Washington Capitals general manager Chris Patrick met with the media on Friday afternoon and discussed a wide variety of topics, perhaps most notably his plans for the team at this year\u2019s trade deadline.<\/p>\n
With the Capitals presently on the outside of the Eastern Conference playoff picture, the second-year GM is heading into a much different situation with his team than he did last year. The Caps were the cream of the crop in the East at this stage of the 2024-25 season and just looking to tinker with their roster ahead of the postseason. The only addition they made was acquiring winger Anthony Beauvillier from the Pittsburgh Penguins.<\/p>\n
This season, Patrick seems prepared to make a bigger splash and has identified what he believes to be the Capitals\u2019 biggest need ahead of their push back into playoff contention in the final three months of the 2025-26 regular season.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, definitely actively pursuing an addition,\u201d Patrick said. \u201cWith as many teams in the mix right now playoff-wise as there are, I think teams are very much trying to figure out their timing and what they need to do and when they want to do it, and then how aggressive they get or do they stand pat. For us, we view our biggest need as a higher-end skilled winger, and those aren\u2019t always available at the deadline. We\u2019re gonna keep trying to pursue those guys if they\u2019re out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
While admitting that the player the Capitals seek is more \u201chigher-end,\u201d Patrick did warn that the club will still be unwilling to part with some of their top, most-coveted prospects. His declaration likely makes names like Cole Hutson, Ilya Protas, and Andrew Cristall unavailable to the prying eyes around the NHL.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve said this in the past, it\u2019s not necessarily harder for us, but we have a group of prospects that we really like that a lot of teams really like,\u201d Patrick said. \u201cIt gets to the point of if we can get a team to move off the top of our prospect list, then maybe there\u2019s something to be done. But we\u2019re not gonna trade away some of our top guys that we think are gonna be a huge part of the team the next 10 years for something that we don\u2019t think is going to have the impact we need it to have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another primary obstacle for Patrick and his staff is the tightness of the playoff races in both conferences. With so many teams still figuring to think of themselves in contention for a spot in the postseason, there aren\u2019t too many raising their hands as sellers this year.<\/p>\n
The New York Rangers made headlines earlier on Friday when their general manager, Chris Drury, announced that the team would enter a \u201cretooling\u201d period<\/a>, signalling that they will likely be one of the few selling teams. According to the New York Post\u2019s Mollie Walker<\/a>, as part of that process, Drury reportedly informed star winger Artemi Panarin that the team would not be seeking extension talks with him and instead will work with him to try and find a trade partner.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, I mean, it definitely helps to know there\u2019s potentially a seller there,\u201d Patrick said. \u201cI think a couple teams have indicated that they\u2019re more willing to be a seller than a buyer right now, so that definitely helps. But again, the prices only go up the longer you wait, so I think most of them will probably just take their time to aggregate offers and then try to get the best one possible. And, in a team like that, there\u2019s probably some players with trade protection, so it takes a little bit longer to work through deals sometimes.<\/p>\n Panarin, who holds a full no-movement clause in his contract, fits the exact profile Patrick described the Capitals as needing. The Caps were also recently floated by leading hockey insider Elliotte Friedman as a potential trade suitor for the veteran winger<\/a>.<\/p>\n In the past, Patrick has been wary of committing to adding players who could turn out to be strictly rentals for the rest of the season. He has also been committed to a youth movement with the Capitals after the team\u2019s more aging stars like Nicklas Backstrom, TJ Oshie, and Evgeny Kuznetsov departed for other ventures. Panarin, 34, would represent both a possible rental and an older addition, which Patrick didn\u2019t seem too against this time around.<\/p>\n \u201cI hope we can do something that helps us in the short term for this team getting into the playoffs again, and for [Alex Ovechkin] to have another run of the playoffs,\u201d Patrick said. \u201cIt also helps long-term, for whenever he\u2019s not on the team.<\/p>\n \u201cI think if you look at some of our history, like even guys that looked like rentals when we acquired them, a lot of times we\u2019ll end up signing them to deals after. I think that\u2019s a situation we look at too. It might look like a rental-type deal, but maybe we get the guy to sign on for an extension after we get him here.\u201d<\/p>\n The Capitals have also reportedly held interest in other forwards over the past few months, like Brayden Schenn<\/a>, Phillip Danault<\/a>, and Nikolaj Ehlers<\/a>. The profiles of those players could better align with what the team is pursuing.<\/p>\n