Distant Early Deals

Deadline Day is the last day of shopping before teams have to move on with what they have. It isn’t the first day. Some deals – the biggest ones, in fact – were consummated before the Olympics. Marquee players such as Ilya Kovalchuk and Dion Phaneuf were moved weeks before Deadline Day.

But that isn’t really the start of it, either. And that has some special relevance to the Caps. The Caps were busy on Deadline Day, although you can’t say any single deal was for a big difference maker. The deals were incremental – some more grit, some better defense for the forwards, some relief for Mike Green, some depth. But before that, the Caps made two deals of considerable consequence for this year – the signings of Mike Knuble and Brendan Morrison. In light of those signings, you cannot say that the Caps have stood pat with respect to their roster.

Let’s compare the lineup that the Caps had in their last win of last season – the 5-4 overtime win over Pittsburgh in Game 6 of the Eastern semifinals – and a lineup that they could ice with their new acquisitions. First, the forwards…

The Caps clearly upgraded the first line, swapping out Viktor Kozlov for Mike Knuble. Knuble provides the net presence on offense that Kozlov was unable to provide and is probably a better defensive player to boot. Knuble already has 23 goals (ten more than Kozlov had in ten more games played last year) and has already passed Kozlov’s point total from last year (42 to 41). His style, characterized by playing more with his backside in the goalie’s face, has given Backstrom and Ovechkin more room to maneuver, and their improved offensive numbers reflect that. More importantly, his presence has given Backstrom more room to control the puck and allowed Ovechkin to avoid making the sort of high-risk plays, allowing those two to be highly ranked in the plus/minus scale. The first line is better defensively for Knuble’s presence by letting the others keep the puck out of the other team’s hands.  Next, the second line...

The second line still has issues with respect to the center. Sergei Fedorov was largely a shell of his former self last year, his series-winning goal against the Rangers in the first playoff round being more or less his last roar. Brendan Morrison was signed to fill that position when Fedorov returned to Russia. And while Morrison got off to a fine start, his play slumped as the games went by. The break might do wonders to rejuvenate him, and having him strong to complement the skill of Alexander Semin and the grit of Brooks Laich will be important entering the playoff part of the season.  Then, the third line...

The third line becomes more of a scoring line than perhaps was the case last year, but the addition of Eric Belanger makes it defensively responsible, too. Eric Fehr is a diligent forechecker and is an efficient (given his ice time) goal scorer. Fleischmann is a very capable offensive player, but has his struggles at the other end of the ice. Belanger provides enough of a two-way presence to help both of those players, should this be the way they line up. The Caps do not lose much, if anything, with Belanger on this line on draws, and he could be Steckel’s equal on defense. Fehr provides more offense than Clark, although Clark’s intangibles are hard to replace.  And last, the fourth line...

The fourth line marries the defensive responsibility of Steckel to the energy that Walker and Bradley provide (or, if need be, the added defensive skill of Boyd Gordon). This is not a line that will score much, but it could be better at making the lives of opposing players more difficult.  (edit: our apologies to Jason Chimera, who we left out of the original draft of this, who was brought in after the first deals and before the last.  He adds even more "bang and boom" -- physical play and some contributions on the offensive end -- that will make the Caps even harder to play against).  From here, to the defense...

On defense, the result of all the deals seems to be to move players to more comfortable levels of responsibility and effort. Mike Green and Jeff Schultz seem to be a good pairing in that Schultz has grown defensively and serves an adequate complement to Green. He can play the minutes, and he is as quietly effective a defender as there is in the league (the operative term there being “quietly”).

Joe Corvo and Shaone Morrisonn would be an echo of the first pair, only with fewer minutes at even strength. Morrisonn was the stay-at-home guy for Mike Green, and he could be that guy for Corvo, who at times resembles Green in style. Tom Poti could play anywhere from the first to the third pair and play in either an offensive or defensive mode. He is now the most versatile of the Caps’ defensemen, which is not necessarily something you might have said about him four or five seasons ago.  And finally, goaltending...

In goal, the Caps still have the uncertainty attached to Jose Theodore’s consistency and Semyon Varlamov’s health. Had the Caps made a deal here yesterday, we think it would have been with those problems in mind, not the talent of the respective goalies. When either of them are “on,” they can be spectacular. The question has been, and will be going forward, can the Caps reliably count on their being “on” (or even around) when it matters in the next few months.

Overall, the Caps have replaced players at five positions (six, including Chimera) from the group that took the ice in last year’s last win. That is a rather substantial overhaul among 18 skaters. In doing so, it has moved and will move other players to other spots with respect to responsibilities. We think is hard to make a case that the Caps are only treading water with the moves, let alone worse off. They are arguably better on the first line, more reliably consistent on the second (Morrison being healthier this year than Fedorov last). They are different on the third line and more versatile as a result. The fourth line will cause more of a commotion than what folks might have associated with the Caps.

The defense balances risk and reward a little more evenly, and the goalies are a year older (and, we hope, a year wiser).

It’s not just about Deadline Day. It’s also about the distant early deals that have threaded their way into the roster. If done well, you might think the players in those deals have been here forever. And with Mike Knuble and Brendan Morrison coming in the first of this year’s deals, that seems to be the case. The Caps, for all the deals they’ve made, are a better team right now and more “playoff ready” than they were when the season ended last year.