The Toronto Maple Leafs will take on the Washington Capitals tonight.
The Toronto Maple Leafs will put their 15-8-1 record on the line against one of the NHL’s secretly worst teams.
The Washington Capitals have been one of the NHL’s best teams for years. Three President’s Trophies and countless playoff disappointments have gained the Capitals respect around the league. They might get laughed for choking in the spring, but everyone knows that with Ovechkin, Backstrom and Holtby they’re one of the best teams in the NHL.
Except, not anymore there not.
This past summer the Capitals saw perhaps the biggest exodus of talent the NHL has ever seen from one team at one time. The Caps lost Justin Williams, Marcus Johansen, Daniel Winnick, Kevin Shattenkirk, Karl Alzner and Nate Schmidt. Now, that might not seem like a lot, but that is two top pairing defenseman, and a player from each of their bottom three lines. Alzner probably wasn’t much of a loss, but he was one of their main leaders. The amount of WAR (wins against replacement) lost here is staggering.
That they used all the cap space to re-sign and overpay guys they already had, while replacing their lost players with the likes of Devante Pelly-Smith, Chandler Stephenson and giving 22 minutes per game to Brooks Orpik.
The Capitals are Terrible
Washington is currently the tenth worst possession team in the NHL. They also have given up the second-most scoring changes in the entire league.
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The only thing preventing them from being near 31st place is Braden Holtby. He should be the current favorite to win the Vezina. As good as Sergei Bobrovsky has been, he at least has a real team in front of him.
Holtby has tricked the entire NHL into believing that the Capitals are still a decent team. Just yesterday I saw a bunch of people saying the Leafs should have played MacElhinney against Carolina and saved Andersen for Washington – those people have been tricked by Holtby. The reality is that Carolina is a massively better team than Washington.
Tonight’s Game
The Leafs will insert Matt Martin, Dominic Moore and (in what I’m assuming is a late Halloween prank) Roman Polak.
Connor Carrick doesn’t deserve to be a healthy scratch. He does deserve to be partnered again with Gardiner since last year they formed one of the NHL’s more effective pairings. Healthy scratching the always effective Carrick is just a bad roster decision.
The Leafs have played so badly lately that they’re almost due for a good game. Unfortunately, this will have the effect of people using that fact to argue that Matt Martin needs to play. Correct me If I’m wrong, but Matt Martin hasn’t ever sniped a goal like this has he?
Trust me, no matter what happens tonight, the Leafs don’t need and shouldn’t dress Matt Martin (or Roman Polak).
Still, whatever lineup the Leafs run with, who cares? In the end, after basically a decade out of the Playoffs, I’m fine with any lineup that features Moran Rielly and Auston Matthews.