Failure to Capitalize

Tonight, the Capitals lost Game 7 of their series against the New York Rangers. I don't want to be negative, I swear I don't, but hearing quotes of "Oh, it's just another game" tossed around beforehand, I shouldn't have been surprised to see another half-hearted, lackluster offense. The Rangers wanted it more, so they won. Rushing back to play defense doesn't score goals. There are no moral victories- it's a pretty objective, results-based activity. This should have been the RuPaul's Drag Race Lipsync for Your Life moment, leaving it all out there, ripping your wig off (figuratively), making an impression. Seeing the game go at the leisurely pace I've seen too often this year, I had little hope.

 I hope Dale heads back to London and honestly, I don't know who else on this team should stay. The few ones who do care, I don't know if I want to see their hard work go unrewarded anymore and maybe they should be where they are valued.

 We get promised every time that this is the one, this group of guys is committed, but it never pans out. It's all talk. Living in Washington (or close enough), hearing big talk and no action gets old.

Karl Alzner: "I’m gonna view it as an underachieved season, in my opinion. I know a lot of people don’t feel the same way."
-via Katie Carrera's Twitter feed

Congratulations All Around

I admit it. I was wrong. Not only did the Capitals make the playoffs, but they won the first round. It was a bit iffy there at times, not because of Braden Holtby- that man is still rocking, but a steady lack of urgency, which gave a sense of dread in overtimes where a determination to score is kind of the point. There didn't seem to be a change of pace or confidence in Game 1 of Round 2 which took place earlier today against the NY Rangers. I have to wonder if someone has told them there's a 3-second rule in the offensive zone, as eager as they are to swipe a single shot and scurry back to defend. They also haven't gotten the memo about there being no back-door on the net. Too much time standing behind the goal and not enough in front. Their minor league affiliate, the Hershey Bears have also come back from a 0-2 deficit to tie their best of 5 series against Wilkes-Barre Scranton (if I spelled that right, I'll be amazed) Penguins. Game 3 included DJ King's first Bears goal. That was enough to make me happy; still a fangirl for ole DJ. Congrats to the Washington Wizards for their end-of-season six game winning streak. Too many people are quick to dump on them for not being very good, but as professional athletes, they should go out every night expecting to win if they do their best and they did. I hope to see more of the same next season. I'm not going to act surprised about the excellent play of the Washington Nationals. I knew they had it in them, even with the continuing domino fall of injuries (pluswhatisupwTylerClippard?). Tonight is Bryce Harper's debut. I am saddened that it had to come at the expense of Ryan Zimmerman being injured enough to sit on the DL, but now we can see if this is his time.

Caps Playoffs, pre Game 4

The Caps play Game 4 tonight of the opening round of playoffs versus the Boston Bruins. They participated in a light skate this morning.

On the near goal, Holtby and Dany Sabourin were switching out fairly regularly facing shots.

Close-ups of Braden Holtby and his mask:

At the far end of the rink, Michal Neuvirth was taking shots as well.

Caps television announcer Joe Beninati was mixing in with the little people (not a short joke, I swear)outside the plexiglass, taking notes and interacting with fans.

Myself included.

The Swedes:

Dennis Wideman stretching out:

After the starters left the ice, Neuvy moved down to take some shots from the scratches.

OK, maybe he's not taking shots in these but I was so glad to see him out there, I just kept taking pictures.

Standing by me happened to be one of my dad's favorite players, Dennis Maruk. I didn't take any pictures so you're just going to have to take my word for it that he chatted with Joe B and some fans then went shopping in the team store including buying out their remaining stock of his player shirt. Seemed like a nice guy and smelled really good, by the way. Unfortunately I didn't know he was one of my dad's favorite players until I told him about it on my way home. I would have tried harder on the photo front then.

And we will close out with a shot of the most dangerous man in Washington. Do you feel menaced?

Prediction

 The Caps aren't making the playoffs.There will be one loss too many to make that final cut. Someone will be traded for a name that sounds good but won't be a fit and the season will sputter and cough away like an old Chevette. I loved that Mike Green returned and looks solid enough out on the ice, but I still have seen more team identity and synchronicity (that is a word and not just a Police song, right?) in pick-up games. I don't know any more. It still doesn't feel like it's Dale's team but if he's not going to stay around long enough to restyle them in his likeness, then this season is just an experiment.

Flipped Script was the Same Old Story

 A 2-15 record has to make any coach start jumping at sudden noises and look behind him. The hammer finally fell for Flip Saunders Tuesday afternoon as Ted Leonsis still had his firing hand still warm from November. The Wizards managed two wins against teams with impressive records but the system didn't work with skilled veterans, there was no way it was going to do much better with a young team not experienced enough to know much better than to do as they're coached to do. So they trade a coach with a 51-130 record in for one with a 100-207 record. A Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Monday stretch will show if the change made any impact.

Congrats to Matty Perreault for his first NHL hat trick. The team still looked disjointed and it was not surprising that the young guys carried the shooting/goal scoring weight in the game. I'm still not convinced that Vokoun wants to be a goalie the way he races to handle the puck, not always cleanly, behind the goal and looks skittish as he tries to find the puck at close angles, but it hits him enough that he seems to be successful.

And the best birthday present: Prince Fielder is not going to be a National. He never struck me as a good fit to the team and the though of being burdened with him and a lengthy/costly contract was taking the shine of anticipating the new season. Detroit was a smooth marketing move and they're welcome to him.

Back to the Ice

The morning skate on Tuesday seemed disjointed and unfocused. If I had known that feeling was going to last all day for the Capitals, I would have watched Glee instead, so let's just look at the pictures:

A panoramic view of the Kettler Capitals Rink-

Ovie and Dale-

Troy Brouwer and his sign-

California Dreamin'

I wrote out this piece early on Wednesday afternoon full of pessimism regarding Vokoun's start against the Penguins and what else could happen but I was proved wrong, but still here is my thoughts from then.


 If only it were a dream. I have never been further west than Knoxville, Tennessee in my travels (thought I have been as far as Pakistan going eastward) so I don't know about the concept of jet lag, but it would seem to me that it would be hard for men who have been working on the same activity for approximately twenty years to forget how to do same activity because of a change in time zones. Still, in two games out in the golden state, the Caps lost 5-2 to San Jose and then to Los Angeles by the same score.

 That's nine goals given up by Vokoun in two games. (Neuvirth took over  in the third vs LA). In three of the four goals given up on Monday, they were the result of not moving side-to-side quick enough, a complaint I've had here since Day 1. On the Comast television broadcast, Craig Laughlin noted that Vokoun's new pads were harder, causing more of a rebound. Not the best strategy I would think for someone who cannot react quickly and has defensemen that seem to hinder more than help.

So logic dictates he's the starter tonight against Pittsburgh- a game on the newly minted NBC Sports Network against big time rivals? I'd love to know what brewing in the coffee pot at Kettler b/c I'm not seeing what they seem to be seeing. The net is going to be guarded by a man whose style is somewhere between a butterfly and the breaststroke? Even without Penguin big guns, I don't feel too confident about this one.

Renewal of the Jinx?

I posted positively about Tebow and then he loses three in a row. I posted positively about the Wizards and they have yet to win. The Capitals aren't much to write about, and while the Hershey Bears won the last two, they lost the high-profile Outdoor Classic. Doesn't seem to be much to write about at the time. Here's hoping that Prince Fielder doesn't come to town to rock the crowded first base boat.

Double Despair

 Last night was the first of the winter where the Capitals and the Wizards played on the same night at the same time. This had the potential to be a very busy and eventful night, but being the Capitals and the Wizards, it ended up being a double disappointment.

 The Capitals had a penalty and goal against before the Wizards got around to announcing their starting five. It didn't take long to see that making the switch over to standard definition CSN+ was not going to be worth the effort. The Wizards put up some strong numbers early- their largest lead was 21 points, but the play was sloppy and they would have been trounced by a better team than New Jersey.

 By the second half, the Wizards fell apart and let Kris Humphries have decent numbers. The man is a joke, following after the real shooters and putting up leftovers, plus he tripped up Andray Blatche who in turn knocked into Nick Young and put him in a lot of pain, even though he managed to come back limping toward the end. The game should have been easily dominated the whole time but there was a level of unfamiliarity and discomfort amongst teammates that was obvious and led to too many missed shots and awkward passes. Hopefully the shortened prep time is mostly to blame for this because they look like a determined group of guys and even Dallas is looking like crap this early on.

 What sucks the most is the negative comments by CSN Washington and their followers on Facebook. There was no positive comments the last time I looked and with titles like "new season, same Wizards" it doesn't seem like pro-team attitudes are encouraged. There is still building being done and it's different than when I bitch about the Caps. They are supposed to be "finished" by now and ready for success but it's not happening. There is a higher level of expectation. Fire Saunders? Maybe. Wasn't impressed with him last year, but let's see after more than one game.

Catching Up

Illness and the holidays have taken days away from me and I realize that I never put up the pics of Jim Johnson's first day as assistant coach. I wasn't surprised to see Bob Woods let go in the aftermath of BB's firing and surely enough he followed him to Anaheim not much longer. The defense in the defense first system was flawed and there seems to be a marked change in the Caps now under Johnson. 

 

Dale's First Day

There was a larger than usual crowd at Kettler Capitals Iceplex on Monday morning as the news spread that Bruce Boudreau was out as head coach of the Washington Capitals and alumnus Dale Hunter was in. Some were there out of coincidence, like the group in front of me, but others had made it a point to come and see the first day of a new era.

The new era got off a bit slowly as the scheduled practice was moved once from 11am to noon to accommodate a George McPhee press conference and then just because as the players did not take the ice until 12:04, led by Alex Ovechkin with George McPhee and Ted Leonsis watching from the perch above the benches. The team was met with applause from the crowd which only got louder five minutes after as Dale Hunter emerged with the assistant coaches Bob Woods, Dean Evason and Dave Prior.

 Practice began with full-ice 4 on 4 drills. While there was no real big difference in the players' demeanor, I still felt a "hey look at what I can do" in the air as Hunter stayed back from the action, letting Coach Evason call the drills and having short one on one conversations with various players.

Mike Green, who had skated on his own earlier in the morning, watched for a few minutes from the bench.

 Over half an hour passed before Hunter took his place at the dry erase board and began to take a more active role in the practice.

 

The first drill was a closed blue-line 5 on 5, a realistic game-type situation drill much like I thought they should be doing more regularly. Ovie was hitting the boards hard, once with the help of Chimera, shaking the whole curve of plexiglass in the lower corner.

 This section I like to call "coaching":

Right before 1pm, the group headed to the far end of the ice where Hunter attempted a shot on Vokoun. He was denied, so clearlt he hasn't seene nough tape yet of his weak spots. Shoot higher next time, Dale!
 On Carlson's shot, he slipped and wiped out into the boards. I apologize for not recording that.

During the course of the practice, several men in St Louis Blues track suits would come in to watch in the hollow at center ice between the stands. On my way out, I saw why. The team was skating on the other rink.

All in all, an interesting first day, but the first test to see whether or not this was the right choice will happen tomorrow night. Will an energized and motivated Capitals team take the ice or will it simply be more of the same?

Cyber Monday Deal- A New Head Coach for the Caps

Mike Vogel's Blog

 I guess I won't be getting that Kitchen-Aid hand mixer after all, because my Christmas wish came true. Coach Boudreau is out and Dale Hunter is in as coach of the Capitals. Yes, BB had a good record, fastest to 200 wins, etc. but he wasn' t the coach for this group of players and this isn't a bad group of players so he had to go. I think he was just fine for AHL level but he's just not an NHL coach. Now we see if Dale Hunter is an NHL coach. He's got records for fastest to 300 and 400 wins in the OHL but we have to see if it translates. I have a feeling he isn't going to take crap and whining and complacency, nor do I think he'll adopt the fool persona for local commercials.

The new era begins with a press conference at eleven. Practice has been moved to noon, pictures up afterward.

I Wouldn't Ask for Anything Else for Christmas if This is True

Washington Times

Apparently on Canadian TV, former Cap/my high school crush/current analyst Nick Kypreos stated that a coaching change could come soon and that Dale Hunter was up for the job. Twitter's quick with the "it's just speculation" right now and the Caps spokesman has issued a denial, but Kyper is usually right and by now I'd think anyone who's been around long enough knows that a denial doesn't always mean something's not true. I'm going to head to practice tomorrow and see what's up and we'll know soon enough.

Prediction

Mathieu Perreault is scratched and no one is parking in front of the goal. The Caps are going to lose.

Is There Still a Lockout?

  I miss the Wizards.

  The outcome might not have ended up in their favor most nights, but more often than not, that was a team who went out onto the court knowing they were just as capable of winning the game as the other team. I cheered for that mindset and effort, so I am on board for Ted Leonsis' slow and steady wins the race approach, but when he applies that same metric to the Capitals, I have to disagree.

 The Capitals were an elite team. They are well beyond the building blocks stage. Premium players have been in place for a while now, but they are still pieces contained within a set of strategies and systems. I know Ted is into the business of happiness, but no matter what smiley face he puts on this current downturn, a great deal of fans- the ones who pay with time and lots of money, are not happy. I know I was insulted when he implied in one of today's blog posts that those upset with the slide are simply not taking the lows with the highs- Ted's Take. There might be bandwagoneers who aren't used to a losing team, but I would hope that a great majority are ones who have suffered through years of mediocre teams and player and coaching changes and know that this configuration of the team should be playing at a higher level than it is. I think it's perfectly reasonable to be disappointed and ask for action.

My broken record is going to keep skipping along right here: When your boss sucks, you don't have motivation to do well. There is no drive to make him look good when he doesn't deserve it. BB has to go.

• If the team needs hustle and drive and speed and a man to stand in front of the goal, why has Monsieur Hustle himself, Mathieu Perreault, been the healthy scratch the last few weeks? Mike Knuble and Matt Hendricks can't do it all themselves.
• Vokoun can't go side to side and the high glove side is weak. The defense does nothing to compensate for that.
• Cody Eakin has not been the ginger revelation that so many proclaimed him to be. There's been a whole lot of nothing coming from him.
• There has to be a way to bring up some new D-men. Even if Green were healthy I can't see him making up for the regular miscues of Hamrlik and Schultz all on his own. There should be enough to rotate some of them up to the press box.
• It may be a coincidence that Ovie hasn't done so well since getting the C, but maybe there is something to him being a kid who feels he has to carry the weight of a team that isn't being motivated correctly from the top down. Some people simply aren't leaders and there's nothing wrong with that. Slide that C over to #22 and see what happens.
• I'm not laying any blame at the feet of George McPhee. He has acquired quality players and that's what he's supposed to do. This bit of intel solidifies my respect. Please don't backtrack later, GMGM.

 I want to be in the business of happiness, too. I admit I haven't finished reading the book but I'd be pretty sure that one of the tenets is not to worry about things out of your control. The employment status of the Caps personnel is certainly something out of my control, but if Ted makes it a point to keep the napkins and straws stocked in Section 104, it seems hard to believe that he'd let the team that people are coming to see suffer from a lack of motivation and leadership.

Accountability When the Buck Doesn't Stop

 When I am in public situations and interacting with people, my voice tends to go a bit high and timid. I don't know why. I don't do it on purpose, but it amuses my dad to no end. "Why don't they get to hear your real voice?" he's always asking. "We don't get the shy and sweet you." This is what I think of when I listen to these Caps post-game/post-practice press conferences Bruce Boudreau puts on, all low and beaten-down. You can feel the waves of "You can't blame me" coming off of him. Those who have seen the HBO 24/7 know this isn't his real voice either. This is someone who gets mad and does something about it, but if you just listened to the press conferences you'd think things happen behind the bench without Bruce being any the wiser. The decisions he had to make were all agonizing but something that had to be done. I'm not buying it, just as I'm not buying services from Hadeed Carpet, copiers from Ameritel or a Mercedes from American Service Center.

 Every time I post an anti-Gabby statement, I feel bad about it because there is an air of "Enough people are negative about DC sports/hockey/the Caps, we don't need to be negative internally" around these parts. I want the man to prove me wrong. I want Ted Leonsis' faith in him to be justified. But I don't see it. I see someone who thinks because he has good players, he's a good coach, but having eyes will tell you otherwise.

By now we see a team he has molded. There is no more "This is the team he was handed and he did what he could with it." He's decided who his favorites are (Semin) and who he tolerates (Perreault). He's got the greatest player in the world so turned around he doesn't know which way is up any more. The idea of Ovie being a team player is better than the reality. This isn't working. Ovie needs to be a selfish bastard to do what he does best. The phrase "too cute" gets tossed around, and not just by the guys at Puck Buddys. It feels like a preschool team where everyone needs to touch the puck before anyone can shoot. Windows close in that time and opportunities are missed. Standing in front of the net is seen as presumptuous and holding back the defense is a waste of time because the other team still gets into the offensive zone faster.

 There are times, and at the beginning of the season they could last for whole games, where there was hustle and drive and an understanding that to win you really do need to score more goals than the other team. When it leaves and you see professional hockey players looking like relief pitchers in the batting box - "How does this go again?" hope fades. These guys are are being told how to play, and so eyes should turn to the play-caller, someone who switches lines and strategies too fast for anyone to catch on smoothly, someone who benches underperformers too few and far between.

 I don't think it's a coincidence that people like Bradley and Steckel, who have revealed locker room attitudes are on other teams now and that people who were thought to be potential leaders, especially Arnott, saw how things really ran and distanced themselves.

 Prove me wrong, Bruce. Use your real voice. I want a Jack Nicholson in "A Few Good Men" moment here. I want to hear Bruce screaming, "You want me on that bench! You need me on that bench! You use words like accountability, bag skates and trying harder. I use them as punchlines. Did I order that sloppy power play with no one crashing the net? You're goddamn right I did!"

And in my version of this fantasy, he looks amazed as Knuble and Alan May drag him away.

It's in the Bag

  I admit, I had to Google "bag skate." It wasn't in wikipedia or my dictionary app, but so many people were using it on Twitter to define the long hard non-stop practice the Caps had on Wednesday, I had to find out. And that's all it is. A long continuous practice, for punishment or conditioning. I think it's obvious which reason the Kettler crew did four sets of sprints in between drills for a straight ninety minutes, though I think if punishment is to be equal, old Gabby should have been doing his share. Mike Green worked hard the whole practice and he wasn't even in the last few games.

11:27am- Everyone was already out on the ice before the 11:30 start time. After stretching and the first set of suicide sprints, it was time for one-on-ones, or what I like to call couples skate. Mike Green was out for the action, paired with Cody Eakin.

 

Then we had some more active one-on-ones where they shot at the goaltenders. I'm not impressed with these and the other open ice types of drills. Sure Vokoun can stop what amounts to a breakaway, well most of the time- the five-hole was pretty open from what I saw. Make that man go side-to-side. That's where he gives up the most, IMO. I would call for five-on-five every day until they get things down. They go through these drills and then on game day it looks as if so many times they stop and you can see them thinking "What happens next?" and there's no time for that when five people who are not your teammates are barreling down on you.

12:16pm- Then came a more realistic drill, three-on-three inside the blue line. They were trying hard, I give them that. Ovie was making moves that had my mouth hanging open a few times.

This mark on the ice was from Ovie falling hard and bouncing right back up.

12:27pm- Blue line to blue line skate. No one was going hard past the lines, mainly gliding to a stop. I can't blame them, by now they had been on the ice for a straight hour. Which leads me to my next bit of confusion. If these men can skate non-stop for an hour with smiles on their faces, why then when I think all they need is a few more steps to really break out and set up a chance do they instead dump it and change lines? Sure they might be worn out, but momentum is a good thing.

For some reason- I didn't catch on to the pattern, Erskine (I think? It may be time for a new prescription) and Ward dropped down for pushups before continuing on.

12:30pm- No signs of slowing down. BB was still working the team. Among the phrases overheard were "If we don't get better at this we're f#$%ed." and "Work your nuts off here!" Stay classy, Bruce.

Over an hour in and everyone was still playing hard.

12:37pm- They all gather at the far end of the rink for some four-on-four and then five-on five drills.

12:41pm- Both nets were brought into the corner for some mini action. I don't get it, I just record it.

Eakin was sent back to collect extra pucks. Rookie work, I suppose.

12:48pm- More sprints. Perreault decided to smack his stick on the glass right by my head and my ears were ringing for quite a bit.

12:50pm- Ovie is still smiling. Is it just me or does Mike Green look like he should be tying up someone to the railroad tracks these days with that facial hair?

 There was so much snow left at the end boards, Arlington County was about to call for a two-hour delay.

12:52pm- One more meeting at the strategy board.

12:54pm- Guys finally start leaving the ice.

Eakin, Ward, Perreault, Hendricks, Laich, Schultz, and Halpern were the last ones still hanging around.

1pm- Brooks Laich was the last one off the ice and still took time to sign for those few still left at the rink.

I was curious to see what BB had to say about this type of practice, so I hung around another forty-three minutes to eavesdrop on the press conference, but those things are quite close in and the sound quality was not the best. People are better off finding it on the official page than going by the few notes I managed to scribble down.

Did it work? We'll find out Friday night.