On Day One of Development Camp, John Carlson Is on a Lot of Minds

It isn't just bloggers and hockeysfuture.com addicts going gaga over John Carlson's very polished, very mature game these days. It's also the general manager of the Washington Capitals. On Monday afternoon after the first slate of Development Camp drills, I asked the GM for his impressions of Carlson from his late-postseason visits to Hershey to follow the Bears' Calder Cup pursuit. "There were a couple of [postseason] games where we really thought he might have been the best defenseman on the ice for either team." Safe to say the GM liked (very much) what he saw from Carlson's play as a CHL assignee to the Bears. "He has tremendous upside," McPhee added. "We liked that he was playing a regular shift at the American League level, big games, especially in the finals." Potentially Capitals' management could have a very tough decision ahead in September as it relates to Carlson. When I mentioned that Carlson h...