Friday, July 04, 2008

Happy 4th Of July

Happy Birthday, big ol' USA. Since I doubt the Caps will sign anyone today, being a holiday and all, I am going to take a nice weekend off. Get some BBQ, light some illegal fireworks and just enjoy a nice long weekend.

Just some loose ends to tie up.

Per Tarik, GM George McPhee maybe done signing free agents, now is the time to lock up some of the those RFA's. Sounds like GMGM is pretty confident that Brooks Laich will be back even though his agent has confessed that Laich has been contacted by other teams about possible offers. What ever the market might give him the Caps will match.

Deals are also in the works to get Sergei Fedorov back, but like I surmised, the Caps and Fedorov are going to wait until the dust settles and comtemplate each others' options. Looks like Fedorov might wait until McPhee has the team he wants under contract and then start negotiating. Which makes sense.

Matt Cooke looks like he will move on. While he served his purpose here in DC, it was down to either Matt Bradley or Cooke. Bradley resigned. End of story.

You might have noticed that Capitals' first round draft pick is not on the development roster. Anton Gustafsson will not be here in July due to his nagging injuries. At first the Caps thought they could at least get him in and work a rehab program for him. At least he would be able meet some of the other players in development. But I think doctors put the kabosh on that and told Gus II to stay home. He was going to stay there for next season anyway.

Shaone Morrisonn's status is still in the air, but it's likely he will be resigned. He found some chemistry with Mike Green last season, which is a big reason the Caps would want him to stay. But with so many good defensemen now in the Caps' system, it going to make playing for jobs quite the battle.

Also some good news. The Rangers weren't going to wait around for Jaromir Jagr and signed Markus Naslund instead. I pretty much think that puts the Caps in the free and clear of any contractual monies obligated to the Rangers and Jagr. It truely is Independence Day!

That's all for now. Happy 4th

1 comment:

Mark Bonatucci said...

The Caps were free of any obligations re: Jagr no matter what he did after this past season. That said, let the big baby finish his career in Russia, that way the hockey fans there can also understand what a waste of talent he is too.