Breaking News - Capitals forwards career could be over after undergoing significant hip surgery
Washington Capitals playmaker and one of their franchise icons, Nicklas Backstrom has been dealing with hip issues for at least the last couple of seasons up to this point. When the Caps were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by the Florida Panthers in 7 games this past season, news broke that Backstrom would likely need major hip surgery which would require a lengthy recovery at the age of 34, which may put his future in the National Hockey League in doubt.
It was just confirmed by the Capital's public relations department that Backstrom underwent successful hip resurfacing surgery yesterday in Belgium at the ANCA Clinic. He is to start rehabbing and is on his road to recovery immediately.
Although this doesn't automatically mark the end of the road in the NHL for Backstrom, Frank Seravalli points out that the other NHL players that have undergone the same surgery have either never played again or played just a small number of games before retiring (Ryan Kessler with the Ducks never played again, and Ed Jovanovski played just 37 games with the Panthers in 2013 after making a full recovery before calling it a career.
If this is indeed the end of the road for Backstrom, he's had quite a remarkable career with the Capitals organization in 1,058 games played all with Washington, the native of Sweden has 264 goals and 747 assists for a total of 1011 points. I think he should be put up there with the Sedin twins as one of the best playmakers to come out of Sweden in the post-lockout era of the NHL.
Best of luck to Backstrom and I hope to be able to see you play hockey at least one more time, but, obviously, health is paramount and comes before anything in a situation like this
