The transition has been seamless and in-house for a franchise that has made 15 postseason appearances in the past 17 years. George McPhee was the only top hockey executive Leonsis has fired, and in doing so, he turned to McPhee's longtime assistant, Brian McLellan. McLellan continues to serve as team president, a position where, as Leonsis put it, “he has the final say on everything.”
But the man making the daily calls to other general managers, meeting with coaches and trainers, getting the lowdown on the organization is Patrick, 48, who comes from a prestigious hockey family and left a stable, lucrative job in finance 16 years ago to start at the bottom in the Capitals' front office. His father is longtime Capitals president Dick Patrick, and his father, uncle and grandfather all won Stanley Cups as players. Chris played at Princeton. He could have been successful at something else. He just couldn't shake the sport. Now he's running the team.
“I see this as a natural progression for the organization,” Leonsis said by phone Monday. “It secures our future. Mac and Chris are really similar. I was joking with someone the other day that Chris is more like Mac than he is like his dad. They're both really smart and really analytical about hockey and the economics of hockey.”
While the change was expected sometime — the Caps promoted MacLellan to president of hockey operations and general manager last summer and also signed a contract extension — it seems abrupt. MacLellan, 65, just finished overseeing the execution of an offseason plan that, at first glance, appears to have significantly strengthened a roster that barely made the playoffs in the final game of the regular season.
“It's going to happen at some point, right?” McClellan said. “I'm OK with that, and I'm going to be there to help him.”
Before we talk about the younger Patrick and his transition from the Alex Ovechkin era and beyond, a little bit about McClellan: When Leonsis parted ways with McPhee after the 2014 season and he transitioned to McPhee's right-hand man, I'll be honest with you, I wondered: Did you recognize the need for new leadership and choose the guy who'd been there all along?
What Leonsis discovered, and acted upon, was that McClellan was a surprisingly honest, analytical guy with a clear plan for how to build a team with Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom as its core. After all these years, was it a good move to trade Troy Brouwer for TJ Oshie? What about signing free agent defensemen Brooks Orpik and Matt Niskanen? Or even trading for Lars Eller?
They then won back-to-back Presidents Trophies in 2015-16 and 2016-17, suffered heartbreaking playoff losses to Pittsburgh each season, and won the Stanley Cup in 2018. It's easy to point out the fact that the Caps haven't won a playoff series since winning, and that needs to change. But they've played worthy hockey throughout McClellan's 10 seasons as manager. Only Boston and Tampa Bay have won more regular-season points in those 10 seasons. McClellan probably doesn't know this, but among GMs with at least 500 games under their belts, only two have won a higher percentage of available regular-season points.
“When you think about it, we won a lot of games,” McClellan said, “When you're going strong, you don't think about that. But when you look back, we've been competing for a long time. That consistency, that's the big thing for me.”
So there's consistency in approach. McClellan had a 10-year NHL career, but he didn't immediately jump into scouting or a front-office job after that. Instead, he went back to school and got his MBA. Patrick initially resisted the lure of the family business, working on Wall Street before landing at Constellation Energy. He got his MBA from the University of Virginia in 2008, but he applied all that experience to hockey.
“I don't think there are enough organizations that value that experience,” McClellan said.
Patrick joined the Capitals in 2008-09 after being hired by McPhee, but was at the bottom of the front office.
“He was making a ton of money in his previous job,” Leonsis says. “I laughed. I was like, 'What are you doing?' And he just said, 'Well, it's in my blood.'”
“When I was working in finance, I used to go to games as a fan, but I felt like I was missing out on something,” Patrick says. “I'm a fan, and it's fun, but I feel like I have so much more to offer. I just didn't want to constantly have to question myself.”
As the years went by, he took on more and more responsibility — last year, when McClellan was promoted, Patrick stepped up to the assistant general manager role — and the line of succession was clear.
“I consider Mac a mentor throughout my career,” Patrick says. “He's very organized, very thoughtful. He has a plan and he goes through a very analytical process to execute it. And everyone in our group has a say. It's not a democracy, and it shouldn't be. Mac makes the final decisions. But nobody tries to be the guy who says I'm right and you're wrong. It's OK to have different opinions, and he's created that environment.”
So what's next? The 2024-25 season has already been decided and is exciting. But Ovechkin needs 41 more goals to tie Wayne Gretzky for the all-time scoring title. He turns 39 in September. His contract expires after the 2025-26 season.
What does Chris Patrick foresee when his No. 8 is on the ceiling instead of on the ice?
“When stars get older, a lot of people have this mindset of, 'Rebuild, rebuild, rebuild and start over,'” Patrick said. “It's a strategy, but I'm not sure it's a strategy that works for everybody.”
Going forward, Chris Patrick's fingerprints will increasingly be on the Caps' strategy, and the challenge will be twofold: leading the team in an era where they no longer have an undisputed franchise player, and maintaining the consistency that a generation of fans here have come to expect.
