Lombardi, Sutter both fired; Robitaille promoted Kings' president, Rob Blake VP & GM

[topshelf15]

The Senators also send their regards.

Huh ,we hired our head of pro scouting to be our GM .PD may lack in social skills at press gatherings,but the guy can spot talent

 

[Vesa Awesaka]

Huh ,we hired our head of pro scouting to be our GM .PD may lack in social skills at press gatherings,but the guy can spot talent

Jason Smith, Richardson, Donovan, Alfredsson, Cameron, Justin Murray, Tim Murray


These are just everyone i assume the poster meant.

 

[tomd]

Personally, I have zero confidence that Blake and Robitaille have the skills to be successful especially given the mess that the current roster is in. The Kings are now the very definition of a black hole team and that is a sad (but predictable) legacy that Lombardi leaves behind. Good riddance to them all.

 

[Baemon Severson*]

Good for the Kings for cutting bait quickly

 

[Bee Sheriff]

I can say nothing bad about the guys who brought the franchise's only two cups. Thanks for it all. Now it's time to move on and hope the new guys make the right moves for the future.

 

[LAKings88]

Sutter lost the room, Kopitar all but confirmed it in his comments after the last game.

I blew off the locker room stuff from two years ago but I guess there was more to it.

DL in a nutshell.

1-Didn't buyout Richards for free and use that money elsewhere.
2-Gaborik's deal to lower the cap hit. (risky given age and injuries)
3-Voynov (just sucks all around)
4-Greene over Mitchell (It's a wash in the end but Mitchell was better on the ice)
5-Lucic (short sighted)/Sekera/Bishop=I get the reasoning but he failed to recognize and adapt to what the league was becoming. Cost prospects for what became nothing really, which hurts an up against the cap team.
6-Should have fired Sutter this year.

 

[Redline]

Those boys have some work to do. It will be interesting to see what direction they take though i suspect either way the task will be daunting.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

I don't have the numbers but remember that playoff revenue is almost pure profit since the players salaries have already been amortized over the regular season. So I do believe that profits (not revenue) are significantly impacted by missing the playoffs versus a long playoff run.

I'm not familiar with the additional revenues that Robitaille has brought in since coming on board and I won't dispute it (but a link would help). Other than ticket prices and TV revenue I can't imagine that it is significant. I do suspect, however, that it might be highly elastic with team performance and if the team continues to suck these revenue sources will begin to dwindle. As many Kings fans have lamented this year, unused tickets are selling for pennies on the dollar compared to the glory days of just 2-3 years ago.

I could buy that 100% as a reason for these moves given Beckerman's statements about basically "we expect to be a playoff team."

I think Lombardi is one of the most overrated GM's there is. Just imagine where the Kings would be if that Richard's situation had gone differently... They got off easy there.

Yeah, just imagine where they'd be if they never hired him in the first place! We might not have all these problems that surfaced as a result of players performing on the way to two Stanley Cups!

 

[roon]

Letting the coach that won you 2 cups in 3 years go? Bold move Cotton - lets see if it works out for them.

 

[Kranix]

Sutter lost the room, Kopitar all but confirmed it in his comments after the last game.

I blew off the locker room stuff from two years ago but I guess there was more to it.

DL in a nutshell.

1-Didn't buyout Richards for free and use that money elsewhere.
2-Gaborik's deal to lower the cap hit. (risky given age and injuries)
3-Voynov (just sucks all around)
4-Greene over Mitchell (It's a wash in the end but Mitchell was better on the ice)
5-Lucic (short sighted)/Sekera/Bishop=I get the reasoning but he failed to recognize and adapt to what the league was becoming. Cost prospects for what became nothing really, which hurts an up against the cap team.
6-Should have fired Sutter this year.

Weren't these moves tinkering around a what the President of AEG called a championship core? They didn't work, but you can't win the cup every year.

 

[Sacha Baron Corbin]

Letting the coach that won you 2 cups in 3 years go? Bold move Cotton - lets see if it works out for them.

3 years ago...it's pretty obvious Sutter had lost the room some time ago and should not have been brought back for this season

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Weren't these moves tinkering around a what the President of AEG called a championship core? They didn't work, but you can't win the cup every year.

Yeah I don't think you can fault a guy for trying to replace Voynov with Sekera coming off two Cups and a WCF. Kings had just won 8 straight or something too. I applaud him for having the guts to keep doing that. After, maybe, it's more easy to be critical, but i'll never get the venom about the Sekera move.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Live press conference FWIW:

https://www.nhl.com/kings/news/live-aeg-la-kings-press-conference/c-288675234

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

Those asking about Futa, Blake seems to want to keep him aboard.

 

[tomd]

I could buy that 100% as a reason for these moves given Beckerman's statements about basically "we expect to be a playoff team."



Yeah, just imagine where they'd be if they never hired him in the first place! We might not have all these problems that surfaced as a result of players performing on the way to two Stanley Cups!

If true, everyone can dispense with the rebuild proposals. They are going to ride the current core into the playoffs or into the black hole.

 

[tsanuri]

Those asking about Futa, Blake seems to want to keep him aboard.

So he already not near as dumb as some people want to think he is.

 

[Raccoon Jesus]

If true, everyone can dispense with the rebuild proposals. They are going to ride the current core into the playoffs or into the black hole.

More likely the black hole but yes. I don't know if I said that in this thread or another one, but Beckerman's comments about the firings yesterday were basically "we expect to be a playoff team" with this core. And he's not really wrong, you tell anyone they have Kopitar-Doughty-Quick you should be able to get some auxillary parts that put you on the bubble. But I agree, they're gonna try to be a consistent playoff team, which will likely be the Dave Taylor era all over again. No rebuild here. Expect a huge contract for Doughty. And so on.

 

[Kranix]

Maybe Lombardi could have saved himself by firing Darryl earlier, like most GMs do. Lombardi got screwed by Mike Richards too it seems.

 

[tomd]

More likely the black hole but yes. I don't know if I said that in this thread or another one, but Beckerman's comments about the firings yesterday were basically "we expect to be a playoff team" with this core. And he's not really wrong, you tell anyone they have Kopitar-Doughty-Quick you should be able to get some auxillary parts that put you on the bubble. But I agree, they're gonna try to be a consistent playoff team, which will likely be the Dave Taylor era all over again. No rebuild here. Expect a huge contract for Doughty. And so on.

Your observations seem obvious to me as well. People expecting a rebuild are delusional. Unfortunately for Kings fans, the current roster is probably not in the top 10 in the conference especially with Winnipeg continuing to improve. I just don't see realistically what trading chips LA has to improve themselves but I guess we'll find out.

Also interesting that Toffoli and Pearson weren't mentioned as part of the "core".

 

[Sacha Baron Corbin]

Your observations seem obvious to me as well. People expecting a rebuild are delusional. Unfortunately for Kings fans, the current roster is probably not in the top 10 in the conference especially with Winnipeg continuing to improve. I just don't see realistically what trading chips LA has to improve themselves but I guess we'll find out.

Also interesting that Toffoli and Pearson weren't mentioned as part of the "core".

Toffoli and Pearson still haven't proven themselves to be consistent first line wingers. Pearson had a breakout year playing mainly with Carter but Toffoli still hasn't taken that next step forward after he scored 30 last year

 

[tomd]

Toffoli and Pearson still haven't proven themselves to be consistent first line wingers. Pearson had a breakout year playing mainly with Carter but Toffoli still hasn't taken that next step forward after he scored 30 last year

So will they commit $8-10 million to these two guys or use them as trade bait?

 

[roon]

3 years ago...it's pretty obvious Sutter had lost the room some time ago and should not have been brought back for this season

Lost the room? What does that even mean?

Are these not professional grown ass men? The way coaches are recycled in the NHL most of them have played for everyone at some point in their careers.

Coaches aren't allowed to fight through the adversity in this league and it's sad. Always catching the blame for the inadequacies of their players.

 

[Voight]

I really thought Lombardi would get another year.

But Blake was waiting in the wings so I can see why they made the move now. Hextall was already scooped up by another team and theres a chance Blake could have left for a GM spot this off season, I think he'll make a really good GM. Lucky Luc from what I've heard has made the Kings a world class organization on the business side and given his vast experience in the business of hockey he should be fine as head honcho now.

 

[Voight]

Sutter lost the room, Kopitar all but confirmed it in his comments after the last game.

I blew off the locker room stuff from two years ago but I guess there was more to it.

DL in a nutshell.

1-Didn't buyout Richards for free and use that money elsewhere.
2-Gaborik's deal to lower the cap hit. (risky given age and injuries)
3-Voynov (just sucks all around)
4-Greene over Mitchell (It's a wash in the end but Mitchell was better on the ice)
5-Lucic (short sighted)/Sekera/Bishop=I get the reasoning but he failed to recognize and adapt to what the league was becoming. Cost prospects for what became nothing really, which hurts an up against the cap team.
6-Should have fired Sutter this year.

Loyalty is what really cost him, guys like Brown & Gaborik got long term deals worth big $$ because of how they played during cup runs.

In regards to Richards, he was still able to circumvent himself out of that one and rid of him for a lot less than a buyout, to be fair.

 

[LAKings88]

Loyalty is what really cost him, guys like Brown & Gaborik got long term deals worth big $$ because of how they played during cup runs.

In regards to Richards, he was still able to circumvent himself out of that one and rid of him for a lot less than a buyout, to be fair.

Each of the deals are understandable if maybe not wise.

If Sekera was resigned no one would talk about it. Guess DL thought he had a chance.

Richards was still on the roster in 15 with a significant salary. Shed him and bring in someone else with that money. DL did not get off either. Still eating up space on a team that needs all it can get.