Forward Carl Grundstrom is getting close to a return — and that’s a good sign for the LA Kings. They can use his physical play and high-energy approach, either on the third or fourth line. His last game played was Feb. 13 in Buffalo, so he’s played all of 18 shifts under new coach Jim Hiller.
That’s all about to change.
It just won’t be in Canada.
From what we’ve been able to gather over the past few days, Grundstrom’s return won’t come on the team’s current road trip, which will conclude with stops in Calgary and Winnipeg.
After that pair of games, the Kings remaining regular season schedule will be comprised of eight games played exclusively in California — including only one game out of SoCal; a brief trip to San Jose next Thursday.
The game against the Sharks will come on the second night of a back-to-back set, after the team first hosts the Kraken at Crypto.com Arena next Wednesday.
As discussed on this week’s Kings Of The Podcast and explained here, the original plan was to send Jacob Moverare and Alex Turcotte back to AHL Ontario to clear enough cap room when the time came to activate Grundstrom off LTIR.
Right now, the Kings have about $200k in available cap space. The reason they would need to send two players down to activate Grundstrom and his $1.3M AAV is all of the four players available to go to Ontario without waivers (Moverare, Turcotte, Alex Laferriere, and Jordan Spence) all earn less than $1M. Thus, sending down just one of them wouldn’t be enough.
Why Turcotte and Moverare? Essentially, they’re the two players ‘not really’ on the team. Management considers Laferriere to be a full-time member of the Kings at this point. Spence couldn’t be send down with Moverare because that would leave the team with only five defensemen.
So, as much as everybody liked Turcotte in the lineup when he was healthy, he just ended up as the odd man out right now. Next year? Well, they see him on the NHL roster next season. How they clear room for him is a summertime issue, not one that has to be dealt with right now.
Everything is settled then, right?
No. Not so fast.
Turcotte being injured puts a fly in the ointment, as injured players can’t be assigned to the AHL (regardless of their waiver status).
As such, should Turcotte still be injured next week when the Kings are ready to activate Grundstrom, they plan to put him on Long Term Injured Reserve (retroactive back to Mar. 19, when he was hurt in Chicago – video here). This would put the NHL rookie out for a minimum of 10 games and 24 days.
Once fully healthy, Turcotte is expected to join the Reign. Earlier this week, Ontario clinched a spot in the 2024 Calder Cup Playoffs.
Moverare meanwhile began today thinking he was already on his way back to the AHL only to have the whole plan called off. He’ll stay with the Kings in Calgary as a precautionary move — more on that whole story can be found at the link below.
In Grundstrom, the Kings will be getting back an important player in their overall lineup composition. He has suited up for 50 games and produced 12 points, including eight goals, in about 11 minutes of action per night. Fully capable of playing on the left or right wing, the 26-year-old Swede is also scheduled to become a Restricted Free Agent with arbitration rights. Thus, how this season plays out will be important to both sides in any upcoming contract negotiations.
When everything is said and done, this would be Hiller’s most likely lineup:
Byfield – Kopitar – Kempe
Moore – Danault – Fiala
Laferriere – Dubois – Arvidsson
Lewis – Lizotte – Grundstrom
Kaliyev
Anderson – Doughty
Gavrikov – Roy
Englund – Spence
Talbot – Rittich
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