Post-Game Talk: Philly @ The Washington Anthony Manthanys | 7p ET | NBCSW

[ALLCAPSALLTHETIME]

Almost forgot...Congrats to Carlson on his 400th career assist. Pretty big accomplishment. 19 more assists and he’ll pass Pivonka for 3rd all time in Franchise history.

 

[artilector]

I think this is a poor take. You are talking like this team is the Senators or the Red Wings.

All teams — and the good ones in particular in sports leagues everywhere — need players that help to make the room solid.

You’ve become seemingly pretty critical over the last year or so. Maybe that’s the issue here.

Now that's almost insulting - I'll have you know that I've been pretty critical for far longer than the last year! lol.

My observation is that elite teams don't have to pay extra for "solid" guys, they get them organically by running a tight ship, developing talent well, doing their homework to not bring in obvious bad apples, etc.

There is also a threshold beyond which "extra" leadership simply doesn't add much, because you have enough, it becomes a case of diminishing returns. I think the Caps are in that situation - Ovi, Backstrom, Oshie, Wilson, Carlson, now Chara - it's plenty. What they need out of the rest is performance, very simple (and basic discipline). Whatever leadership a guy like Dillon brings, I think realistically they won't miss a beat if that's gone. But if he starts turning pucks over regularly, no amount of leadership from him will compensate for that.

Re: "You are talking like this team is the Senators or the Red Wings.", I don't understand what you are referring to. My point was pretty much that the Caps *shouldn't* act like that sort of a team, where people feel the pressure to overpay some "solid" vets to try to turn around a losing environment that is typically the result of botched trades/drafting/development.

 

[Melkor]

They call him the AntMan..

 

[Roshi]

Dillon is pretty good at what he does.

He gets 3,9m a season. Thats a nr4 guy paycheck, and thats what you should expect from him. So he maybe shouldnt have to play 20 minutes a night against the best players of opposing team, and would do better being nr 4 than nr 2-3, but thats not his fault that we are overusing him.

He is still surviving the minutes now, and brings the physicality and team element with it. He is a warrior. Everybody on the locker room loves warriors.

For our boards Dilly is just the trashing pin now. He really isnt all that bad, but since he has done couple visible turnovers and hasnt been here for a decade like JC and Orlov he became the easy target. Someone needs to take the heat, but who wants to trash Chara? And Jensen has suffered his part already.

the thing is that if you want someone to handle better the minutes and challenge Dillon is handling, you are propably paying more than 3,9 for it.

 

[Kuz]

Dillon is pretty good at what he does.

He gets 3,9m a season. Thats a nr4 guy paycheck, and thats what you should expect from him. So he maybe shouldnt have to play 20 minutes a night against the best players of opposing team, and would do better being nr 4 than nr 2-3, but thats not his fault that we are overusing him.

He is still surviving the minutes now, and brings the physicality and team element with it. He is a warrior. Everybody on the locker room loves warriors.

For our boards Dilly is just the trashing pin now. He really isnt all that bad, but since he has done couple visible turnovers and hasnt been here for a decade like JC and Orlov he became the easy target. Someone needs to take the heat, but who wants to trash Chara? And Jensen has suffered his part already.

the thing is that if you want someone to handle better the minutes and challenge Dillon is handling, you are propably paying more than 3,9 for it.

Still we are using 8th most on our defence in the league. Dillon is playing 19:02 a game which is whats expected of a 4th defenceman. Go to any team and you will see most teams have their 4th gut with a little more time than what Dillon gets.

Dallas - Oleksiak 20:14
NYI - Mayfield 19:33
Tampa - Cernak 19:11
Colorado - Graves 19:33
Penguins - Matheson 18:47

The problem for the Caps is they dont have a player that is consistently solid in his own end and can take the hardest minutes. Carlson is underrated defensively on this board, but he is still not a top tier defensive defenceman and with his offensive abilities you want him to use most of his minutes offensively. Orlov is very good at his best, but he is not consistent enough in delievering a good game after another.

We really dont have any defenceman that are underpaid for what they bring. Most deliever around what is expected compared to their contract. Thats why when people talk about the defencemen that needs protection its pretty much Carlson and Orlov and then the rest are pretty much expendable as at their cost its possible to find a Jensen, Dillon and Schultz level player. I believe Schultz has been best for what he brings, but he only has 1 year left so not certain Seattle would take him anyway. Some even mention Orlov as expendable as he is paid the second most of the defencemen and if Ovi demands a raise you can probably find a player that cost less that could fill the gap from Orlov leaving.

 

[Roshi]

Still we are using 8th most on our defence in the league. Dillon is playing 19:02 a game which is whats expected of a 4th defenceman. Go to any team and you will see most teams have their 4th gut with a little more time than what Dillon gets.

Dallas - Oleksiak 20:14
NYI - Mayfield 19:33
Tampa - Cernak 19:11
Colorado - Graves 19:33
Penguins - Matheson 18:47

The problem for the Caps is they dont have a player that is consistently solid in his own end and can take the hardest minutes. Carlson is underrated defensively on this board, but he is still not a top tier defensive defenceman and with his offensive abilities you want him to use most of his minutes offensively. Orlov is very good at his best, but he is not consistent enough in delievering a good game after another.

We really dont have any defenceman that are underpaid for what they bring. Most deliever around what is expected compared to their contract. Thats why when people talk about the defencemen that needs protection its pretty much Carlson and Orlov and then the rest are pretty much expendable as at their cost its possible to find a Jensen, Dillon and Schultz level player. I believe Schultz has been best for what he brings, but he only has 1 year left so not certain Seattle would take him anyway. Some even mention Orlov as expendable as he is paid the second most of the defencemen and if Ovi demands a raise you can probably find a player that cost less that could fill the gap from Orlov leaving.

Yeah, im not indicating that much of the amount of minutes, but the usage of the minutes he is playing. And I agree that you can propably find a guy to replace his on-ice play with 3,9 millions, but it will be hard to find it cheaper as many have been saying is very "doable". And for that finding someone at the same cost, Dillon has the off-ice advantage.

We dont have guys overperforming their contracts on D, thats the cost of drafting low 20s for over a decade with also selling some of your picks. We've had dynasty of regular season success instead though, with a cup too, so hard to be too worried about that

And as ive said i completely agree with that Schultz propably doesnt look too interesting for Seattle with his one year contract. In a vacuum I think Schultz is equal or more important to our D as Dillon is (on ice), but with protecting Dillon over Schultz i think we have a better chance keeping them both. And I dont think we are about to find a better guy than Dillon with a cheaper contract from FA-market or from our own pool for next season either.

 

[AlexBrovechkin8]

Glad to see everyone excited, it was a solid debut. They worked the Flyers pretty good but Elliott was so bad that he didn’t give them much of a chance either so it’s hard to take much away from that game. Still, impressive the last two games that they were able to take advantage of teams not at full strength or at their best, that’s what good teams do.

I was thinking after the 4-2 loss to the Bruins that they needed to take advantage of the soft upcoming schedule and they’re playing out that script so far. Their next two games are against Buffalo and Philadelphia but then they close out the month of April with three straight against the Islanders and two against Pittsburgh so banking these points and finding their game again is important.

Liked a lot of what I saw from Mantha. I think the biggest difference between him and V from what I saw was his ability to absorb contact and still maintain possession of the puck. That part of his game should translate better to playoff hockey. It was also fun seeing him make plays with Backstrom and Osh who both think the game at an elite level which hopefully says good things about his IQ. He’ll have his bad games or dull stretches for sure but I thought it was pretty easy to see why BMac coveted him and thought he could be a good fit here. And Wilson, Ovechkin, Mantha, and Oshie as your top six wingers is a hilarious amount of big human.

 

[LesDiablesRouges]

Glad to see everyone excited, it was a solid debut. They worked the Flyers pretty good but Elliott was so bad that he didn’t give them much of a chance either so it’s hard to take much away from that game. Still, impressive the last two games that they were able to take advantage of teams not at full strength or at their best, that’s what good teams do.

I was thinking after the 4-2 loss to the Bruins that they needed to take advantage of the soft upcoming schedule and they’re playing out that script so far. Their next two games are against Buffalo and Philadelphia but then they close out the month of April with three straight against the Islanders and two against Pittsburgh so banking these points and finding their game again is important.

Liked a lot of what I saw from Mantha. I think the biggest difference between him and V from what I saw was his ability to absorb contact and still maintain possession of the puck. That part of his game should translate better to playoff hockey. It was also fun seeing him make plays with Backstrom and Osh who both think the game at an elite level which hopefully says good things about his IQ. He’ll have his bad games or dull stretches for sure but I thought it was pretty easy to see why BMac coveted him and thought he could be a good fit here. And Wilson, Ovechkin, Mantha, and Oshie as your top six wingers is a hilarious amount of big human.

Ant-Man is a completely different tier than Vrana.

 

[max21]

I really like the top 6 now, even Sheary makes the third line look good also. That was a great game from everyone. Samsonov looked solid

 

[Capsman]

Glad to see everyone excited, it was a solid debut. They worked the Flyers pretty good but Elliott was so bad that he didn’t give them much of a chance either so it’s hard to take much away from that game. Still, impressive the last two games that they were able to take advantage of teams not at full strength or at their best, that’s what good teams do.

I was thinking after the 4-2 loss to the Bruins that they needed to take advantage of the soft upcoming schedule and they’re playing out that script so far. Their next two games are against Buffalo and Philadelphia but then they close out the month of April with three straight against the Islanders and two against Pittsburgh so banking these points and finding their game again is important.

Liked a lot of what I saw from Mantha. I think the biggest difference between him and V from what I saw was his ability to absorb contact and still maintain possession of the puck. That part of his game should translate better to playoff hockey. It was also fun seeing him make plays with Backstrom and Osh who both think the game at an elite level which hopefully says good things about his IQ. He’ll have his bad games or dull stretches for sure but I thought it was pretty easy to see why BMac coveted him and thought he could be a good fit here. And Wilson, Ovechkin, Mantha, and Oshie as your top six wingers is a hilarious amount of big human.

Granted it was against Philly, but my take is that line will generate more chances than with Vrana. When was the last time Jake had 6 shots in a game? I was thinking, they may end up having similar stats but this line may tilt the ice a lot more and that’s huge. I also liked Mantha’s passing better than Jakes’s, again a small sample size but he seems to have a defter touch.

 

[Fallschirmyager]

Of course scoring points during your first game with your new team is going to be fun but Mantha looked like a little kid smiling on the bench. Here's hoping he gets to keep it going.

 

[AlexBrovechkin8]

Granted it was against Philly, but my take is that line will generate more chances than with Vrana. When was the last time Jake had 6 shots in a game? I was thinking, they may end up having similar stats but this line may tilt the ice a lot more and that’s huge. I also liked Mantha’s passing better than Jakes’s, again a small sample size but he seems to have a defter touch.

Jake had 5 shots twice this year but never 6. In all of March and April — a span of 19 games — he had 21 total shots on goal. In his last 15 games with the Caps he never had more than 2 SOG and had 5 games with 0 SOG. Pretty easy to see why both parties were frustrated.

 

[tenken00]

I wonder how different a feeling this is for Mantha?

 

[kicksavedave]

View attachment 422212

Hah, hilarious photoshop. Happy little clouds, indeed. Can even see the enormous outline of old Bob's hair. 8/10!

 

[19 for president]

Let's wait more. Shall we? I'm still skeptical. That was a report on him: that he can be absolutely a top player in this league if he was motivated more. If he was what you described, no way Detroit would trade him.

I think Wash is a great situation for Mantha. He isn't the guy (which he was in Detroit), he is playing on a winning team, and he'll have a true playmaking center. None of that was going to happen in Detroit for him anytime soon. He really does has the skills to be a 40 goal guy. He is always going to be a guy you probably want more out of, but that doesn't mean he can't be a key piece for you. I think he'll have a really solid playoffs for you guys.

With that said I think Vrana might have ended up in a great situation for him to. I think he'll pair well with our transition game and Larkin. Plus he gets to take on a bigger role with Detroit than he was going to get anytime soon in Washington. Sometimes being thrust into a leadership role can help players grow.

Oh and we are totally with you in the Pens hate. I think they and Chi are the only two teams I still readily dislike lol. Its all Crosby/ Kane/ Toews though...

 

[AlexBrovechkin8]

I think Wash is a great situation for Mantha. He isn't the guy (which he was in Detroit), he is playing on a winning team, and he'll have a true playmaking center. None of that was going to happen in Detroit for him anytime soon. He really does has the skills to be a 40 goal guy. He is always going to be a guy you probably want more out of, but that doesn't mean he can't be a key piece for you. I think he'll have a really solid playoffs for you guys.

With that said I think Vrana might have ended up in a great situation for him to. I think he'll pair well with our transition game and Larkin. Plus he gets to take on a bigger role with Detroit than he was going to get anytime soon in Washington. Sometimes being thrust into a leadership role can help players grow.

Oh and we are totally with you in the Pens hate. I think they and Chi are the only two teams I still readily dislike lol. Its all Crosby/ Kane/ Toews though...

I'll definitely watch more Detroit games now. I want to see Vrana with Larkin. Very curious to see how Jake responds to more minutes and more responsibility. I think he'll drive you nuts defensively but he's going to flourish offensively in an increased role.

 

[CapitalsCupReality]

View attachment 422212

don’t really like it, but I like the effort.

 

[tenken00]

don’t really like it, but I like the effort.

That's all that matters!

Although it took me 30 secs of effort lol. Mantha-like.

 

[tycoonheart]

When was the last time our TDL acquisition started off with a bang like this?

 

[twabby]

When was the last time our TDL acquisition started off with a bang like this?

Shattenkirk was pretty good to start IIRC.

 

[Fallschirmyager]

I'll definitely watch more Detroit games now. I want to see Vrana with Larkin. Very curious to see how Jake responds to more minutes and more responsibility. I think he'll drive you nuts defensively but he's going to flourish offensively in an increased role.

And what he'll do seeing the oppositions checking line and #1 D pairing. This is why I don't think his numbers will increase dramatically.

 

[AlexBrovechkin8]

The Shattenkirk saga still drives me nuts. He and Schmidt would have been an outstanding third pair but Trotz gonna Trotz. Didn't we try playing him on his offhand too or am I making stuff up in my head?

 

[Carlzner]

Shattenkirk sucks

 

[Hivemind]

Shattenkirk sucks

 

[ALLCAPSALLTHETIME]

*Yuck* I just lost my appetite.