We are down to Team W in the march through the Washington
Capitals All-Alphabet Teams. This one
draws mostly from the early days, the days of disco, Star Wars, and a lot of
frustrated hockey fans in Washington.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 4 seasons, 158 games, 37-28-65,
minus-62
Playoffs (with Capitals): none
Tony White was not an especially flashy goal scorer when he
was rising through Canadian juniors with the Kitchener Rangers. It was not surprising that he would last
until the tenth round of the 1974 amateur draft. That is where the Capitals picked him (161st
overall), one of a stable of 25 picks taken in their inaugural draft.
He would get a taste of the NHL the following season (five
games) but spent the bulk of his time with the Dayton Gems of the IHL, where he
scored 23 goals in 64 games, more goals than either of his seasons with
Kitchener.
That was prelude to a rookie season in 1975-1976 in which
White scored 25 goals, he and Nelson Pyatt (26) becoming the first players in
team history to hit the 25-goal mark for a season. It was a frustrating season,
nonetheless. Despite finishing with 32
even strength points, White was minus-43 in 80 games, one of nine players to
finish minus-40 or worse in an 11-59-10 season.
That would be White’s high-water mark for goals and points with the Caps. In 1976-1977 his plsu-minus
improved markedly (minus-15 in 72 games), but his offense shrunk almost as
much. His production was halved
(12-9-21) from his rookie season.
White slid all the way to the minors in 1977-1978, appearing
in just one game for the Caps (no points and a minus-4 in his last appearance for the team) and in 68 games for the
Hershey Bears. After spending
a season with the Springfield Indians of the AHL, White was signed as a free
agent by the Minnesota North Stars. He
appeared in six games for the North Stars in 1979-1980, his last appearances in
the NHL. After playing most of that
season in Oklahoma City with the Stars of the CHL and another with that club,
he headed to Europe where he played his last two seasons of hockey with EV
Fussen in the West German leagues.
It was good while it lasted, even if it did not last too
long for Tony White and the Capitals.
Being a “first,” even on one of those struggling early teams for the
Caps was something to note. That’s why Tony White gets the
left wing spot on Team W.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 4 seasons, 307 games,
114-163-277, minus-14
Playoffs (with Capitals): none
When the Washington Capitals made Ryan Walter the second
overall pick in the 1978 amateur draft, they took a youngster whose progress
through Canadian juniors was impressive.
Over a three year period with the Kamloops Chiefs and Seattle Breakers,
Walter recorded 130 goals and 308 points.
He did not miss a beat when he joined the Caps in the
1978-1979 season. A 28-goal, 56-point
season was good enough to earn Walter a second-place finish in the Calder
Trophy voting for the league’s top rookie.
He also happened to be the only rookie to earn votes for the Lady Byng
Trophy for gentlemanly play.
Walter put together two more solid years in 1979-1980
(24-42-66) and 1980-1981 (24-44-68) before he had a breakout season in
1981-1982. In 78 games Walter went
38-49-87, the goals, assists, and points all being career bests. He also finished eighth in Selke Trophy
voting for top defensive forward (right between two forwards who later would
play for the Caps – Dale Hunter and Jorgen Petterson).
Instead of that 1981-1982 season being the launching pad for
a long and productive career with the Caps, Walter become the personification
of “sell high.” On September 9, 1982 he
and Rick Green, a first overall draft pick in the year before Walter was
selected, were traded to the Montreal Canadiens for Rod Langway, Brian Engblom, Doug Jarvis and
Craig Laughlin. It was arguably the
biggest trade in Capitals history, playing a large role in saving the franchise
in Washington.
As for Walter’s fate after leaving the Caps, he never was
able to repeat with Montreal the level of production he had in the 1981-1982
season with Washington. After a 75-point season in his
first year with the Canadiens he settled into being a 40-50 point player over
the next five seasons. In 1988-1989,
having reached his 30th birthday, Walter’s offensive production
started to decline as his game evolved into one of being more of a defensive
specialist. In 1990-1991 he registered
only one point in 25 games. Walter
signed as a free agent with Vancouver in July 1991, where he played in his last
two NHL seasons.
Ryan Walter had quite a range of experiences in his
career. With the Caps he was the young
phenom who had fine early seasons, then at the age of 24 and at top of his game
he was traded. He had a long and
productive career – more than a thousand games and more than 600 points – but
he will always be linked with the biggest trade in team history. For his early years of play and his role in
saving the franchise, Ryan Walter centers Team W.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 4 seasons, 307 games,
114-163-277, minus-14
Playoffs (with Capitals): none
Expansion teams generally have two kinds of players on their
rosters. There are the youngsters thrown
into a lead role because there isn’t much by way of talent to hold them back in
the minors, and there are the veterans on the back nine of their careers
playing a leadership role or filling in the blanks until the young club can
build itself into a competitive one.
Williams might be considered the latter. By the time he arrived in Washington from
Boston in a cash deal in July 1974, he already had 13 seasons under his belt,
11 of them in the NHL and two in the fledgling World Hockey Association. It was a solid, if unspectacular career to
that point, Williams recording 131 goals and 351 points in those 11 NHL seasons
with three teams, and 31 goals and 89 points in two years with the New England
Whalers in the WHA.
In coming to Washington, Williams was experiencing his second
tour with an expansion team. He was a
member of the WHA Whalers in their inaugural (and championship) season in 1972-1973. His experience with the Caps was not quite as
successful. On a team that set a league
record for futility, Williams was third on the team in games played (73), and led
the team in goals (22), power play points (19), and total points (58).
Williams played another season with the Caps, and plagued by an
ailing back he was limited to 34 games in which he scored eight goals and
recorded 21 points. He retired after
that season, second on the franchise list of all time goal scorers (30, since
eclipsed). It might not have been the
end of a career one would dream of, but Williams was certainly appreciative of
what he experienced, including being the only American in the NHL for a time. Part of that experience was being a member
of the first Washington Capitals teams and being an important part of
them. It is the reason he gets the call
on the right side of Team W.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 10 seasons, 626 games,
20-63-83, minus-50
Playoffs (with Capitals): four seasons, 31 games, 4-0-4,
minus-10
By the time Brendan Witt was hit by an SUV while on his way
to get a cup of coffee in downtown Philadelphia on the morning of a game in
2009,
he had long established himself as one of the toughest players in the NHL.
When Witt was taken in the first round of the 1993 entry
draft by the Capitals (11th overall), there were no pretensions that
he was an offensive, or even a two-way defenseman. In two years with the Seattle Thunderbirds of
the WHL, Witt recorded just five goals and 35 points in 137 games. He did compile 474 penalty minutes in those
130 games, though. What the Caps were
getting, even with Witt still being a teenager, was a tough, physical defensive
defenseman.
They were also getting a stubborn one, or a principled one,
depending on where you sit on the matter of signing entry level contracts. It took the Caps almost two years to sign
Witt to a deal, almost losing him to his re-entry into the 1995 draft. But sign him they did, and he
established himself as a player who seemed fearless in applying his physical
skills. In his first two seasons he was
third among Caps’ defensemen in total penalty minutes (173), but he played in
only 92 games, far fewer than the two defensemen in front of him – Joe Reekie
(256 minutes in 143 games) and Mark Tinordi (231 minutes in 127 games). That penalty total included 15 fights,
including quite a bout in Philadelphia…
It was the beginning of a ten year career in Washington in
which Witt did not do much by way of scoring (20 goals, 83 points), but did
make a physical impression on opponents (1,035 minutes in penalties, 53
fights). His no-nonsense style of play
helped earn him a co-captaincy for the 2001-2002 season with Steve Konowalchuk.
After that 2001-2002 season the Caps started a decline. In 2002-2003 they finished second in the
Southeast Division but dropped a six-game opening round playoff series to the Tampa
Bay Lightning after holding a 2-0 lead in games. Oddly enough, it was Witt who scored the only
goal by a Capitals defenseman in that series.
In 2003-2004 the Caps collapsed, and they started selling
off assets in preparation of a rebuild.
Witt, who was still just 28 years old, was not among the players being
sent away for picks and prospects.
Things were different, though, after the league went dark for a year due
to labor-management problems. The
2005-2006 season was going to be a difficult one for the Caps, and Witt was not
inclined to play through a rebuild. He requested a trade in August 2005 to a team that had better chances of playoff
success.
He was still with the club to start the 2005-2006 season,
but he was not there to end it. In March
2006 he was traded to the Nashville Predators for Kris Beech and a first round
draft pick (that would become Semyon Varlamov).
Witt played out the season in Nashville, then he signed with the New
York Islanders as a free agent the following summer. He played four seasons on Long Island, until
he was placed on waivers by the Islanders in January 2010. When he cleared waivers he was sent to the
Islanders’ AHL affiliate in Bridgeport.
After he wrapped up the season with the Sound Tigers, the Islanders
bought him out of his remaining contract years, bringing his NHL career to an
end.
Brendan Witt was one of a kind, a player who seemed to be of
an era before that in which he played, a tougher, simpler era, "old school," if
you will. It made for an interesting mix that made him
one of the enduring characters in franchise history, one of only seven
defensemen to appear in more than 600 games for the Caps. He and Scott Stevens are still the only
defensemen in team history to play in more than 600 games and accumulate more
than 1,000 penalty minutes. We would not
presume to leave Brendan Witt off of Team W.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 3 seasons, 155 games,
4-26-30, minus-24
Playoffs (with Capitals): none
Bryan Watson made the rounds in his career. Undrafted as player in Canadian juniors with
the Peterborough Petes, he started his NHL career with the Montreal Canadiens
in the 1963-1964 season. Two years in
Montreal were followed by stops in Detroit, Montreal (again), Oakland with the
Seals, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Detroit (again), and finally, in 1976, with
Washington, courtesy of a trade sending former number one overall pick Greg
Joly to the Red Wings.
Never an offensive producer from the blue line (13 goals and
122 points in 14 seasons before suiting up for the Caps), Watson’s game was
going to have to provide more in the category of “intangibles." Well, except perhaps for his lively
nature. Despite being ordinary in size
(5’9”, 175), he did not let that prevent him from mixing it up from time to
time. In the five seasons immediately
preceding his arrival in Washington, he rolled up 70 fights.
The fighting and penalties were less frequent with the Caps,
Watson’s value being on the ice for a team just struggling to be
competitive. The clock was ticking
louder for Watson, though, and he was released by the Caps after appearing in
20 games of the 1978-1979 season.
Although his release brought his NHL career to an end, he caught on with
the Cincinnati Stingers of the WHA and played 21 games before calling it quits
for his professional hockey career. When he left the NHL he did so as the league’s
all-time leader in penalty minutes at the time (2,176 minutes).
Watson, who was approaching the end of his career when he
came to Washington, played parts of three seasons with the club. As it turned out, he was the oldest skater on
each of those three teams (the oldest player on two of them), the most
experienced among a collection of youngsters and journeymen. He did not entirely lose his feistiness (16
fights in 155 games) and still did not have much in the way of offensive punch
(four goals, 30 points in 155 games), but his presence and experience was an
important part of the Caps getting through those rough early years in the history
of the franchise. That is why “Bugsy”
gets a spot on the blue line on Team W.
Regular Season (with Capitals): 4 seasons, 120 games,
20-61-21, 4.17, 1 shutout
Playoffs (with Capitals): none
Being a goaltender for the early editions of the Washington
Capitals was an unforgiving exercise in despair. The Capitals did not have a goaltender finish
a season having played at least 20 games with a goals against average of less
than 3.50 until 1982-1983, when both Pat Riggin (3.36) and Al Jensen (3.44) did
it. There were nine goalies over the
first eight seasons in franchise history who played in at least one season with
20 or more games who failed to finish below that 3.50 goals against average
mark.
Bernie Wolfe was one of those goalies. He and Ron Low would “fail” the most times
over that eight-year period, three times apiece. But let us not heap the blame on the goalies
in general or Wolfe in particular. It
was a team effort, and it made for a hard way to make a living for a
goaltender.
Over a four-year period from the 1975-1976 season through
1978-1979, Wolfe appeared in more games than any of the eight goaltenders the
Caps employed. His 4.17 goals against
average was typical of the period. He
did however, work against the Capitals type in one respect. He won in his first NHL appearance, a 6-2
win over the Kansas City Scouts on October 30, 1975.
Wolfe had another first as well during his stay in
Washington. On January 10, 1977, in the
Capitals’ 202nd game in franchise history, Wolfe recorded his first
(and only) career shutout, a 2-0 win over the Detroit Red Wings. It was part of what would be his “best”
season with the club (7-15-9, 3.84 goals against average).
Two more seasons followed for Wolfe in the Capitals
organization that saw him losing playing time, first in 1977-1978 to Jim Bedard
(25 appearances to 43 for Bedard), and again in 1978-1979 (18 appearances to 30
for Bedard and 37 for Gary Inness).
Wolfe retired from the NHL after that 1978-1979 season, but
it would not be the end of his hockey career.
Not quite. The NHL was about to
expand in the 1992-1993 season, and that meant holding an expansion draft. Teams were allowed to protect two goaltenders
and 14 skaters (the San Jose Sharks were exempt from exposure of players owing
to their being an expansion team the previous season). One of the goalies to be left unprotected by
each team had to have at least 60 minutes of NHL experience.
Some teams were creative about how they dealt with the
goalie provisions. It is worth noting
that six goalies played in only one game in the 1991-1992 season. Chjcago did not want to expose any of their
three top goalies – Ed Belfour, Dominik Hasek, and Jimmy Waite – to selection
in the expansion draft and solved that problem by dressing Ray LeBlanc for one
game in 1991-1992 (he was not selected in the expansion draft).
Calgary dressed Scott Sharples for one game – the season finale – in what
would be his only NHL game, allowing the Flames to hold on to Mike Vernon, Jeff
Reese, and Trevor Kidd.
The Caps went one better, or rather tried to. They wanted to protect Olaf Kolzig, Don
Beaupre, and Jim Hrivnak. They might
have had the solution in exposing Mike Liut, but he retired after the 1991-1992
season and thus was not an option. Faced
with the possibility of losing a goaltender for whom the team had plans,
general manager David Polie signed Bernie Wolfe to a contract on June 15th. That would be 40-year old Bernie Wolfe, 13
years removed from the NHL and working as a financial planner in the Washington
area. The league’s response to this imaginative
idea was “nice try.” The Caps were told
to go back and do it again, and they signed Steve Weeks to a contract the
following day (he was not selected, either).
And so, Bernie Wolfe’s NHL career finally came to a
definitive end. All of it – four seasons
of play and one day as a backup backup backup goalie over an 18 year period –
makes for one of the more interesting tenures in Washington Capitals
history. That gives Bernie Wolfe the job
of goaltending for Team W.
Team W reaches back to the earliest days of the franchise
for much of its roster. There is a lot
of pain and heartache in those early years for those players. One the other hand, Brendan Witt, a player of
more recent vintage, dished out a lot of pain and heartache (and headache and
rib-ache). All told, there are more than
3,800 regular season and playoff experience on this team. That is a combination that makes for a team
that perhaps you don’t want to play against.
