Fiction: “I finish my hits all the time. There’s always motivation in these games. There’s always a little extra in the air, and that will be the case again tonight.” - Sidney Crosby talking to Tarik El-Bashir before last night’s game.

Fact(s): (click second image to enlarge)

By now you may have seen that the Capitals have re-signed defenseman John Erskine. What you may not have seen is that Erskine was inked to a two year deal worth a total of $2.5 million dollars.

I respect John Erskine a great deal. He’s a great team player, he always hustles, he gives up the body to block shots, and he’s more than willing to drop the gloves (and not half bad at it). But he’s also a painfuly slow skater and a poor puckhandler who, at twenty-eight, isn’t likely to get all that much better. He also takes far more penalties than anyone else on the Capitals: with thirty-six minors in fifty-six games last year, Erskine was taking .71 minor penalties per game. The next more frequently offer was Alexander Semin who picked .34 minor penalties per game, meaning Erskine was send to the box for minor penalties more than twice as often as anyone else on the team.  Some of those may have been roughing penalties due to his style of play but I’d be willing to bet the vast majority were holding, hooking, tripping, or puck-over-the-glass.

Aside from Erskine’s shortcomings as a defenseman (more on that can be found here), there doesn’t seem to be a great deal of need at the defense position for the Capitals. Mike Green and Tom Poti are signed through next year. The team controls, to varying degrees, the status of Jeff Schultz, Shaone Morrisonn, and Milan Jurcina, all of whom are, despite their struggles at times, better options than Erskine. Meanwhile the team expects blue-chip prospect Karl Alzner to be in Washington by season’s end, and fellow Hershey Bear Sami Lepisto is also playing well.

But the biggest problem with this contract isn’t the depth the Capitals have or that they want to have Erskine back - after all, you can never have too many defensemen and Erskine is good enough to be at least a seventh or eight defenseman in the NHL. The problem is that the contract is completely irreconcilable with what it would take to keep Erskine if he were to hit the free agent market. If the Capitals decided the wanted to re-sign Erskine next summer, fine. But I have a hard time believing any other NHL team is going to shell out $1.25 million a year for a guy who should only get in when someone else is hurt. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong, but it still seems like the Capitals have paid Erskine at least fifty percent more than he could have gotten somewhere else.

There is one, and only one, possible rationale I can think of for this signing: that the team plans to move Erskine to the wing and have him play the role of enforcer in coming seasons. It might sound crazy, but then Donald Brashear will be thirty-seven at the start of next season and if there’s anyone slower than Erskine on the team, it’s him. The Capitals don’t have any NHL-calibre enforcers in their minor league system - Grant McNeill’s the only enforcer in Hershey and he’s spent most of his career in the ECHL.

The idea of moving a defenseman to forward and into an enforcer role is not uncommon: Paul Bissonnette, Patrick Kaleta, Wade Brookbank, Wade Belak, and Eric Godard are all examples of players who successfully made the transition from rugged defenseman to winger-enforcer, as is former Capital Stephen Peat, although each of these players did it at a younger age than Erskine.

Would a move to wing work for Erskine? My guess would be that it would, and not just because I’ve often found myself thinking that Erskine could have carved out a nice career for himself if a coach had decided to move him to wing as a twenty-one year old. On the wing Erskine would have to opportunity to play his game, hitting opponents without having to worry as much about whether or not he’s drawing himself out of position and getting into scraps without forcing his team to alter the defensive rotation. He wouldn’t be an every game player, but he could still be a valuable one by playing a role similar to the one played by Aaron Downy for the Detroit Red Wings last season.

That said, on a final note, I’d like to point out that Erskine as an enforcer playing the wing, still probably isn’t worth $1.25 million a year. But my goal here was to provide a possible explanation for the logic of the Capitals’ front office, not to try and defend the decision.

The final contract question of the Capitals’ offseason was answered today, when an arbitrator awarded Shaone Morrisonn a one-year, $1.975 million dollar contract. The deal itself is more than fair for both Morrisonn and the Capitals, but it does create a salary cap crunch for the team.

Assuming the Capitals retain this roster, with the exceptions of sending Quintin Laing to Hershey, Brian Pothier being on long-term injured reserve, and keeping Karl Alzner with the club, the team’s salary cap situation breaks down as follows:

Forwards: $37,510,962
Defensemen: $14,582,639
Goaltenders: $5,312,500
Buyouts: $250,000

Total: $57,656,101
Salary Cap: $56,700,000

…putting the Capitals $956,101 over the cap.

There are several contracts that could be second-guessed here: Fedorov at four million, Brashear at 1.2 million, and Erskine at all are the ones that stand out the most. But there’s no use worrying about what’s already done. So what are the Capitals’ options moving forward? The answer to that question depends largely on the development of Karl Alzner and the health of Chris Clark. With that in mind, here are several possible salary cap scenarios:

Scenario #1
Key Points: Karl Alzner isn’t ready to play regular NHL minutes come October.
Transactions: Alzner is sent to Hershey.
Salary Cap Implications: Alzner’s $1,675,000 cap hit doesn’t count towards the Capitals while he’s in Hershey, bringing the overall cap number down to $55,981,101, giving the team $718,899 in cap space to start the season. Of course, if the team decides to call up Alzner at a later date part of his cap number will count for 2008-09. But that’s a situation the team deals with when it occurs.
Positives: The team gets under the salary cap without having to move anyone.
Negatives: The Caps’ defense would probably be better off if Alzner is ready to step into the lineup for John Erskine.

Scenario #2
Key Points: Chris Clark isn’t healthy enough to start the season
Transactions: Clark is placed on long-term injury reserve.
Salary Cap Implications: The Capitals would get cap relief from Clark’s $2,633,333 putting them at $55,022,678, $1,110,566 under the cap.
Positives: The team gets under the salary cap without having to move anyone.
Negatives: The team would miss Clark’s leadership, as well as his grinding style of play and secondary scoring skill. Uncertainty about how close Clark might be to coming back would make it difficult to acquire a backup, since Clark’s salary counts at a pro-rated amount once he starts playing.

Scenario #3
Key Points: Alzner is not NHL-ready and Chris Clark is hurt to start the season.
Transactions: Alzner is sent to Hershey and Clark goes on the long-term injury list.
Salary Cap Implications: The team starts out with $4,308,333 in cap relief, giving them $3,352,232 in cap space.
Positives: No one has to be moved and the cap space is enough to acquire a decent player.
Negatives: The team doesn’t start the season as strong as they look like they might. The unsure nature of when Alzner would be ready and Clark’s injury means it’s not obvious how much is available to spend on replacements.

Scenario #4
Key Points: Alzner is NHL-ready and Clark is fully recovered, but the team wants to keep all its players.
Transactions: Alzner is sent to Hershey.
Salary Cap Implications: Same as the first scenario: the team’s cap number goes to $55,981,101 giving them $718,899 in cap space.
Positives: The team gets its salary cap relief and keeps its depth.
Negatives: If Alzner is good enough to play a regular shift in the NHL the team will be weakening itself by not playing him instead of John Erskine.

Scenario #5
Key Points: Alzner is NHL-ready and Clark is fully recovered, and the team wants to keep Alzner in the NHL.
Transactions: There would be a number of options in this case but the most likely (and probably best) moves would be for the team to either trade, waive, or demote both John Erskine and Tomas Fleischmann.
Salary Cap Implications: Erskine’s $537,500 and Fleischmann’s $725,000 come off the books, netting the Capitals $1,262,500 in savings, putting them at $56,393,601, which would be $306,399 under the cap.
Positives: Provided everyone is healthy this scenario gives the Capitals the best twenty-man on-the-ice lineup. Erskine is a borderline NHLer and Fleischmann is behind Clark, Alexander Semin (if he plays on the right), Eric Fehr, Matt Bradley on the depth chart. Boyd Gordon and Brooks Laich are both better options capable of playing on the right side as well.
Negatives: Losing Erskine and Fleischmann would hurt the team’s depth. It’s unlikely the Capitals would get much in return for either player but it’s unlikely Fleischmann would clear waivers as well. Some in the organization think Fleischmann is poised for a breakout season so it may hurt to lose him in the long run.

Of course there are other possible scenarios; someone could get hurt in training camp or someone else could be traded. But these five are probably the most likely.

During the Capitals 2-0 loss to the Flyers is became pretty readily apparent that they need to make some changes to their gameplan if they hope to succeed in picking the win in at least one of the two games they have this week in Philadelphia. The changes that need to made include:

(1) Scratch John Erskine. This isn’t number one necessarily because I think it’s the most important one, but I do think it’s the most obvious. Erskine can hit pretty well and he can fight, but that’s about all he has going for him; for Erskine a successful game is one where he doesn’t give up a scoring chance because of his suspect skating ability or take an unnecessary penalty. I like Erskine as a reserve defenseman but why he’s playing while Steve Eminger, who’s quicker, more agile and has more offensive upside, sits in the press box is a mystery to me.

(2) Improve play in front of the nets. It didn’t come back to bite the Caps in Game 2 but they were still letting the Flyers have far too easy a time setting up in front of Cristobal Huet, and that’s something the Capitals aren’t going to be able to get away with for an entire series. At the other end Caps players are going to the net but they’re doing so only to look for rebounds and as a result aren’t creating near enough havoc in front of the Philadelphia net in terms of screens, potential deflections and drawing penalties.

(3) Simplify. In the neutral zone this means looking for a pass, only carrying the puck when there’s space and dumping it when necessary (I’m lookin’ at you, Ovechkin, Green and Semin). In the offensive zone this means getting pucks to the net, getting traffic in front of the net and battling in the slot for rebounds rather than endlessly passing the puck while looking for a perfect chance. Last game the Capitals passed up more good scoring chances that I could count.

None of these changes are particularly complex, but I’d expect each of them to pay dividends.

Capitals 3, Lightning 2

After losing in Florida and falling to Atlanta in a shootout, the Capitals were desperate to pull out a win in Tampa Bay to finish their swing through the Southeast and they were able to do so behind a resilient team effort and a rock-solid Olie Kolzig. Since there are a number of important issues to touch on from this game, so I’ve given each its own mini-section.

Olaf Kolzig. Clearly the game’s best player (and the difference between a win and a loss) with 39 saves on 41 shots (.951 save %), Kolzig played like he did when he was an all-star and a Vezina Trophy winner. Since going to the more-or-less 60/split in playing time with Brent Johnson, Kolzig’s play has vastly improved. It’s nice as a Caps fan to see that Olie still has some very good minutes left in him….even if there aren’t quite as many as we may have hoped.

Sami Lepisto’s NHL debut. He didn’t exactly set the world on fire in his first NHL game, but the 23-year-old Finn registered a shot, a hit, a blocked shot and some powerplay time. What struck me the most about Lepisto were his poise and calmness with the puck and his skating ability - attributes the Capitals are in dire need of along the blue line right now. Jeff Schultz, John Erskine and Milan Jurcina are all big bodies but they’re also all mediocre skaters and both Erskine and Jurcina are butchers with the puck. The Capitals defense is more balanced, and probably better overall, with Lepisto or Eminger in the lineup every night until Brian Pothier and/or Tom Poti return. Which brings me to…

John Erskine. Okay, I don’t have any objective analysis to prove anything but it seems to me that there is a very high correlation between the Capitals opponents’ getting quality scoring chances and Erskine being on the ice, which seemed to especially be true during last night’s game. I like Erskine’s attitude and style of play, but he is such a poor skater and is so bad with the puck that he is a liability against most NHL caliber forwards. While I think he’s an okay depth guy, I don’t think Erskine should be getting playing time ahead of any of the Capitals other current defensemen.

Secondary scoring. The Capitals scored three goals, which isn’t an offensive explosion by any means. But the fact that they potted three from players not named Alexander Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Viktor Kozlov or Mike Green was nice. It’s even better that Alexander Semin and Tomas Fleischmann each seem to be finding a groove offensively.

Horrible television announcers. I think that fans of teams in Southern locales are too often unfairly dismissed as ignorant about the game of hockey, but if there is any truth to this stereotype I’m pretty sure it’s a result of the guys doing the games on TV in these markets. In the past I’ve detailed the follies of the Atlanta Thrashers’ announcers and in the Capitals game on the other night against Florida the Panthers commentators were not too impressive either. But I think Bobby “The Chief” Taylor takes the cake with his comment during last night’s game. With about two minutes left their was a brief scrum that start in front of the Capitals net. Taylor blamed this on David Steckel, saying “What is that? I never understood that. If you’re going to fight, then fight, but if you’re not then just turn around and skate away. What is that? That’s a bunch of crap!” There are a lot of thing wrong with that assessment including (1) if you don’t know why that happens, you really probably don’t know much about hockey and (2) Steckel gave a pretty innocent little push on a Tampa player’s arm and the Tampa player then cross-checked him. But really that’s irrelevant. What really matters is that Taylor demonstrated a complete lack of maturity and professionalism and if the person who is supposed to provide insightful commentary on hockey is pouting like a twelve-year-old fan of the team, it’s no wonder that Southern hockey fans aren’t schooled in the game’s finer points.

DMG’s 3 Stars
(1) Olaf Kolzig - 39 saves on 41 shots (95.1 save %) and clearly the best player on either team
(2) Alexander Semin - 1 goal (game winner), 1 assists, +1, 6 shots,
(3) Tomas Fleischmann - 1 goal

Quotable

“He didn’t seemed fazed at all. He was making great plays and he played within himself.”

-Bruce Boudreau on Sami Lepisto

“Kolzig gets credit the whole game. He’s the difference.”

-Lightning coach John Tortorella

Quick Hits

• Another rough night on the faceoff dot for Viktor Kozlov - he won just two of nine draws.
• Someone should just tell Dave Steckel to imagine Lightning uniforms on every opponent. Steckel now has five NHL goals, four of which have come against Tampa Bay.
• On the official scoresheet the Capitals were outhit 27-19
• How nice was it to see how excited Semin was after his goal?
  

Around the (Inter)net
A New York Times intensive version today: the seven best trades the NYT could come up with and why the Southeast’s big time scorers aren’t on winning teams…now that he’s been fired, everyone cares what John Ferguson Jr. thinks of the Leafs…Celebrating the Top 10 U.S.-Born Fighters

All photos AP/Getty by way of Yahoo!