Merry Christmas. One year ago today I published a story entitled “Good Caps tiding for Christmas” in which I said the 2022-23 Capitals were actually really good. This was a mistake, and it haunts me everyday. So instead of statistics, today I bring you a different kind of optimism.
As we all know, hockey players can be sorted into one of three categories:
- nephew,
- uncle, or
- neither uncle nor nephew
And by this objective and standard measurement, the 2023-24 Capitals have more nephew energy than at any time since their Stanley Cup win in 2018.
Nephew-uncle status is not the same as age, though there is correlation. Actually, nevermind. I will not explain nephew and uncle energy. It is self-evident.
There are players whose energy is apparent to all. Mike Knuble was an uncle. Andre Burakovsky is a nephew. But there are players who are neither uncles nor nephews, such as Martin Erat and Brett Leason. There are older players who are nephews, and there are younger players who are uncles. There are players who were nephews but became uncles, such as Brooks Laich in 2010. There is one player who has been a nephew then became an uncle but then reverted to nephew, and obviously that’s Evgeny Kuznetsov.
I have – painstakingly – reviewed every Caps roster since 2007-08 and sorted all 114 skaters into their appropriate categories. Here is the ratio of uncles to nephews for each season.
As expected, the early seasons of the Ovechkin era were rife with nephew energy, it probably smelled crazy in there. But those first few years also had some prominent uncles, such as Sergei Federov and John Erskine. By the end of Bruce Boudreau’s administration many uncles had left, and some nephews had become uncles, such as Jeff Schultz and Mike Green.
The Capitals maintained a delicate homeostasis for several years, but a wild spike in nephewness caused them to miss the playoffs in 2014.
Barry Trotz and Brian MacLellan were maniacally committed to maintaining nephew-uncle balance from then until the Cup win in 2018. I know what you’re thinking: so therefore 32-percent nepotality is the key to success in the NHL. That’s an understandable assumption and sadly too common these days. The Capitals actually had an anomalously low number of nephews during their championship run and owe much of their victory to avuncular performances from Brooks Orpik and Devante Smith-Pelly. Most Cup winners are more nephew-driven, and I have done no research to back this up.
Washington’s Cup hangover years saw an exodus of nephews from the team (Vrana, Burakovsky, Siegenthaler, Stephenson), and thus began the Uncle Years. Under the cruel tutelage of Todd Reirden and then Peter Laviolette, 2018-19 through 2022-23 was a time of contempt, when excessive uncle energy depleted the team’s mischief reserves.
But here we are in the twilight of 2023, and the Washington Capitals are experiencing a nephew rebirth. Aliaksei Protas is a lorge nephew, Connor McMichael is a blossoming nephew, Dylan Strome is an adopted nephew, Evgeny Kuznetsov is a Benjamin Button nephew. Fehervary and Sandin barely qualify as nephews, but Sonny Milano is teeming with nephew energy.
The Washington Capitals are a team in transition, as any team undergoing punctuations in its nephew-uncle equilibrium would be. As of this moment they have a higher percent of nephews than at any time since 2014-15. I don’t know what this means for hockey, but generally this is good for hockey fans. The Capitals may or may not make the playoffs (46 percent according to MoneyPuck, 49 percent according to HockeyViz) and therefore I may or may not have to grow the Vince McMahon mustache, but far more certain is this fact: nepotalism is on the rise in the District of Columbia. And with it comes hi-jinx, goofs, and grab-ass. Fridges full to bursting with ketchup. Sticks stuck in masks, turning players into hockey unicorns (Jay Beagle’s final act as a nephew). This is a good thing.
Merry Christmas and happy holidays to you. I hope you have comfort and joy. If you’re a nephew of any kind, I hope you spend time with an uncle of any kind, and vice versa. Peace on earth and goodwill to all.
p.s. – here’s my Christmas song for the year:
