I'm not sure I've seen a more ridiculous bias against a player on this board in recent times, congrats.
I just saw Niskanen, Orpik, and even Carlson struggle to keep up with a fast team in playoffs, but let's single out a guy that actually played pretty decent (by no means perfect, etc).
If we're calling Orlov's contract a problem, then by this measure we might need to replace the entire Caps defense --except Kempny, maybe Jensen, and cost-controlled guys.
Btw, as far as points, sure, Orlov looks like he should be able to get more with his moves, but his "contract-normalized" ES production (28 pts for 5M) is quite similar to Carlson's 37 pts for 8M. And consider that Orlov's partner was Niskanen, who had a tough year. Fwiw, in playoffs (small sample, ok), Orlov led all Caps D men with 3 pts at ES (Carlson had 1) -- in fact Orlov tied Kuz for 3rd most ES points behind Ovi and Backstrom (laugh or cry).