With limited options and resources at his disposal, General Manager Rob Blake ended up with a quiet trade deadline.
Having painted himself into a corner with cap mismanagement, Rob Blake was faced with a bevy of difficult decisions on Friday. The organization lacks many interesting NHL-ready prospects outside of Samuel Fagemo, who was recalled after the Nashville Predators claimed Jaret Anderson-Dolan off waivers. Down three wingers and a first-pairing defenseman, depth was already strained as it was before Blake’s curious decision to try and sneak both Anderson-Dolan and Jacob Moverare through waivers. The idea was to be able to “send” them to the Ontario Reign via paper transaction so they would be eligible for AHL playoffs.
With 24 hours to add a scoring winger, Blake either couldn’t or didn’t make it happen. Presumably this is because Adrian Kempe has been skating in a red no-contact jersey at practice, indicating that his return is imminent. Getting Kempe back is as good or better than any trade deadline pickup but it still feels like there’s something lacking, especially offensively. At 5v5, they rank 21st behind non-playoff teams Pittsburgh Penguins, Minnesota Wild, Nashville Predators and the Arizona Coyotes in goals-for per 60.1 Even if Kempe were to return for Saturday’s match up against Dallas, players typically take time to ramp back up to game speed. But for a team that has a long history of offensive woes and has struggled the last two years in the playoffs, why not go for a scorer?
This is where it’s a little head-scratching that the Kings didn’t go for the likes of Tyler Toffoli. General Manager Tom Fitzgerald apparently changed his mind about trying to keep the Scarborough native in Newark and ended up dealing him to Winnipeg while retaining 50% of his salary. It was a deal the Kings definitely could have afforded, even missing two picks from this year’s draft.
While Los Angeles doesn’t have this year’s third round pick (it went to the Columbus Blue Jackets last year along with Jonathan Quick in exchange for Joonas Korpisalo and Vladislav Gavrikov), there was surely some wiggle room. Toffoli’s 26 goals and 18 points would have him as the team’s goal-scoring leader and sixth in assists. The benefit also would’ve come with his historical knowledge of the team and systems. It’s impossible to ever know if LA was ever in the running (Blake declined to speak with the media following the deadline but there were also no indications from any reporters or NHL “insiders”), but it’s not to wonder if it was intentional.
If you’re wondering how Toffoli’s $2.125 million would’ve fit under the cap, the Kings actually had just shy of $2.5 million as of Friday. But if necessary, they could very easily have sent either Jordan Spence or Brandt Clarke back to Ontario for a month and a half until the playoffs. One of them (likely Brandt) was going to be reassigned soon anyway as Mikey Anderson continues to progress and could possibly return to the lineup soon as well. Anderson was not on long-term injured reserve so there’s no worry about going over the cap when he’s activated.
But perhaps most frustratingly, Blake opted not to heavily pursue a goaltender — a position that has been a weakness since 2020 and which has not been upgraded in four years. Yes, they were partially hamstrung by Jonathan Quick’s monster contract that Dean Lombardi signed him to. However, no one forced Blake to offer Cal Petersen a $15 million deal after only one good year. In a desperate effort to improve the team’s biggest weakness by far, they sent Petersen to the Philadelphia Flyers for Ivan Provorov in a three-way trade with the Blue Jackets. The Kings ended up retaining $2.025 million for the last three years of his contract. That dead cap space won’t come off the books until 2025. Unable to keep Korpisalo around for the summer (the $20 million contract with the Ottawa Senators was far too expensive for a cap strapped team like Los Angeles), Blake brought in Cam Talbot to compete with Pheonix Copley and it was expected that Talbot’s $1 million would be easily flippable. While Talbot has been instrumental in getting the Kings to where they are today (3rd in the Pacific), he wasn’t able to steal games for them during their usual winter woes.
Boston Bruins General Manager Don Sweeney acknowledged that he had a conversation with Blake about acquiring Linus Ullmark (who nixed the trade) but it was apparently not that serious.
What “enough” means is unclear. But what is clear is that the Kings made zero improvements to their roster at the deadline. Meanwhile, Las Vegas proved that cap space is a lie and if you’re willing to get creative. The Edmonton Oilers added Sam Carrick, Adam Henrique, Mattias Ekholm and Troy Stecher to their roster. The Jets acquired Sean Monahan, Toffoli and Colin Miller. Out in Denver, Yakov Trenin, Sean Walker, and Casey Mittelstadt join an already impressive Colorado Avalanche roster. The Dallas Stars were oddly quiet but it’s hard to improve on near-perfection (and they have L.A.’s number anyway). Based on current standings, the Kings could face the Canucks, Oilers, or any of the Central Division teams. Or they could fall out of the playoff race entirely.
Perhaps most frustrating is the Kings should’ve had room to add upgrade their roster even with their spate of injuries — or rather because of them. Copley, Carl Grundström, and Viktor Arvidsson have a combined $7.050 million cap hit. But thanks to mismanagement, somehow they managed to use $2.588 of their LTIR relief, leaving them with $2.4 million per CapFriendly (no indication what happened to the remaining $2 million they should’ve had).
Talbot is a very good goaltender and would make a terrific 1-2 punch for the Kings. The issue lies not in his skills. His underlying metrics are in line with his overall career performances and he has played very well this season. However, the Kings needs an elite netminder to take them further, someone who can steal them games. Four of their six games against the Oilers last year were decided by a single goal and three games went into overtime. Their seven-game series the year before had more lopsided scores, which they attempted to improve upon by bringing in Phillip Danault. Unfortunately for the Kings, Korpisalo was just not quite enough for them to win one-goal games.
If the Kings somehow manage to make a deep run and Talbot performs a miracle à la 2014 (although Quick had an elite pedigree), then maybe Blake was a master genius after all. If not, expect calls for his head to get louder. There’s no way Luc Robitaille can overlook a team of this caliber doing this poorly. Right?