Ted Leonsis tries to “future-proof” the Caps by hiring Chris Patrick

The transitions have been seamless and internal for a franchise that has made 15 postseason appearances in the last 17 years. George McPhee is the only top hockey executive Leonsis has fired, and when he did, he turned to Brian MacLellan, McPhee’s longtime assistant. MacLellan remains the team’s president, a role in which, Leonsis said, he “has the final say on everything.”

But the man with his finger on the pulse of the organization will make the daily calls with other general managers and hold the meetings with coaches and staff. Patrick is the 48-year-old member of one of hockey’s royal families who left a secure and lucrative job in finance 16 years ago to start at the bottom of the Capitals’ executive ranks. His father is longtime Capitals president Dick Patrick, whose father, uncle and grandfather all won the Stanley Cup as players. Chris played at the collegiate level at Princeton. He could have succeeded doing something else. He couldn’t shake the game. Now he runs a team.

“I see this as a natural evolution for the organization,” Leonsis said by phone Monday. “It future-proofs us. Mac and Chris are really, really like-minded birds. I joked with someone the other day that Chris is more like Mac than his father. They think about hockey – and the economics of hockey – in a very smart and very analytical way.”

While this move was bound to come at some point — the Caps promoted MacLellan to president of hockey operations and general manager last summer when they also extended his contract — it seems to be coming suddenly. MacLellan, 65, just oversaw the implementation of an offseason plan that, at first glance, appears to have vastly improved a roster that narrowly fought its way into the playoffs in its final regular-season game.

“It had to happen at some point, right?” MacLellan said. “I’m OK with it. And I’ll be there to help him.”

Before we get to the younger Patrick – and how he will approach the transition from the Alex Ovechkin era to what comes after – a moment on MacLellan. I’ll admit, when Leonsis finally parted ways with McPhee after the 2014 season – a difficult decision, to be sure – and he essentially became McPhee’s right-hand man, I had my doubts. You recognized the need for new leadership and chose the guy who had been around all along?

What Leonsis discovered – and responded to – was that MacLellan was a disarmingly honest and sharp thinker who had clear plans for how to improve the roster, with Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom remaining as central pieces. Does trading Troy Brouwer for TJ Oshie seem like a good move after all these years? How about signing Brooks Orpik and Matt Niskanen as free agent defensemen? Or trading Lars Eller?

What followed were back-to-back Presidents’ Trophies in 2015–16 and 2016–17, bitter losses to Pittsburgh in the playoffs each season, and the 2018 Stanley Cup. It’s easy to point out that the Caps haven’t won a playoff series since the championship and that needs to change. But they’ve played relevant hockey throughout MacLellan’s tenure, a 10-season period in which only Boston and Tampa Bay have scored more regular-season points. MacLellan may not know this, but among GMs who have played at least 500 games for a franchise, only two have scored a higher percentage of available regular-season points.

“When you really think about it, we’ve won a lot of games,” MacLellan said. “When you’re battling through it, you don’t think about it. But when you look back, we’ve been competing for a long time. That consistency is a big thing for me.”

So there is a consistency in approach. MacLellan had a 10-year career as an NHL player, but he didn’t go straight into scouting and management afterward. Instead, he went back to school and got an MBA. Patrick initially resisted the pull of the family business and worked on Wall Street, then for Constellation Energy. He earned his MBA from the University of Virginia in 2008 – but he took all of his knowledge and applied it to hockey.

“I don’t think enough organizations value this kind of experience,” MacLellan said.

When Patrick joined the Capitals for the 2008-09 season—a position brokered by McPhee—he did so at the lowest rung of the management team.

“He made a lot of money in his old job,” Leonsis said. “I laughed. Like, ‘What are you doing?’ He just said, ‘Well, it’s in my blood.'”

“When I was in finance, I would go to games as a fan and feel like I was missing out,” Patrick said. “I mean, I’m a fan and it’s fun. But I feel like I could offer so much more. I just didn’t want to always have that question about myself.”

Over the years, he took on more and more responsibility. When MacLellan was promoted last year, Patrick took on the title of deputy managing director. The succession seemed clear.

“I really consider Mac a mentor for my entire career,” Patrick said. “He’s very organized, very thoughtful. He has a plan and works very analytically to execute it. And everyone in our group has a voice. It’s not a democracy and it shouldn’t be. Mac makes the final decision. But nobody tries to be the guy who says, ‘I’m right and you’re wrong.’ It’s OK to have a different opinion, and he’s created that environment.”

So what happens next? The decisions for the 2024-25 season have been made and it will be exciting. But Ovechkin only needs 41 more goals to equal Wayne Gretzky, the all-time record holder. He will turn 39 in September. His contract expires after 2025-26.

What does Chris Patrick foresee when No. 8 is not on the ice but on the roof?

“When your stars get old, a lot of people say, ‘Rebuild, rebuild, rebuild and just start over,'” Patrick said. “That’s a strategy, but I don’t know if that’s a strategy for everyone.”

The Caps’ strategy will increasingly bear the signature of Chris Patrick in the future. The challenge will be twofold: to lead the franchise into an era in which it no longer has its undisputed franchise player, but at the same time to maintain the consistency that a generation of fans have come to expect here.