Former Washington Capitals goalie Olie Kolzig had some strong words on Wednesday about his ex-teammate Alexander Ovechkin’s work ethic, or lack thereof:

“For Alex, it’s a work ethic,” Kolzig said. “He just has to get back to being the way he was in his younger days and maybe not get wrapped up too much in the rock-star status that comes with being Alex Ovechkin.”

“ …Alex was getting away from playing the hard, no-nonsense, honest type of hockey, exuberant hockey that he displayed the first three years that he was in the league.”

Ouch. Of course, everyone knows now that statistically Kolzig is correct. You can compare his first 3 years with the next 4 right here on Hockey-Reference and see for yourself. The numbers don’t lie, his production has fallen as he has gotten older. But why have the numbers dropped when he should, by all means, be right in the middle of his prime hockey playing years? Well, what you might want to zone in on within Kolzig’s statements is the timing of it all:

“…the first three years…”

What happened after the first three years I wonder?  OH RIGHT!  Alex Ovechkin signed a 13 year extension in the middle of his 3rd season with the Washington Capitals for $124 million. He was just 22 years old then and here’s what he had to say at the time:

“I know it’s extra pressure, but I have to play the same,” he said. “If you think of pressure, it’s hard for you. I have to play the same way — play more, play better.”

Hmmm…he thought he could handle the pressure but, so far, the results of his play would say otherwise. He’s definitely not playing the same way he was, as Kolzig pointed out on Wednesday, and he’s certainly not playing better. Ovechkin also stated during the contract extension press conference:

“Hockey is my life,” he said, shrugging, “and money is money. … If you think about money, you stop playing hockey.”

I wonder if Ovechkin has forgotten his own advice? Seems like Kolzig thinks that he has.

There must have been a lot people skeptical about his maturity, being an instant superstar at age 20, since it seems that everyone was asking him how he would handle the gigantic payday. It’s entirely possible that after his huge payday, with all the partying and easy living, Ovechkin has just gotten soft.  Ted Leonsis, back in 2005, thought he could handle it all:

“My bet is the money won’t affect him,” Leonsis said. “He’ll play every shift like it’s the seventh game of the finals of the Stanley Cup, and that’s what we’ve come to love about him.”

Well, I think we can all say that prescient statement has not come true…yet.  There’s still time for Alex Ovechkin to find that hunger and intensity which he used to play every game with but with each passing season of losing without any financial penalty on his part…he might have little incentive to do so.

Hopefully Ovechkin will take Kolzig’s advice and play with the drive he had before the payday, if anything just to prove his doubters wrong…otherwise this Leonsis might live to regret this contract nearly as much as the $88 million deal he gave Jaromir Jagr.

It looks like Alexander Ovechkin will get onto the golf course early, yet again, this off-season as the Washington Capitals were swept in the 2nd round of the NHL Playoffs by the Tampa Bay Lightning. This marks the 2nd straight season where the Capitals were a #1 seed that could not make it past the first or second rounds of the playoffs. Despite what Ovie thinks, the Caps by no means dominated the Lightning in this series.

At times the Capitals played some very inspired hockey, most notably in my mind was the the 2nd period of Game 3 where they dominated the puck for the entire 20 minutes, but in general the Caps looked sloppy against the sharp play of the Lightning. Sure, maybe the Caps just ran into another blazing hot buzzsaw of a team (this is the Lightning’s 7th win in a row during the playoffs) just like when they got bounced by the Canadienes last year but I don’t know if anyone actually believes that this is the case.   The system and team that Tampa’s coach Guy Boucher and GM Steve Yzerman put together played right into the Captials’ main weakness, utter lack of discipline.

The Lightning could basically sit back and wait for the Capitals to make a mistake because everyone in the building knew that they would screw up somewhere and whenever it happened, the Lightning would strike (pardon the pun) and generally it turned out in their favor. The Caps can talk all they want about the lucky bounces that the Lightning got throughout the series but, to me, that is loser talk. Most successful people say that you make your own luck. Preparation, practice and most importantly execution make your luck. The Captials, despite having several days to prepare for this series, in hindsight were never prepared for this series.

The coaching staff didn’t adjust, despite ample time to come up with a game plan for the Lightning, the players couldn’t adapt to the circumstances and they regressed to the sloppy/over-aggressive play of the last few years (or just stopped playing whatsoever [see Backstrom, Nicholas or Semin, Alex]) and the team’s management and fans could only sit and watch as yet another season as a top seed gets wasted away.

As a lifelong Washington Capitals fan, being disappointed by this team is by no means a surprise. They always disappoint. Its what the Capitals do. Its happened one way or another every year that I have followed this team. Its par for the course. I feel at this point that if they ever do win the Stanley Cup I might just be disappointed that they finally did not disappoint me. I can’t start thinking that way though, I’ll just get let down again somehow.

Young Washington National, Bryce Harper, played in his first simulated game against real major leaguers yesterday afternoon and do you want to guess how he fared in his two at bats?  Well he struck out twice.  Disappointing?  Totally! Surprising?  Not in the least.

It just can’t be surprising if you’ve followed sports in this town for the last twenty years.  DC has been full of young athletes with promise that only serve to let us down over and over again.  We have had several high draft picks or young phenoms that have come into this town and failed, sometimes in spectacular fashion.  DC might actually be one of the worst cities in all of sports in terms of positively assisting in a young athlete’s growth.

Plus, he’s super young (big strike against him), he’s super confident (can he handle not having immediate success), and he’s super inexperienced (can he handle injuries, can he handle the life in the big city, can he handle his money). The odds really are stacked against this kid unless the stars align.

The stars rarely align in DC however. If history is our guide, Harper will be yet another huge disappointment. So let’s look at a brief history of the other highly touted disappointments DC has had, at least in recent memory:

Stephen Strasburg

Ok, so sure, its a little early to judge the whole career of this kid but c’mon, he blew out his arm in his first taste of the majors.  That is a huge disappointment.  Especially from a pitcher who can only be compared to the likes of Doc Gooden, who never took care of his body and in fact abused it to hell with drugs and partying but still managed to avoid Tommy John surgery his entire career.  This city named the day that Strasburg pitched “Strasmas!” for crying out loud. What a huge disappointment that in his FIRST YEAR he blew out his arm.

Sure he could recover from it and be as good or even better than what he was those first few starts he had for the Nationals.  On the other hand, he couldn’t.  Knowing DC superstar disappointment history…he probably won’t. As of right now, this whole city is disappointed that Livan Hernandez will be tossing out the first pitch on opening day instead of Strasburg.

Alexander Ovechkin

This guy was supposed to be a combination of Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux with a dash of pre-concussion Eric Lindros in there.  A big guy, unafraid to mix it up, who was agile, fast and an unstoppable scorer.  He was supposed to be the best. For a little while, there might’ve been an argument that he was the best, this year however, he isn’t even close.

With 24 goals in 63 games, Sidney Crosby is STILL ahead of him even though he’s been out with a concussion for what seems like half the year.

This isn’t even the real problem with Ovechkin however.  All of this season stats could just be a massive, season-long slump. A blip on the career of an incredible player.  Its way too early to tell.  The real problem with Ovechkin is that he has never won anything, anywhere.

Great players are supposed to elevate the talent around them…or at least win a championship at some point.  That Ovechkin hasn’t been able to do that yet, despite teams full of massive talent and promise, is INCREDIBLY disappointing. Read the rest of this entry

Yesterdaky, Uncle Teddy reached a deal with the estate of Abe Polin on a purchase price for the Verizon Center and the Washington Wizards.  Now, if only the Wizards can stockpile 7 first round picks in the next 3 years or 11 in the next 5 years, get lucky in the lottery with a #1 pick and use that pick to grab one of the greatest players in the game then Uncle Teddy will cement his place in the hearts of all Washingtonians as THE GREATEST OWNER CURRENTLY IN TOWN.

Ted Leonsis appears to be the owner in DC that fans want Dan Snyder and any of the Lerners to become, which I can kinda understand.  He seems to treat people well, doesn’t abuse the fact that he is massively wealthy too much, he actually talks to the fans (a novel concept), he hasn’t raised ticket prices too much (except this season, YIKES what a hike) in his ownership tenure and has even cut them once or twice…but do not forget he wasn’t always this way.  This guy was Dan Snyder Jr. with a violent streak (he did punch a fan once) when he first got the team, buying up aging veterans and constantly trying to compete the wrong way…then he got the sports equivalent of religion and his flock began to gather.

Somewhere after the disastrous 2002-03 playoff appearance, Leonsis discovered the NHL draft and using ancient scrolls that contained the blueprint of the Florida Marlins World Series titles (of all teams!) he sold off every single asset he had for future players and minor leaguers.  People loved getting rid of Jagr in this town, but I can’t say that anyone enjoyed watching the Capitals that 2003 season.  Poor Peter Bondra didn’t deserve to have his tenure here end like that nor should the best player on your team ever be named Robert Lang.

Nevertheless, from 2002-2006 the Washington Capitals had 11 first round picks.  ELEVEN!  Sure the team sucked balls from 2003-2006 but who cares now, right?  Who are those guys they drafted with those picks?  You might have heard of some of them like: Steve Eminger, Alexander Semin, Boyd Gordon, Eric Fehr, Alexander Ovechkin, Jeff Schultz, Mike Green, and Nicklas Backstrom.  Green, Backstrom, Semin and Ovechkin are the top 4 point scorers for the Capitals this season and Fehr isnt far behind at #9.  So with those accumulated picks and players and a whole lot of luck, he’s built a foundation of players that he could control on the cheap for quite awhile and contend for titles…and the fans were happy and decided to fill his church and wear red…lots of red.

That is the good news.

The bad news is, what happened with the Capitals will likely never happen again and especially not to the Washington Wizards.  God only created the Earth once as far as we know.  The NBA is a different game when it comes to team rebuilding, look at the Minnesota Timberwolves and ask them how rebuilding is going…and they traded away Kevin Garnett!  The Wizards have no assets to trade for picks anymore after their gutting this season.  There is no Alexander Ovechkin to come save the Wizards in the draft either, John Wall is not going to elevate this team to another level even if they get the #1 pick.

Just because Leonsis is now the owner, it doesn’t mean that the Wizards are going to suddenly be able to rebuild “the right way”.  There is so much luck in the draft it would be foolish to think the Wizards could duplicate the success of the Capitals even if they tried to follow that blueprint.  They also don’t have a ton of cash to throw around in free agency thanks to the $100 million albatross in Gilbert Arenas they have.  Rebuilding for Leonsis this time is going to be a lot longer than it was with the Capitals.  Its going to hurt…for awhile.

So, while it is nice to know that the Wizards and the Verizon Center are in good hands in that they have an owner that seems like he will spend the money to look after them the right way, I don’t understand the mindset that believes Ted Leonsis will suddenly cure the Wizards of sucking.

They’ve sucked for over 30 years people…they are going to keep sucking.   If you’re a Wizards fan, the team is essentially the girl you love that will break your heart, tease you just enough to lure you back in to give her just ONE MORE CHANCE, only to have your heart broken in a new and spectacularly different way before she lures you in again and starts the cycle anew…on a yearly basis.  As much as people love him…Uncle Teddy ain’t gonna change that anytime soon.