This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
John Carlson
Washington Capitals Defense
One thousand and nine games, 674 points, and 25:54 a night at 34.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2009-10 | WSH | 22 | 1 | 5 | 6 | +11 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 21 | 4.8 | 15:15 |
| 2010-11 | WSH | 82 | 7 | 30 | 37 | +21 | 44 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 144 | 4.9 | 22:39 |
| 2011-12 | WSH | 82 | 9 | 23 | 32 | -15 | 22 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 152 | 5.9 | 21:52 |
| 2012-13 | WSH | 48 | 6 | 16 | 22 | +11 | 18 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 97 | 6.2 | 23:01 |
| 2013-14 | WSH | 82 | 10 | 27 | 37 | -3 | 22 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 208 | 4.8 | 24:31 |
| 2014-15 | WSH | 82 | 12 | 43 | 55 | +11 | 28 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 193 | 6.2 | 23:04 |
| 2015-16 | WSH | 56 | 8 | 31 | 39 | +16 | 14 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 124 | 6.5 | 23:42 |
| 2016-17 | WSH | 72 | 9 | 28 | 37 | +7 | 10 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 180 | 5.0 | 22:43 |
| 2017-18 | WSH | 82 | 15 | 53 | 68 | 0 | 32 | 4 | 0 | 4 | 237 | 6.3 | 24:47 |
| 2018-19 | WSH | 80 | 13 | 57 | 70 | +21 | 34 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 185 | 7.0 | 25:04 |
| 2019-20 | WSH | 69 | 15 | 60 | 75 | +12 | 26 | 2 | 0 | 6 | 189 | 7.9 | 24:38 |
| 2020-21 | WSH | 52 | 10 | 34 | 44 | -5 | 12 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 128 | 7.8 | 23:47 |
| 2021-22 | WSH | 78 | 17 | 54 | 71 | +13 | 20 | 7 | 0 | 2 | 195 | 8.7 | 23:49 |
| 2022-23 | WSH | 40 | 9 | 20 | 29 | -7 | 12 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 124 | 7.3 | 23:23 |
| 2023-24 | WSH | 82 | 10 | 42 | 52 | -7 | 40 | 6 | 0 | 5 | 176 | 5.7 | 25:54 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 1009 | 151 | 523 | 674 | +86 | 342 | 46 | 2 | 32 | 2353 | 6.4 | 23:38 |
This Season So Far
The 2024-25 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
82 games, 10 goals and 42 assists for 52 points, 6 on the power play, 40 penalty minutes, 25:54 a night — the most ice on the club — and minus-7, with 5 game-winners. He took 47.7 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,538 minutes, the 36th percentile, and his ice went 56-67 against an expectation of 62.57-68.63.
Seven goals of finishing below what the chances were worth and two goals of goaltending above them. Fifty-two points is his most since 2021-22 and he played all 82 games to get it.
The Finesse Game
271 attempts at a median of 50 feet with 61 per cent of them from beyond forty and 15 per cent from inside twenty, 173 of those on goal, converted at 5.7 per cent against a career 6.42 across 2,353 shots.
523 career assists and 151 goals in 1,009 games. He runs a power play from the point and has done it for fifteen seasons; 271 attempts is the most of any defenceman who played the season in Washington and the shot from the blue line is still heavy enough to be feared.
The Physical Game
He is 6-3 and 220 and took 40 penalty minutes.
342 career penalty minutes in 1,009 games. He is large and defends by closing space rather than by punishing anybody; a third of a penalty minute a game across a thousand of them is a defenceman who is rarely beaten badly enough to have to foul.
The Intangibles
Twenty-seventh overall in 2008 by Washington, fifteen seasons, one organisation, and 674 points in 1,009 games.
A career plus-86 and 46 power-play goals in 1,009 games. He is 34, he has played every one of his 1,009 NHL games for this club, and he took twenty-five and three-quarter minutes a night last season.
What kind of player
The searchable half of the report. The first group is computed from the season's own data; the rest are read out of the prose above, and each one carries the sentence that produced it. A subject the report never raised is simply absent.
- measuredcomputed here from the season's own data
- a strengthread out of the prose, and claimed
Each computed tag also says how well its measure holds up from one season to the next, because a tag describes a season that has finished and a reader will assume it predicts the one coming. Some do and some do not, and the gap is wide: five-on-five workload repeats well, scoring late does not repeat at all.
- slot-man· shoots from where goals are scored
17.7% of his attempts in the slot, 92nd percentile among defencemen
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.69) · 44% keep it
- durable· was available
82 of 82 games
Season to season, this measure repeats weakly (0.32) · 53% keep it
“He runs a power play from the point and has done it for fifteen seasons; 271 attempts is the most of any defenceman who played the season in Washington and the shot from the blue line is still heavy enough to be feared.”
“A career plus-86 and 46 power-play goals in 1,009 games.”
“He is large and defends by closing space rather than by punishing anybody; a third of a penalty minute a game across a thousand of them is a defenceman who is rarely beaten badly enough to have to foul.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 1,538 minutes
- Expected goals
- 47.7%
- 36th pct
- Shot attempts
- 47.6%
- 32nd pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 56 for, 67 against. Expected: 62.6 and 68.6.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe report ranks him 62 points above where the numbers do. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.
Both bars are percentiles among the 652 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 83 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Tracked
NHL Edge, 2023-24 · 82 games
- Top speed
- 22.0 mph
- 62nd pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 0.50 a game
- Distance
- 3.54 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 100.8 mph
- 95th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 21.7
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 90.2
A top speed is a season's best, and a man who takes more shifts gets more tries at one; the percentile is the feed's own, against every skater, and says less between a top-pair defenceman and a fourth-line wing than it does between two men in the same job. The counts are shown per game for the same reason.
Usual linemates
2023-24 · 1538 minutes at five-on-five
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2023-24
- The club
- WSH took 47.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 47.7% — 0.5 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- First pair, 1,538 minutes at five-on-five — 98th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Martin Fehervary | 49.2% | 46.6% | 44.9% |
| Dylan Strome | 56.2% | 43.2% | 52.6% |
| Alex Ovechkin | 48.2% | 47.4% | 45.0% |
49.2% together, 46.6% for him apart and 44.9% for Fehervary apart. Fehervary was worse away from him while his own share held — the pairing was doing more for Fehervary than for him.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
271 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 11 of them goals. His median goal came from 37 feet. 15% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 61% from beyond forty.