The Kings have done a lot of things right over the course of their successful stretch in recent years.
What the team perhaps lacked during the Dave Taylor era was a real structure and direction to the organization's thinking. The Dave Taylor year's of the LA Kings were played in a somewhat barren wasteland of Kings hockey. Drafting was not very strong, development also had problems, and the Kings were a team outside the scope of mainstream to both free agents and the league's attention. When Wayne Gretzky left, as did the interest of the Kings. That much is a shame considering some excellent players.
When Gretzky left in 1996, it left the Kings with a void that was very difficult to overcome. From 97 to 2006, the Kings made the playoffs four times and were eliminated in the first round every time except for in 2000-01 with a memorable series win against the heavily favored Detroit Red Wings. However, the cupboard was pretty barren throughout those years.
Dave Taylor was not a draft/development GM. He made his name on the backs of some very astute moves that kept the Kings in the competitive side of things much longer than they probably should have.
Amongst the underrated moves of the Dave Taylor era include the acquisitions of Jozef Stumpel, Bryan Smolinski, Ziggy Palffy, the massive haul of the Rob Blake trade, (Which would have been even better had the first rounders panned out, and numerous other low cost deals to get players like Felix Potvin, Nelson Emerson, and Derek Armstrong. Even the Mathieu Schneider trade to Detroit would have seemed better had the Kings perhaps gone with Corey Perry over Jeff Tambellini in that first round. Alas, that is how things go in hindsight.
These weren't the haydays of the LA Kings, but there have been some names acquired under the Dave Taylor banner that still to this day have an impact within the halls of the LA Kings offices (Nelson Emerson, Derek Armstrong for example).
But for all the good done in the free agent market and on the trade block, the Kings draft and development had more misses than hits.
We do have the Dave Taylor era to thank for the likes of Brown, Quick, and Kopitar, this much is true. But looking over the various draft habits of the Kings from the mid 2000's backwards, there was no consistency. There was no honey pot. There was no trends. Finally, there was very little success.
The Kings went everywhere. They went to Russia, Finland, Switzerland, Japan (yes, Japan) the CCHA, the BCHL, the AJHL, the WHL and OHL, and they even went to the now defunct EJHL at one point. Styles of players were all over the place. There were a lot of high skill europeans like Pavel Rosa, Lauri Tukonen, Andrei Shefer, and Alex Frolov drafted, but also a lot of more meat and potatoes power forwards and stay at home defensemen. While it overall probably seemed like a good mix, the trend and direction did not seem right in the long run.
All you need to do is look over the screen caps of some of the names drafted during the early 2000's to get an idea.
Believe it, there are many more Matt Zultek's and Justin Papineau's than Mike Cammalleri's or Lubomir Visnovsky's.
Instead of sinking our teeth further into the shortcomings of one era, this gives us an opportunity to appreciate the things we do not often think about with front offices.
The Kings have become consistent. The have become much more precise in their drafting, their development, the organizational mentality, and overall the dividends that have come from said structure. If the team on the ice is praised for its structure, as too should the front office.
What do we mean by consistency and structure?
Well one major trend we could point to is the organization's overhaul of the back end. Dean Lombardi has mentioned in interviews about how they built from the back out. To this day when you look at the Kings pipeline, it is loaded with very good defensemen. While maybe they struggled to plug in forwards, or high end skill, the Kings have had an immense amount of goaltenders and defensemen develop within the organization.
Jonathan Bernier, Jeff Zatkoff, Martin Jones, Jonathan Quick, and J.F. Berube are just a few goalies to develop with the Kings. Defensively, however, is where you see the real pride of the Kings system.
Past Drew Doughty the Kings have only selected a few defensemen in the first round. Derek Forbort, Colton Teubert and Thomas Hickey are others, with only one of them really holding the "Bust" tag.
All of the Kings defensive depth have come from free agent signings and mid round picks. They have gone to old standbys in places like the OHL or St. Cloud State in the NCAA to draft some incredibly impactful players. The Dean Lombardi front office found a honey pot in these places at some point, and they just kept going to it. In fact, since 2007, the Kings have selected a staggering
17 defensemen from the OHL and the NCAA of a
total 24 selected blue liners. From that honey pot they have gained players like Alec Martinez, Kevin Gravel, Paul LaDue, Colin Miller, and Roland McKeown.
In terms of an overall trend, it really is night and day.
While there has not been a real difference in amount of players selected from a positional standpoint, where they have been drafted from has been incredibly different. Every team has their places they like to go to, and the Kings under Dean Lombardi are certainly much different than that of the Dave Taylor era. We can also touch on the general style of player the Kings have pushed to go after.
Many of these players in the later rounds of the Lombardi era have not been massive "Boom/Bust" picks like you would expect with later round picks. They have been more or less players that do a number of little things "Just okay." However, the Kings like to look for workable skillsets into their system. With the established style and mentality they have, it is easy to go after a player like Justin Auger or Matt Schmalz and project them into your lineup. They have natural tools that allow them to flourish under a set system. Would Justin Auger be nearly as NHL ready under the Capitals system? Probably not. What about Dwight King? Probably not. This is another area where we can really appreciate the structure and understanding of what the Kings know they are.
It may seem like common knowledge to draft to strengths, and draft to your general structure, but teams can definitely get away from that with the various draft strategies out there.
The pipeline might be thing, but you can look at players like Michael Mersch, Kurtis MacDermid, and Jonny Brodzinski and appreciate the foresight and hard work put in by the Kings scouting staff and development staff.
We can use this mentality as a primer when it comes time to review the Kings pipeline here shortly. While it may lack for quantity, the Kings have set themselves up to have impactful players at numerous junctures because they know exactly what they are, and they have drafted to those strengths.
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