Anyways, if I was to go out on a limb I think it has nothing to do with leaked photos or anything of that nature.
You know that's a cliche and is hyperbole right?
You've never heard the expression "they must have pictures of somebody"?
Like never? It's a fairly common expression implying that some situation or relationship is so absurd that the only possible explanation is blackmail.
It's not a sincere accusation or belief that compromising photos actually exist.
Here's a random sampling I found when I googled "must have pictures of somebody"
"Man, this guy makes me grab the mute button he is so stupid. He must have pictures of somebody [...], because there is no(expletive) way he passed an audition."
"Here is just how bad this LeClerc yoyo is. How is he still in the big league. He must have pictures of somebody doing something to somebody or something."
"Same guy, still. Not sure how he keeps his job with that winning personality of his. He must have pictures of somebody, or something!"
I'll confess that my current offerings are indeed "bland" (no offense bland) but c'mon man.
Meet me half way.
I think the issue realistically is that the organization is trying to make a sniper into a grinder and they preach conformtity rather than let Kaliyev delve into his skillset. This smells like bruised egos and bullshit. They dont know how to handle a sniper. They f***ed up with Kovalchuk and they're doing it now. If someone like Blake has a job still despite his only success is consistency in failure, then I don't think the bar is that high when it comes to management/assessment. We have confirmed already with evidence that the Kings messaging and actions contradict one another pretty frequently so let's not heavily waste our time on what comes from the coaches. Lets focus on the actions.
when the commentary and the actions contradict themselves you can ignore the commentary
when the commentary and the actions align I think you can find value in the commentary
Now tell me Jesse, what do you think the reason is? And try to add the same energy to your theory. It'd be a nice change of pace.
I'm not gonna connect every single dot because some of my thoughts are total speculation but I can tell you that (I think) everything I posted below is public record and verifiable.
Most of this is cut and paste from an earlier post I made. Some of it is cut and paste from other publicly available sources.
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To start the preseason Kaliyev was on a line with Dubois and Fiala.
Kaliyev got suspended after the Oct. 3rd preseason game against the Ducks.
In that game he played 10:10 at even strength with Fiala and Dubois.
McLellan quote at the time of the suspension
"He's not going to lose his spot," said McLellan. "Last year when he went down with the foot injury, it started out as a short-term injury and ended up being quite a long-term injury. The fact that he didn't get a lot of skating in and the overall ability to carry that big body around diminished a little bit. That's unfortunate circumstances where he lost his job, but this suspension won't prevent him from working, and working really hard, and maintaining his ability to skate and be involved in practices. He's had a very good training camp and we expect that to continue on when he returns to the lineup in Winnipeg, I think it is."
In the last preseason game before the season started the team dressed 11 forwards and 7 defensemen and the lines were essentially
Byfield - Kopitar - Kempe
Moore - Danault - Arvidsson
After Arvidsson got placed on LTIR to start the season and Kaliyev was suspended for the first two games of the season Laferriere replaced Kaliyev on the 22-80 line for two games.
As soon as Kaliyev served his suspension he joined Danault and Moore while Laferriere remained on the second line.
Kaliyev played with Moore and Danault from Game 3 to Game 13.
On October 19th McLellan said this of Kaliyev (in between games 3 and 4)
"That's the first regular season game we've seen Arty play. We saw him play in the exhibition season, we asked him to do a number of things over the summer that we think will help him become a better player, and yea he went on a different line last night but I think the big adaptation wasn't going to two new players it was what he had worked on over the summer. He looked faster, he looked quicker, more involved, more assertive. He beat a defenseman up ice all the way from the far end to score his goal. Those are all good signs. So I see your point and I agree with it but I'm gonna give him credit for the work he did before he got shuffled around on different lines."
SOMEWHERE around November 7th (between game 11 and game 12) Todd McLellan said the following (from my files... media availability recording)
"You can't ease your way in and I think some of our younger players have figured that out now. You have to put your work in and you have to earn your stripes. When you do, things go your way. Arthur did that over the summer. He's way better equipped now to play than he was in the past and I think anybody watching the game can see that."
In Game 14 v the Flyers Kaliyev was moved to a line with Laferriere and Dubois.
Fiala was moved to the line with Danault and Moore.
Fiala would go on to play almost 600 minutes with Danault and Moore. It was the second most common line combo the Kings used last season behind Byfield-Kopitar-Moore.
You can go back and find quotes from McLellan and Fiala et al about why the 80/22 pair was split up.
NOVEMBER 24th
they bumped Grundstrom up to the Dubois Laferriere line because Grundstrom had been off to a hot start and they wanted to help kick start PLD or at least that's the accepted narrative.
Kaliyev found himself on a line with JAD and Trevor Lewis. (I believe Lizotte was out with an injury?)
Up to that point
Kaliyev had 3 goals, 5 assits and was +5 in 15 games
averaging 14:29 per game
2:16 on the PP
0 points on the power play
and had been complimented multiple times for doing the work they asked him to do in the offseason and improving his overall game
The game that Kaliyev was placed with Lewis and JAD and Grundstrom bumped up was
11/24 a 5-2 win over the Ducks
11/25 a 4-0 win over MTL (Kaliyev w Lewis/JAD)
11/29 a 2-1 that 2-1 loss to the Washington Caps (34 w/ JAD/Lewis)
12/03 a 4-1 win over the Avs (34 w/ JAD/Lewis)
That led into the road trip where they beat Columbus in OT, shutout the Habs again and then got beat by the Islanders and Rangers on back to back nights on the road to end the unbeaten streak.
By January 26th, Kaliyev had been healthy scratched twice and we had open rumors about potential trades and Todd McLellan directly addressing a question about Kaliyev and referencing the rumors.
The Kings record from moving Kaliyev to the 4th line in favor of Carl Grundstrom til the All-Star Break when McLellan was relieved of his duties
12-12-7
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It's 2:31am and I woke up in the middle of the night and can't get back to sleep so forgive me for not tracking down every quote that I have a faint memory of but I seem to recall comments being made in conversations on All The Kings Men about things that happened at practice. I know that there are more tweets and clips from 32 Thoughts and other canadian media markets on the availability of Kaliyev and there's been quotes on here from people eavesdropping at various events around Kings dev camp etc.
TL;DR
Kaliyev was praised early and often for putting in work, improving his game and performing the way they wanted him to.
Kaliyev-Danault-Moore was a successful line and at the time they were broken up, Moore was on pace for 44 goals. Kaliyev was on a 22 goal/52 point pace. Danault was on a 19 goal/50 point pace.
CF% 58.58
xGF% 57.77
GF% 69.23
Dubois and Fiala were split up.
Shortly after that Grundstrom was promoted up the lineup to play with Dubois.
About two months after that we started hearing rumblings of potential trades for Kaliyev and hearing public statements from the coaching staff that he had to "work hard to fit" and "wanna be here, wanna be out there and wanna be successful" and that when he did that he would play again.
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EDIT: I tried to find the quotes to back up my memories but can't pull it off right now but I remember multiple occasions where Grundstrom, Moverare and JAD were all praised for their attitude when not getting into the lineup or being called up and down and not having the opportunities that they maybe wanted or in some cases earned.
I know I brought it up on an episode of ATKM asking if perhaps cultivating an environment of "complacency" among players/prospects wasn't necessarily a good thing.
11/23 - McLellan on JAD
"He's proven that hes been able to do that. Hes very focused and committed on his craft. Regardless of wether hes in the lineup or not hes planning on getting better everyday. I'm sure its mentally its hard on him. the team went on a pretty good run and we didnt flip the lineup aroun very much. that couldnt be easy but if there's an individual that can handle that it would be JAD"
Just poking around my files a bit more I found this quote from Oct 5th in the preseason.
"I'd like to talk about Arthur prior to training camp because we asked him to do a lot of things in the summer, physicality, the strengthening his engine so that he can play there and play their consistency, stretch some shift lengths out and not hurt the team but help the team contribute to the game when it's not just about shooting it in the net and I think we've seen that, pardon me, in the last three exhibition games. He's done his homework, he should feel confident, he deserves to be confident right now and we want to see him continue that as the season rolls in."
