Matt Murray has been a Kings fan since the late '80s, when Wayne Gretzky grabbed headlines by defecting to the West Coast. Since then, he has been a card-carrying bandwagon member as the club soared in popularity with their sole Stanley Cup appearance to their position near the bottom of the Pacific. But things are looking brighter, as he is anxious to witness the rise of the new Kings.
Blip in the Matrix can't stop Hockeywood
So, the past week has been an off week for us here in Hockeywood. Apparently, some hacker decided to get cute and flood LANG's server, knocking all of insidesocal.com offline for a while. In that span of time, the hockey season has started back up, and a lot has happened in Hockeywood.
On the 26th, the Kings recalled Patrick O'Sullivan and Konstantin Pushkarev from Manchester to start the second half of the season on the big club's roster. Pushkarev was sent down prior to the All-Star break so that he could still remain in playing shape. O'Sullivan has been playing remarkable down in Manchester, firmly entrenched as the club's second-leading scorer. That night against the Vancouver Canucks, O'Sullivan shared the same line as Anze Kopitar, and he impressed everyone with a goal in his first game back. Alexander Frolov continues to pace the Kings in scoring with scoring twice, and Kopitar had two assists in the Kings' win, one assist on Patrick's goal.
But the Kings couldn't capitalize on their good start by dropping the next two games to Edmonton and Calgary. O'Sullivan scored again at Edmonton, and had some solid shifts against the Flames. The loss to Calgary hurt, because prior to the game, L.A. traded center Craig Conroy back to the Flames for Jamie Lundmark, a fourth-round pick in the 2007 draft, and two more draft picks. Conroy turned around and helped batter his former team, 4-1, by chipping in two goals.
The trade of Conroy opened the doors of speculations that L.A. was about to start a small fire sale, moving some expensive veterans in exchange for youth. Rumors started to float that Dean Lombardi was tired of Sean Avery's act, and was actively shopping him. But apparently the asking price for a first-round pick was too steep for everyone. Derek Armstrong, Brent Sopel and Mathieu Garon all have one year left in their contracts, making them viable candidates for trade talks.
It seems that the youth movement is underway in Los Angeles. The Kings are already suiting up three highly-touted rookies in Kopitar, O'Sullivan and Pushkarev, with a few more possibly on the way. Add to that the excitement that MIchigan defenseman Jack Johnson will bring to the club if he decides to join the Kings after the college season is over this season, and Kings fans may be getting a sneak peek of what to expect next season.
