Caps sign five UFA's

The Washington Capitals have signed 5 players so far in the "silly season" as some have labelled it. The Caps entered the off-season with a few glaring holes, the 2nd line center Martin Hanzal moved on from the club as well as the starting goalie who had spent his first three seasons in the EHE with Washington, Roberto Luongo. Also the defense was looking rather thin with just Aaron Ekblad and Justin Faulk left on the roster as top 4 options.

After day two word came out that two players had signed pro contracts with the club. The first is defensive specialist center Thomas Plekanec to a 2 year contract worth $4,725,000 per season. He should fit into coach Ken Hitchcock's system perfectly. The second was defensive defenceman Alexei Emelin to a 1 year contract worth $4,000,000. "These are definately my types of players here." quipped coach Hitchcock. "I like the players down the middle to be defensively responsible."

The next announcement was the biggest signing for the team so far in their three year history. The Caps brought in defenceman Jay Bouwmeester to a 4 year deal worth $7,350,000 per year. "Jay Bo has been a personal favorite of mine for quite some time now." Said GM Mitchell at the press conference. "We're very excited to bring in a top pairing defenceman that cost us no assets other than the cap space which we had in spades."

Yesterday's press release showed two more pieces added to the Capitals pro roster. Back-up goalie Curtis McElhinney joins the team on a 1 year deal worth $3,000,000 and center/right winger Torrey Mitchell joins the club with a 1 year deal worth $3,550,000. TSN caught up with Torrey Mitchell when the news broke for an interview and this is what he had to say: "No, I am not related to the GM." So there you go, this wasn't a bone thrown to a family member.

The GM has said they aren't done yet with their UFA signings, we expect a few two-way deals might be reached for some farm help in the coming days.

Here is now how the depth chart looks:

Ondrej Palat - Anze Kopitar - Jonathan Marchessault

Anders Lee - Sean Couturier - Loui Eriksson

Tobias Rieder - Thomas Plekanec - Torrey Mitchell

Benoit Pouliot - Brian Boyle - Alexander Burmistrov

Extras/Camp battles:

Matt Nieto / J.T. Compher

Jay Bouwmeester - Justin Faulk

Alexei Emelin - Aaron Ekblad

Zbynek Michalek - Dan Girardi

Extras/Camp battles:

Ian McCoshen / Nick Jensen

Andrei Vasilevskiy

Curtis McElhinney

The rest of the Metro division got a lot better, so keeping up with those teams is a must. The Capitals are letting it all ride on a young unproven goalie, that looks like it could be the biggest wild card for the team.