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Pick 'Em: Best Capitals Draft Pick of the Decade

David M. Getz — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 18:00:27 -0000

by Nick Wass - AP

Readers who venture outside the friendly internet confines of the the Rink may have noticed that, in anticipation of ~~the end of the decade~~ 2010, Puck Daddy has been compiling the best and worst of the last decade, including the ten biggest goon moments, the best and worst contracts, and NHL's best and worst decisions. Yesterday saw Ryan Lambert of The Two Line Pass take a look at the five best and five worst draft picks of the last ten years.

Being a Capitals blog we figured it would make for some interesting discussion to ~~pilfer the idea~~ alter their framework every so slightly to suit our favorite team and take a look at some of studs and duds of recent Washington draft classes. To make things a little more interesting, we decided to eliminate lottery picks, which in essence means no Alex Ovechkin, no Nicklas Backstrom, and no Karl Alzner.

To start things off, let's take a look at the five worst:

5. Jakub Cutta (Defense, 2nd round, 61st overall, 2000)

Cutta was billed as a guy with an ideal frame, but a project nonetheless. At the time of his draft people knew there were questions about his skating, his ability to move the puck out of the zone at the next level, and whether he would ever use his 6'3'', 214 frame as effectively as possible. The problem was, nothing ever really panned out. The skating never became NHL caliber, there wasn't any offense to speak of as a pro, and while Cutta laid out a big hit every once in a while, he was far from an intimidating physical force. All told Cutta saw action in eight games over the course of three seasons with the Caps, earning himself a minus-5 rating. By 2006 Cutta would be back in his native Czech Republic, and he's been splitting time between his homeland and Russia for the past few years. It's not always fair to look back and evaluate a pick using 20/20 hindsight, but the fact that Paul Martin was taken with the 62nd pick certainly doesn't make this one any easier to swallow.

4. Josh Godfrey (Defense, 2nd round, 34th overall, 2007)

Yeah, it's still early, but thing don't look very good for Godfrey, who's now in his second season with the ECHL's South Carolina Stingrays. Part of us wants to say that the blue line is stacked at Hershey, that Godfrey's still young, and that he was drafted as an offensive defenseman who would have to spend a lot of time working out the kinks in his own end before he had a chance at the NHL. Another part of us says that guys who spend more than one season in the ECHL don't usually do much at the NHL level - and that's not enough for someone picked 34th overall. The fact that, other than Kings prospects Wayne Simmonds and Oscar Moller, no one picked after Godfrey has seen much NHL playing time helps keep him from rising on this list - for now.

3. Keith Seabrook (Defense, 2nd round, 52nd overall, 2006)

Also an offensive defenseman, the Capitals were hoping Seabrook would one day be a powerplay quarterback, or at least an offensive threat from the blue line. However, Seabrook underwhelmed offensively, first by scoring 13 points (two goals) in 37 games at the University of Denver and then by scoring 17 (four goals) in 59 games with the WHL's Calgary Hitmen - all while failing to make marked progress in his own end. In 2008-09 Seabrook finally became the offensive force people thought he was capable of being by registering 55 points (fifteen goals) for the Hitmen, but questions persisted about whether it was because he was growing in to his talent or because he was an overage player. Currently in the Calgary Flames organization, Seabrook still has a chance to become an NHL player, but never came close to getting a contract, let alone a game, with the Caps.

2. Joe Finley (Defense, 1st round, 27th overall, 2005)

The Caps would eventually sign Finley in the summer of 2009, but his future seems to be up in the air. After playing as a forward in camp, Finley's back on the blue line with South Carolina this season. If Finley ever makes it to the NHL, it's almost certainly going to be in a limited role as an enforcer...and you don't aim to draft a part-time enforcer in the first round. 36 of the first 45 players taken in the 2005 draft have played in the NHL, and has four of the five and seven of the ten taken after Finley. The issue at this point wasn't the talent pool. It was the selection.

1. Sasha Pokulok (Defense, 1st round, 14th overall, 2005)

How could it be anyone else? There's no way the Caps should have been picking 14th in 2005, but they sure didn't do themselves any favors in picking Pokulok. Billed as a physical specimen with skating ability and offensive upside, Pokulok was beset by concussion problems each of his three years in the Capitals organization. In the end, Pokulok wasn't able to stick in Hershey, let alone Washington, earning himself the dubious (and unfortunate) title of "Worst Capitals Pick of the Decade".

Honorable Mentions: Steve Eminger, Ted Ruth, Maxime Daigneault, Boyd Gordon

Now that that's over, let's take a look at the five best:

5. John Carlson (Defense, 1st round, 27th overall, 2008)

He's played just three games at the NHL level thus far, but is there any reason to think Carlson won't be a very, very good NHL defender? With size, skill, and smarts he's bested every challenge thrown his way since the draft, finishing second in the OHL in scoring among defensemen and second among rookies last year, and registering 18 points in 24 games for the Bears this year. Carlson may very well be a top pairing guy in the very near future, and in a league that prizes two way defensemen as highly as the NHL does that's a heck of a return on the 27th pick.

4. Johnny Oduya (Defense, 7th round, 221st overall, 2001)

Hey, we said these guys were going to be Capitals draftees, we never said anything about whether the team signed him. With only one point and an minus-1 rating, Oduya's slumping this year but he's nonetheless a legitimate top-four guy defenseman in the NHL, something that can only be said for a handful of the 200 players taken before him.

3. Alexander Semin (Left Wing/Right Wing, 13th overall, 2002)

At September's Capitals Convention members of the team's scouting staff were insistent they'd been lucky with Semin, who has grown three inches and added thirty-five pounds since the time he was drafted. Even if there was some luck involved, Semin is a elite offensive player who may just be the most naturally talented guy in the NHL. Picking thirteenth overall you expect to get an NHL caliber player - but getting a guy with Semin's ability in that spot is a steal. He might not have the career top 2002 pick Rich Nash will, be there's no doubt Semin was the most talented player available at the this spot - and your GM picking that guy is all you can ask for.

2. Semyon Varlamov (Goalie, 23rd overall, 2006)

We'd be lying if we said there wasn't a part of us that was still scared Semyon Varlamov was going to burn out (insert obligatory Jim Carey reference here), but what he's doing at his age, well, that just doesn't happen very often. The Capitals get credit here for being willing to use their first round pick to take a netminder in what was regarded as a weak draft between the pipes. The next time you want to criticize George McPhee for going off the board, remember that sometimes the risk pays off.

1. Mike Green (Defense, 29th overall, 2004)

Twenty-ninth overall isn't exactly scraping the bottom of the barrel, but no one expected this. Fifty-one goals and 159 points in his last 180 games, a historically great season, a Norris Trophy nomination at age 23, and comparisons to Paul Coffey would make Green a great pick just about anywhere, but at the end of the first round it's practically criminal. Thank the Lord the Stars saw something they liked in Mark Fistric.

Honorable Mentions: Mathieu Perreault, Oskar Osala, Braden Holtby

While the issue of the worst draft pick seems pretty cut-and-dry (seriously, if anyone thinks it's someone other than Pokulok, we'd love to hear why), the best pick is up for debate - and we want to know what you think. Vote in the poll, and let us know who you picked in the comments section.

Poll

So, who's the best Capitals draft pick of the decade?

Friday Caps Clips: Canadiens @ Caps Game Day

J.P. — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 11:46:45 -0000

More photos » by Mark Humphrey - AP

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Your savory breakfast links:

Previews of tonight's Caps/Habs tilt from NHL.com and Peerless, and be sure to check out our SB Nation partner Habs Eyes On The Prize for coverage from the other side of tonight's match up.
The Caps will be without Alexander Semin, Mike Knuble, Boyd Gordon and Quintin Laing tonight, and will likely also not have Jose Theodore, Shaone Morrisonn and Milan Jurcina available.
Prized blueline prospect John Carlson is set to make his NHL debut tonight after being recalled yesterday. [Dump and Chase, CSN Washington, Washington Post, Washington Times]
More on Theodore. [Washington Times]
A couple of Verizon Center thrillers and a Jose Theodore picture that never gets old are among the highlights of the decade's ten best games. [Puck Daddy]
Matt Bradley Week continues #needsmorebradley. [D.C. Sports Bog, Peerless]
Some (more) well-deserved praise for Brendan Morrison. [CBC]
From the "If you say so, Larry" file: Brian Pothier is one of at least four mean Capitals defensemen. [NY Post]
You had me at "Washington Capitals Sparklines." [Missing Monkey Head]
Wondering where the Caps stack up in terms of man-games lost to injury so far? [From the Rink]
A tender moment, captured and uploaded. [Flickr]
Speaking of candids, the three most outgoing Young Guns attended Wednesday night's Wiz game. [D.C. Sports Bog]
A look at the Caps at the quarter pole. [Puck Prospectus]
Arturs Irbe was back in his native Latvia to take part in the NHLPA's Goals & Dreams "10 countries in 10 days" tour. Wait, there's still an NHLPA? [NHLPA Goals & Dreams]
The words say "Malkin is FAR more important than Ovechkin," but what I read is "Crosby stinks." [Rock The Red.net]
Braden Holtby is back in Hershey and has a new mask. Spoiler alert: no more chocolate bars. [John Walton Hockey]
The Bears' special teams are the opposite of the Caps': awesome PK, lousy PP. [LDN]
Eric Mestery is back in Tri-City. Sweet? [Tri-City Herald]
Kids, Navy, Sylvain Cote and, of course, hockey. [The Capital]
Russia: gold medal favorites. Canada: wanting so badly to be able to play the underdog card. [The Hockey News]
Finally, per the HHoF, on this date ten years ago, the Caps "set an NHL record by going 12 consecutive games without allowing a power-play goal, in a 3-0 win at Boston. Craig Billington recorded his 100th career victory (and 8th career shutout)."

November Prospects Update: Goalies and Defensemen

David M. Getz — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:30:31 -0000

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With the first month of the hockey season gone, we've reached a point where performance and statistics, while still suffering from the problem of small sample size, have enough validity that they can be fairly analyzed. With that in mind, we thought it might be a good time to check in on the Capitals organization's prospects and see how they've started the season off.

Below are the team's goaltender and defenseman prospects and how they've performed so far this year:

Goaltenders

Dan Dunn - Dunn, a tall netminder whom the Capitals picked in the sixth round of the 2007 draft, is in his third season with St. Cloud State. The good news is that he's playing more than he has in his first two and his numbers look pretty good. The bad news is that he's still not starting in goal for the Huskies, currently splitting time with freshman Mike Lee.

Dan Dunn	Lge	GP	MIN	W	L	T	GA	GAA	SA	SV	SV%	SO
St. Cloud State	WCHA	3	182	2	1	0	6	1.98	79	73	.924	0

Braden Holtby - Holtby started the season in Hershey, moved to South Carolina when Michal Neuvirth got healthy, and even spent a couple of days in Washington (albeit for salary cap purposes). He started off hot in Hershey but hasn't done as well with the Stingrays.

Braden Holtby	Lge	GP	MIN	W	L	O	GA	GAA	SA	SV	SV%	SO
South Carolina	ECHL	3	183	1	1	1	11	3.60	101	90	.891	0
Hershey	AHL	3	178	2	1	0	3	1.01	90	87	.967	1

Michal Neuvirth - Most Caps fans are, at this point, painfully aware of Semyon Varlamov's early season struggles, last night's solid performance notwithstanding. What they might not be aware of is that Neuvirth is having problems of his own down in Hershey. There's no reason to worry at this point, and the young Czech will almost certainly start putting up better numbers before too long, but it's hard not to be a little bit disappointed.

Michal Neuvirth	Lge	GP	MIN	W	L	T	GA	GAA	SA	SV	SV%	SO
Hershey	AHL	5	299	2	3	0	15	3.01	136	121	.890	0

Defensemen

Karl Alzner - Alzner's numbers aren't eye-popping, but when are they ever? Better question: why isn't he in the NHL yet?

Karl Alzner	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Hershey	AHL	12	0	1	1	7	4	0	0	0	8	0.0

John Carlson - Carlson just keeps on impressing at every level of play and he's been a beast in the AHL so far this year, putting up eight points to go along with a nice plus-6 rating. Not to mention he has yet to take a single penalty. I'd say we should expect the Capitals to find a spot for him in 2010-11, but this time last year I would have said the same about Alzner for the 2009-10 season.

John Carlson	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Hershey	AHL	12	1	7	8	6	0	1	0	-	30	3.3

Josh Godfrey - Godfrey hasn't been able to stick in the AHL which, although owing in part to the depth of the Hershey blueline corps, is not a good sign. We've recently criticized George McPhee's asset management and with Mike Green, Jeff Schultz, John Carlson, and Karl Alzner looking like the defensive core of the future and Godfrey struggling to make the AHL team, it might be time to look into trading him for a draft pick or grit in the bottom six.

Josh Godfrey	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
South Carolina	ECHL	7	0	2	2	-3	10	0	0	0	10	0.0

Eric Mestery - Mestery didn't look very good in this summer's prospect camp, but the 2008 second rounder has always been considered a project. He's currently playing his trade for a mediocre Lethbridge Hurricanes team, for whom he sports a team-worst minus-8 rating, though is also chipping on offense.

Eric Mestery	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Lethbridge	AHL	16	2	5	7	-8	21	2	0	-	-	-

Patrick McNeill - Relatively unheralded and definitely overshadowed, McNeill's put up some pretty good numbers for Hershey over the last couple years. His NHL prospects aren't very strong, but he's a nice guy to have in the organization.

Patrick McNeill	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Hershey	AHL	11	1	4	5	1	4	0	0	-	19	5.3

Dmitri Orlov - The Caps second round draft pick from last season impressed both the team and fans in camp over the summer. At the moment he's in the KHL, playing with Novokuznetsk Metallurg, but expect him to be in North America (though not a Caps uniform) next season.

Dmitri Orlov	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Novokuznetsk Metallurg	KHL	19	1	1	2	0	8	0	0	1	21	4.8

Patrick Wey - Drafted out of the USHL and now playing at Boston College, Wey is a defenseman capable of moving the puck in an already-big (6'2'', 200 pounds) and very projectable frame. Given that he was a fourth round pick and has only played a handful of games so far we can't draw too many conclusions, but it is nice that he's cracking the BC lineup.

Patrick Wey	Lge	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PPG	SHG	GWG	SOG	PCT
Boston College	HE	4	0	0	0	-	2	0	0	0	2	0.0

Be sure to check back tomorrow for an update on how the organization's forwards have fared in the young season.

Theodore Is the Main Squeeze, For Now

Stephen Pepper — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:00:37 -0000

via www.csnwashington.com (Jan. 6, 2009)

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"[I]n training camp I said it was the best I felt since the lockout. Sooner or later, people are going to realize I didn't say that just for fun." - José Théodore post-game last night.

Well it wasn't entirely clear who would be the #1 netminder for the Washington Capitals heading into the 2009-10 season. But at least for now, Théodore est #1 à nouveau!

Théodore is putting up the best GAA (2.47) and SV% (.922) numbers since 2003-04, when he won 33 games for Montréal. Those season-to-date numbers are seventh-best in the league in GAA, and third-best in SV%, for all goalies who have started at least seven games. He's carried the momentum of a sensational training camp into a strong early season performance, punctuated by a brilliant 41-save performance last night at le Centre Verizón. Unlike last autumn, where he didn't really establish himself until shutting out the Canadiens in late November. And, still, #60 won over 30 games in 2008-09.

Whither Semyon Varlamov this season? Thus far, he hasn't exactly looked like the world class 'tender that emerged to pull the Washington Capitals out of the depths of despair last April against the Rangers, and an iron curtain for at least the first three games of the second-round Penguins series. Even though he's earned a 4-0 record.

Besides already noting a propensity to allow goals in bunches, Varly seems to have added, to a troublesome glove hand that dogged him in the Pens series, a greater vulnerability five-hole. To roughly break it down (and to be clear, these are characterizations born from my own observations) -- of the fourteen goals that Varly has allowed this season, four have been to the stick side, four to the glove side (but only two of those were high: one tally by Nashville's Shea Weber and the other by Philadelphia's Mike Richards), and six through the five-hole (or approximately 40%).

But Varlamov's performance last spring was wondrously unexpected, and he's still a 21-year old work-in-progress. So adjustments and small steps backward for greater strides later is exactly what we all should expect at this point. New goaltending coach Arturs Irbe's work with young Varly may be akin to breaking a few eggs now for a delicious omelet by mid-season.

All of this is why the Caps still have a veteran "bridge" in Théodore under contract for this season to steady the ship when the young charge struggles. So everything seems to be going according to plan to date, with the team's goalie of the present and goalie of the future scenario. And should both of them falter, well, Braden Holtby, goalie of the more distant future, is garnering national recognition for his early season play in the Palmetto State, and Michal Neuvirth, who was the Calder Cup playoff MVP last spring, is also a phone call away, though still looking to regain his form.

But could Théodore be more than just a bridge this season? Could he remain this strong in April, May? June? How long can his current success last? He's 2-0-1 / 2.04 / .939 in his last four starts. But we've seen similar stretches of stellar backstopping in his post-lockout career, followed by a return to the average.

In December of 2006, JT allowed just 11 goals in 5 games, and followed that streak by registering a SV% over .900 in only one game out of the next ten contests, and with a SV% in the .700s in five of those games.
Théodore followed up a ten start / 2.18 / .919 January last season with an unremarkable ten start / 2.96 /.906 February. (Yet his record in each month was identical: 6-3-1.)
But his 2007-08 season (his previous contract year, mind you) saw a steady improvement and consistently strong play from January 30 to the end of the regular season, where he allowed three or more GA in consecutive games just once in 27 starts, and allowed two or fewer in 17 of those starts, during that stretch drive to the post-season for Colorado.

For all we know, we could see a complete reversal of fortunes for Théodore and Varlamov by March (or even by next month), with #40 on top and JT wearing the ball cap on the end of the bench. In any event, Coach Bruce Boudreau has the luxury of going with the hot hand. And "the lefty" sure is hot right now.

Wednesday Caps Clips: Five W's in a Row

J.P. — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:44:14 -0000

More photos » by Manuel Balce Ceneta - AP

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