When the Kings submitted their opening night roster to the NHL head office in advance of the 2pm Pacific deadline on Monday, nothing really changed from where things stood over the weekend.
Once top prospect Liam Greentree was returned to the OHL last week, and a handful of players were placed on waivers (for the purposes of assigning them to AHL Ontario) — guys like Andre Lee and Akil Thomas — much of the intrigue regarding what GM Ken Holland and/or coach Jim Hiller may be up to had all but dissipated.
Even Pheonix Copley getting claimed on waivers by Tampa Bay didn’t really disrupt things at the NHL level. It had some consequences for the Reign, but not what the Kings were planning with their 23-man roster.
And to that point, they’re not even starting out the year with 23; more like 22.
For context, here’s how things would have looked when training camp opened:
Kuzmenko – Kopitar – Kempe
Fiala – Byfield – Laferriere
Moore – Danault – Foegele
Malott – Turcotte – Armia
Helenius
Anderson – Doughty
Dumoulin – Clarke
Edmundson – Ceci
Moverare
Kuemper
Forsberg
The Fourth Line
It became apparent rather early on that Jeff Malott was going to make the Kings roster coming out of training camp. What’s interesting is what that does for the fourth line. On one hand, it plugs the hole created by Corey Perry’s injury (more on him in a minute).
What it also does is give Hiller several options for how he puts the fourth line together on any given night. Alex Turcotte, who has become LA’s new Swiss Army knife, is the guy most likely to move around a bit. Although all the talk pre-camp was of him playing center primarily, that wasn’t the case near the end of camp. Because he can slot in at center or wing, two options present themselves on the fourth line:
Malott – Turcotte – Armia
or
Turcotte – Helenius – Armia
All of this assumes that Alex Laferriere is good to go for the home opener — as there is a difference between the opening night roster and the opening night lineup. The term ‘roster’ refers to the group of players available to a coach, while the lineup refers to the actual 20 players assigned to suit up for a particular game. In the case of Laferriere, if he isn’t available to play on Tuesday night vs. Colorado, their fourth line would most likely be Malott – Helenius – Turcotte, with Armia sliding up to fill the hole on the third line. At least that’s what Hiller did on Saturday vs. the Ducks.
Another option would be to let Turcotte fill in on the third line, leaving a fourth line of Malott – Helenius – Armia.
Once Perry is back — initially targeted for late November — things will get shuffled around again. Until then, it’s a big opportunity for Turcotte, Helenius, and Malott to show what they can do; all in the hopes of keeping their individual ice time when Hiller eventually has to sit one of them to make room for Perry on the fourth line.
Burroughs, the D, and Injuries
On defense, things became a little wonky late last week when Joel Edmundson and Kyle Burroughs missed practice. The former ended up slotting into the lineup on Saturday for LA’s final preseason game. He was expected to be one of the team’s six starting defenseman once the regular season gets going, so that had to be a good sign for Hiller.
And even though he’s on the roster, exactly where Edmundson ends up on the blueline may be a fluid situation. Brandt Clarke spend time in the preseason playing with both Brian Dumolin and Edmundson, so both could continue to be options in the short term.
Burroughs, on the other hand, was not intended to be an every game member of the defensive unit Hiller deploys. Along with Jacob Moverare, he was thought to be extra insurance in case of injuries or to occasionally spell other guys for rest, typically in back-to-back situations. Both Burroughs and Moverare and were used quite a bit in the preseason, and Hiller appears to have no problem playing either guy moving ahead.
Where things get interesting is with a potential roster call-up. Assuming Laferriere and Edmundson are both healthy, the Kings really don’t need to call anybody up right away. Staying at 22 players is fine, especially since they’ll have one extra forward and one extra defenseman. They could even stay that way for Game 2 coming up on Wednesday in Vegas (assuming everybody comes out of opening night healthy).
Teams don’t like to recall players just to recall them. In the case of Thomas and Lee (the most likely recalls at forward when all things are equal, and they sometimes aren’t), both just cleared waivers. They can now be recalled for a maximum of 30 days and/or 10 NHL games, whichever comes first. Thus, you don’t want to burn some of those roster days for nothing. If there isn’t a high likelihood that one of them will play, there isn’t a strong reason to recall somebody from Ontario.
However, when the Kings leave for a two-game road trip to Winnipeg and Minnesota on Friday afternoon, they’ll most likely want at least 13 healthy forwards and seven healthy defensemen. It’s a short trip too, so they may even opt to call up somebody ‘off the board.’ This is a situation where they could call up somebody like Glenn Gawdin or Logan Brown, rather than start the clock on Thomas or Lee.
Potential Kempe Contract Extension
Nothing concrete to report at this time, yet the situation was discussed in detail over the weekend on NHL Network Radio. A free replay has been linked here for your listening pleasure.
Salary Cap Situation
Per PuckPedia, the Kings will open the season with less than $2M in available cap space. And for those who missed it, putting Perry on LTIR is not an option.
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