Is There Even Room for Milan?
With Milan Jurcina set to find out just how badly a team of eagle eye lawyers can pick apart his game and the skills he has spent his whole life honing, the real question is, is there even room under the Salary Cap for Jurcina to remain a member of the Washington Capitals?
You be the judge.
The Caps have a lot of cash tied up already and, from all appearances, there does not honestly seem to be room for Jurcina to fit in under the Cap.
Without getting drastic and proposing trades to make room for Jurcina’s salary, I have compiled a list of the all of the players currently signed to the Capitals. I have also included possible prospects from Hershey who have a chance at making or seeing ice with the Caps this season.
Read on to understand more.
Forwards
This is a list of the forwards(plus their ’09-10 cap hits) who are all but guaranteed spots in the Capitals lineup on opening night:
Alexander Ovechkin | 9,538,462
Michael Nylander | 4,875,000
Alexander Semin | 4,600,000
Mike Knuble | 2,800,000
Chris Clark | 2,633,333
Nicklas Backstrom | 2,400,000
Brooks Laich | 2,066,667
Brendan Morrison | 1,500,000
Matt Bradley | 1,000,000
Eric Fehr | 771,750
Boyd Gordon | 761,250
Tomas Fleischmann | 725,000
David Steckel | 725,000
Total Cap Hit: $ 34,396,462.00
This is a list of the players who will be competing at training camp for the 1 or 2 available forward positions:
Chris Bourque | 578,000
Oskar Osala | 850,000
Keith Aucoin | 487,000
Jay Beagle | 875,000
Mathieu Perreault | 716,667
Francois Bouchard | 850,000
Defense
Mike Green | 5,250,000
Tom Poti | 3,500,000
Brian Pothier | 2,500,000
Shaone Morrisonn | 1,975,000
Karl Alzner | 1,675,000
John Erskine | 1,250,000
Jeff Schultz | 715,000
Milan Jurcina | TBD
Total Cap Hit: $ 16,865,000.00
If Milan Jurcina’s arbitration award is not to the Capitals liking, they may elect to make Jurcina a UFA and to bring on one of their highly touted young defenseman. Among those who would have a chance to replace Jurcina are:
John Carlson | 875,000
Josh Godfrey | 845,833
Tyler Sloan | 640,000
Sean Collins | 650,000
Joe Finley | NA(may be forced to spend a year in the AHL to prove his worth following his recent scuffles with the law)
Zach Miskovic | 875,000
Goaltending
Jose Theodore | 4,500,000
Total Cap Hit: $ 5,321,667.00
(Regardless of whether it’s Varly or Neuvo, the cap hit is the same therefore the cost of goaltending will not change.)
Competing for the backup role/possible starter:
Simeon Varlamov | 821,667
Michal Neuvrith |821,667
Salary Totals:
Offense: 34,396,462.00
Defense: 16,865,000.00
Goaltending: 5,321,667.00
Total Cap Hit: $ 56,583,129.00
I have used nhlnumbers.com as well as Hockeybuzz’s Cap Central to compile, what I feel, will be the Capitals 2009-2010 roster.
These numbers do not include a 2009-2010 buyout hit of $366,667 for Ben Clymer’s contract. Although it is the final year of the buyout for the Capitals, the cash currently tied up in Clymer’s buyout pretty much rules out the Capitals ability to add to their current roster without subtracting.
Yes, the fans would love to see McPhee find a way to move out the burdensome contracts of Michael Nylander and Jose Theodore, but that won’t be happening anytime soon and with the hopes that these two will live up to their purported value, the Caps may be better served by getting the most out of them while they can. Plus, the only way for McPhee to move either of these two current Capitals will be to find trade value by playing them and hoping they play well. Without Nylander and Theodore showing marked improvement(Nyls more than Theo), the Caps will just have to sit an wait for their contracts to run out. Hopefully that will not be the case, as players that can somehow fetch over $4 million a season likely have some talent and ability, right?
The grand hope is that Nylander can find his feet and start to play defense again and that Jose will prove that he is getting better at handling the pressure.
The other hope is that Mike Knuble will be a dramatic improvement over Viktor Kozlov. No offense to Kozy, who was a valued teammate during his tenure in DC, but Knubs brings that element of size, scoring and GRIT to the Caps top line and is known to get his nose dirty in front of the net and in the corners, something that Viktor tended to shy away from.
Washington will also be counting on a bounce back season from former playmaker Brendan Morrison. Morrison has suffered through some injury plagued seasons, but word is that he is feeling healthier than ever and that he thinks that he is going to be a great fit on the Capitals. He has some awfully large shoes to fill as he will likely be competing with Michael Nylander to replace Sergei Fedorov.
These 4 players, Nylander, Theodore, Knuble and Morrison will prove to be the real keys to the Capitals upcoming campaign. Nyls and Theo need to bounce back while Knuble and Morrison will need to be consistent contributors.
So where does that leave the rest of the team.
As long as the stay the course they have been on, the rest of the team should continue to thrive and develop.
The current question of whether the Caps will retain Jurcina or not, is rather moot at this point.
The reality of the situation is that the Capitals can go over the Cap by 10% before the start of the regular season and, although the Caps are once-again bumping against the Cap ceiling, George McPhee knows that resigning Jurcina simply gives him more options.
Jurcina definitely has some value. It’s just hard to imagine the Caps pushing Karl Alzner out of a spot once again.
Washington will keep Jurcina, as he is an asset, but they will also make at least 1 trade before the opening of training camp, if not more.
With word that the Caps are keeping tabs on UFA players like Brendan Shanahan, Sergei Zubov and Maxim Afinigenov, it is certainly clear that the Caps are looking to move some players out.
Milan Jurcina’s arbitration ruling will be out on August 6th.
Until then, all things Washington Capitals related will be very uneventful. Only following Jurcina’s ruling will the Caps finally address what final moves to make before the start of training camp.
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