Kings Trade Muzzin to Toronto, The Fire Sale is Here

By Jeff Duarte
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Updated: January 30, 2019

(Featured photo by nhl.lakings.com)

My favorite show in the world is HBO’s “Game of Thrones”, and despite the show’s strong reputation for being gut-wrenching and constantly kicking it’s own viewers (and reader’s) in the teeth due to certain elements of the show’s storylines and characters, that I wouldn’t dare spoil for anyone who hasn’t watched the show yet, (is that even possible?), we viewer’s/reader’s of that show really do get kicked in the teeth… a lot, yet we always come back for more. Especially with the final season fast approaching in April, I already know that I am going to get kicked in teeth again and again during this final season, but I am going to watch it anyway, and that’s how I feel about this Jake Muzzin trade to the Toronto Maple Leafs, the trades that will follow, and the entire Kings’ season thus far. Like “Winter” on the show, the fire sale is nowhere, and I saw it coming, (read my last article, “Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down : LA Kings’ Edition” to catch up), but yet it’s still a major kick in the teeth for me anyway, and I also know there are still some more kicks in the teeth to come. Unlike watching (or reading) the fantasy, fictional “Game of Thrones”, being an LA Kings’ fan can be even more gut-wrenching, especially when you’re at the beginning of a long rebuild, where there isn’t going to be much enjoyment to be had from it, at least not immediately.

Yesterday, Kings’ GM Rob Blake traded their Kings’ best defenseman this season (statistically), Jake Muzzin to the Leafs for a 2019 first round draft pick, forward Carl Grundstrom and the rights to defenseman Sean Durzi. Ironically, I was outside trying to dig my car out of a winter hell after we got hit with 12-15 cm’s of snow (not Jon), thinking about “Game of Throne’s” final season when my phone buzzed, alerting me of the trade. I looked at it, slowly shook my head, put my phone back in my pocket and went back to shoveling, but I already knew this job wasn’t going to get finished. See, I live near Toronto in southern Ontario, so I am knee deep in what is known as “Leaf’s Nation,” so I was somewhat prepared for what was to come my way. And that was that ALL of my family, friend’s and colleague’s that are die-hard Toronto Maple Leaf fans were going to blow up my phone with questions about what kind of player Jake Muzzin was? (As I already knew they would have NO IDEA who he was because most of them do not watch anything in the Western Conference that has a game starting time in the Pacific time zone).

But this article isn’t about them, it is about us. My little “birds” in SoCal have told me that many in the Kingdom do not want to use the term “rebuild”, as it pertains to years of suffering from a developing team, where the term “re-tool” is more friendly in nature, as it portrays the suffering as only short term. Ladies and Gentlemen of the Kingdown, let us not be fooled with words of sorcery. What Blake and the Kings are doing right now, as this Muzzin trade is showing us, is that the organization has now gone ALL IN (not the wrestling event) with a full rebuild. Whether they use the term or not is irrelevant. So like when King (spoiler) took the (spoiler) in a season (spoiler) of “Game of Thrones”, let the real suffering begin. Sigh.

The “Golden Era” of Kings’ hockey had ended some time ago. If we are to look back in hindsight, one could say it ended after winning that second Stanley Cup in 2014. I say it ended at the end of the 2016 season, just before the salary cap ceiling really started to squeeze and hurt us from signing or re-signing top free agents. Then GM Dean Lombardi, and then later rookie GM Rob Blake, did attempt a few retools to try and fix the team’s many ailments, but with the Kings missing the playoffs in what this year will be the 3rd time in 5 seasons, it wasn’t working. It wasn’t working at all. So here we are with this rebuild and this serious fire sale, (which is a lot less cool than fire breathing dragons). Trades from now on will involve important players from our team and Stanley Cup-winning past, like Muzzin, (who was our best defenseman in a year where the Kings are defensively horrible, and who honestly should have represented the Kings in the recent NHL All-Star Game in San Jose), for first round draft picks, (this year and/or next), and/or young prospects, with hopes that this draft picks and prospects eventually become key players in the future to help the Kings become playoff contenders again, (well playoff contenders first, Stanley Cup contenders later… hopefully).

A first-round draft pick and some prospects are exactly what the Kings got in return for Muzzin. The 21-year-old, 6’0, 190-pound Grundstrom is an excellent skater with pace, who isn’t afraid to power his way to the net and sniff for some goals. Winning the Calder Cup last season with the Leaf’s AHL affiliate, the Toronto Marlies, Grundstrom led all rookies league-wide with 8 goals and 14 points in 20 playoff games. So far this season, Grundstrom was second overall on the Marlies with 29 points in 42 games, and also had experience playing with his native Sweden in the 2016 and 2017 IIHF World Junior Tournaments. When playing in Sweden with MODO, Grundstrom was the highest scoring under-20 player in the entire league.

The 20-year-old, 6’0, 196-pound Durzi is currently playing for the Guelph Storm (the same junior club that Doughty and Dustin Brown played for), after recently being traded from the Owen Sound Attack, (where Kings’ prospect Markus Phillips currently plays). Durzi, so far this season, has 8 goals and 28 points in 26 games while missing about a month due to injury between the two OHL clubs. Last season he was made an OHL Second Team All-Star after achieving 15 goals and 49 points in 40 games. Though drafted by the Leafs 52nd overall in the 2018 NHL entry draft, Durzi has remained un-signed, therefore there is no guarantee he will sign with the Kings either. Overall, the Kings only hold the offensive defenseman’s rights.

Due to the Leafs currently being in the 7th overall position in the NHL, and more than likely will finish somewhere around there, the first round draft pick that the Kings attained will be around the lower level. Both Grundstrom and Durzi have the potential upside to become key assets in the Kings’ future, but the very problem with these rebuilds is the very word “potential”. Really, every draft pick, or free agent, or waiver pick up has potential, but whether big or small, will they live up to that potential? (Anyone remembers Jeff Tambellini from the epic 2003 NHL draft? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?) It is way too early in the process to tell, with still many years ahead of us before we fully know for sure if Grundstrom and Durzi will amount to anything within the Kings’ organization? Maybe they will? Maybe they won’t? Maybe they get used in future trades for players that will end up helping the Kings’ more, but there is no way to tell right now, nor can we truly know if Blake got enough in return for Muzzin? If the Kings weren’t rebuilding, then I would say no he didn’t, as you want equal or better value in return. Since the Kings are indeed rebuilding, then it’s a tricky answer. It all depends on what the future holds for Grundstrom and Durzi, and who the Kings end up selecting with that draft pick, as evaluating and predicting the outcomes of draft picks and prospects are a gamble at best. But it would be a (small) step in the right direction to at least sign Durzi to a contract. (Like at the VERY least because WHO trades a valuable asset for someone who does not even have a contract?)

One thing I can tell and guarantee, okay two things, is that the fanatic Toronto media are going to position Jake Muzzin as the second coming of Bobby Orr, (or at least until they get their few #MuzzKill moments). Since the Leafs couldn’t get their hands on Doughty, or Alex Pietrangelo from St. Louis, or the aging Duncan Keith from Chicago, Muzzin will now become the media darling of the moment, especially since unlike Doughty, who grew up as a Kings’ fan, Muzzin actually did grow up as a fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Media hype or not, I feel Muzzin will be just fine in Toronto (which is a bit over an hour away from his hometown of Woodstock, ON, the dairy capital of Canada, (and no, I did not make that up), and will indeed help lead that young blueline corps of theirs, and I wish him the best of luck. He will be missed, (though technically or more like geographically, I now can’t get away from him if I tried).

(photo by nhl.lakings.com)

The second thing I can guarantee is that Blake and the Kings aren’t done yet. This fire sale is only beginning and there are more trades involving the Kings’ major players already on the way. Now I wish that I could guarantee that Rob Blake knows what he is doing when it comes to rebuilding a team at the NHL level? If I’m to be honest, after a promising start to his general managing career, (or at least as the actual GM of the team, as he started as an assistant to Lombardi first), his decision making in signing the 35 year old Ilya Kovalchuk as a free agent who hadn’t played an NHL game for 5 years to a 3 year contract with a $6.25 million AAV, bringing in interim (and former Vancouver Canucks’) head coach Willie Desjardins, and the fact he promised Doughty, (before “Dewy” re-signed with the Kings last summer), and us Kings’ fans, that the Kings were NOT going to rebuild at all, yet here we are rebuilding like nobodies business, makes me question whether Blake is the right man for this job? Which is a question I asked aloud when he first got the job, to begin with after Lombardi was fired? Blake did not have the experience to be a GM period, (which worried me already), and now he’s in charge of a full rebuild of an NHL franchise in only his second season on the job? (Oh boy. Did I also mention we traded Muzzin and one of the returns was a prospect with NO contract? No wonder I’ve been spending this entire season thinking more about “Game of Thrones” than NHL hockey! It’s less stressful!)

For you Cuppers out there, the last time the Kings went into full rebuild mode was after the collapse of the 2005-06 season. A season that led to the firings of head coach Andy Murray and Kings’ Legend/GM Dave Taylor, therefore bringing in Lombardi, (who already had NHL GM experience), and putting him behind the Kings’ rebuilding steering wheel. The rest, of course, is 2 time Stanley Cup history. But this current rebuild and future timeline seem even more uncertain and unstable to me then that one did. I know this rebuild had to happen, (which does not make me like it any better), and it was definitely coming down to this, but since it is, I’m just not sure about Blake being the one who will be able to pull this off successfully? Hopefully, my red flags about Blake’s inexperience will be something we all can laugh about in the future because he will actually end up becoming the “prince that was promised” by rebuilding the Kings into a fire breathing dragon that will drink once again out of the majestic Stanley Cup. We have no choice but to wait and see what happens. But for now the fire sale is here, so let’s just get ready for the next big kick in the teeth, and the ones after that too.

Until then I have been JD Stylz, and now I am out of here, (because I still have to dig our car out from all of that snow before my wife gets home, finds out and starts kicking me in the teeth!)

GO KINGS GO!!!

(Thanks for everything Muzzin!)

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