It's not a double standard. People who have been talking about an NHL team for decades, through good and bad (as many of us here have) and being very down on the management of the team (which most Kings fans seem to be) is not the same as "OilersFan6969" coming onto the forum and trolling the Kings for losing to them again.
Your claim to fame on here was making a post where you said the 2012 season was over (paraphrasing), and the team proceeded to win the cup that year and 10 playoff series total over a three year period. By your own logic, wouldn't you be a fake fan who should be cheering for another team? You were wrong about the team being bad, but those of us who were right about the team being 1st round cannon fodder are now fake fans. Got it.
It's just so crazy that something as basic as this gets people excited for the hire.
I have no idea how he will do with the Kings, but at least his vision will be expressed to us fans.
Ok fine, but in 4-5 years when the Kings are hopefully maybe getting ready to contend for the playoffs, no complaining about these guys when their age is really starting to show and their contract is a huge albatross around whoever the GM is. No complaining when 35 year old players are traded to contenders and the Kings are retaining to make it happen. People here are freaking out about the aging and fall-off of Hall of Fame players, imagine what it will be like for a guy like Gavrikov, and even Kempe. Long-term contracts to players that extend well into the 30's are almost always bad news, we say it about other teams, so we should hold the Kings to the same standard.
If the Kings had just lost a hard-fought conference final and were a younger team, it's a different story. But they lost in the 1st round again, and many key players are on the wrong side of 30 already.
Absolutely they will. Whether he wants to, who knows?
But even if Byfield reaches the potential that some people here thinks he has, if Kopi retires next summer the Kings will have a gaping hole down the middle. And teams aren't letting young centers go, and certainly not to a team that largely gutted it's youth already by going after guys like PLD and Fiala.
It would not shock me in the least if Kopitar signed a 1 year extension sometime after July 1st for the 2026-2027 season and he and Doughty finish up together.
Signing Marner or giving Knies an offer sheet (If Marner re-signs with Tor) is probably the best way to try and win next season for the Kings. Because it gives you some much needed offense for either nothing (Marner) or 1st round picks that don't matter to a team with a 70 year old GM, 35+ year old top players and with a mandate to win within 2 seasons.
Scenario 1 you sign Marner, he slides right in perfectly with Kopitar and Kempe. Even with Kopi slowing down, those are two premier wingers in the NHL to play him with. We saw what Kuzmenko did for those guys, imagine Marner. This also lets Byfield and Fiala continue to feast on softer matchups. If they don't add a true 1st line wing, and Kopitar falls back even more (and he and AK were really struggling before Kuzmenko), you will start to see teams matching up their top checkers against Fiala/Byfield/Laf and not Kempe/Kopitar/whoever.
Scenario 2 you offer-sheet Knies if Marner re-signs with Toronto. He is a few months younger than Byfield, just had 30 goals and many nights really looked the part of a young burgeoning power-forward. You just hope like hell that he takes the step to a 35-40 goal winger, and Byfield takes the step to a 70+ point center. Losing the picks does suck, but I'd rather lose them on a 23 year old than a 31 year old. Once the Holland era ends, with the age of this team there is going to be a massive tear-down needed, and at that point you can flip Knies (and QB) to recoup some of the draft capital lost, as neither would be viable age wise for the next rebuild, which will probably be built around players drafted 2028-2032
Been saying for years to bring in forward thinking people from successful franchises and not retread GM's and loser players from the dead-puck era who never won a thing in LA. Look at this guys resume as opposed to Blake, Luc, Emerson, Murray etc, a bachelors from Harvard and a PhD from Cal Berkeley.
I wonder what spot this franchise would be in if ChatGPT were around and put in charge in 2017, I'm guessing we probably have at least one playoff round win.
I was saying this when Blake quit, the most important thing for this organization is leaving the 1990's and coming to the 2020's when it comes to how they draft, develop and deploy young players.
But I'm guessing that is going to be an issue for the next GM who replaces Holland. Holland sure seems like a win-now guy, and youth and development be damned. I think it's very unlikely that any of the players that Holland does draft end up playing for the Kings with him as GM.
The one difference we may see immediately though is Greentree. Holland had Larkin on the Wings as a 19 year old, and he contributed on a playoff team. I didn't think Greentree had a prayer to make the team under the Blake, Emerson, Murray paying the dues, learn the system ideology. With that possibly gone, maybe Holland wants to have a high skill guy on an ELC for the 3rd or 4th line.
Whatever the Kings would have traded for Eichel, it would have been worth it.
I've heard Byfield and Clarke
I've heard Vilardi, Turcotte, Kupari and Clarke
I've heard Kempe+
Name as many players/prospects as you want, but no realistic trade would have been bad for the Kings.
If you add Jack Eichel to this team, and remove him from Vegas it's very likely that the discussions around these parts are quite a bit different. A young star 1C in place makes building the rest of the roster a hell of a lot easier, just ask Dean Lombardi.
When the Kings won in 2012 they fixed their secondary scoring issues both years, and since you had a star 1C, 1D and 1G it made it where you were a single move both years.
The Kings are the opposite now, it's a huge collection of secondary scorers and solid players without any star players. The Kings are a star 1C away, but it's way harder (impossible most offseasons) to trade for a star 1C than it is for a goal-scoring winger like Gaborik or Carter.
Blake letting most of the 2019 draft turn to dust without recouping either draft capital or a veteran when they wanted to contend was right up there with his worst decisions as GM. This notion some push here that you can't trade prospects that quickly is not true, it has happened plenty of times before. I would have traded Turcotte for the best offer (best veteran or 2020 1st) and you just can't let Bjornfot and Kaliyev both end up on waivers, Bjornfot should have been unloaded when they deemed he wasn't good enough to beat out Edler.
I think our fanbase was a bit unrealistic when it comes to the fall-off older players have, because we didn't see much of it with Kopitar. And on the flip side due to the slow-cook and the comments by members of the organization, we also sometimes fail to realize how quickly an asset depreciates. Players 20-22 that our fans are calling kids and that the management is slow-cooking into oblivion are making things happen all over the league.
This is not some kind of gotcha that you think it is.
Eichel was put on the block in the Fall of 2021, that was after the Kings had already committed to ending their rebuild and trying to contend, which happened in July 2021.
I think
@Sol views are probably the same as mine, I would have preferred to keep the rebuild through the 2023 draft. That should have been option #1, that is what the AI would have said if you asked it at the best way to get back to true contending.
But once you commit to trying to win with older players and you have a bunch of prospects that you plan on slow-cooking, you should just trade them for the 25 year old star 1C.
Best All-Around Pick: Eric Tulsky (Carolina Hurricanes - AGM)
Visionary Builder: Kyle Dubas (Pittsburgh Penguins - President)
Proven Winner: Julien BriseBois (Tampa Bay Lightning - GM)
Culture & Identity Guy: Mike Futa (Former Kings AGM, Scouting Guru)
Wild Card / Bold Move: Meghan Duggan (Devils’ Director of Player Development) or Hayley Wickenheiser (Maple Leafs VP)
