General Manager George McPhee appeared on the PreCap Podcast with Mike Vogel this afternoon. He shared a number of notable assessments related to players in the Capitals’ development pipeline.
- With respect to collegiate upperclassmen such as Minnesota State’s Travis Morin and Wisconsin’s Andrew Joudrey, seniors both, as well as St. Cloud junior Andrew Gordon, the organization’s amateur scouts this week came to determinations for each of them for this spring. “Some” will be offered pro contracts and, if signed, join the Hershey Bears. It’s understandable at this point that McPhee wouldn’t identify specific individuals, as college hockey is just this week entering its postseason.
- Acadie Bathurst center and Caps’ ‘06 draftee Mathieu Perreault receives “the highest possible” score on a player’s hockey sense. Wow.
- Whereas previous summers’ Rookie Camps have been more orientation than evaluative in nature, the Caps are reconceptualizing it this year, and seem inclined to have it lengthened and lead into autumn’s full training camp. With two sheets of ice available at the new Kettler Capitals Iceplex, the team does hope to include a day or evening matching rookies with another NHL club. Vogel suggested potentially devising a Traverse City-style, four-team tournament camp, and McPhee seemed open to the idea.
- ‘06 draftee Oskar Osala, who dominated at the most recent World Juniors, has continued to impress the Caps with his play in 2007 with Mississauga.
- ‘05 draftee Viktor Dovgan, skating this season with South Carolina in the East Coast League, has enjoyed an “outstanding” season and is poised to join Hershey next season. He was assigned to South Carolina because of his age — the Caps do not like having teenagers in the American League, Chris Bourque being the rare exception.
- Queried on the access the team accorded Comcast at last summer’s NHL Entry Draft, and perhaps according to the team’s bloggers privileged access this summer, McPhee noted the broadcast outlet’s judicious use of footage but hinted that he was open to the idea of having bloggers participate in a comparable capacity. Free beer (maybe) for George!
Listen to the PreCap Podcast with GMGM here:
4 Comments
From the looks of things it seems are next round of prospects are going to be better than the current group in Hershey. The future looks bright.
I particularly enjoyed GMGM’s discussion of the value of first round draft picks — the fact that the earlier UFA age means that teams have the rights to players for 4-6 pro years instead of 10 years as in the past. Those picks are still important, and a good way to get skill on a budget, but that may explain why so many first-rounders changed hands this trade deadline.
5′9, 155 . . . makes St. Louis seem almost Schwartzenegger-like. Give the kid a milk shake.
Even though a team has a less of a window of exclusing rights with a prospect I do not think that it really lessons the need to have a continual supply of young/cheap talent…especially as we see many of the top teams riding so close to the cap.
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