The Capitals announced they’ve signed winger Ethen Frank to a two-year, $4MM deal. He’ll count $2MM against the cap for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons.
Frank was set to be a UFA this summer after completing the two-year extension he signed for the league minimum in 2024. With the Caps’ loss to the Mammoth last night putting them further out of playoff contention, there was a fair chance he could have been moved by Friday afternoon as a rental. Instead, he’ll be sticking around in D.C. for another two years.
The 28-year-old is certainly a late bloomer, but has grown into an impactful depth scoring presence for the Caps. The Nebraska native started his pro career as an undrafted free agent, signing with AHL Hershey out of Western Michigan back in 2022. He exploded for 30 goals in 57 games as a rookie – the most he’d had in a single season since his under-16 days – and earned an NHL deal from the Caps at that year’s trade deadline.
The 5’11” winger continued to serve as Hershey’s top goal scorer, awaiting his chance to squeeze out some NHL minutes. Amid a 20-goal showing in just 35 AHL games last year, the call-up finally came. Frank made his NHL debut in January 2025 and remained up with Washington the rest of the way, notching four goals and seven points in 24 games while seeing 10:49 of ice time per game. The skilled finisher shot at 17.4% and did everything he could in his limited minutes to put himself in the conversation for an opening night job this year.
It didn’t come. Washington waived Frank to begin the season and, somewhat unexpectedly, he managed to pass through the wire unclaimed. Less than a month later, he was back up with the Caps. He’s stayed up ever since and has been quite valuable for Washington in a bottom-six role. His 11-12–23 scoring line in 52 games ranks 10th on the team while seeing his ice time creep up to nearly 13 minutes per game, featuring more consistently on the Caps’ second power-play unit.
With Washington seeing an overall dropoff in finishing this season, it makes sense they’d want to retain one of their most efficient shooters, particularly with the lingering uncertainty of whether Alex Ovechkin will return for a 22nd NHL season. Washington now has 17 of the 23 players on its active roster signed through next season, with $34.5MM in projected cap space to burn, per PuckPedia.