I had a lot of opinions this week: Braden Holtby’s decision to skip the Capitals’ White House ceremony, the playoff format, and an award prediction.
Tag: Washington Capitals
Blake’s Takes: Trade Deadline Edition
This week’s Blake’s Takes dives into Matt Duchene’s run in Ottawa and the impact of both trades. I also take a look into the hit that earned Connor McDavid his first suspension and another jersey retirement ceremony.
Five Really-Lopsided NHL Trades
What makes a trade lopsided? Many hockey fans think it is when one team gets the better players, declaring that that team had “won” the trade. But getting the better players doesn’t necessarily mean that team always wins.
For example, look at the Wayne Gretzky trade. One could rightly surmise that the Los Angeles Kings won that exchange, since they acquired the game’s greatest player in the deal. But consider that the Edmonton Oilers got $15 million in the trade, which allowed them to stay afloat, and won the Stanley Cup in 1990 with some of the assets they received. The Kings raised their profile exponentially with Gretzky on their team, but did not win a Stanley Cup Championship until 2012, long after that trade had any bearing.
That trade doesn’t seem so lopsided anymore when you look at it that way, does it?
With today being the NHL trade deadline, here is a look at five lopsided trades, where one team clearly benefited, while the other got hosed.
Was Ryan Reaves Autographing Tom Wilson Injury Photo Going Too Far?
On Tuesday, Las Vegas Golden Knights forward Ryan Reaves hit Washington Capitals forward Tom Wilson with a blindside hit. Reaves was ejected from the game, and Wilson also left the game with a concussion. Fan response ran the usual gamut, from lauding Reaves for giving Wilson a taste of his own medicine, to demonizing Reaves for making what many would consider a dirty hit (while, presumably, not understanding what “irony” means).
Two days later, Inscriptagraphs, a sports memorabilia store based in Las Vegas that specializes in autographed items, was selling 16″ x 20″ photos of Reaves standing near an injured Wilson — and signed by Reaves in red ink with the inscription “He ran into a Lion in the Jungle,” which Reaves said in a postgame statement.
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Wilson Deserved 20-Game Suspension
20 games is a long time to learn a lesson
Wilson is not a bad person, nor is he a bad player. In fact, he was awarded the Bob Probert Bowl in the First Annual Puck Junk Awards earlier this year for possessing that formidable balance of skill and aggression.
However, his hit on Sunqvist was egregious and inexcusable. So, the NHL handing Wilson a 20-game suspension was the right thing to do. Here’s why.
The 10 Biggest Hockey Stories of 2017-18
By Sal Barry, Kyle Scully, Blake Isaacs & Jim Howard
Before we fully turn our attention to the season that lies ahead, here is a look back at the biggest hockey stories of the 2017-18 season.
The First Annual Puck Junk Awards
A.K.A. 6 NHL Awards We’d Like to See
The 2018 NHL Awards take place tonight. Seeing the same great players over and over win trophies and make boring speeches is fine and all, but what hockey needs is a little variety to its awards. So here are six all-new and exciting trophies that the NHL should give out to these six unique and interesting players. But the NHL is more likely to give Quebec its next expansion franchise than to acknowledge the feats of these guys. I guess that leaves it to me. So I present to you the First Annual Puck Junk Awards!
That Time the Capitals Played the Maple Leafs…at Montreal Forum
1979 Sportscaster #56-05 – Montreal Forum
OK, I will admit that the title is a lie. The Capitals and Maple Leafs played many games at the Montreal Forum — just never against each other at the Montreal Forum. But the card above states otherwise. What’s going on here?
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8 Offbeat Washington Capitals Cards
Since the Washington Capitals entered the NHL in 1974, the team has been in the Stanley Cup Finals just twice: back in 1998 and now in 2018. And during the team’s 43-year history, there have been only a handful of offbeat Capitals hockey cards. Here are eight such cards of Capitals players that are so fun, strange or ridiculous that they just have to be shared.
Book Review: Dennis Maruk
When thinking of hockey’s greatest scorers, it is easy to overlook Dennis Maruk. Twice he put up 50 or more goals and was nearly a point-per-game player in his 14-year NHL career. But if you look at the sad-sack teams Maruk was doomed to play on — the California Golden Seals, the Cleveland Barons, the Minnesota North Stars and the Washington Capitals — it is easy to understand why Maruk is often forgotten. Three of the four teams he played on don’t even exist anymore, and the Capitals were so bad in the early 1980s that the team almost moved.
Perhaps it is the lack of press that Maruk got during his career that makes his new book, entitled “Dennis Maruk: The Unforgettable Story of Hockey’s Forgotten 60-Goal Man,” so appealing. Thousands of words have been written about Bobby Orr’s Cup-clinching goal, but not so much about the feisty center with the Fu Manchu. Maruk’s book is co-authored by SportsNet’s Ken Reid (“One Night Only,” “Hockey Card Stories“) and puts a much-deserved spotlight on Maruk’s stellar NHL career.