LAK DEADLINE POKER: HOLDING KINGS

LOS ANGELES, CA — The NHL Trade Deadline came and went with the Los Angeles Kings going the conversative route in the seasonal high stakes poker game. Despite having significant holes in the lineup due to primarily but not exclusively injury, General Manager Rob Blake only augmented his battered roster with the addition of defenseman Troy Stecher from the Detroit Red Wings.

The cost was only a few poker chips – a seventh-round draft pick in the upcoming 2022 NHL Draft. What they get in Stecher is a healthy (a key word around these parts) right shot defenseman who returned from wrist surgery a month ago. He averaged 15 minutes a night with the Red Wings but given the presence of inexperienced defenders and a familiar ex-teammate in Alexander Edler to be paired with initially, you can assume that his minutes will climb north until the Kings have a full compliment on the blueline.

And that’s the tricky thing, when or maybe it’s more relevant to ask if, Los Angeles will ever be fully healthy for the remainder of the season.

I’ve covered this team since they moved into Staples Center/Crypto.com Arena and the rash of injuries in this short of a timeframe to impact players is unprecedented, hitting all facets of the team save goaltending. The chance of missing the playoffs in what has turned into a breakthrough season exists if the untested depth doesn’t perform adequately and why some were looking for more aggressive moves by the Kings when the final trade buzzer sounded on Monday.

What is in their favor is a very friendly schedule (tankathon.com ranks the remaining 18 games the third easiest) with the backdrop of playing .500 hockey (5-5-1) in the three weeks leading up to the trade deadline.

Give Blake and his staff credit, they have stuck to their conservative plan of building the franchise back to contender status and even though their margin of error has lessened, they remaining taking the long view. Given what contending teams (and regardless of your feelings about the lack of activity at the deadline, Los Angeles is not a legitimate Cup contender) have surrendered in this trade market, it would have taken multiple higher value assets to bolster the roster with proven talent.

I reported the conversations with Vancouver around Conor Garland – a player who would fit the Kings’ new identity and would be top six winger if added – but the price that included some combination of a first-round pick and one of Los Angeles’ right side defensive prospects didn’t come to fruition. It was also reported that Calle Jarnkrok was on the radar but surrendering a second, third and seventh round pick for an expiring free agent makes far more sense for Calgary than it does Los Angeles.

Blake’s injury news update on Monday was a mixed bag.

Viktor Arvidsson – who had been hitting the scoresheet with the regularity hoped since the calendar turned to 2022 – and Tobias Bjornfot may join practice by the end of the week with Brendan Lemieux hoping to follow by the end of next week’s homestand.

The defensive news was not as encouraging. Matt Roy looks to return to skating next week but the major concern is around what is (or was) the team’s top defensive pair – Drew Doughty and Mikey Anderson. Anderson was injured on March 7 in Boston and is expected to be gone six to eight weeks from the time of injury – at best, that would be a return for the team’s final five games, at worst he’s done for the regular season.

Doughty’s status will always be the most significant and the uncertainty around it is the biggest concern. His arm/hand/upper-body injury has not kept him off the ice but observing him each time he does practice does support the fact that he is not close to a return. He is not doing any puck drills and when he does shoot at the net it’s nothing more than lobbing attempts. I asked Blake for a more definitive timeline and to address the chatter that Doughty could be done for the regular-season and in response, he said that the injury will be reassessed to determine the length of return and it’s too early to speculate on if he’s played his last regular-season game of 2021-22.

So, while they may not crawl to the finish line on April 28, it sure looks like Los Angeles with cross it with a distinctive limp.

But that limp may be a blessing in disguise, the pressure of an NHL playoff run may enhance the toolkit of Jordan Spence, further mature Sean Durzi’s game, move the production needle for Quinton Byfield and may prove to be the redeemer that Gabriel Vilardi needs. In a season that has been fascinating to watch, one in which a team forged an entire new identity and has overachieved, the decision to hold their cards as their final bet was the only logical way this season can end.

And for those done with the abundance of patience approach, you can’t deal at the trade deadline for a top pair defense duo to replace Doughty and Anderson. 

But what about looking past their final destiny of this season? Even if the playoffs are reached, it’s apparent where this team needs to improve – only its strong 5-on-5 play enables it to be in a playoff race even with the failure of its special teams and receiving average goaltending (with a duo that has a $10.8 million cap hit next season, affordable maybe but not close to fair market value). Full credit to Blake for the medium swings he took this off-season, Arvidsson and Philip Danault have answered the questions posed with their acquisitions. The patience exercised with Adrian Kempe has finally paid off, he can thank the Maple Leafs for Durzi, Trevor Moore and Bjornfot, and Lemieux’s absence shows his worth far exceeds the fourth-round pick surrendered in March of 2021.

But they still can’t score.

The forwards from the prospect pool that have been recalled who were supposed to score (Arthur Kaliyev is 11th in rookie goal scoring but was with the club from Game 1) have literally delivered nothing. Maybe it changes in the final 18 games but I’m discounting that possibility based on watching the individual and collective struggles of the prospects to become impact offensive players. In addition, they are in the bottom third of scoring with Danault amid a projected 25-goal campaign and career years from Kempe (goal-wise) and Moore. If the team does make the playoffs, expectations automatically shift and are raised to winning the division title next season.

Some choose to keep ringing the “patience bell” and say give the kids – who I’ve advocated should be playing since last season – more time to grow but there is a flip side to that virtue. At some point, the fruit of the prospect tree must be harvested or it becomes overripe and will only return a fraction of its value.

There is no question some of the prospects have reached that stage, the last six first-round picks remain with the organization (Brandt Clarke, Quinton Byfield, Alex Turcotte, Bjornfot, Rasmus Kupari and Vilardi) and the highest future draft pick traded away is the third rounder in the Arvidsson deal (they have Pittsburgh’s 2022 third-round pick from the Jeff Carter deal), contending teams simply don’t have that many future assets. As strategic as the decisions were to export talent and make solid trades for futures, now the reverse must occur.

Does it happen with a Jacob Chychrun deal? Is it Ivan Provorov? Tyler Bertuzzi?

Los Angeles has the benefit of this season’s success to build off, but the sign of a true contender is what you’ve seen from others over the days leading up to the deadline – trading away picks/prospects. Until that happens in Los Angeles you won’t see the term “Cup contender” in the same sentence with the word “Kings.” But in the moment, having games of consequence being played in March in downtown Los Angeles is a net win for the franchise and its fans.