of this era.

*****

Did you know that in 130 career games and in his second season, Nicklas Backstrom has 91 assists? Now, compare that to the top five all-time career assist leaders (centers only) in their first two seasons...

Ron Francis -- 138 games, 102 assists

Mark Messier -- 147 games, 61 assists

Adam Oates -- 114 games, 43 assists

Steve Yzerman -- 160 games, 107 assists

Marcel Dionne -- 155 games, 99 assists

We're thinking that at his current rate Backstrom will finish this year with around 115 career assists, which certainly would put him in this company. OK, OK... we didn't list Wayne Gretzky. Well, he lives on a different planet. Sue me.

*****

Did you know that Alexander Semin has 92 goals in his first 222 career games in this, his fourth season? Well, compared to the top-five career goal-scorers among wingers in comparable volumes of career games...

Gordie Howe -- 228 games, 70 goals (over parts of four seasons)

Brett Hull -- 228 games, 146 goals (over parts of four seasons)

Mike Gartner -- 237 games, 119 goals (three)

Luc Robitaille -- 237 games, 144 goals (three)

Brendan Shanahan -- 206 games, 59 goals (three)

...he compares pretty favorably, especially considering that Gartner and Robitaille began their careers in a high-scoring era.

A few years does not a career make, even for players (or a coach) off to such fine starts as these. But fine starts they've had. Just something to tide us over this All-Star week.

One

Well, the rosters are now complete for the Eastern Conference team playing in the All Star Game later this month, and Alex Ovechkin is on it.

That's the good news.

The bad is that he will be the only Capitals representative at the All Star Game in Montreal on January 25th. Mike Green was not selected, nor was Nicklas Backstrom. Backstrom was a longshot for this event, but Green's absence has the flavor of a voting related incident. Mike Komisarek -- a fine defenseman in his own right -- will start as a product of techno-ballot-stuffing.

Are there five hockey fans in North America outside of Montreal who think Komisarek should be there instead of Green?

The Capital Way

For those of you who have a memory for the Baltimore Orioles of major league baseball, you might remember almost 30 years back to a time when the O's had pitching out the wazoo. In fact, Earl Weaver once referred to his starting rotation of pitchers as ''Cy Young'' (Mike Flanagan), "Cy Future'' (Scott McGregor), ''Cy Old'' (Jim Palmer), and ''Cy Present'' (Steve Stone).

Well, here we are at the end of December, and it's about time for the selection of the NHL player of the month. Among the leading contenders for the award are Capitals Alex Ovechkin (12-7-19, 2 GWG in December) and Nicklas Backstrom (6-15-21, 1 GWG).

Ovechkin (November) and Alexander Semin (October) already have won this year. They are POM "Old" (Semin being 24) and POM "Young" (Ovechkin, who is 23). If Backstrom wins, he's POM "Present."

Would that make Mike Green POM "Future?"

Just "The Capital Way," we guess.

A TWO-point Night: Caps 5 - Hurricanes 2

Well…as pre-season games go, tonight’s 5-2 Capitals win over the Carolina Hurricanes was entertaining. But let’s not delude ourselves that this was either: a) indicative of the relative strengths of these two teams, or b) that the Caps played well. But, it was a chance to look at some youngsters, a chance to put a few vets in roles they don’t normally play, and a chance to reminisce about the sort of crowd that would frequent (for lack of a better verb) games last December. Some thoughts on the game…

- Official attendance: 13,266. Uh-huh…a lot of season ticket holders didn’t brave the weather. There might have been 8,000 actual bodies.

- We could sit here and type that Michal Neuvirth had a difficult game (which would be true in many respects), but we’ll give him credit. He gave up two goals on the Hurricanes’ first seven shots, and he was fighting the puck for most of the 40 minutes he played. But he dug his heels in after the second goal and kept the Hurricanes from scoring again. Yeah, if Rod Brind’Amour or Eric Staal were out there, and this was January? Neuvirth would have been lit up like the Las Vegas strip. But this night, against these opponents, he stuck it out. We’ll give him marks for that.

- Chris Bourque is light years better – if this night was any indication – than he was in previous stints here. In visits past, he’d skate around like a water bug, full of energy, but with no discernible purpose. Tonight, he was a lot more in control of his game, finding the open spaces to get shots off. And for someone of such short stature, he took a hit well with his low center of gravity. Only Alex Ovechkin and Mike Green had more power play time.

- Tim Conboy…three minor penalties for roughing. If it wasn’t for his being utterly obnoxious, you’d never have known he dressed.

- OK, so you’re Daniel Manzato. You’re a young goalie coming into the game mid-way through the second period. You’ve played only one game above the ECHL level in your career. And the first shot you face from an NHL player is a penalty shot…and it’s Alex Ovechkin doing the shooting. Wes Craven can’t gin up a plot as horrifying. And the results were just as predictable.

- Speaking of Ovechkin, having notched the penalty shot goal and an assist on the first goal of two by Michael Nylander, he was trying to set up anyone wearing a red jersey, passing on a number of open shots. Failing to get anyone to finish his passes, one could almost hear him say, “enough of this crap (or whatever the Russian equivalent is),” and just fired the puck in himself on a set play from a faceoff.

- Was it me, or did Chris Clark look like he played with a smile on his face all night (except when he was staring over at Conboy with a look that said, “what the #@$& is your PROBLEM, pal?”)

- I don’t think you could get Daren Machesney to settle down if you bolted him to the ice. He was a bundle of perpetual motion out there. Given that he faced only three shots in 20 minutes, he probably needed to do something to keep himself occupied.

- In the NHL scoresheet, it’s “Joshua” Godfrey, in case you were wondering.

- It is entirely possible that the Hurricanes started only one forward who will start on opening night (Patrick Eaves).

- Carolina had only three shots on goal in the last 23:30 of the game.

- Alexander Semin had several puck-handling displays that might be SportsCenter-worthy…none of them resulted in a goal; few of them resulted in a chance. He looked like he was holding onto the puck too much and too long.

- We sat there for most of the game fretting…”Mike Green could easily get into bad habits with the sort of game he had tonight.”

- But speaking of Green, he logged 5:49 of penalty-killing time tonight. That would be about 20 percent of all the time he got short-handed last year. Alex Ovechkin had 4:48 on the penalty kill…he had a total of 13:09 last year. Enjoy it now boys…

- In the first intermission, with the Caps trailing 2-0, the Caps ran a text-message ticker on the big screen. One message said, “it’s not over until Brooks Laich says it’s over”…guess that person knew what they were talking about.

…Brooks sez, it’s over.

2009-2009 Previews: Mike Green

The cousins ran out of beer, and were off collecting empties to finance their next purchase, so we’ve been out for a few days. But now, we come to…



Mike Green


Last Year: 82 games, 18-38-56, +6, 4 GWG

Career average (per-82 games): 10-24-34, -6


Fearless’ take: Let’s start with this…Mike Green has played a total of 174 regular season NHL games. Of the top ten scorers among defensemen in the league last year, Green finished the year having played the fewest career regular season games (next fewest – Mark Streit: 205), and he was the youngest (Dion Phaneuf is 185 days older). What’s more, he was 15-34-49, +14 in the last 61 games of the season under coach Bruce Boudreau. That works out to a 20-46-66, +19 full season rate of production. Let’s look at this another way and compare his first three seasons (a partial and two more or less full seasons) with another defenseman and his first three seasons (a partial and two full seasons):

Green: 174 games, 21-50-71, -12, 4 GWG, 8 PPG

Player 2: 165 games, 21-66-87, +43, 2 GWG, 10 PPG

Let’s also note that Green played his partial first season and his first full season with a struggling team. Player 2 played on a team that made the playoffs in both his partial first and then his first full season. Player 2 is Scott Niedermayer. Green is by no means there, yet. He is not the Scott Niedermayer of the last ten years, but it is not beyond reasonable to think he will get there. More to the point, being managed by a coach who gives him sufficient latitude to do the things he does best, and being paired with a defenseman who complements his style very well by being a stay-at-home type (Shaone Morrisonn), he could move a little closer to that high standard in 2008-2009.

Cheerless’ take: Twenty seconds. That’s how much penalty killing time per game Green had last year. Shoot, Joel Kwiatkowski got more: 33 seconds (Uh, Cheerless?...Kiwi played in only 18 games). That’s Patrice Breeze-by territory (22 seconds). Among top ten defenseman scorers, Green had by far the lowest amount of PK ice time (Mark Streit: 49 seconds/game, the only other top-ten scoring defenseman with less than 1:20 of PK time/game). Oh, and that Niedermayer comparison?...Scotty had 3:33 of PK time/game in 48 games. Are the rest of the Caps’ defenseman that good at killing penalties that he should be last among the defensemen in that measure?

He had one big year…look at those first 92 career games, cuz. 3-12-15, -18. Was last year the start of a trend, or was last year a fluke?...a one-timer of a year? He’s got that big ol’ contract now that pays him 21 million bucks over the next four years. That sounds like a recipe for a fall to me, cuz.

The Peerless’ take: Green’s young career falls into two very clear and very neat stages:

The Hanlon Stage: 113 games, 6-16-22, -26, 0 GWG, 0 PPG
The Bourdreau Stage: 61 games, 15-34-49, +14, 4 GWG, 8 PPG

But what is interesting about that “Boudreau Stage” is that it represents something of a continuation of Green’s performance under Bruce Boudreau at Hershey…68 regular season games, 12-39-51, +9, 3 PPG.

Green does have issues in his own end. He can be at time a little lackadaisical with the puck, and he can seem to lose focus at times. Both seem the kinds of things that plague a lot of young defenseman. We don’t put a great deal of stock in the penalty killing time issue – sorry, Cheerless – since he logs so much time otherwise. What Green is, is almost the prototypical post-lockout defenseman (“offensive” category). He skates well, handles the puck well, has good judgment (given his age and experience) in jumping into the play in the offensive end, has a good sense of timing on weak side plays, is effective on the power play. In the last ten years, only one defenseman playing more than 60 games in a season achieved a point-per-game performance (Nicklas Lidstrom – 80 points in 80 games in 2005-2006). Green, given his talent, the talent around him, and the philosophy of the club, appears best positioned among current NHL defensemen to achieve that level of production. It will not, however, be this year.


Projected: 20-44-64, +15

Built to Last

Back in the 1990’s, when the Dallas Cowboys were winning three Super Bowls in four years in the NFL, the Cowboys’ had their “big three” – quarterback, running back, and wide receiver. By the time the Cowboys had won that third Super Bowl in four years, neither Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, nor Michael Irvin had reached their 30^th birthday. It was a reflection of the importance of having a core group of players (in this case, all on offense), a young group at that, and of keeping them together for a period of time. These players shared ten seasons together, from 1990-1999, and were among the most important cogs of what was arguably the most successful team in the NFL in the 1990’s.

It makes one wonder at what passes for the “big three” among NHL teams. During this agonizingly slow stretch of the hockey calendar, we were doodling with lineups and such, and wondered what the 30 teams might look like in terms of their “big threes.” Before we get too deep into this, this isn’t entirely science. One might split hairs over who plays what position among the forwards, or if one player or another is really “big three” caliber (and to extent they’re not, it might be an indicator of a club that is, or will struggle). However, we took a look at the clubs with only a few criteria in mind. The “big three” is comprised of a center, a winger, and a defenseman (goaltenders weren’t included, because they tend have longer lead times to establish themselves, and a goaltender would make “four”). To be a “big three,” the player had to be under 30 years of age, and the players had to be contributors (raw recruits of considerable promise generally aren’t in this group). See? I told you it wasn’t science. But if you’re looking for a theme to this, it is “built to last,” and part of that is how long the trio, under their current contracts (or extensions, if already signed), will be together.

So, with that, here they are, one fan’s look at the 30 “big three’s:”

And what do we glean from this? Well, for those of you paying attention, the Capitals’ big three is the most expensive of the lot, but you already suspected as much, didn’t you? That’s a product of two big-time extensions that will kick in this year.* The other leg of that triad – Nicklas Backstrom – represents some work to do down the road insofar as it is his contract that keeps the three together only through the 2009-2010 season.

We find it interesting that 17 teams will have to reassemble or re-sign their groups after this coming season, since at least one member of the big three has an expiring contract. Only two clubs have groups whose contracts permit them to be together (barring trade or other departure) for more than three years. Curiously, those two are Edmonton, which is generally thought to have a pretty good prospect pool behind such players as Shawn Horcoff, Dustin Penner, and Tom Gilbert; and Tampa Bay, which has almost no one coming in behind the likes of Vincent Lecavalier, Ryan Malone, and Matthew Carle (well, there is that Stamkos kid…). Opposite poles, as it were.

We’re looking at a snapshot here, and salaries are a moving target. So, divining a relationship between dollars and playoffs is a bit of work. Let’s look at Washington, for example…Alex Ovechkin, Mike Green, and Nicklas Backstrom will represent a $17.2 million cap hit for the 2008-2009 season. The Caps made the playoffs last year when these three represented a $7.1 million cap hit.

Let’s cut to the happy ending…does it matter? We think it does. Continuity and talent are two important ingredients for success in a league where the salary cap and the possibility of large paydays through free agency make for a lot of player movement. However, looking at the group ranked in terms of cap burden suggests that there is a third element here as well. If you look at the list above, nine of the teams in the top half (in terms of cap burden this year) made the playoffs last year. Seven clubs in the lower half made it. Even accounting for the fact that some of these “big threes” include players not on the roster last year, there are eight teams in the top half of the cap rankings having made no changes to that top three that made the playoffs last year, five in the lower half. Money helps, to a point (and in some case, moving up in the rankings reflect rewards for and retention of core elements – Washington is a case in point), but one has to build a team around these guys, too.

Here’s the thing, though. The Capitals have the youngest of the young here. Ovechkin, Backstrom, and Green – is the youngest of the 30 big threes. Seeing as how Ovechkin and Green will be together (barring trade or other departure) through the 2011-2012 season, and how Backstrom is on record as saying “I don’t want to play anywhere else in the NHL. Washington is my team,” this could be a group that will be together for quite a stretch. It just another way of showing that this is a club that is being “built to last.”

* The careful reader will note that the Caps’ being at the top of this list comes on something of a technicality – Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin is conspicuously missing from the Penguins’ big three, his being a center. If he was to be included, replacing Ruslan Fedotenko, Pittsburgh’s big three costs $21,400,000. They also stay together through the 2012-2013 season. And, Ottawa has the unsettled matter of defenseman Andrei Meszaros, which could push the Senators past the Capitals in replacing Anton Volchenkov as part of their “big three.”

After-Math -- Caps vs. Maple Leafs

Woo-hoo!!!.... TWO points, tonight!!!

And that’s how it’s done. If one were to tell The Peerless, “Alex Ovechkin will not register a point, and the Caps will score five goals, anyway,” The Peerless would have asked, “who the $#@& are you, Eklund?”

As it was, that’s just what happened in the Caps’ 5-1 win against the Toronto Maple Leafs. And, lordy, did the goals come from odd places. Alexandre Giroux scored his first NHL goal 1:46 in after Steve Eminger sent the puck to the end boards, where it popped straight back, hopping past the flailing stick of Toronto goalie, Andrew Raycroft (who had one of the more brutal games a goaltender can have..he couldn’t handle a puck cleanly tonight if you, well…handed it to him). Giroux celebrated in appropriate fashion. After all, it’s not as if goal scoring is foreign to him (he has 38 goals for Hershey this year), but it was his first goal of the NHL variety. Congratulations, kid.

The Caps had a familiar face notch the second goal – Alexander Semin stuffed in his own rebound after a nifty takeaway. After that . . . Boyd Gordon, Kris Beech, and Tomas Fleischmann. Along with Giroux, those four have a grand total of 26 career NHL goals, counting tonight. Semin has 34 this year. It is the kind of contribution from the “other guys” (meaning ones whose first names don’t rhyme with “Malexander” . . . ok, there’s Giroux, but you get my point) that has been lacking all year.

Some folks might wonder . . . why did Brooks Laich get a second star in this game? Well, look at the shift chart.

Boyd Gordon took a lot of draws against Mats Sundin, but the pesky Gordon gives away four inches and 30 pounds. It was Laich that served as the big body pounding on the big Leaf, and in the end took more draws than Gordon. Sundin shook loose for an assist on the Leafs’ lone goal, but other than that was largely neutralized. Laich also led the Caps in ice time on the penalty kill. There is more to getting a star than scoring goals.

There were a few odd numbers tonight . . .

- “zero”…the number of hits Darcy Tucker registered. What, he’s mellowing in his older years?

- “four”…that’s how many Caps registered fewer than 10 minutes ice time.

- “two”…Neither Brian Sutherby nor Mike Green took a shift in the third period.

- 15:34…the combined ice time of Toronto centers Jeff O’Neill and Yanic Perreault.

- “16”…that’s how many different skaters made their way to the penalty box tonight. What, were they serving beer over there?

- “two” (again)…the number of Toronto skaters finishing the night even . . . 16 were in the minus category (testimony to the ability of the Caps to spread the joy around tonight; only three Caps were even, the rest were in the plus category).

- “.971”…the save percentage for Olaf Kolzig tonight (34 saves on 35 shots). Amazing what a steadying influence a veteran goalie with a pedigree can have.

All in all, it was a quite satisfying game. It might be just one game in the slow march to the end of the year, but the guys looked like they were having fun. Hope they played the music really loud in the locker room.

The Evening after the Afternoon -- Caps vs. Penguins

Nope . . . no points today.



It was all about the goaltending. One flinch was the difference – a hesitation by a shooter, followed by an innocent looking flick at the net. That was the sliver of difference between the Washington Capitals and the Pittsburgh Penguins, the latter skating off Mellon Arena ice with a 2-0 win this afternoon. An empty net goal at the end provided the final margin, but less than ten seconds in the second period was just enough to sink the Caps – long enough for Ronald Petrovicky to collect the puck in his own end, skate down the right wing, fake a pass, and send the puck to the net and past goaltender Olaf Kolzig, who appeared to be expecting something smarter fired at the net.

At the other end, Marc-Andre Fleury continued his run of fine performances with a 30 save shutout. It was good enough to send Alex Ovechkin into a stick-snapping fit of frustration after the game.

There really isn’t anything else to offer in terms of difference. It is not as if the Caps played a bad game. They didn’t. They had chances. Eric Fehr, especially, had two golden opportunities – one on a partial breakaway – that Fleury turned aside. Fleury was, as he has been for the Penguins the last five weeks, the difference. For the Caps, this loss looked a lot better than the confounding and sloppy losses to Florida. Offense is, by its nature, often streaky. But defense is a product of effort – something that can be brought every night (or close to it). The Caps had that effort this afternoon.

If there was one very subtle number in this game it was this . . .

20:23. That was the ice time for the newest Cap, Milan Jurcina, more than any other defenseman. The Peerless wonders, if the club was in the thick of the playoff hunt, would a brand spanking new player be given top minutes on the blue line?

There is much caterwauling on the official boards about the play of Olaf Kolzig and the Caps in general. Going 6-15-0 over what amounts to more than a quarter of the season will do that. But let’s step back and look at the hand the Caps are playing on the blue line . . .

Shaone Morrisonn (18:26 in ice time today) – 173 games experience
Steve Eminger (16:36) – 173 games
Mike Green (17:04) – 72 games
Jeff Schultz (18:26) – 11 games
Milan Jurcina (20:23) – 92 games

Joe Beninati and Craig Laughlin noted the Penguins’ youth in this afternoon’s broadcast (second youngest team in the league), but it would be hard to find a greener defense than the one Washington is putting on the ice. These are guys who someday will fit the roles they are now being asked to play, but it is unfair to expect these guys to flourish in those roles right now. Today, they did themselves proud against what is one of the hottest teams in the league (now 11-2-2 in their last 15 games).

The standard argument among a lot of Caps fans – that the club should have gone out and procured a veteran defenseman sooner – is largely irrelevant. The problem is not talent . . . when healthy. The club did manage to compile a 15-10-7 record when the blue line was vertical. The problem is depth and experience. Jeff Schultz is as good an example as any to point to. He is a first round pick of whom much is expected . . . down the road. He was ticketed to spend a full year in Hershey. Although he has played well, for the most part, in his 11-game stint with the big club, he is not equipped in terms of either his experience or his current skill level to be a cornerstone defenseman on this club. Two or three years from now? Maybe. But some Caps fans would rather sacrifice his development in the here and now to have the club procure (at what cost usually remains a bit of a mystery) a veteran defenseman.

We keep coming back to this point in a variety of ways, and we return to it again. There will come a time when the addition of a veteran – either a forward or a defenseman – will not just be recommended, it will be required. But that has to be done to complement the development of youngsters, not to replace it. Schultz, Green, Eminger, Morrison, and the newcomer Jurcina are getting that battle experience now. It could have the benefit of accelerating their development curve and to sort out just who among them can really play this game, if that needs to be done.

Here is another way to look at it. Pittsburgh is, at the moment, the most improved club in the NHL – 26 points better than they were at a comparable point last year. Most of that is a recent development (that 11-2-2 record they’re currently on). In a sense, the light has gone on as their top picks garnered as a result of their 2002-2006 run of suck have gotten some games under their belt. For the Caps, the light-going-on moment is (and The Peerless expects to be) next year. The experience the kids – especially on the blue line, where development is slower – are getting right now, and the lumps they are taking in getting it, will only help bring that day closer.

The Morning After -- Caps vs. Hurricanes, Part Deux

It was a two-point night!

Carolina was better . . .

Last night’s 7-3 win by the Caps over the Hurricanes was an effort by two teams to give away two points. Carolina was better. A lot better.

The Caps rushed to a 3-0 lead in the first 13 minutes on a pair of goals by Alexander Semin sandwiching one by Alex Ovechkin. The last two in that series were directly attributable to sloppy puck handling on the part of the Hurricanes, who all but handed the puck to the Alexes for their scores.

That should have ended the competitive portion of the evening, but when you’re 5-12-0 in your last 17 games, nothing is so simple as that. The Caps gave one back when Justin Williams sent a drive from the right wing point past Olaf Kolzig, who was having to contend with Andrew Ladd’s backside firmly planted against the cage of his mask. Compared to the iffy goaltender interference call against Jakub Klepis the previous night, that qualified as assault.

Worse was what followed. Mike Green chose just about the worst time to nonchalant the recovery of the puck at the top of his own zone, reaching out with one hand to try and corral the biscuit. He missed, and Carolina ended up burying the puck behind Kolzig moments later. That would be the last ice time Green would see for almost nine minutes. He ended up with just over eight minutes for the game – his lowest total (except for a game in which he was injured) this year. Welcome back from Young Stars, kid.

But this was a night for highlight plays. Alexander Semin had a pair of such – once backing the Hurricane defense in before roofing the puck over Cam Ward’s glove, later picking the pocket of Erik Cole and racing the length of the ice to – yup – roof the puck over Ward’s catching glove.

Alexander Ovechkin had a couple of his own – one coming on a Carolina giveaway deep in its own end, when he collected the puck and ripped a laser of a wrist shot – uh huh – past Ward’s glove. The other came on some of the sickest stick work you’ll see this year. From the left wing boards, Ovechkin used Mike Commodore, Scott Walker, Andrew Ladd, and Eric Staal like skating pylons to thread his way free off the boards and snake a pass to Kris Beech at the right wing hash marks. Beech had only to one-time the puck past Ward’s – well, you know – for the goal.

And even the new kid got in on the action – Eric Fehr had a memorable 11 minutes. Skating with Alexander Semin, Fehr waited as Semin moved out from the left wing boards between Erik Cole and David Tanabe and pushed the puck to the middle. Instead of trying to curl the puck on his own blade, Semin left it for Fehr, who rifled a wrist shot past Ward’s . . . blocker (thought I was going to say “glove,” didn’t you?). It was the game-winner for the evening. The Peerless was even more impressed with what Fehr did a short time later. Harrassing Dennis Seidenberg in the Carolina end, he picked the defenseman clean and in one motion fired a wrist shot that Ward barely tipped over the net. That was a play of will as much as skill on Fehr's part (and it didn't hurt to be 6'4", either).

This was a game of mistakes. The club that made most of them was going to pay, and tonight it was Carolina who wrote the check. The Hurricanes must have thought the Caps would roll toes up after the results of the previous night, but if there is one thing the Caps can do, it is muster up an effort against a superior opponent – they’ve done that several times this year (Buffalo, Ottawa, Atlanta, Dallas, to name a few). There are no eye-popping numbers leaping out of this game, although there are two that caught The Peerless’ eye. First, faceoffs. The Caps won that battle for the first time in six games against Carolina this year (30-28). The second was hits. As generous as the official scorer was with spreading them around in Carolina (61-33, Caps), he was frugal with them last night (18-14, Caps).

As for the keys to the games we spoke of a couple of days ago:

Get off fast (score first) – Scoring the first three goals would qualify as getting off fast. For the sixth straight time first on the board wins.

Be aggressive (out-hit Carolina) – 18-14 doesn’t seem to reflect the level of contact in this game, but the Caps did win that battle.

Shoot the damn puck – For the first time in three wins, the Caps did not have 30 shots (23)

Make sure the usual suspects are represented on the score sheet – The big line (Ovechkin-Zubrus-Clark), plus Semin, were 4-3-7 for the night

The Peerless is going to toss a bag o’ chips to Ben Clymer. Clymer had one shift last night on which he was a one-man forechecking crew. He might have had all 18 hits for the Caps on that shift alone. Although he is dimly reflected on the scoresheet (no shots, one hit credited . . . one??), he put forth a fine effort.

Another goes to Jeff Schultz, who played his best game since his recall. And by “best,” The Peerless doesn’t mean “highlight reel” best. He was patient and careful in his own end, for the most part, and was sturdy on his feet. He led the club with a +4 in more than 19 minutes of work, including leading all defensemen in penalty killing time.

The confounding thing about this club is that on any given night, they can put together a game like this, where the offensive cylinders are firing, Olaf Kolzig makes the saves he has to make when he has to make them, and the defense isn’t ECHL level (although a couple of guys had their moments last night). The trick is being able to do it on a consistent basis. When that happens – and note we said “when” – they will be a contender.

Oh, and Cam? . . . It looked like you had one of these on last night.

The Morning After -- Caps vs. Flyers

It was a two-point night, Caps fans.




There is an old saying about baseball . . . there are 40 games you’ll win, no matter what, and there are 40 games you’ll lose, no matter what. It’s what you do with the rest of them that matters.

Well, we’ll leave the matter of the games you lose, no matter what, and the rest of them for another time. This morning, the matter at hand is games you win, no matter what.

The Caps last night faced a beaten team in the Philadelphia Flyers – beaten long before the final 6-2 result was displayed on the scoreboard, one that their own coach implied gave up in their last game against Ottawa. The Flyers also were beat up, missing Peter Forsberg and Joni Pitkanen, not to mention the lingering absences of Mike Rathje, Denis Gauthier, Mike Richards, and Geoff Sanderson. Add to that the fact that both goalies have suffered a variety of ailments this year, and a bad team becomes a sorrowful one. The Caps should have beaten this team, and should have been able to do it sleepwalking.

Lucky for the Caps, that’s pretty much what happened.

Robert Esche played the first shot of the game – one that one normally sees in a skate around – into a goal 15 seconds into the game. Alexander Ovechkin netted a goal six minutes later on the Caps’ third shot after the Flyers coughed up the puck in their own end and failed to pursue the matter with any intensity. When Ovechkin scored, you could see the Flyers collective shoulders visibly slump . . . here we go again. To their credit, they gamely pressed on, but unlike the case in, oh, the last decade or so, it was the Caps who badly outmanned the Flyers in terms of skill and quickness.

But the Caps, who could have applied a knockout in that first period, allowed the Flyers to dominate large stretches of play. Perhaps it was an effort to put on a show of skill for the home folks, perhaps it was just a lack of focus to the duties at hand, but there just didn’t seem to be a sense of urgency in the Caps’ play. Here’s an example of what went on . . . in the 23:21 between the Caps’ second and third goals, spanning parts of the first and second period . . .

Philly outshot the Caps, 19-13
They held the Caps even in face-offs, 15-15
They matched them in hits, 6-6
They protected the puck better, yielding only two giveaways to the Caps’ eight.

But let’s be fair here, too. In an 82-game season, there will be nights like this, and it is as much a testament to the development of the Caps as it is the woefulness of the Flyers that a comparatively pedestrian effort could result in such a lopsided result. Caps fans might be too timid and unsure to admit this, but the fact is, the Caps are better than the Flyers, and they are developing into a pretty good team right now, despite the holiday blues they experienced.

Looking at the numbers coming out of the game, you might not say that the Caps played badly or that any one player did . . . just that the team probably put forth their “B” game. One nice thing to see was Ben Clymer get that 15-seconds-in goal and get a plus-2. He might finally be righting his ship. In his last 11 games, he’s 2-3-5, -1, which isn’t bad for a guy getting about 14 minutes a night over that stretch of games.

And what can one say about Donald Brashear. If there was one Cap who seemed to bring a sense of giddyap last night, it was Brashear, and that’s not just because of his scoring his first goal as a Cap. Five shots on goal? They’ll be calling him “Alex” or “Bravechkin” at practice. Add in two hits and a blocked shot, and it wasn’t a bad night’s work for 12 minutes.

One down note was the absence of Mike Green in the third period. He’d had something of a quiet game through the first 40 minutes, but didn’t play in such a manner than obviously suggested a benching. One fears that he suffered an injury that is sure not to be disclosed as being anything but some sort of “(fill in the blank)-body injury.”

This being the NHL and not the Beauty Contest Sweepstakes of college football, two points is two points. You don’t get extra style points, and with the two they earned last night the Caps find themselves in eighth place in the East with a game in hand on each of their closest pursuers – Tampa Bay and Toronto.

And for those of you following the hijinks of Alex Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby, ponder this . . . since December 1st:

Sidney Crosby: 18 games, 11-22-33, +5
Alex Ovechkin: 18 games, 12-20-32, +3

They are now one-two in the scoring race, and both of their clubs are fighting for a spot in the top-eight. It will be a fun 40 game sprint to watch.