RMNB’s own Rachel Cohen created this Valentine for Matt Bradley

In honor of Valentine’s Day and to drown your sorrows after the latest Caps loss, we asked our readers to submit their very own cards addressed to a Capitals player. And oh, boy, did you listen. We’ve included many of your submissions but have narrowed it down to five finalists. From there, you guys will vote to pick the winner, who will receive one of our lovely — no pun intended — t-shirts. Voting will last until Wednesday night at midnight. And FYI, some of these cards may be NSFW. Proceed with caution!

Stephanie C., clearly impressed by Semyon Varlamov’s rapidly expanding acting portfolio, brings out the hand love cursors with this Valentine for Varly.

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Reader John A. plays the role of a disappointed, yet encouraging lover in this personalized ditty for Sasha Minor. Our favorite line: “A Caps winning-streak you could start, but mostly, I wish you’d toe-drag into my heart.” Awwwwww.

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Our dear friends at Knuble’s Knights assure us that they didn’t make this card. They found it outside of the locker room at Verizon Center. Who could this mysterious B.B. character be?

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Twilightxqueen7, brilliantly shows her appreciation for Matt Hendricks’s blind-folded antics in this Valentine’s Day Card. Steve Downie never stood a chance, right? Though we have to deduct some serious points for inappropriate language here, we felt this was definitely worthy of being a finalist. What do you think? Is this the one?

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Jennifer B. actually hand-made this card for noted Holtby fan @WashCapsRock. Stunning.

Now that you’ve seen the Top 5, head on up to the top of the page and vote for your favorite!

The Best of the Rest

Bob M. totally copped-out and didn’t make us an original card. For shame! But what his submission lacked in effort, was made up for with its humor. His email entitled “The Count loves OV” aptly describes this youtube, and it… just… works.

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Lady Bug Ashley created this sweet card for Brooks Laich. Let’s be honest, the puffy paint typeface is impressively appropriate here.

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Brittney M.‘s Valentine pays homage to some of the stronger male bonds on the team. While the Ovechkin/Semin bromance is well-documented, Brit also shows her appreciation for Carlzner, the Swedes, and… Brookseen?

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Some dude named Peter H. thinks bulldogs love Matt Bradley. While that may be true, we think it’s Peter who #needsmorebradley.

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This card was submitted to us by an Anonymous reader. Who is Niel Breengerg and why would he ever want to apologize to Jason Chimera? Hmmmmmm.

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Abram Fox’s Valentine’s Day poem to the entire Capitals organization
In the style of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnet 43 (“How do I love thee?”)

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love you on Comast and Versus and on ice
Where my cheers can reach, when feeling out of sight
Stuck in the 400 level and thee in open space.
I love thee though masks obscure thy face
Covered in scars, missing several teeth.
I love thee freely, as McPhee looks for a decent
Right wing to complement two stars who need one badly.
Thanks to Facebook and Twitter put to good use
I love thee now that I know that I #needmorebradley.
I love thee with a love I started to lose
With Hanlon’s reign, when you sucked so badly.
I love thee in January when the Penguins you abuse
I shall but love thee better in June when you win Lord Stanley.

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Olga sent this from an .ru email address and swears she spent all day working on card. We’re sorry, but we’ve got to ask: why does Alex Semin look like the Statue of Liberty? Is that symbolism for something?

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Long-time reader Paula also made a Valentine for the Great 28. Someone please put a shirt on him, ASAP.

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Danielle‘s Valentine seems to indicate she really, really loves our blog. ::high five::

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Zachary P. gets a lil’ weird with this card for Nick Backstrom. Zach, there are filters in Photoshop other than just Inner Glow. Like Fresco. Get on that.

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Greg G.‘s Valentine for DJ King focuses on the enforcer’s stunning good looks.

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Tari C., please don’t strike your child. She is really cute. Don’t make us call Child Services on you. (We’re kidding! Great photoshopping!)

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Katie A. submitted this card for Neuvy. Cuz’ he’s a boss.

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Jennifer B. also hand-made this card for the world’s biggest DJ King fan, @mildbestwishes. She should sell these at a craft fair. Wow.

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Danielle‘s Valentine for John Carlson was too adorable not to put up!

And finally we saved our personal favorite for last. Knuble’s Knights decided to create a second Valentine, this time for Neil’s Monte Carlo Machine. We couldn’t stop laughing when we saw this.

Brilliant work, guys! A huge thanks to everyone else who submitted. Make sure to leave a comment below on whose your favorites were!

Additional reporting by Chris Gordon.

Photo credit: Dilip Vishwanat

When it comes to Alex Semin, there are fans on both sides of the fence. Some people think the $6.7 million one year deal is a fair one, while others, like me, think it is a tad too much. Part of it boils down to whether you think Sasha Minor is able to give consistent performance night in and night out. In other words, should players be rewarded even if they can’t produce consistently?

All hockey players, particularly goal scorers, hit slumps. A skater that shoots 14.5% for the season will have some nights when a third of his shots light the lamp and others that are goose eggs– it’s all in the game of hockey. In fact, it’s possible that the skater is not actually streaky by nature, but due to some bad bounces he appears streaky.

This chart is a random simulation of a hypothetical 35-goal scorer, who averages 3 shots a game and shoots 14.5% night in and night out– Mr. Super Consistency– using a 10-game moving average to smooth out the curves. Look at how streaky he appears, yet his shooting percentage (14.5%) and shots per game (3) never deviated on any given night.

Let’s look at it another way. This same hypothetical 35-goal scorer has a probability of going 0-for-3 on any given night equal to more than 60%, while his chances at a hat trick are less than 1%.

We really shouldn’t be surprised or disheartened when our favorite player fails to light the lamp because it is going to happen almost 2 out of every 3 games they play.

Now let’s look at Semin’s actual 10-game moving average for goals scored over the last 2.5 years along with another simulation of Mr. Super Consistency, this time using Semin’s actual shots per game over that time span.

Not much difference. In fact, it could be argued that Semin’s trend (in red) looks more consistent than Mr. Super Consistency!

Consistency during the regular season is fool’s gold, especially when 70% of scoring is due to luck. This is why future performance, not perceived consistency, should be the basis of any contract valuation.