Man I didn’t expect to wake up and see maybe one of the best defensemen in Capitals history and a Caps legend get traded, but here we are.
Before we get into the details let me state that trading a legend and leader of this franchise at 1am in the morning while he is sleeping is pretty disrespectful in my opinion.
Johnny alternate captain since 2019 has been a cornerstone to this franchise for 17 seasons and holds many of the franchise records as a defensemen, not to mention helped get us a Stanley Cup and we trade him when everyone is asleep, pretty lame.
Now yes it sucks we are letting go of a legend, but I wanted to think big picture instead of being annoyed so here we go. So Carlson is a free agent at the end of the season and I doubt we would resign him unless it was for really cheap on a one year deal. So instead of getting zero for him we were able to get a 2026 1st round pick and a 2027 3rd pick for Johnny. Not a bad haul for an old defensemen.
The conditions on the first-round pick that the Capitals negotiated are that if the Ducks make the playoffs this season, the Capitals will get their 2026 selection. If the Ducks fail to qualify for the postseason, they have the option to retain their 2026 pick and instead send their 2027 first-round pick to the Caps.
The Caps are definitely stacking draft capital for the future which I like so lets see if some of these picks pan out or are used in future trades for other season playoff pushes.
Regardless I still believe we did Johnny dirty, love the guy ever since his world juniors performance. Hope he gets a playoff run with the Ducks.