Caps Briefing: How Worthless Are They?

According to Forbes magazine, the Washington Capitals are the third most worthless team in the National Hockey League. This is a big step up from last year, when they were number one!

Of course, being businessmen and not hockey fans, the boys at Forbes have failed to take into account the kinds of younger, developing players that the Caps hold, ready to carry them to success either this year or in the immediate future. If they watched the development of players like Nicklas Backstrom, Brooks Laich, Mike Green, Boyd Gordon, Tomas Fleischmann and the recently recalled Chris Bourque, they might have ranked the Caps in the top ten.

Also, they've failed to take into account the team's most important asset: generations of fans who have grown with the team since the 1970s. That alone should put the Caps ahead of new teams in cities like Atlanta, Tampa, Miami, Columbus, Raleigh, Anaheim and San Jose. Forbes is not in the business of measuring sentimentality or making even obvious sports predictions. Instead, they're looking at the terms of arena leases and local television contracts, and at short-term revenues, even though the latter are more of an indication of recent success or failure than of future earnings or long-term value. With this blunt approach, they have determined that the Caps show their games on a local cable channel that the team doesn't own, and that they haven't made the playoffs in a few years. Bravo, Forbes. Bravo.