How important has Jeff Carter been to LA's success this year? This important:
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Carter, Pastrnak, and Crosby are the only players in the league who have scored over 20% of their team's goals so far this season. If you haven't voted Carter for the upcoming All-Star Game, you certainly should!
Of course, if Carter is doing this much of the team's heavylifting, that means a lot of Kings aren't carrying their weight. Here are some of LA's slumping "scoring forwards":
• Tanner Pearson just scored his first goal in 16 games last night in Vancouver.
• Dustin Brown has one goal in 16 games and has gone without a goal in his last 10.
• Devin Setoguchi has notched one marker in his last 11 appearances.
• Marian Gaborik has rang up only one goal in his 13 contests since returning from a pre-season foot injury.
• And of course, Anze Kopitar is stuck in a one goal in 24 games hole.
The good news is that Kopitar and Gaborik have a recent-enough scoring track record to suggest the goals will come -- Kopitar's current 4.6 shooting % is well below his career 12.2 (14.1 last year) and Gaborik's 3.6 is more than a third of his career 12.8 (8.5 last season). Their scoring chance rates aren't suspiciously off either, though the pivot could probably stand (as usual) to shoot more.
If they're going to pick up the pace, they better get on it. Carter's scoring rate is probably unsustainable (his 17.0 shooting % is well above his career 11.6) and Tyler Toffoli, who was finally heating up, won't be back
"in the near future."
In the big picture, Peter Budaj has been an adequate replacement for Jonathan Quick and LA's defensive structure is as tight as ever -- so finding goals beyond Carter may well determine this campaign's chances of making the playoffs.
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Is this the year that Kopitar finally fails to lead the team in points?
After nine consecutive years atop LA's leaderboard -- a club record, bettering Marcel Dionne's eight straight -- the Slovenian, with just 16 points this year, is looking up at Carter's 30.
Remember that Kopitar has "spotted" Carter early-season leads in this department before -- in 2014-15, Carter had an nine-point headstart in October, while last season, he had an 11-point advantage in November. But this is Carter's biggest lead over Kopitar yet.
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Speaking of finding goals, Teddy Purcell continues to tear it up in Ontario. His 3-9-12 line in just nine AHL tilts suggests that his struggles in Los Angeles probably had more to do with injury and "fit." Purcell can certainly still play, but will he and his relatively meager 1.6 million cap hit make it through waivers again?
With Toffoli's absence and Brayden McNabb's return, LA is carrying eight defensemen. I would guess that a roster move involving Kevin Gravel, Matt Greene, or Tom Gilbert would be in the offing -- for either Purcell or Michael Mersch. Mersch, who suffered his own slump earlier this year, has come on recently with five goals in his last eight games. The 24-year-old certainly could find a place as the front-of-the-net presence on LA's second-unit power play. Brown hasn't done a lot in that area recently.
Gravel might be the safest bet to go, simply because he doesn't have to pass through waivers. But the Kings, as we saw recently with Purcell, haven't shown much hesitation with demoting a struggling vet -- that would point more toward Gilbert.
Between Purcell or Mersch, who would you call up? And between Gravel, Gilbert, or Greene, who would you dispatch?
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Stats as of 12/28/16, courtesy of Behind the Net, Corsica, Hockey Analysis, Hockey Reference, Natural Stat Trick, NHL.com, Puckalytics, and Sporting Charts.
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