Capitals’ Rasmus Sandin expected to miss some time of 2026-27 season with leg injury
A veteran blueliner is going to be out for an extended period of time, and even well into next season.
On Monday, Washington Capitals general manager Chris Patrick revealed that defenseman Rasmus Sandin will miss a “decent amount of time” due to a leg injury. According to Patrick, the ailment could keep Sandin on the shelf for the beginning of the 2026-27 season.
Rasmus Sandin will miss a “decent amount of time” going into next season, GM Chris Patrick said. Will factor into Caps offseason plans
Patrick also noted that Sandin’s looming absence next fall could play a role in how the Capitals’ front office approaches the offseason, as the team looks to bounce back after a disappointing finish in 2025-26, missing the postseason for the first time in three years.
Sandin suffered a lower-body injury in Washington’s second-to-last game of the regular season back on April 11 against the Pittsburgh Penguins, which held him out of the final two games of the campaign against the Pens and Columbus Blue Jackets.
It wasn’t an easy season for the 25-year-old, as he ended up missing a total of nine games due to injury. He sustained upper-body injuries that caused him to miss a handful of games in October, November, and December, with another lower-body injury forcing him to miss a contest in late January.
Yet, in the 73 games he appeared in, Sandin managed to be a productive player on a struggling Caps team. He posted five goals and 24 assists for 29 points, finishing ninth on the team in scoring, just one point shy of matching his career-best performance, when his 30 points in 82 games helped Washington finish atop the Eastern Conference standings. Sandin also had a plus/minus of +4 while averaging 19:12 of ice time per game.
This year was the third full season the Swedish blueliner completed as a member of the Capitals. Traded to Washington from the Toronto Maple Leafs prior to the trade deadline during the 2022-23 campaign, he has been a consistent piece in the lineup, scoring 97 points in 242 regular-season games with the club, with one assist in 11 postseason games.
Sandin still has three more seasons on his five-year contract he signed with the Capitals in March 2024, with the deal carrying a cap hit of $4.6 million through the 2028-29 campaign.