Ovie's goals now all about the goals

There wasn't much talk about Alex Ovechkin winning more Cups when his five-year extension was announced. But with a roster in decline, perhaps chasing the goal record is the only thing to celebrate

Assuming he retires after this contract, Alex Ovechkin must average 33 goals a season to break the all-time NHL goals record.

When Alex Ovechkin’s contract extension expires in five years, a few months before his 41st birthday, he will have earned about $183 million over the course of 21 seasons. That is, of course, minus taxes, escrow, salary deferrals, income lost through lockouts/a pandemic and agent fees – wait a minute, he doesn’t pay those. Whatever the final total is, regardless of what Ovechkin accomplishes over the next five seasons, he will have earned every penny.

And we can say that even before Ovechkin collects the first paycheck on the five-year, $47.5 million contract extension that has been in the drawer for a couple of months and was signed the day before he was to officially become an unrestricted free agent. We don’t need to bore you with all the numbers. Ovechkin is the greatest goalscorer of his generation, arguably the greatest of all-time, and has done as much for the Washington Capitals as any superstar has for any organization.

It’s funny, though, how much of this is about the goals, about chasing Wayne Gretzky’s all-time career record of 894. It doesn’t take long to do the math. An average of 33 goals per season – which is only one more than his worst full-season total – over the five years will give him 165 more goals and put him one past Gretzky. You may have seen that a few times on social media today.

In fact, that’s almost all of what you would have seen today. It was interesting how so many people, including the Capitals themselves, framed this signing around how it gives him a chance to etch his name at the top of the scoring list. The team’s own website ran a headline that read: ‘Capitals Re-Sign Captain Alex Ovechkin.’ It was accompanied by a subhead, which read: ‘The all-time franchise leader in games, goals and points has signed with Washington for five more seasons as he chases the NHL’s all-time goal scoring title.’

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Will we see 165 more of these before Ovechkin’s career ends?

Hmmm. Interesting, isn’t it? No word of him chasing his second, or third, or fourth Stanley Cup. Chances are, if Ovechkin averages 33 goals each of the next five seasons, the Capitals will increase their odds of winning another Cup, but, and I’ve said this before and endured a huge amount of heat for doing so, focusing only on Ovechkin getting his goals might not the best thing for this organization. If you look at the pressure both Ovechkin put himself under and the way the Capitals played as he approached the 700 mark, neither of them looked very good.

But back to the goals record. We can only think of what might have been if not for two lockouts and a pandemic. A full-season lockout wiped out what would have been Ovechkin’s first season in the NHL, so there’s probably 40-50 goals there. Another half-season lockout robbed him of 23 goals, based on his pro-rated production in 2012-13. Also based on pro-rated production the past two truncated seasons, he would have added another 23 goals to his total (assuming he would have missed 12 games in two full seasons, which is the total he missed in the past two). So if not for the lockouts and pandemic, it’s probably safe to say he would have in the neighborhood of another 100 career goals and would be a shoo-in to break the record.

But now he needs 165 goals. And the good thing for the Capitals and Ovechkin is it shouldn’t take too long to determine whether he has a realistic shot at it. Let’s say he gets 50 this season and wins his 10th Rocket Richard Trophy. That would put the per-season average down to a much more manageable 29 goals a season. But he’s going to need to pad those totals in the first couple of years if he realistically wants to have a shot at breaking the record.

The wildcard in all of this is how both Ovechkin and this contract are going to age, because nobody really knows how all of that is going to play out. Ovechkin is a freak of nature, one who has played in almost 97 percent of his team’s games through the first 16 seasons of his career. But it is important to note that Ovechkin missed 11 games in the truncated 2020-21 season, after going 15 seasons never missing more than four. It’s also important to note that this is based on him retiring after this contract. If he’s close to the mark and still has game, who knows? Perhaps he goes on a year-by-year agreement with the Capitals in his 40s.

Depending on whether or not the Capitals trade Evgeny Kuznetsov, Ovechkin will have his running mates along with him for most of the way. Nicklas Backstrom and T.J. Oshie each have four more years remaining on their deals, while John Carlson’s contract is set to expire after the 2025-26 season, the same time as Ovechkin’s. Tom Wilson has three more years left on his deal, provided he doesn’t do something in the interim that gets him banned from the NHL for life.

The Capitals themselves are on a steady decline as a Stanley Cup contender. Since winning the Cup in 2018, they have not won a playoff round and have bowed out of the past two playoffs in shockingly meek fashion. They did not have a first-round draft pick this year and, with the exception of Connor McMichael and Hendrix Lapierre, their prospect pool is middling. This is a franchise that is moving more and more quickly away from a Stanley Cup and no number of goals from Ovechkin is going to change that.

So perhaps it’s just best for everyone to cheer for Ovie to go out and get that record. Because for the next five years, that might be the only thing in Washington worth celebrating.