Yep.  Fans just need to face the fact that the team is dreadful and is likely to remain so for a long time.  You watch the other playoff games and see the speed and skill and immediately realize how bad they really are.

Yes - take a look at the Winnipeg-Colorado games for instance.  The pace of those games have been amazing. Pretty much every other series has been played at a much fast pace with much more skill.  The Rags look good compared to the Caps, but they are no where close to 5 or 6 other teams.  I will enjoy watching them lose the next series.

Oof.  Not that we expected differently, but this hasn't been fun to watch.  As soon as Rags tied it within a minute of JC's goal, I knew it was over, and that SHG just took any hope anyone had left.

Caps just don't have it.  They spent everything they had in the tank just to get here, and it wasn't like they were "peaking" at the right time...it was just everything they had. 
You have a mediocre team, playing above its talent level to get here, all its stars are aged, AND has 2 starting D out of the lineup (that was barely average to begin with), AND you're facing the best team in the league this year which just happens to be firing on all cylinders, AND you throw in terrible officiating, AND the bounces all go against you, and it adds up to lopsided hockey.  Sucks to be on this side of it, but that's where this team is.
I'm not knocking our team or their effort...they just don't have enough to compete.   

It's over.  The Caps won't win game 4.  Get the brooms out.

Yep.  Fans just need to face the fact that the team is dreadful and is likely to remain so for a long time.  You watch the other playoff games and see the speed and skill and immediately realize how bad they really are.

Oof.  Not that we expected differently, but this hasn't been fun to watch.  As soon as Rags tied it within a minute of JC's goal, I knew it was over, and that SHG just took any hope anyone had left.

Caps just don't have it.  They spent everything they had in the tank just to get here, and it wasn't like they were "peaking" at the right time...it was just everything they had. 
You have a mediocre team, playing above its talent level to get here, all its stars are aged, AND has 2 starting D out of the lineup (that was barely average to begin with), AND you're facing the best team in the league this year which just happens to be firing on all cylinders, AND you throw in terrible officiating, AND the bounces all go against you, and it adds up to lopsided hockey.  Sucks to be on this side of it, but that's where this team is.
I'm not knocking our team or their effort...they just don't have enough to compete.   

It's over.  The Caps won't win game 4.  Get the brooms out.

The only way the Caps were going to be contenders in the draft lottery was to lose more than %50 of their games since thanksgiving. And, the draft lottery is no guarantee of anything. It is extremely rare that a 1st round pick makes a difference in the first three years of their career. I think our perception has been skewed by a few select players. I can count five off the top of my head since Ovechkin was drafted, 18 years ago.

Team management needs to have a come to Jesus moment to see the reality they are dealing with. Such religious moments are rarer than 1st round picks making an immediate impact on a team.

And you can't brush away accountability by saying oh there wasn't much risk in that contract.  We lost a year of development because of 67