Capitals coach Spencer Carbery addresses reporter Bailey Johnson’s Washington Post layoff

Spencer Carbery started his press conference Thursday morning by acknowledging the reporter who wasn’t there.

Bailey Johnson, who covered the Capitals for the Washington Post for the last two and a half years, was laid off on Wednesday as part of the mass layoffs that effectively shuttered the Post’s sports department.

“I would be remiss not to say something about Bailey not being here today,” Carbery said. “Getting to know her over the last two and a half years, I’m just thinking about her. And also know wherever her next stop is, whether it’s in the DC area or somewhere else, know she’ll do a fantastic job. She’s an incredible person and really, really good at what she does.”

#ALLCAPS Coach Spencer Carbery started this morning’s press conference by acknowledging @BaileyAJohnson_, who said she is among the journalists caught up in WaPo’s layoffs yesterday. “I would be remiss not to say something about Bailey not being here today. Getting to know her…

— Tarik El-Bashir (@Tarik_ElBashir) February 5, 2026

Johnson announced the layoff on X on Wednesday afternoon, shortly after the Post began sending individual emails to staffers informing them they’d lost their jobs.

I was among the layoffs at @washingtonpost today. It has been an absolute dream to be a small part of this incredible team. Covering the Caps has been an honor; being a beat writer is an all-consuming thing that I love deeply. I hope I’ll get to continue that in whatever is next

— Bailey Johnson (@BaileyAJohnson_) February 4, 2026

The Post had covered the Capitals since the team’s inaugural season in 1974. That relationship ended Wednesday morning when executive editor Matt Murray told employees on a Zoom call that the sports department would be closing in its current form.

Johnson responded to Carbery’s comments later Thursday.

“I was so lucky to spend my time here covering a coach as kind, generous with his time and sincere as Spencer Carbery,” Johnson wrote. “I learned from him every day, and it was a gift.”

I was so lucky to spend my time here covering a coach as kind, generous with his time and sincere as Spencer Carbery. I learned from him every day, and it was a gift. https://t.co/LAf0uV2TDu

— Bailey Johnson (@BaileyAJohnson_) February 5, 2026

The layoffs on Wednesday affected roughly one-third of the Post‘s staff. The sports department took the heaviest losses. Murray told employees that a handful of reporters would move to the features department to cover sports as a “cultural and societal phenomenon,” meaning they’ll write about sports when something intersects with politics or social issues, but won’t necessarily cover games. A few employees would remain to work on the print sports section. The rest were out.

Johnson was one of dozens of sports staffers who lost their jobs. The casualties included NFL writer Mark Maske, Commanders reporters Tashan Reed and Tom Schad, Nationals beat writers Andrew Golden and Spencer Nusbaum, college sports reporter Jesse Dougherty, columnist Candace Buckner, NBA writer Ben Golliver, enterprise reporter Sam Fortier, sports media reporter Ben Strauss, and sports investigative reporters Will Hobson and Molly Hensley-Clancy.

The layoffs followed weeks of cost-cutting that made Wednesday’s outcome feel inevitable. A few weeks ago, according to Puck’s John Ourand, the Post informed Monumental Sports that it would no longer send reporters — including Johnson — on the road to cover the Capitals, Wizards, or Mystics.

The consequences of eliminating that coverage played out on Wednesday afternoon when the Wizards acquired Anthony Davis from the Mavericks in one of the biggest trades in franchise history. The Post’s coverage  — if you can even call it that — consisted of a single Associated Press article that didn’t appear on the website until more than seven hours after the trade was reported. That’s likely what Capitals coverage looks like now without Johnson, which Carbery was pretty much acknowledging when he opened his press conference by talking about her.