\u201cOf course, [Fedorov] deserves it,\u201d Ovechkin said to RIA Novosti<\/a>, as translated by Google Translate. \u201cBut I don\u2019t work for Detroit, so I can\u2019t say anything. As for the idea of \u200b\u200bmy number being retired by the Capitals, call Washington and find out about it.\u201d<\/p>\n Ovechkin\u2019s future has been a major topic of discussion as he heads into the final year of his contract with the Washington Capitals. While he would prefer not to talk about the end of his NHL career just yet<\/a>, that won\u2019t stop speculation about how the Caps could handle honoring the club\u2019s best player when he does hang up his skates.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a virtual guarantee that no one else will ever wear the number 8 for the Capitals once he retires. Ovechkin could step away from the game tomorrow and leave DC as the team\u2019s franchise leader in goals, points, power-play goals, even-strength goals, game-winning goals, playoff goals, shots, and hat tricks. He\u2019s also the only captain of the Caps to have led the franchise to a Stanley Cup championship.<\/p>\n When asked earlier in the month about a future ceremony for Ovechkin, Fedorov told RIA Novosti<\/a> that you don\u2019t need to be a fortune teller to predict what the Capitals will do.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not a secret that Alexander Ovechkin\u2019s \u2018eight\u2019 will also be taken out of circulation in the future,\u201d Fedorov said<\/a>. \u201cIf we talk about current (Russian) players (who could have their jersey retired), then Sasha Ovechkin, Zhenya Malkin, Nikita Kucherov and his Tampa teammate Andrei Vasilevsky have turned the entire league upside down and changed the consciousness of hockey fans. They play at such a high level consistently, and that\u2019s not easy!\u201d<\/p>\n The Capitals will likely enshrine Ovechkin permanently in more ways than just a jersey retirement, as the details of ongoing renovations of Capital One Arena revealed further plans to honor him and other franchise legends. In renderings provided by Monumental Sports & Entertainment last year<\/a>, arena redesigns included a statue of Ovechkin holding the Cup outside one of the entrances.<\/p>\n The Capitals have not retired a number since 2008, when Mike Gartner\u2019s number 11 was taken out of circulation. Additional recognition of other players sounds likely to come once the arena renovations are complete in 2027.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we\u2019re planning on some interesting things as a way to pay homage to players from all of our teams,\u201d Capitals owner Ted Leonsis said last year<\/a>. \u201cStatues, walls of honor, rings of honor \u2013 we now have the opportunity to do some advanced planning and take advantage of that. And, we have great players \u2013 the Peter Bondras, the Olie Kolzigs. There\u2019s some really, really fantastic players that we have to pay recognition to.\u201d<\/p>\n Ovechkin will head into his 21st season with the Capitals later this fall. He has stated that his only goals<\/a> for the year are to \u201cplay well and try to win the Stanley Cup,\u201d adding that he has no desire to talk about his future in the NHL until after the season is complete<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sergei Fedorov will officially become the third Russian hockey player to have his jersey retired by an NHL…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":123260,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-123259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/123260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Alex](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/alex-ovechkin-statue-capital-one-arena-rendering2.jpg\")
\ud83d\udcf8: Monumental Sports & Entertainment rendering of Capital One Arena<\/p>\n