The Washington Capitals traded defenseman Joel Edmundson to the Toronto Maple Leafs for the Chicago Blackhawks’ 2024 third-round pick and a 2025 fifth-round pick on Thursday. The 30-year-old can become an unrestricted free agent on July 1.
Washington acquired Edmundson from the Montreal Canadiens on July 1 of last year for third- and seventh-round picks. Montreal retained 50% ($1.75 million) of his $3.5 million cap hit for this season and Washington retained 50% ($875,000) of his remaining cap hit in this deal.
While averaging 16:26 per game (sixth among Washington defensemen), including 1:31 shorthanded (fifth), Edmundson recorded a goal, six points, a -5 rating, 47.65% five-on-five Corsi-for percentage, 46.47% five-on-five expected goals-for percentage, and 48.38% five-on-five scoring chances-for percentage in 44 games this season. He missed the first 14 due to a fractured hand.
Here’s Edmundson’s microstat card from this season, quite consistent with last year’s. The higher-than-expected offensive impact is attributable to some okay puck-moving ability. #LeafsForever pic.twitter.com/SyC3eqp2dE
— JFresh (@JFreshHockey) March 7, 2024
In 521 career NHL games with Washington, Montreal, the Carolina Hurricanes, and St. Louis Blues, Edmundson has 29 goals and 110 points.
In 75 career postseason outings, he has earned six goals, 21 points, and a +7 rating. Edmundson won the Stanley Cup with St. Louis in 2019 and made the Stanley Cup Final with Montreal in 2021.
Washington continues to sell after trading left-wing Anthony Mantha to the Vegas Golden Knights for 2024 second- and 2026 fourth-round picks on Tuesday.
Washington’s 5-2 loss to the Arizona Coyotes on Sunday pushed them seven points back of the Tampa Bay Lightning (who they have three games in hand on) for the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference and Philadelphia Flyers (three) for third place in Metropolitan Division. They collected points in six of their previous eight (4-2-2), including a five-game point-streak (4-0-1) where they defeated Tampa Bay, the New Jersey Devils, and Philadelphia (all teams they are fighting for positioning with) before Sunday’s setback.
The NHL Trade Deadline is Friday at 3 PM ET. Left-wing Max Pacioretty, goaltender Charlie Lindgren, left-wing Nicolas Aube-Kubel, right-wing Beck Malenstyn, and defenseman Nick Jensen have all garnered interest on the trade market. Pacioretty and Aube-Kubel can also become unrestricted free agents after this season.
Washington visits the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday night (7 PM ET, Monumental Sports Network in-market, ESPN+ out-of-market) before the deadline.
By Harrison Brown
Draft picks are good. But I want to do more with them than just read NovaCaps evaluation reports about them. I want them to be used, trained, and evaluated in the Caps pipeline. I want to see and cheer their contributions in the ECHL, AHL, and NHL — for our teams. I want to see the cream rise to the top and then be rewarded – by us. Drafting players, spending time developing them, and then ignoring them does us no good. We might as well just give the players away if we aren’t going to make good use of those picks.
What a concept. I wanted them to be terrible picks, not trained, and then ignore them until you made me see the light. Is my face red.
What? Unless your name is Lavi or you are part of the Caps vets-are-the-only-way-to-go brain trust, why would your face be red?
Who is sick? I couldn’t make it out
Kemper
thanks. since they recalled Hunter thought it probably was a goalie.
Oh really? Didn’t hear about Hunter yet.
An interesting Stage is Set:
Caps trade away several key players, probably more on the way. PIT hasn’t sold off anybody. Very much a Season-pivotal game tonight. It’s a tense time … We’re watching closely! Will the Caps “mail it in,” pout and play a wimpy game, get “schooled” like they did in Detroit — or do something positive?
Con permiso, Capitan Carbery? The hall is rented, the orchestra engaged. It’s now time to see if you can dance!
Every potential trade list I read this past month has had at least one Pit on it, several had more than one. Interesting that as of yet they have not made any trades. Speculation had cooled down on Sullivan but is now heating up again. Could add interesting dynamic to tonight’s game on both sides.
PD, you have said I a few times. What does POHO stand for? Since you associate it with GMac, I am sure it is very complimentary. LOL!
President of Hockey Operations, must be))
President of Hockey Operations
Much fanfare when Ed came aboard, quite a significant amount paid, but the output has been underwhelming, imo. And we get some measly 3rd and 5th round draft picks at the end of it all. Much ado – and nothing.
Other than Ted’s money, which I don’t care about at all, they got back more than they gave up for Edmundson. The 3rd rounder they got is going to be one of the top two in the round, vs. what they gave up which will be lower depending on where the Caps finish. And the 5th next year they got is marginally better than the 7th in any year. So overall this isn’t too bad.
This is true. But still little. I am referring mostly to his play, when I say “output”. Not the guard dog, sandpaper man, etc. that they advertised him to be. Lots of costly giveaways and numerous positional errors throughout the year. Little in the way of offense (although this was not expected, anyway).
He was brought in to be a physical presence which he was. Nebulous descriptions of lots of giveaways, positional errors with no examples. I could say he had very few giveaways and played almost flawless positional hockey and get just as credible since I can’t name a particular example either.
He is definitely more physical than most other Caps Ds, but not quite the monster in front of the net and in the corners that he was advertised to be when he was brought in. Remember plenty of times he failed to clear the crease or shove someone off the puck. Plenty of times he lost his man and the Caps got scored on. Much like the other D, maybe a bit more stingy.
Lots of times he would fail to clear and it ends up in the back of our net. Again, didn’t stand out from the rest of the D – in either direction.
Giveaways are easier to track, although even the NHL doesn’t count them all, from practice. Quite a task to point out specific breakdowns or great plays, you know) But not impossible, if you put the time in 😉
P.S. Caps are failing to clear the crease now against the Pens without Ed… Gotta do a better job with that, or else…
I don’t remember the fanfare you speak of, but we got back more than we gave up. GMBM wins!
This is another good trade for Mac in terms of rebuilding . Got the 3rd back it took to acquire him plus turned a 7th into a 5th and we got solid play out of the guy for half a season when he was healthy.
I love what Mac is doing , now all he got to do is keep adding to the cupboard.
I would have to think NAK ,Dowd ,Max are all gone ESPECIALLY if they lose tonight against Shittsburgh.
If he could get a 1st for Charlie and get out of Jensens contract( even though he been solid lately)Or Darcys somehow that’d be icing on the cake for me
(1)What are everybody’s expectations for Dowd’s return a 1st plus right ? One of the best in the business at what he does and is signed cheap through next season.
(2)Same thing for Charlie ?? 1st plus some sense he’s having good year and signed cheaply next season as well
Why in the world would you want to trade Charlie? He’s by far our best goalie. Send Kuemper packing and bring up Sheppard and we are set for the future. Chuck is not where we need to be looking.
We are not a playoff team or if we some how do make it we are not going far.
Charlie is having a career year at 30 years old , has one more cheap year left on deal after this year . YOU SELL HIGH
Charlie is not part of the long term future , you have a potential GEM in Stevenson waiting in the wings who just turned 25 and is ready to go . Time to figure out if he can be long term #1 and is signed even cheaper than Lindgren for the next 3 years compared to 1.
You also have Shepard who should get a look as a #2 as well and you have Gibson coming up the pipe along with a couple others.
Teams like Colorado, Carolina, Toronto could use a goalie for playoffs and could offer nice package.
If you are going to rebuild the right way it starts with smart business decisions.
I know I am a little slow. But I thought last summer we gave up a third and a seventh to acquire a 30-year-old defenseman. Nine months later, we are trading said defenseman (who missed time with us because of injury) for a third and a fifth. I agree, GMBM certainly did not lose, on this transaction, IMO