23 May, 2012

Category Archives: Matt Bradley

Say Hello to Sixty Minutes of Quality Road Hockey

28 October, 2010

If you Tivo-ed last night’s 3-0 whitewashing of the Hurricanes in their home opener, hold onto it for a while. How elusive have three quality periods, stitched together in a single evening, proven for this hockey club since the start of last season? It wasn’t a game of precision offensive flow and flair — in [...]

Also filed in Carolina Hurricanes, Michal Neuvirth, Mike Green, National Hockey League, Nicklas Backstrom, Southeast Division, Washington Capitals | Comments (3)

The Caps’ Bradley: “This Year Is Kind of Do or Die”

14 September, 2010

Capitals forward Matt Bradley harbors no illusions about the pressures facing the Caps this season to go deeper in the playoffs after a disappointing few years of early postseason exits.

“I think this year is kind of do or die,” Bradley said at Kettler Monday. “We have to make something happen.”

Also filed in NHL, Washington Capitals | Comments (2)

Enforcement Endorsement

9 September, 2010

Earlier in the offseason, when the Caps acquired D.J. King from St. Louis, I offered some pretty piercing commentary on the necessity of that move. Specifically, I wrote: I thought about [Bradley's] health and welfare looking ahead, and what this trade most especially meant for that. Last season Bradley, a middleweight, was asked by the [...]

Also filed in D. J. King, Washington Capitals, Washington Post | Comments (5)

That Beautiful Ex-Girlfriend, Toughness, Suddenly Back in Our Lives, Let’s Not Dump Her Ever Again

29 July, 2010

The era of peacenik puck in D.C. has ended. Mercifully. And emphatically. Good riddance. May it never return. Here’s its tally sheet: zero Cups won, one playoff series won (barely), zero opponents intimidated. (Ever.) Now, we’ll try something new, which is actually something old, which is actually something quite intrinsic to hockey. And which is [...]

Also filed in Bruce Boudreau, D. J. King, Dale Hunter, Front Office, Morning cup-a-joe, National Hockey League, Washington Capitals | Comments (12)

Chicago: Case Study in Poor Cap Management

7 July, 2010

The NHL Awards have passed us by, the Stanley Cup has been hoisted by the Chicago Blackhawks and free agency is in full swing. Despite all the time that has passed, Washington Capitals fans are still left yearning from the far too early first round exit from this year’s playoffs. They are left thinking to themselves that could have been us, we do have a lot of the same qualities as the Blackhawks and yet we didn’t go all the way. After what the Hawks have had to do in the last few weeks, do Caps fans really wish they were in the same boat as Chicago though?

Also filed in Alexander Semin, Chicago Blackhawks, Front Office, Mike Green, National Hockey League, NHL, NHL Salary Cap, NHL Trades, Washington Capitals | Comments (39)

Suddenly, It’s a Short Series Again

22 April, 2010

We’ll get to Boyd Gordon’s remarkable shorthanded, late second period heroics in a minute. But first, you can see the way this whole thing in the East is setting up, can’t you? The Caps are all but certain to move on, vanquishing the 8th seed and drawing next the 7th — Philly — in a [...]

Also filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Boyd Gordon, Jason Chimera, Montreal Canadiens, Morning cup-a-joe, National Hockey League, NHL playoffs, Semyon Varlamov, Washington Capitals | Comments (29)

Bradley Bandwagon Or Laing Love Train?

11 February, 2010

On Tuesday, the Caps’ PR man Nate Ewell posted the following on Twitter:
Who’s a bigger cult hero: Laing or Bradley? @dcsportsbog may lure some back to Lainger’s camp http://bit.ly/aWvr0I
The link is an article that the Post’s Dan Steinberg wrote about Quintin Laing and his thoughts on the win streak. However, most of the article was filled with praise for Laing, from his coach and teammates. How could you not like a guy like this?

Also filed in Brooks Laich, Dan Steinberg, Nate Ewell, Washington Capitals | Comments (5)

The State of the Capitals’ Union, January 2010

27 January, 2010

Red Army, fellow Washington puckheads, late January again finds the Washington Capitals in an enviable competitive position: in first place — by a Grand Canyon chasm — in the Southeast division, but also first overall in the Eastern conference. And of late, establishing some separation from the rest of the East. The Capitals’ brand of [...]

Also filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, American Hockey League, Brendan Morrison, Bruce Boudreau, Chris Clark, Eastern Conference, Eric Fehr, Hershey Bears, Jeff Schultz, John Carlson, Jose Theodore, Karl Alzner, Mathieu Perreault, Michal Neuvirth, National Hockey League, NHL playoffs, Nicklas Backstrom, Prospects, Semyon Varlamov, Sergei Fedorov, Ted Leonsis, Tomas Fleischmann, Washington Capitals | Comments (9)

Good Teams Win Lucky When They’re Not Good

20 January, 2010

In the early 1980s, as the Washington Capitals matured from doormat to strong Patrick division challenger to the dynastic Islanders, it wasn’t uncommon for them to skate in dominant fashion against established and elite teams and come up short. I thought about those Capitals’ teams on Tuesday night, as the 2010 Capitals, the East’s elite, [...]

Also filed in detroit red wings, Hockey Towns, Jose Theodore, Mike Green, Morning cup-a-joe, National Hockey League, Washington Capitals | Comments (4)

Getting Defensive About the Defense

8 January, 2010

We unleashed our undergraduate reporters, Andrew Tomlinson and Alexander Perlmutter, on the Caps-Sens’ tilt last night, and they managed to chat up Flash and a few other Caps in the post-game, and listen in on Bruce Boudreau’s postgame thoughts. This morning they offer their take on a strong Caps’ performance Thursday night. One of the [...]

Also filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Bruce Boudreau, John Carlson, Jose Theodore, Marcus Johansson, Morning cup-a-joe, National Hockey League, Ottawa Senators, Tomas Fleischmann, Washington Capitals | Comments (0)

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