My new pal 😄 Ted Leonsis does the hockey math on the re-acquisition of Richard Zednik.

So, if my math is correct, we will have Zubrus on our first line, Zednik on our second line and Gordon (who will most likely play for the Caps and Hershey next season) in exchange for Jan Bulis, Trevor Linden and a second and a third round pick.  That is a pretty decent set of deals.

Actually, Ted’s math isn’t quite right. We got Linden as a part of the original Zednik trade, then traded him for the 1st round pick we used on Gordon. And of course, we started with Zednik, so that’s a wash. So the actual math goes Zubrus and Gordon for Bulis, a 2nd round pick (not sure who the Canucks got with that pick) and a 3rd round pick in next years draft. On paper, Bulis and Zubrus are close to a wash – Bulis had 20 goals and 40 points last season, Zubrus has 23 goals and 57 points. So that breaks the trade down to a 1st round pick (i.e. Gordon) for a 2nd and a 3rd. Not bad, but not mind blowing either.

That being said, it’s nice to have Zed Head back in a Caps jersey. Hockey is played on ice, not paper. I’d rather have Zubrus and Zednick than Bulis and Linden any day.

Yesterday, the Dallas Stars signed the Capitals captain Jeff Halpern to a four year contract worth around $2 million a year. My mom (even more rabid a Caps fan than I am if you can believe it) thought this was a mistake, but I’m not so sure. As reported by the Washington Post, the Caps are stocked w/ checking-line forwards. They apparently offered Halpern $1.5 million a year for two years. Sure, Halpern is a fan favorite – he grew up a Caps fan in Maryland – but $8 million seems like a lot to tie up in a checking forward / face-off specialist.

In the “old” NHL, you often saw teams throw crazy money (typically the same teams every year) at marginal players, hoping they would be the last puzzle piece to put them over the top and help them win the cup. Now with the salary cap, I think it’s going to shift from dollars to contract length – plus all teams will have a chance to be involved, not just the same five teams year after year. Players want longer contracts and teams want shorter contracts (go figure). A team in the Stars’ position – Dallas won their division last year but were bounced from the playoffs by the Avalanche – is more willing to tie up long term money for short term gain than a team that’s rebuilding as the Caps are.

So while I’m sad to see Halpern go, I think it’s a good move in the long term for the Caps. As much as I’d like the Caps to be competitive next year, I’ll believe it when I see it.

By coincidence when I was in DC last spring, I got an email from Ted Leonsis, Vice Chairman of American Online and owner of the Washington Capitals. Long time DevHawk readers might remember that I called Ted “an abomination to the sport of hockey” in the wake of trading Peter Bondra in the “Great Caps Fire Sale of 2004″ (Jagr, Lang, Nylander, Gonchar and Bondra). So I was somewhat surprised that wrote that he wanted to meet me since I blog a lot about the Caps. As I was in town, we arranged a meeting on short notice. I gotta say, it’s much easier to call someone an abomination on your blog than to their face. 😄

I got to spend an hour chatting about hockey – both from a game and ownership standpoint. Not that I’m likely to own a hockey team any time soon, but it was cool to hear about. I agreed with the owners during the lockout before Ted’s hockey team math lesson, but it was useful to see all the numbers laid out. We also spoke about Web 2.0 and new media to some extent. I guess it’s not surprising that a vice chairman of AOL is acutely aware of the changing face of the media – hence his reaching out to bloggers, even ones that have said bad things about him.

Anyway, expect to see more hockey coverage on these pages in the future. And significantly less owner name calling, unless we trade Calder Trophy winner Alexander Ovechkin:

My brother sent me this great compliation video of Alexander Ovechkin’s first year in the NHL. In the words of Barry Melrose, the Calder Trophy has been a one man race for some time now. Congrats to Alex on being only the second rookie to score 50 goals and 100 points his first season.