Sleeksays

LA Kings (10-11-4) vs. Columbus Blue Jackets (11-11-3) 7:30 PST, Fox Sports West The Kings' power play feels shitty right now. The numbers don't really back me up (the Kings are about where they were last year, around 17th) but I don't know, I'm still not a fan. There's something vaguely unlikable about it; if the Kings' power play were an actor, they'd be Cole Hauser.* I think the problem I have with it is that it relies way too heavily on the Kings' forwards to move the action. When the Kings get the puck in the opposing zone, they end up passing it back and forth between the forwards while the defensemen just kind of stand there. There's no movement, there's no position-switching to confuse the defense. You kind of kill the man advantage when you allow the defense to stand still. What the Kings need is a small, nimble puck mover, one that can get involved in the play. Maybe pair him with a big, aging asshole with a booming shot. That would...

LA Kings @ Calgary Flames (11-9-1) 6:30 PST, RSW (Regehr Sucks Wang?) Record: 8-8-3 (49 Goals For, 49 Goals Against) Special Teams: 16.7 PP% (19th) , 84.1 PK% (10th) Top Scorer: Anze Kopitar, 15 points Best Forward: Dustin Brown? Best Defenseman: Drew Doughty Biggest Surprise: Drew Doughty/Erik Ersberg Biggest Disappointment: Anze Kopitar (It's only 19 games in, but tomorrow's Lubo Day so I'm doing this now.) All coaches search for a balance between top-line talent and depth with their forward lines. At the beginning of the season, the Kings were running 3 lines that were of relatively equal strength, with Brownitar on the top line, Frolov/Handzus on line 2, and O'Sullivan/Stoll on the 3rd. These lines helped spread out the Kings' talent but probably did so a little too much and the Kings had trouble hanging with the top-level talent on other teams. Then Terry Murray apparently had a stroke and screwed with the lines for about 4 or 5 games, banishing O...

I was talking to my brother yesterday and we were in agreement that if the Kings could somehow combine Erik Ersberg and Jason Labarbera, they'd have the perfect goaltender (basically, Roberto Luongo) . We then decided that if they somehow grew a child in a lab from their genes, he'd grow up to be: ...the dude from Idle Hands and She's All That . (He was also Fulton from Mighty Ducks.) I have a gift for placing faces, what can I say. My brother also has a similar gift (and a similarly small penis) and pointed out that Edmonton's new goaltender looks exactly like Evgeni Malkin: Also, and this is completely unrelated, but what the hell is Twilight ? I went and saw Role Models this weekend and they had a trailer for this emo vampire movie; I sat there with a confused expression on my face for about 30 seconds and then muttered, "What the fuck is this shit?" Teenagers are retarded.

The Kings have made their final cuts of training camp. The big winners were Wayne Simmonds, Oscar Moller and Erik Ersberg. Simmonds and Moller were expected to come up, get a pat on the head and then travel to their respective minor league teams but both were highly praised all camp and definitely earned this opportunity. I think Moller will play with Kopitar, but he may get slotted alongside Frolov and Stoll. Or Simmonds could. Who the fuck knows. Ersberg ended up beating out Jonathan Quick for the back-up job, which was to be expected. It's more important for Quick to play at this time and Ersberg can hold place until one of the young guys demands attention. The big loser at training camp was Ted Purcell, who was shockingly sent down to Manchester. I guess the Kings felt the rest of his game needed rounding out (or maybe they wanted him to practice left wing, since the Kings currently have a logjam on the right side), but it still has to be a pretty big blow to him. Hop...