rboomercat90
Registered User
We’re not going to become a contender over night. It takes years to draft and develop the talent needed to become a contender. Nobody wants to hear this but not only are we still rebuilding but I think we’re still earlier in the process. Let’s face it, we started when we drafted McDavid. The years before that were just wasting time.I'm a part time Caps fan, so I'm biased, but looking at the Caps this postseason tells me how weak our wingers are. They have Kuznetsov and Backstrom, and I'd call Kuznetsov and Drai a wash. Backstrom is a big step back from McDavid, but to make up for it, on the wings, they have Ovi, Oshie, Wilson (who plays Lucic's role better than Looch does at a fraction of the cost), Vrana, Burakovsky, etc instead of Nuge (who is good), Lucic, Rattie, Aberg, etc.
That's a massive difference on the wings. Plus a better defence than ours. And goalie.
The thing most worth noting here to me is that with the exception of Oshie, all the Caps players I mentioned were drafted and developed by the Caps. Ovi, Kuznetsov, Backstrom, Wilson, Vrana, Burakovsky, etc. So this gives me hope that if we continue to draft decently well, we actually won't be as far as it seems we are. For example, if in two years, Puljujarvi, Yamamoto, and Benson are top-6 NHL wingers, then we're in fine shape. That's how this Caps team seems to have been built.
Lowe should have been fired in 2010 when it was clear the team had gone off the rails and different hockey people with different hockey ideas should have been brought in then. I said back then that it was foolish going into a scorched earth rebuild with the same people that sewered the team in the first place and expecting a good outcome. Before 2010, drafting and development was a huge problem with the team. We’re seeing now that it didn’t get better in the following years. Nothing but time wasted. I always thought it was going to take five more years of rebuilding after the Lowe group was gone. Assuming that group is actually gone, I guess that means two more years.