Rumor: Planning Ahead: 2019 Off-Season Part 2

[Fishhead]

Forbort looked ok as a rookie. Im very critical of his play and overall think he sucks. But I am willing to give him benefit of the doubt and hope he has a solid year. Chalk up last season as a sophomore-ish slump and move forward. The problem with him is he has many problems... Bad in the d zone. Bad in o zone. Gets beat a lot even by forwards that arent top end talents. For a big guy hes soft in front of his own net. What a horror show.
To be honest I thought the best he looked was on the 3rd pair with fantenberg and i think he may have also played with folin. On paper those pairings are scary bad but they did play solid.

He was actually worst with Doughty last year, but it's difficult to quantify as he played 1242 minutes with DD and less than 200 with everyone else combined. Here's a look over the last few years:

Forbort-Doughty: Had double the ice time of any other pairing - almost 3200 minutes - they were barely even split up. They had a CF% of 49.84, which is terrible for a pairing with a Norris winner. Their GF and GA and a wash, their expected GF/GA is slightly negative.

His numbers look slightly better with Folin and worse with Martinez, but the samples are so small they don't say much. There's a reason he plays so much more with DD than everyone else, 3 coaches now have seen that unless he's stapled to his side he's not nearly as effective.


Lifetime Drew has a CF of 50.15% with Forbort and a goal +/- of 3

Compare that with:

Muzzin - 58.98 % and +33 (minutes are nearly the same as with Forbort)
McNabb - 60.37% and +23 (1578 min)
Regher - 53.09 and +6 (931 min)
Scuderi - 52.87 and +11 (2454 min)
Johnson - 54.28 and -5 (JMFJ!, 630 min)
Mitchell - 55.11 and a +16 (1023 min)

Drew has been better with literally everyone, even minus forever. Scuderi is the lowest but that's only because the wheels fell off at the end for him, his first few seasons they were a 54.15 when he was Drew's regular partner.

He's just not a good defenseman. He's not even a 50% corsi guy and has a lifetime +/- of zero despite being hooked to one of the best in the game his entire career.

 

[Steve Zissou]

Forbort looked ok as a rookie. Im very critical of his play

This screams critical analysis coming up!

...and overall think he sucks.

Just jump to your conclusion in the same sentence I see, Einstein.

 

[funky]

With the way our defense looks, adding a Ton of rookies and losing our only real physical presence in Phaneuf, I really hope MacDermid is ready to step up.

1 - Doughty - true number 1 stud
2 -
3-
4 - Martinez - declining offensively but okay at 4
5 -
6 - MacDermid - I place him here as he is almost a true 6 but we need his physical presence and ability to step up since no one else will.

Candidate to fill spots

UFA - it almost has to happen or our goalies eat a lot of rubber

Forbort - has played 2, but more of a 5. Unfortunately there may be no one else to put at 2.

Roy - I liked what I seen last year in his limited time. He is a right shot Dman that should slot into the bottom pair nicely with MacDermid

Walker - another right shot guy that cut his teeth last year and seemed to do okay. Averaged a point every 4 games which may jump this year. If we had a good team I would let him fight Roy for 5 but we may need him to pair with Marty on the second pairing to make things work.

LaDue - right shot guy that needs to make it work now before being bypassed for good. Competes against Walker and Roy for bottom pairing spot.

Hopefuls - need to have great camps

Anderson - love those kids progress. Would love to see him blow the doors off everyone and line up beside Drew on opening night but it is more likely he starts the year in Ontario and continues his progress. Maybe one of my favorite prospects. Let’s bring him up properly.

Clague - I am not a fan but I also can’t really say why. I really hope he works. Obviously he could be a great Martinez replacement if Marty gets traded next year and Clague progresses like the team believes. If he makes the team where does he go? He is small and not a net front clearer. He is almost okay defensively but nothing to write home about at this point. Would want him next to a bigger guy that takes care of home plate and let’s Kyle take care of moving the puck up the ice.

Brinkley - not ready to write this guy off yet. Maybe with a good camp he makes the team but another year starting in the AHL to get a little more experience won’t hurt.

Without adding anyone else my early projections are this.

Forbort- Doughty
Martinez - Walker
Clague - MacDermid
LaDue

Manchester bound and may see call ups throughout the year.

Anderson, Durzi, Brinkley, Strand.


Of course I do believe Blake will pull off a trade for a defenseman. We are very bottom heavy at forward, have a little cap space to work with to take on a bit of a contract from a cap team. Maybe we see one of our guys go for a DMan

 

[Cook24]

For Shits and giggles...let’s see what our all prospect team would look like...

Kaliyev-Turcotte-Kupari
Fagemo-AndersonDolan-Vilardi
Grundstrom-Thomas-Luff
Rempal-Lizotte-Sodergran
Dudas/Eyssimont

M.Anderson-Durzi
Bjornfot-Phillips
Clague-Hults
Spence/Moverare

Peterson/Villalta

Excluded Roy, Walker, and Brickley because of age, even though Peterson is 24 also...

 

[LAKings88]

I think Roy and Lizotte have decent shots of making the team. MacDermid I think showed he can play and will be on the team with his physical presence.

In a perfect world, Carter and Kovy would be shipped out. Hoping they rebound and turn the hockey world on its head.

 

[Steve Zissou]

For ****s and giggles...let’s see what our all prospect team would look like...

Kaliyev-Turcotte-Kupari
Fagemo-AndersonDolan-Vilardi
Grundstrom-Thomas-Luff
Rempal-Lizotte-Sodergran
Dudas/Eyssimont

M.Anderson-Durzi
Bjornfot-Phillips
Clague-Hults
Spence/Moverare

Kaliyev has only played on the right side, never the left.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

This was quite the eventful day eight years ago. Never a dull moment with the Flyers.

What do you think Rob Bordson tells his friends?

He was actually worst with Doughty last year, but it's difficult to quantify as he played 1242 minutes with DD and less than 200 with everyone else combined. Here's a look over the last few years:

Forbort-Doughty: Had double the ice time of any other pairing - almost 3200 minutes - they were barely even split up. They had a CF% of 49.84, which is terrible for a pairing with a Norris winner. Their GF and GA and a wash, their expected GF/GA is slightly negative.

His numbers look slightly better with Folin and worse with Martinez, but the samples are so small they don't say much. There's a reason he plays so much more with DD than everyone else, 3 coaches now have seen that unless he's stapled to his side he's not nearly as effective.


Lifetime Drew has a CF of 50.15% with Forbort and a goal +/- of 3

Compare that with:

Muzzin - 58.98 % and +33 (minutes are nearly the same as with Forbort)
McNabb - 60.37% and +23 (1578 min)
Regher - 53.09 and +6 (931 min)
Scuderi - 52.87 and +11 (2454 min)
Johnson - 54.28 and -5 (JMFJ!, 630 min)
Mitchell - 55.11 and a +16 (1023 min)

Drew has been better with literally everyone, even minus forever. Scuderi is the lowest but that's only because the wheels fell off at the end for him, his first few seasons they were a 54.15 when he was Drew's regular partner.

He's just not a good defenseman. He's not even a 50% corsi guy and has a lifetime +/- of zero despite being hooked to one of the best in the game his entire career.

To be fair, you're comparing Doughty and d-men on the best possession teams of the decade with Doughty and a guy comparable to late career Scuderi on bar none the worst kings possession team of the decade and near the bottom of the league, i'd be more interested in the relative numbers to make the point even though I agree with the conclusion. The bigger problem with forbort is shot generation/play driving, he does a fine job of generally suppressing things to the outside,but there's a reason they're used more as a shutdown pair than they should be. Will never forget Doughty getting double-teamed because no one has any respect for Forbort with the puck, and dumping the puck to Forbort's side and double teaming him down low so DOughty can't get involved defensively, either. It's just sad.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Forbort started really, really good. The problem after that is he's only shown he can play with Doughty, and has been a mess with everyone else he's been paired with. So it's either first line or struggling, he looks like a 6/7 whenever he isn't with Drew.

I said this before the expansion draft, and I'll say it again: protecting Forbort over McNabb was a mistake. Drew's numbers with McNabb were off the charts, he's played better with him than anyone else in his career for whatever reason. And McNabb could play up and down the lineup if needed. Brayden had his issues but he's substantially better than Forbort, which analytics strongly supported at the time. Forbort was passing the eye test but his numbers showed glaring weaknesses. It could have easily been chalked up to small sample size, and was also during a time where everyone was getting sick of advanced stats and questioning their validity because they came up in every conversation. Unfortunately for the team it turned out to be a predictor rather than an anomaly.

It didn't bother me that much when it did happen, because I understood the reasons why the team did what they did. The team was on it's way to sucking anyways so it didn't really matter in the end.

I said for a long time McNabb was getting a raw deal here but he's not a top-pairing d-man ideally. He's a guy who can slot in there from time to time but would be best on a 2nd pairing. But he's absolutely better than Forbort and I was miffed McNabb was the one to go after all the developing we did and after he looked his best before that unfortunate injury. The problem for this parade of dudes playing with Doughty is that any average-to-good NHL d-man can look ok on a top pairing for some time, but it's a marathon--once you raise their minutes and stakes, their play drops. There's a reason even McNabb looked like Chris Pronger for 1/3 of a season, tailed off for the middle third, then completely fell apart in the last third.

 

[Johnny Utah]

Are we really starting next season with this ****?...

Kovalchuk-Kopitar-Brown
Iafallo-Prokhorkin-Toffoli
Grundstrom-Kempe-Carter
Clifford-Lewis-Luff/Wagner
Amadio

Forbort-Doughty
Martinez-Walker
MacDermid/Clague-Roy/Ladue

That’s terrible. Methinks Blake tried to move a couple of these guys(Ladue/Forbort/Lewis) at the draft for picks but no one wanted them lol...

Basically that is the roster. Walker and MacD played together in Ontario - so the question is really who is Martinez’s partner...Roy? Brickley? It would be nice to have someone with Brickleys size back there - I like Walker and Roy but they are small and didn’t really play physical.

I would like for Luff to step up and steal someone’s job so the Kings have to deal Lewis or Kovy.

 

[SFKingshomer]

We could use another top 4 D but I hope they stay away from the UFA market. Hopefully 1 or 2 of the young guys play well enough.

 

[Fishhead]

To be fair, you're comparing Doughty and d-men on the best possession teams of the decade with Doughty and a guy comparable to late career Scuderi on bar none the worst kings possession team of the decade and near the bottom of the league, i'd be more interested in the relative numbers to make the point even though I agree with the conclusion. The bigger problem with forbort is shot generation/play driving, he does a fine job of generally suppressing things to the outside,but there's a reason they're used more as a shutdown pair than they should be. Will never forget Doughty getting double-teamed because no one has any respect for Forbort with the puck, and dumping the puck to Forbort's side and double teaming him down low so DOughty can't get involved defensively, either. It's just sad.

That is completely true. But even look at last year alone when they were all terrible:

CF% Doughty with:

Muzzin - 59.12; Rel CF% 11.07
Fantenberg - 55.88; Rel CF% 6.3
Phaneuf - 48.68; Rel CF% 0.82
Forbort - 45.87; Rel CF% -3.24

Undoubtedly there will be a difference in deployments, opponent strength, zone starts, and so on. But that's just terrible. They were complete shit, even compared to our favorite Martinez/Muzzin pairing. They even had worse numbers than the 17-18 M&M fiasco which made me throw up in my mouth whenever they were out there.

 

[LAKings88]

Blake keeps saying they aren’t signing anyone.

Team is pretty much what it is.

Trim the fat, plug in youth.

 

[Cook24]

I blame the mayor for getting my hopes up on some of the older guys getting moved out, as much as it would hurt.(Quick,Carter,Lewis,Martinez)

 

[KopitarFAN]

Oh boy, if anybody thinks this team is gonna make a 25 point jump and contend for a playoff spot, I direct you to the blue line.

 

[KingsFan7824]

So if Leipsec doesn’t get a qualifying offer, he’s an UFA right? When is that deadline again?

Tuesday.

With the way our defense looks, adding a Ton of rookies and losing our only real physical presence in Phaneuf, I really hope MacDermid is ready to step up.

1 - Doughty - true number 1 stud
2 -
3-
4 - Martinez - declining offensively but okay at 4
5 -
6 - MacDermid - I place him here as he is almost a true 6 but we need his physical presence and ability to step up since no one else will.

Candidate to fill spots

UFA - it almost has to happen or our goalies eat a lot of rubber

Forbort - has played 2, but more of a 5. Unfortunately there may be no one else to put at 2.

Roy - I liked what I seen last year in his limited time. He is a right shot Dman that should slot into the bottom pair nicely with MacDermid

Walker - another right shot guy that cut his teeth last year and seemed to do okay. Averaged a point every 4 games which may jump this year. If we had a good team I would let him fight Roy for 5 but we may need him to pair with Marty on the second pairing to make things work.

LaDue - right shot guy that needs to make it work now before being bypassed for good. Competes against Walker and Roy for bottom pairing spot.

Hopefuls - need to have great camps

Anderson - love those kids progress. Would love to see him blow the doors off everyone and line up beside Drew on opening night but it is more likely he starts the year in Ontario and continues his progress. Maybe one of my favorite prospects. Let’s bring him up properly.

Clague - I am not a fan but I also can’t really say why. I really hope he works. Obviously he could be a great Martinez replacement if Marty gets traded next year and Clague progresses like the team believes. If he makes the team where does he go? He is small and not a net front clearer. He is almost okay defensively but nothing to write home about at this point. Would want him next to a bigger guy that takes care of home plate and let’s Kyle take care of moving the puck up the ice.

Brinkley - not ready to write this guy off yet. Maybe with a good camp he makes the team but another year starting in the AHL to get a little more experience won’t hurt.

Without adding anyone else my early projections are this.

Forbort- Doughty
Martinez - Walker
Clague - MacDermid
LaDue

Manchester bound and may see call ups throughout the year.

Anderson, Durzi, Brinkley, Strand.


Of course I do believe Blake will pull off a trade for a defenseman. We are very bottom heavy at forward, have a little cap space to work with to take on a bit of a contract from a cap team. Maybe we see one of our guys go for a DMan

Doughty
Martinez
Forbort
LaDue
MacDermid
Walker
Roy
Brickley
Durzi
Anderson
Phillips
Clauge
Strand
Reddekop

That's enough to fill both the Kings and Reign. If someone gets hurt, easy enough to call someone up and sign someone on a tryout for the Reign. It doesn't matter how many pucks the Kings goalies see next year. Seems like they're going to see if they have anything at all in the players that sit between the Cup vets and the 20 and under prospects. This should be the chance for all those mid-20's guys who aren't that far away from playing their way to the KHL. This is their moment. They keep saying they're going to be quiet, and do this internally. I think we should take them at their word on that.

 

[KingsFan7824]

I blame the mayor for getting my hopes up on some of the older guys getting moved out, as much as it would hurt.(Quick,Carter,Lewis,Martinez)

Nobody needs old guys with term. Always keep that in mind with any rumor. Guys like Lewis, nobody needs to trade for guys like that in the summer. There's a dozen TL's in free agency. He's the perfect deadline rental though. He's exceedingly low maintenance, and plug him on any 4th line of a team heading to the playoffs, and nobody will miss a beat. Same with Clifford. Nobody needs them for October.

Nobody needs old guys with term.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Oh boy, if anybody thinks this team is gonna make a 25 point jump and contend for a playoff spot, I direct you to the blue line.

Honestly I think they blackhole pretty hard this year. I'd argue it's harder for them to NOT make a 25 point jump assuming 3/4 of the vets are at 75% effectiveness instead of 25% and a few youngsters (amadio, kempe, etc.) take a large step forward in addition to the new coach bump and excitement from player debuts.

I'm not saying that out of hopefulness, I'm just saying most of the roster was truly that dreadful last year, like literally unsustainable bad all around.

 

[The Tikkanen]

So on July 1st I can enjoy my day without hitting refresh 1000 times?

 

[BigKing]

Been saying for months that the team is already here. It isn't a tank, but they are going to lose games because of that defense unless guys surprise.

What this is all about is these entitled vets either putting this team on their backs or punting again. Going to really see if these guys are still pros or not.

 

[rajuabju]

I'm looking at every possible roster option, guys in the AHL, etc....

There is literally no roster combination that gets me excited about our chances of putting out a team that can compete. EVEN if guys like Kopitar and Carter have bounce back years, there are still so many holes in our lineup.

I'm just hoping Blake understands the reality and continues strong drafting, shedding any contracts he can, and continues on a full rebuild path.

 

[raswilliam]

What do you think Rob Bordson tells his friends?

the same thing Martin Gelinas tells his homies.

 

[AKAY47]

We could use another top 4 D but I hope they stay away from the UFA market. Hopefully 1 or 2 of the young guys play well enough.

Blake pretty much said LA wouldn’t be heavy in the UFA game. Don’t think they’ll be making any substantial signings but I do think there’s a glaring hole in the top 4. Doughty hasn’t had a solid partner in so, so long. Since the Muzzin cup run year? Voynov-Mitchell? Martinez-Greene? Am I recalling that correctly? Haha

 

[KingsFan7824]

the same thing Martin Gelinas tells his homies.

Gelinas had his own NHL career though. Fairly solid too, all things considered. Not anywhere near as good as the 3 guys selected behind him, but better than the 3 guys selected ahead of him.

 

[kovacro]

So on July 1st I can enjoy my day without hitting refresh 1000 times?

July 1 on here is going to be an Error 520 filled day.

 

[Sleeping Dog]

July 1 on here is going to be an Error 520 filled day.

But that won’t effect King’s threads as they’ll be quiet on 7/1. I’m sure HF has servers assigned to each team, right?