News Article: You want 'em both?

[Whiskeypete]

in the simplest and stat filled format available today, since the trade(s) took place

-Carter to Columbus, eventually to LA
-Richards to LA, Schenn and Simmonds to PHI

LA SC 1, PHI SC 0

end of story

the remainder of your subjective bs means nothing, because stats and winning for both teams comes down to only one thing. the Stanley Cup. until the Flyers, Simmonds and Schenn hoist the Cup this conversation is over. so the question of 'who won the trade' as of now is simple, LA.

 

[damacles1156]

We need to talk to those certain folks, they just have to show up to be educated, that's all.

Pretty sure it's the same folk, that said Quick would never amount to a quality Starting Goalie.

 

[Herby]

There is a alot of strange things being said here.

JT, the Kings were going nowhere without a trade for a true 2nd line center. We had gone through three awful seasons of watching Stoll try and fail miserably at it. I know you were always a big Stoll guy, but there is no way a team wins a Stanley Cup with him as 2nd line center, and certainly not a team who lacked an elite winger. The Kings had core players entering their prime years and those years would have been wasted without a compliment to Kopitar. And I think the Kings started to see something in Schenn that they didn't like, the first hint was when despite massive injuries the Kings didn't call up Schenn for the 2011 playoffs after his junior team was eliminated, instead calling up John Zeiler. And even almost three years after the trade, Schenn hasn't shown anything that suggests he will ever live up to his draft hype, I think you are falling in love with what he was supposed to be and not what he really is.

I've been critical of Richards play, you are right, he does go through stretches of awful play, he does struggle defensively at ES, especially against bigger centers, I really don't find him the savior many on this board do, but when he is on, he is a heck of a player and a quality 2nd line center, and the Kings don't win the Stanley Cup without a massive upgrade at 2nd line center, and that was going to cost the Kings a significant amount, no matter which guy they traded for, whether it was Richards, Kessel, Staal, Carter, whoever.

I don't think you can honestly say the Kings win the Stanley Cup with either Stoll or Schenn in 2012. They did win the cup with Richards, so that is why the trade was good for the Kings.

 

[King'sPawn]

The Kings have already won their respective trades in the form of a cup and elite contender status.

It's just yet to be proven if Philadelphia or Columbus win their respective trades if they build a successful franchise around the pieces they acquired. But at this point it's a resounding no.

 

[damacles1156]

So according to JT Dutch, the Kings lost because the Flyers gained more assets that are younger? I guess the Devils lost the Mogilny trade as well when they dealt Brendan Morrison and Denis Pederson to the Canucks, despite winning a Stanley Cup. Sometimes I wonder what exactly is going on in this poster's head. Doesn't make any logical sense.

What the **** is the reason for being in this league? To win a Cup. The Kings accomplished that and reached the Conference Finals the year after and are looking like strong contenders again this season, and it all started when they added Richards, then added Carter, and had players slide into roles where they are put in a position to succeed. They didn't have such depth or success with Simmonds and Schenn.

So if you undo the trade and have Johnson still on the blueline, do you honestly believe the Kings would be where they are today in the standings, with a Cup and Conference Finals appearance in back-to-back years? Get real man.

That's often overlooked, would anyone really want Jack minus Johnson roaming the blue line still ?

Anybody ? , over Slava mind you......

 

[Herby]

Well to be fair, the Flyers weren't winning a SC with them either, especially with Pronger's career ending.

On the Flyers they were considered premier players, on the Kings they are probably the 4th and 5th best players on the team, the Flyers had no Kopitar and certainly no Doughty or Quick.

The Flyers would not have been skating laps with the Stanley Cup had they held on to Carter and Richards. They were an average team who somehow made it to the finals and then came back to Earth, much like the 2006 Oilers.

 

[damacles1156]

Well, he truly is a unique person with a different point of view. One of those bitter fans who is never satisfied. Speaking of never satisfied, how about those Flyers who won the Richards and Carter trades who are fighting tooth and nail to earn a playoff spot in the weak Eastern Conference? They may miss the playoffs in two consecutive years. Yeah, they sure are on the upswing.

Even if they made the playoff's ...First round fodder.

They have no stable Defense to speak of, no structure to their game.

Kudos to Mason, he has found himself again on a piss poor team.

 

[Whiskeypete]

but Simmonds scored two goals tonight so the Flyers and that young talent came out ahead on the trade

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

With Richards and Carter on Philly, they were able to reach the Conference Finals in 2008 and reached the Cup Finals in 2010, and lost twice in the 2nd round in their last season there before deciding to move Richards and Carter. They were able to accomplish this without having any stability in net. I think they were missing some pieces but they were on the cusp of accomplishing something there with those two at the helm and with Giroux emerging as one of the top players in the game.

Now look at where their organization is. Still struggling to find consistent goaltending.

 

[Nefarious]

So if you undo the trade and have Johnson still on the blueline, do you honestly believe the Kings would be where they are today in the standings, with a Cup and Conference Finals appearance in back-to-back years? Get real man.

To be fair, I think Johnson's +/- would still be the same.

 

[Fishhead]

Carter and Richards played in 4 out of the last 6 conference finals on their teams, playing in two cup finals and winning one. That's pretty damn impressive, I'm not sure there are many other players that can say that.

It is impossible for the Kings to have lost either of those trades, the goal has already been accomplished. You could argue that Philly also won those trades, the two aren't mutually exclusive. I personally think the only way Philly wins the Richards trade is if they flip Schenn/Simmonds into a major talent and actually do something rather than play mediocre hockey.

 

[T2M]

I think everybody's forgetting the fact that Richards is the cultural catalyst that turned the Kings from a developing team into a group of winners. He did it with this hit:



After that hit in game one, the Kings don't take any more crap from anybody else. It would only be a couple of games later that Brown made the first major statement of what would be a series of career defining major statements with this hit:



The team took off from what Richards did. He set the tone for this team being not just "hard to play against" but ruthless. The Kings haven't been the same team since that Vancouver series and I credit Richards with showing Kopitar and Brown what it means to elevate their games at key moments. To their credit, they took that and ran with it and the rest of the team followed, but Richards just did it the way he always does: Find a big moment in the game, make the right play, get the win, forget dry island.

Schenn and Simmonds would never have done that. The Kings will be a different franchise for this generation because of the catalytic effect of Mike Richards' character. This is where the stats fall short. They don't measure quality, and sometimes that's worth way more than quantity.

 

[jml87]

I think everybody's forgetting the fact that Richards is the cultural catalyst that turned the Kings from a developing team into a group of winners. He did it with this hit:



After that hit in game one, the Kings don't take any more crap from anybody else. It would only be a couple of games later that Brown made the first major statement of what would be a series of career defining major statements with this hit:



The team took off from what Richards did. He set the tone for this team being not just "hard to play against" but ruthless. The Kings haven't been the same team since that Vancouver series and I credit Richards with showing Kopitar and Brown what it means to elevate their games at key moments. To their credit, they took that and ran with it and the rest of the team followed, but Richards just did it the way he always does: Find a big moment in the game, make the right play, get the win, forget dry island.

Schenn and Simmonds would never have done that. The Kings will be a different franchise for this generation because of the catalytic effect of Mike Richards' character. This is where the stats fall short. They don't measure quality, and sometimes that's worth way more than quantity.

Fixed the videos for you. And I agree with you. The team went into that Vancouver series as the 8th seed and as a team that had lost in prior years to the Canucks in the first round. Then you have a guy like Richards come in to the first game and say '**** the past, we are winning this thing', and the rest of the team starts believing in themselves.

 

[T2M]

Fixed the videos for you. And I agree with you. The team went into that Vancouver series as the 8th seed and as a team that had lost in prior years to the Canucks in the first round. Then you have a guy like Richards come in to the first game and say '**** the past, we are winning this thing', and the rest of the team starts believing in themselves.

Thanks for fixing the videos.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Would anyone in the right frame of mind want to trade places with the Flyers?

 

[Herby]

I think everybody's forgetting the fact that Richards is the cultural catalyst that turned the Kings from a developing team into a group of winners.

Yet before the Carter trade the Kings were out of the playoffs.

I think one ex-Flyer was more important towards making the Kings a contender than the other ex-Flyer was.

The reality is, as much as we want to talk about intangibles, attitude, culture etc. the Kings were really a great goal-scoring winger away from being a contender, if they hadn't gotten that player they probably aren't a playoff team in 2012.

 

[Muzzinga]

Getting JMFJ the hell off the team was bigger than getting either Flyer

 

[Herby]

Getting JMFJ the hell off the team was bigger than getting either Flyer

No.

Getting an elite goal-scoring winger is what put the Kings over the top. But people want to pretend that a certain player walked into the lockerroom and instantly snapped his fingers and made the Kings a contender.

 

[Rorschach]

Would anyone in the right frame of mind want to trade places with the Flyers?

Somehow some of the Flyers fans think its "good" that they went from finalists, one goalie away from being champs, to basically the Oilers of the East...a horrible team with a lot of talented young scorers who wish they could sniff the playoffs.

No one in the West wants to be the Oilers...not even the Oilers.

 

[Buddy The Elf]

No.

Getting an elite goal-scoring winger is what put the Kings over the top. But people want to pretend that a certain player walked into the lockerroom and instantly snapped his fingers and made the Kings a contender.

I think both are equally important and i think you validated that with a post earlier in this thread when you said this team wasn't winning a Cup with Stoll as the 2nd line center. And I do agree. You can refer to the fun stat about the teams record when Richards records a point. Both of those guys have been essential to the Kings success.

There are a lot of angles to look at the 2011-12 season. There were so many variables including the coach being replaced midseason. That is something that hasn't even been commented on here. Do the Kings win a Cup with Carter/Richards and Terry Murray? I don't know.. so it is kinda silly to point to one thing as the most significant change when a lot of things changed prior to and during the 2011-12 season. Who knows how the team would have performed with Carter and without Richards or Sutter? It is easy to point to the arrival of Carter as the defining moment but I think one could argue that he was the last cog in the machine and maybe he isn't as effective or the team as a whole doesn't take off without all the other change (Richards, Sutter etc.)

 

[Herby]

I think both are equally important and i think you validated that with a post earlier in this thread when you said this team wasn't winning a Cup with Stoll as the 2nd line center. And I do agree. You can refer to the fun stat about the teams record when Richards records a point. Both of those guys have been essential to the Kings success.

There are a lot of angles to look at the 2011-12 season. There were so many variables including the coach being replaced midseason. That is something that hasn't even been commented on here. Do the Kings win a Cup with Carter/Richards and Terry Murray? I don't know.. so it is kinda silly to point to one thing as the most significant change when a lot of things changed prior to and during the 2011-12 season. Who knows how the team would have performed with Carter and without Richards or Sutter? It is easy to point to the arrival of Carter as the defining moment but I think one could argue that he was the last cog in the machine and maybe he isn't as effective or the team as a whole doesn't take off without all the other change (Richards, Sutter etc.)

I agree with most of what you said, it was a combination of things.

I just find it funny that some people on here want to call Mike Richards the Messiah and the instant he walked in the door the Kings became contenders, when in reality the Kings were 10th in the West at the time of the Carter trade.

And yes, the Kings weren't winning a cup with Stoll as 2nd line center, but they also weren't winning a cup with Kopitar and Richards as centers without an elite winger.

Sutter and Richards certainly deserve a lot of credit, but trading for Carter changed the dynamic of the Kings and made them true contenders more than trading for Richards did.

 

[Johnny Utah]

I was critical of the Richards deal for a long time, even getting tossed from the board, but in the end, Richards proved me wrong. He had 4 goals and 11 assists in the Cup run. That hit on Burrows was huge. I think the way he plays in the playoffs forces Kopitar to step up.

Richards would be a #1 center on a lot of teams. He can shoot, hit, pass and fight. He is on pace for another 50-60 point season this year.

Losing Schenn didn't bother me so much, I think he is over-rated. It was Simmonds, who emerged as an elite power forward. He broke though with a 28 goal season the year of the trade and was on pace for 30 last season. Still only 25 years old.

There was a rumor the Flyers were debating between Clifford and Simmonds...man, what a fumble by DL is that is true. Can you imagine Simmonds on the Kings now?

 

[santiclaws]

Philly's going nowhere with Holmgren at the helm, but I hope he never gets fired. Watching the ongoing train wreck has been a hoot.

I'm still holding out hope he's going to blow it all up again soon and trade us Giroux.

 

[kingsfan]

There was a rumor the Flyers were debating between Clifford and Simmonds...man, what a fumble by DL is that is true. Can you imagine Simmonds on the Kings now?

If it was Philly debating between the two, how is it a fumble by DL?

 

[deeshamrock]

Losing Schenn didn't bother me so much, I think he is over-rated. It was Simmonds, who emerged as an elite power forward. He broke though with a 28 goal season the year of the trade and was on pace for 30 last season. Still only 25 years old.

There was a rumor the Flyers were debating between Clifford and Simmonds...man, what a fumble by DL is that is true. Can you imagine Simmonds on the Kings now?

100% right about Schenn, pretty much a disappointment since he arrived, esp in his own end.

But yoiu've overrated Simmonds. You only put up his goals in his first 2 years, which were inflated greatly by Lavvy's run and gun ineffective offense only system. Berube's system is nothing like that and the forwards are to defend their end first and he's struggled badly all year on both ends. He struggles alot in his own end and iusually makes the wrong decision.
He's a heart and soul 2nd/3rd line winger whose physical. He does a nice job on PP standing in front 0f the net. But left to his own devices, he needs help and esp when facing top line opposition.
There's a reason he's in every trade rumor, the Flyers need to upgrade at D and he and Schenn are the most likely candidates to go, they're easily replaced.