{"id":734228,"date":"2026-06-30T05:10:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T05:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/734228\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T05:10:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T05:10:12","slug":"charlie-lindgren-expected-to-remain-with-capitals-despite-trade-speculation-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/734228\/","title":{"rendered":"Charlie Lindgren expected to remain with Capitals despite trade speculation (report)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Washington Capitals<\/a> appear ready to begin the 2026-27 season with the same goaltending tandem from the past two campaigns: Logan Thompson<\/a> and Charlie Lindgren<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Sportsnet\u2019s Elliotte Friedman revealed during the latest episode of the 32 Thoughts podcast<\/a> that, despite Lindgren garnering some trade speculation around the NHL, the Capitals seem set to keep the veteran backstop. Lindgren, 32, made 21 appearances for the Caps this past year, serving as Thompson\u2019s backup.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d also heard Charlie Lindgren\u2019s name out there a little bit, but I don\u2019t think that\u2019s happening,\u201d Friedman said<\/a>. \u201cI think that they realize they have a good team there with Lindgren and Thompson, and I think they\u2019re keeping him.\u201d<\/p>\n

After an impressive 2023-24 season in which Lindgren nearly single-handedly dragged the Capitals into the playoffs, he has struggled to replicate that form over the past two seasons. In 60 games since the beginning of the 2024-25 campaign, Lindgren is 29-22-6 with a 3.01 goals-against average, a .890 save percentage, and two shutouts. According to MoneyPuck<\/a>, he has also allowed 6.3 more goals than expected in those games.<\/p>\n

The Capitals signed Lindgren to a three-year, $9 million contract extension in March of 2025, meaning he is on their books with a $3 million cap hit through the 2027-28 season. With the emergence of Logan Thompson as one of the NHL\u2019s top goalies, the Capitals could have thought to move Lindgren to free up some salary cap space and allow a younger, cheaper player like Clay Stevenson<\/a> to take on the now much smaller role behind Thompson on the team\u2019s depth chart.<\/p>\n

Stevenson, 27, was very strong in four games for the Capitals this past season, going 3-1-0 with a 2.00 goals-against average and a .921 save percentage. The Hershey Bears stalwart is signed through next year, but will have to be risked on waivers again if the Caps want to send him down to the AHL in the fall. There were rumors last year that other teams were circling, interested in claiming Stevenson<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Capitals also did not tender a qualifying offer to goalie Garin Bjorklund<\/a> on Monday, making him an unrestricted free agent<\/a>. Bjorklund was the de facto number-four goaltender in the organization last season, serving as Stevenson\u2019s backup at the NHL level<\/a> when Thompson and Lindgren were unavailable at the same time.<\/p>\n

Given the move to make Bjorklund a free agent, the Capitals are left with just Thompson, Lindgren, Stevenson, and Mitch Gibson as goalies with NHL deals for next year.<\/p>\n

Recent goalie draft picks, Antoine Keller<\/a> and Nicholas Kempf, will be at development camp later this week<\/a>. Kempf is expected back at Notre Dame in the NCAA for the 2026-27 campaign, but Keller, who played four games for the ECHL\u2019s South Carolina Stingrays before heading back to Europe last season, could get another shot in North America.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Washington Capitals appear ready to begin the 2026-27 season with the same goaltending tandem from the past…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":734229,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-734228","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\/734228","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=734228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/734228\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/734229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=734228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=734228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=734228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}