Mike Richards; To Be Or Not To Be A Los Angeles King

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2015

He skated up with the rush and watched the puck get loose along the boards.  He made a dash for it while aware that his opponent was also coming in hard to neutralize any threat he could create.  Using his body to shield the puck away from the opponent, he collected it and made a quick and accurate pass out to his defensive teammate who was rushing in.  The defenseman shot towards the net but the opposing goalie made the save.  A lukewarm sound that started as a promising cheer but ended up as a disappointed sigh was coming from those that attended the half full arena. They were hoping for him to help score a goal.  He looks up at the score clock and sees how much time left there is in the period and wonders if Drew Doughty would have turned his pass into a goal?

After the game and with the victory secured he celebrates the win with his new teammates.  He high fives them all but only a few faces are recognizable.  Most of them are young and inexperienced, their whole lives and careers just ahead of them.  He wondered how many of them would actually make the Los Angeles Kings roster or even the NHL period in the end?

In the locker room he took off his sweaty jersey and watched it drop to the floor.  For a second he forgot and half expected to see the familiar logo of a crown with large letters spelling the acronym LA.  Instead it was the logo of an angry lion (Bailey maybe?) with a crown on his head.  It was only 7 months ago that he was wearing the armor of the Los Angeles Kings while lifting up the Stanley Cup for the second time in  his career after an exhausting and brutal 2 month path through the playoffs.  So much has changed since then that it now felt more like 7 years have gone by instead of months.  Now he just had played his first game for their minor league affiliate team, the Manchester Monarchs.  They had won the game but he didn’t play very well.  He hasn’t been playing well for a long while.

The noise in the locker room rose to a louder decibel and he deliberately changed his mood from a melancholic one into a warm and approachable one.  The press was here and they were there to see him.  He sat up and welcomed them in and answered their questions as best of he could while his mind stayed restless.  Deep down inside himself he had a question to ask all of them. For the press, for Dean Lombardi, for the entire hockey world but also knew that none of them really had any true answer for it.  He wanted to ask what the future now held for him?  For the first time ever in Mike Richards’ NHL career, the future direction of his career path was in complete darkness and it bothered him.

2011

Mike Richards had just recently been the Captain of the Philadelphia Flyers but was now about to walk up to a podium and be introduced as the newest member of the Los Angeles Kings.  He posed for the cameras with team GM Dean Lombardi and held up his new team’s jersey.  There had been excitement by the local Los Angeles press as well as from the fan base of his arrival. The possibility of finally winning the Stanley Cup with this up and coming team greatly appealed to Richards but the sting of the blindsided trade out of Philadelphia was still biting at him.  It weighed on him so hard that for his first month of living in Los Angeles (or more accurately in Manhatten Beach) consisted of him staying in his apartment and almost never coming out.

Aware of Richards’ hurt and confused state, Lombardi just let him be but still made the occasional phone call to him to see if he was okay and needed anything.  Richards would answer that he was fine.  He explained to the GM that he truly was excited to have this fresh start and play for Los Angeles but just needed time to think and sort through the shock and emotional feelings of betrayal that he felt about the trade but he would be ready and happy to play for his new team by the time training camp started.  Lombardi respected this and didn’t doubt anything Richards was telling him.  Richards was exactly the type of player and personality that was needed for the type of winning culture he wanted for his team.  A leader and a warrior, Mike Richards was the right man for this job.

2012

The Los Angeles Kings were minutes away from winning their first ever Stanley Cup.  They were up 6-1 against the New Jersey Devils but the stubborn Devil’s were still coming on strong.  Richards got possession of the puck and shot it down the ice to clear the zone where a teammate of his was awaiting the play.  Completing his objective, Richards got off the ice and sat on the bench.  The anticipation of winning the prestigious Cup was contagious to all of his teammates on the bench as they were beaming full of excitement.  Richards was excited too but held it in.  There was still a job to do.

Though he had not yet won the highest pinnacle of Hockey accomplishments like winning the Stanley Cup, he had won numerous of other important championships throughout his career already.  In 2003 as the Captain of the OHL Kitchener Rangers he lead them to the Memorial Cup.  Then in 2005 he captained an All-Star Team Canada team that also contained Sidney Crosby, Corey Perry, Ryan Getzlaf, Patrice Bergeron, Shea Weber and best friend Jeff Carter to win the World Junior Gold Medal for the first time since 1997.  He completed a championship double later that year by winning the AHL’s Calder Cup for the Philadelphia Flyers minor league team as well.

In short time Richards had become the Captain of the Philadelphia Flyers and became an NHL All-Star by 2008 when he scored 28 goals and 75 points.  He then posted even better numbers the following year with 30 goals and 80 points and before he knew it, he was being selected by GM Steve Yzerman to play for the Canadian National team for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.  The highest honor at the biggest tournament on a patriotic national level.  Richards and his countrymen went on to win the Olympic Gold Medal on their home soil and the rush and momentum of the win kept Richards going as his Philadelphia Flyers team went all the way to the Stanley Cup Final, losing in a close 6 game series.

Now with seconds ticking away, Richards was about to finally win the biggest trophy of them all and enter into hockey immortality.  Despite the shock of being traded from Philly to Los Angeles and the rough start to the season with his new team, including suffering a concussion, Richards and his teammates had turned on the Jets (not Winnipeg) and dominated their way through to Lord Stanley’s Cup.  Even sweeter was that his old friend Jeff Carter, who had also been traded away from the Flyers to Columbus the same day he was traded to LA had found his way to the Kings and they formed a “Redemption” line with Dustin Penner that became a bulldozing force.

Richards publicly stated that he had no intention to stick this Stanley Cup victory in the faces of his former team but away from the cameras and limelight, one would wonder if Richards acknowledged that it didn’t hurt if the powers that be in Philadelphia did end up feeling that way?  Through those playoffs, Richards manned the “second” line and made his mark in the first round for Los Angeles by crushing Alex Burrows of the Vancouver Canucks, right in front of their bench.  The message was sent and the president trophy winning Canucks were deflated and gone after 5 games.

In the second round, Richards completed a “Gordie Howe” hat trick by scoring a key goal, setting up a beautiful goal for a rushing in Drew Doughty and knocking some sense into St. Louis Blue veteran Jamie Langenbrunner with his fists.  The Kings swept them in 4.  In the conference Final, Richards scored a goal on Coyote goalie Mike Smith with severe intentions and was on the ice later in overtime when line mate Dustin Penner scored the overtime goal to send the Kings into the Stanley Cup Final for the first time in 19 years.

Now the time clock ticked down to zero and he had finally become a Stanley Cup champion.  Richards was handed the Cup by teammate Justin Williams and he lifted it up above his head with pure joy.  He already knew who he would give the Cup to next so without surprise he handed it to buddy Jeff Carter and watched Carter and the rest of his teammates skate around the Staples Center ice with it with deep pride as the fans cheered and happily cried.  Dean Lombardi approached Richards during the celebrations and he was embraced for a job well done.  The mission was accomplished.