This weekend the Caps avoided a nasty mess next summer when they signed Alexander Semin to a two year, $9.2 million contract extension. The left winger finished last season second on the team in scoring, and has been the most creative puckhandler in Washington since before the lockout. If Semin had gone until summer without a new deal, he would have become a restricted free agent (RFA).

As an RFA, Semin could have signed a contract with any NHL team that wanted him, and they would have all been interested. It used to be an unwritten rule that hockey teams didn’t actually try to sign each other’s RFA’s. Then, this past summer, Buffalo winger Tomas Vanek signed a fifty million dollar offer sheet with the Edmonton Oilers. If Buffalo hadn’t matched the pricey deal, they would have lost their best young player and received only a handful of draft picks as compensation. A similar situation was surely in store for the Caps with Semin.

Semin may only be the Caps second-best young left wing behind all star Alexander Ovechkin, but last year he was already the twelfth highest scoring left wing of any age in the thirty team NHL. Given that the Caps had previously suspended the player and then subsequently sued him, nobody expected him to commit so quickly to a longer stay in town, especially at such an affordable price. Twenty-nine teams were salivating over a chance at Semin, but the Caps have held on to him through 2010.

Now they just have to work out a deal with Ovechkin. The greatest talent in the game right now is still on schedule for free agency at season’s end. Hopefully the team’s commitment to Semin will encourage him to stick around.