The mantra was not just get in. Everyone was expecting 2013 to be the first year for contending, then lightning struck with the Carter deal, Voynov's arrival, and discovering Quick has ice water in his veins.
After that, "just getting in" was no longer acceptable.
In 2012 the Kings won as a team that missed finishing 1st in the Pacific by 2 points. Your disdain for Lombardi is obvious, and difficult to understand, but keep going with the "he just got lucky" narrative.
It's not a disdain. It's juts that he also relied on people he knew. Canadian farm boys that he knew, no less. People that he worked with, but people that he never won with. It's that his big move, Richards, wasn't working. It was damn near a total disaster. The line between winner and loser is that thin. The plan wasn't firing Murray. If that was part of the plan, it would've happened before it did. There was no, oh, obviously we'll get Jeff Carter. No, that was a move made in total desperation, and luckily Carter cried about having to live in Columbus.
It's just that his whole grand plan, the whole grand design, was not working. But because they did end up doing what the franchise has never done, we give him nothing but credit(Pre-June 2014. Everything after that, we've all agreed that DL was a total moron). But that's in hindsight. He completely whiffed on a top 4 pick, but that's discounted because he ended up winning. But before the team won, that was a big deal. As was trading and/or losing Purcell and Moulson for nothing. Those moves were the end of the world, until the Kings won. Then they became funny footnotes.
Nothing matters if you win. If you don't win, every detail matters. We'll obsess about every little move Blake makes, until they win. If you had said that DL would completely mess up a top 4 pick, before it happened, who says they'd still end up winning the Cup? Nobody. We all hate the Cloutier signing, but nobody really thinks about it anymore. It's just sort of, haha, remember when DL did that? That was crazy.
But DL at least played the part of a guy that knew what he was doing. Which was confirmed by the fact that they won. But how close were they to not winning? If Carter was happy in Columbus, who else are they getting that puts them over the top? Because they were totally desperate for offense in 2012, with nobody else like Carter on the market. And if there's no Carter in 2012, then 2013 and 2014 might look different.
