from Tom Gulitti of NHL.com,

Other teams around the NHL were spending millions of dollars in contracts after the free agent market opened at noon ET on Saturday, but the Washington Capitals were mostly idle.

This was not unexpected.

The Capitals are tight against the NHL salary cap with a little more than $12.4 million in remaining space, according to CapFriendly.com, and still have to re-sign restricted free agents Evgeny Kuznetsov, Andre Burakovsky and Philipp Grubauer. They need to fill out the rest of a roster that has 14 signed players. That's why general manager Brian MacLellan said "we're done" as far as re-signing the Capitals' potential unrestricted free agents after re-signing right wing T.J. Oshie to an eight-year, $46 million contract on June 23.

Still, it was jarring to see three key players -- defensemen Kevin Shattenkirk (New York Rangers) and Karl Alzner (Montreal Canadiens), and right wing Justin Williams (Carolina Hurricanes) -- sign with Eastern Conference opponents. Those are teams the Capitals might have to beat out to qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs this season.

continued