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Kings News: Marian Gaborik (with 50% Retained) to Kings for Matt Frattin + 2nd + Cond 3rd

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My hopes for Gaborik are high, but my expectations are low.

Don't get me wrong, I like the trade from a risk/reward standpoint; it could pay off huge if Gaborik is suddenly rejuvenated, remotivated, and healthy, but realistically, the chances of that happening are slim IMO.

His impact will probably be closer to that of Simone Gagne than Jeff Carter.
 
johnjm22 said:
My hopes for Gaborik are high, but my expectations are low.

Don't get me wrong, I like the trade from a risk/reward standpoint; it could pay off huge if Gaborik is suddenly rejuvenated, remotivated, and healthy, but realistically, the chances of that happening are slim IMO.

His impact will probably be closer to that of Simone Gagne than Jeff Carter.
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He's never been in a situation where he's had lower expectations. First ever pick by an expansion team in Minnesota. Big ticket free agent in NY. Trade deadline pickup by a team trying to make the playoffs that gave up players to get him.

With the Kings, he's now been traded for a healthy scratch, and Columbus is paying half his remaining salary to not play in Columbus, while they're in a playoff race themselves. He's coming to a team that has won the Cup and made it to the 3rd round without him. If he's just another guy at this point in his career, a 20 goal/50 point kind of guy tops, that works.

He's been traded twice within a year, for less each time. At 32, if he doesn't do well with the Kings, he might play himself out of the league.
 
KingsFan7824 said:
He's never been in a situation where he's had lower expectations. First ever pick by an expansion team in Minnesota. Big ticket free agent in NY. Trade deadline pickup by a team trying to make the playoffs that gave up players to get him.

With the Kings, he's now been traded for a healthy scratch, and Columbus is paying half his remaining salary to not play in Columbus, while they're in a playoff race themselves. He's coming to a team that has won the Cup and made it to the 3rd round without him. If he's just another guy at this point in his career, a 20 goal/50 point kind of guy tops, that works.

He's been traded twice within a year, for less each time. At 32, if he doesn't do well with the Kings, he might play himself out of the league.
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Almost looks like KHL material, hope he will want to resign. Anyone have ideas on what he will ask for or what we will want to pay.
 
FrozenRoyalty said:
My story/analysis/thoughts on Gaborik deal:

LA Kings Trade For Marian Gaborik Is A Good One, But…
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Pretty big quote there:

“The other thing I liked about this…Columbus gave us permission to talk to his agent. Marian wanted to come here before, don’t forget, before he went to New York. But I didn’t think it was the right time. He was very interested in playing here, but I thought where our franchise was at, it wasn’t the right time. I thought we needed to put other things in place first before you added a player like this. But that kind of dovetails. If he wanted to be here then, and now, OK, he’s coming here. He’s talked to his agent. He clearly wanted to come here. He’d like to stay here. I like that he’s coming here with the purpose of staying here versus some of things you saw out there with some of the free agents where the player says, ‘I’m going to July 1.’”
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Nice to know that we had already talked to his agent and the possibility of re-signing was already nodded over before the deal went down.

“I have a hard time thinking somebody’s going to go get his head smashed in St. Louis or San Jose when he’s already talking about going July 1,” added Lombardi. “So that’s the other factor, he wants to be part of the fabric of this team, versus somebody who’s already told you, ‘I want to go to July 1.’”
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Telos said:
Pretty big quote there:



Nice to know that we had already talked to his agent and the possibility of re-signing was already nodded over before the deal went down.
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Does this mean Lombardi also spoke to the agents of other free agents (Moulson, Vanek, etc.) and asked the same thing and got an answer he didn't like (going to July 1st)?
 
Telos said:
He was paired with Kopitar and Williams. Looking good!
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So they are going to try him at LW initially. I hope he excels there and Bernstein can eat it.

So, I'm guessing:

Gaborik - Kopitar - Williams
Toffoli - Richards - Carter
King - Stoll - Brown
Clifford / Pearson - Lewis - Nolan

Lots of opportunities for Sutter to mix and match depending on how things are going.
 
Can't wait to watch the game tonight. I think it's really going to be about desire for Gabby. Does he want it still or doesn't he? Is he still fast? I think the answer is yes. Can he still stickhandle? Can he still shoot it? I'll probably go with yes on those as well. Now, does he want to go into the dirty areas still? Work hard on the forecheck and backcheck? Gabby's elite qualities are still there, but will he work hard enough to put himself in position to use them? That's the key question. That's different from Simon Gagne when he was a King. Simon had the desire, just physically couldn't perform anymore.

If you look at Gaborik's games missed over the last few years, it's actually not as bad as people are making it out to be. First off, people seem to forget that last season was a work-stoppage shortened year. He missed one game. Prior to that, he missed 20 and just 6 games and no games the year the Kings won the Cup. That's not that long ago, folks. Obviously, he's been hurt this year, but recently the Kings have had some success with injury reclamation projects.

If Gaborik buys in, this could really be a great move. Think about how the defense will have to back off of him on zone entries because of his speed. Only Carter has that ability now. If he's paired with Kopi, I expect Gabby will enter the zone with the puck and create space for Kopi and whoever ends up on the other wing. Tonight is going to be very interesting as I'm sure many of us will be watching him closely.
 
People were saying the same things about Gaborik when he went to the Rangers. People are overblowing his recent struggles. He played 82 games, had 41 goals, and 76 points when the Kings won the cup, and he also nearly played all of the games during the lockout (47 out of 48). His injury this year was a sprained knee that is healed now and his most recent injury was just a broken collarbone. He should be good to go, even on the Kings he should be capable of 30 goals and 60+ points. Just have to wait and see. This is a guy who has had multiple 40+ goal, 80+ point seasons across more than one team and beyond severe lower body injuries and he didn't even need 82 games in either year to do it... He's done it before, and he is a high performer. It's more likely an issue with the Kings than Gaborik if he can't produce remotely close to par, which is still high end.
 
jfont said:
Does this mean Lombardi also spoke to the agents of other free agents (Moulson, Vanek, etc.) and asked the same thing and got an answer he didn't like (going to July 1st)?
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I believe Moulson/Vanek wouldn't have signed here.

Those guys according to rumors already have made up minds.

Vanek (Wife and house in Minny) Moulson (likes the East Coast, so does his family).

Players that have made their career's EAST of the Mississippi, Rarely choose to come West.
 
I'm really excited to watch him play. At the same time, I have low expectations. The guy could break his leg when he steps on the ice tonight. But man, this guy is probably the most skilled player Kopitar has ever played with in a Kings uniform. This really has potential to be fun to watch but that could all end in a flash.
 
Buddy The Elf said:
I'm really excited to watch him play. At the same time, I have low expectations. The guy could break his leg when he steps on the ice tonight. But man, this guy is probably the most skilled player Kopitar has ever played with in a Kings uniform. This really has potential to be fun to watch but that could all end in a flash.
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Probably the most skilled player he has ever played with period. Gaborik is the most skilled King since Palffy. Just pray he stays healthy
 
Telos said:
People were saying the same things about Gaborik when he went to the Rangers. People are overblowing his recent struggles. He played 82 games, had 41 goals, and 76 points when the Kings won the cup, and he also nearly played all of the games during the lockout (47 out of 48). His injury this year was a sprained knee that is healed now and his most recent injury was just a broken collarbone. He should be good to go, even on the Kings he should be capable of 30 goals and 60+ points. Just have to wait and see. This is a guy who has had multiple 40+ goal, 80+ point seasons across more than one team and beyond severe lower body injuries and he didn't even need 82 games in either year to do it... He's done it before, and he is a high performer. It's more likely an issue with the Kings than Gaborik if he can't produce remotely close to par, which is still high end.
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No one is questioning his talent, and we're all excited to him play, but there's a reason why his market value was so low.

Since February of last year, he's played about 64 games. In that time, he's scored 13 goals. That puts him at 16 goal pace over the course of a full season. Most of those games were with the Rangers, and against the defensively weaker Eastern Conference.

He has 1 power play goal in his last 91 games.

He had nearly the worst corsi on rating of any CBJ forward this season.

If this is the version of Gaborik that we're getting, than I doubt he'll have much positive impact. On the other hand, if coming to LA rejuvenates him, than he could be great, but the chances are slim IMO. He doesn't look to me like he cares much about hockey these days.
 
Buddy The Elf said:
I'm really excited to watch him play. At the same time, I have low expectations. The guy could break his leg when he steps on the ice tonight. But man, this guy is probably the most skilled player Kopitar has ever played with in a Kings uniform. This really has potential to be fun to watch but that could all end in a flash.
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This is what I'm most excited about. Those guys are going to be dynamite, and I think including Williams on that line is a subtle-but-genius move.
 
Buddy The Elf said:
I'm really excited to watch him play. At the same time, I have low expectations. The guy could break his leg when he steps on the ice tonight. But man, this guy is probably the most skilled player Kopitar has ever played with in a Kings uniform. This really has potential to be fun to watch but that could all end in a flash.
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Pretty much. And then we'd just pretend he's Matt Frattin sitting in that pressbox doing nothing, and go about business as usual until he's healthy again. That why this move is so great.
 
Great quote from DL in Gann's article:

“It’s interesting too…like [assistant general manager Rob Blake] said, and [veteran defenseman] Robyn Regehr had told Darryl this,” Lombardi elaborated. “This guy, when he’s on, is one of the hardest players in the league to play against. Not in a physical sense, but he’s very difficult to defend. You have to be cognizant of him on the rink all the time.”

“Again, it’s a weapon that I’ve felt we would like to add to the mix here to throw a little bit of everything at you, but not at the expense of what this team stands for.”

http://frozenroyalty.net/2014/03/06/la-kings-trade-for-marian-gaborik-is-a-good-one-but/
 
Chiming in here: Justin Williams was labeled an injury-prone, high-risk player when we acquired him. Now he's one of the most solid puck-possession forwards in the game and has carried this team at times with his work ethic. I'm optimistic our training staff and team size can help Gaborik avoid his past and get back to doing what he does best, just like J-Dub did.
 
Ollie Weeks said:
Pretty much. And then we'd just pretend he's Matt Frattin sitting in that pressbox doing nothing, and go about business as usual until he's healthy again. That why this move is so great.
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Everyone of the TV people referred to us as top tier contenders for the cup already before the trades came down and with the exception of the Blues no one else got a whole lot better, so this statement is clearly how we should view this if he works out awesome and if he doesn't we will miss the 2nd round pick lol, frattin looked like a draft day trade for a 3 or fourth round pick waiting to happen anyway

the reason I mentioned the TV people is on this board I think we forget how good we really are, at lest some do
 
jfont said:
Carter
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I think Gaborik has more dimensions than Carter, though. He's got the ability to carry and dish the puck more than Carter has. They both have the speed and snipes and hands, but Gaborik is better in traffic both in terms of holding the puck and getting a quick shot off in my humble opinion.

Edit: at least, the Gaborik of old did. haven't seen much of him since 2012 with the Rangers when he still looked great.
 
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