The Caps are in first place in the NHL's ultra-lame Southeast Division (hard to top the historic vitriol of a Florida Panthers/Carolina Hurricanes bout, eh?) by eight points over Carolina. Break out the beers! Its playoff time!
But seriously, folks, its mid-December and I say the Caps are just waiting for the playoffs to start. Does that sound over-confident? Maybe it is, but if so, show me the team in the Caps' division who can beat them? [...3 hours passes...] My point! And with the weirdness of the NHL's playoff seeding system guaranteeing them at least the third seed in the conference and (minimally) home ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs almost regardless of how bad they suck from here on out, well... its hard not to look past the next four months.
As far as I'm concerned, the only questions this team needs to answer are, will they be healthy come playoff time, and who will their goalie be... ah-ha! There's the rub. The Caps spent about $9 million (that's $429 million Canadian*) on former Vezina winner Jose Theodore to solve their goal tending, uh, issue this past off season. Theodore, who is injured, is currently helping his team more than he has all season long by avoiding the ice at all costs. In short, Theodore's performance looks like $9 million down the shitter. Fortunately for the Caps, perennial backup Brent Johnson has stepped up and played awesomely** (2.46 GAA and a save percentage of .920 - even I know thems damn good numbers).
There's no certainty that Johnson will keep this up. He might, but he never has before, and in baseball we call it a hot streak while acknowledging that the player is likely to return to his career norms.
Still, if Johnson keeps doing what he's been doing this Caps team will be tough to beat. If not, which is the more likely scenario, well, it doesn't even matter. They're just going to coast into the playoffs as the number three seed anyway.
Its good to be in the Southeast Division, eh? See you bitches in April!
*Now, thanks to the magic of deflation, Canadian-Money-Is-Worthless jokes are back! Yay!
**Is "awesomely" a word?
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