Why would a team trade in an experienced right-back who is running well, has legitimate offensive skills and is just 24 years old? And what about an easily manageable upper salary limit?
Because this team can use all the cap space they can currently squeeze out and, perhaps more importantly with this deal, open the door to a potentially much better version of the coveted profile mentioned above.
The Kings traded Sean Durzi on Saturday, trading a polarizing blueliner to Arizona for a second-round pick in the 2024 NHL Draft. It’s one of four picks the Coyotes had for next year and which he originally got from Montreal at swap away center Christian Dvorak fetched. And while that pick doesn’t add to LA’s meager draft tally for next week’s 2023 draft — just five picks and no first-round picks — it helps fill a gap into 2024, as the Kings have nothing between the first and fourth rounds had.
That’s really not what this deal is about. It’s about money, especially the cap. It’s about Brandt Clarke.
Durzi has long been a candidate for trade. It was still understood he would eventually go elsewhere, even though another right-back in Sean Walker was sent to Philadelphia in this cap-focused package with Cal Petersen, which helped see Vladislav Gavrikov re-signed. The Kings weren’t just tightly packed on the right side of defense. Organizationally, they were crammed together like a can of sardines.
That opens the door for the uber-confident Clarke, the 20-year-old frontrunner who made his NHL debut last fall, won a gold medal with the World Juniors and ended his year by winning the Ontario Hockey League with 30 goals and 84 points in 43 games between the regular season and the playoffs in his final junior season. Clarke even got some ice time with Drew Doughty when the Kings were behind late in the games and needed offense. He’ll have Doughty and Matt Roy in front of him on the right, but that also allows him to loosen up in the five-a-side game and work his way into the power play.
And if Clarke is having a bad camp and management decides he needs a season stint with Ontario Reign in the AHL, the Kings have Jordan Spence as someone to fill in at their level as well. Spence, 22, has been waiting for a full-time opportunity to run for a spot. He doesn’t have Clarke’s massive offensive advantages, but he has 87 points in 102 games with the Reign over the past two seasons.
The fanbase has held out hope for Clarke’s rise and the prospect of him taking his first steps towards becoming a central part of their defense over the long term. The Kings have identified Mikey Anderson as such with their eight-year extension for the shutdown left-hander. The trade in Durzi – who scored nine goals and 38 points in the 2022-23 season – allows the emerging reality of Clarke to become part of the bigger picture. We can see the process and how measured or how fast it develops.
Brandt Clarke is a 20-year-old star player who made his NHL debut with the Kings last fall. (Charles LeClaire / USA Today)
But trading Durzi is also very much about positioning yourself for the next big step. It feels more and more like it’s Pierre-Luc Dubois. The rumors the Kings are trying to concoct about the Winnipeg Jets center have not been disproved or calmed down. In fact, the opposite is the case.
How close does Durzi’s move bring you to taking over Dubois? As we know, the Kings were challenged with the cap. The waiver of Petersen’s contract, along with Walker’s contract, helped general manager Rob Blake correct his mistake of granting Petersen the three-year, $15 million contract extension. However, that he had to keep $2 million of Ivan Provorov’s contract in the three-way deal with Columbus and Philadelphia didn’t give Blake full flexibility.
Durzi makes $2 million in real money this season, but his cap hit is only $1.7 million. Cap Friendly now has Los Angeles at their disposal with an estimated area of over $9 million. That’s still very close considering they have to find a keeper in Pheonix Copley and they have to sign some restricted free agents, the most notable being Gabriel Vilardi.
Considering Dubois reportedly counts LA among the teams he’d love to join but also reportedly wants to make up to $9 million a year from a deal that has to be negotiated, it’s still hard to imagine , how the Kings can do that, maybe it will work. But that brings us to Vilardi, who is an RFA with its own arbitration rights.
23-year-old Vilardi cannot look back on Dubois’ longer track record. He just finished his first breakout season, in which he scored 23 goals and provided 18 assists in 63 games. Returning from injury, he impressed in the playoff series against Edmonton. The promise that came with the 2017 first-round pick has finally been implemented on a larger scale after years of working through old issues and the erratic development that came with it.
But despite his breakthrough, Vilardi was still missing weeks of appearances at the end of the regular season and couldn’t completely shake the threat of injury. His size and talent are unquestionable. Its availability may remain an issue from time to time. Dubois brings his own offensive upside and consistency issues. It was also long-lived and productive, even if it didn’t reach the level of a high-end #1 center.
Quinton Byfield would interest the Jets trying to get the best possible offer from a player who is clear about his exit intentions. But Blake refused to cut ties with Byfield, certainly hoping he would develop into the hit player the franchise needs for the long haul. There has to be something of value in a Dubois trade, and that’s where Vilardi might come in.
Blake has this second-round pick from Arizona. He has second pick this year, No. 54, which is first pick since their first-round pick for Gavrikov and goalkeeper Joonas Korpisalo were sent to Columbus. More salary needs to be cut for it to work, but there’s Viktor Arvidsson ($4.25 million AAV) and Alex Iafallo ($4 million) who could be postponed as neither has trade protection. Trevor Moore ($4.2 million AAV) is also at a similar price point but has a 10-team no-trade clause in a five-year extension he signed last December.
Will Vilardi, one of those $4M wingers and second-round picks, make it? If the Kings are truly determined to take over Dubois, Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff should at least be open to it as he doesn’t have much influence here. It’s the opportunity Blake has to secure Dubois and tackle the net, albeit at a much lower cost than would have been the case with Connor Hellebuyck or Juuse Saros.
But that could be the view when it comes to allocating the remaining funds that will be made available in many other areas. The mistake with Petersen – coupled with the fact that Vegas won the Stanley Cup with a full team backing Adin Hill – may make Blake somewhat reluctant to spend big on Hellebuyck, who has another year with a cap hit of 6 $.1 million ahead of him but aiming to jump into Andrei Vasilevskiy’s territory for his next deal.
There are free-agent goalkeepers, including their own at Korpisalo, who will obviously be scouting for their best deals, but will also fare well below what Vasilevskiy and Saros – who is underpaid at $5m and will take a royal ransom to get out of Nashville – will command now and in the future. The run in Dubois is all about further strengthening the center position and protection if Anže Kopitar either slips in the lineup or even on the day he hangs up his skates. (Kopitar is entering the final year of his contract but he and the club have been in talks about extending the 35-year-old’s career with the Kings.)
The Kings have long had an interest in Dubois, a power forward whose physical ability seems to tempt and occasionally frustrate. They put him under close scrutiny when he was about to leave Columbus, but the Blue Jackets favored NHL talent over high-level talent and brought in Patrik Laine and Jack Roslovic. When he gets going and fully committed, Dubois can be a beast. In the case of the one-off vote for third place in the overall ranking, however, the question remains as to when.
With their Durzi deal, they opened a door for Clarke and might have opened another rift for Dubois. It gives Durzi a chance to become more of a standout player with a young Arizona blue line that Jakob Chychrun no longer has. And Kings fans can no longer complain about Durzi’s mistakes or shortcomings.
The Kings may not have a pick in Wednesday’s likely first round draft, but they still appear to be a team looking to make a splash in Nashville. Heck, it’s obvious they’re already at work this weekend.
(Top photo by Sean Durzi: Perry Nelson / USA Today)