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Kings are pretty much falling apart at the moment, with their 5 game losing streak and terrible road trip last week. We even reached the point where Jim Hiller tried the "break-up Kopitar and Kempe" plan that failed multiple times last season and just as it did for Todd McLellan "lasts exactly five periods", as Jim Fox cheerfully reported last year.
("Five periods" meaning "one loss, and on the way to a second one before coach sobers up" as makes logical sense.)
So did the Kings, desperate for offense, bring in Tage Thompson, as I dared dream? Bring home Tyler Toffoli, as I nostalgically hoped? Acquire Teemu Terravainen, as I whimsically wished?
Nope, nope and nope. Not a single player with the initials T.T. Tough titty, alas.
But we did get Andrei Kuzmenko from Philly for a future 3rd-rounder (and they retained half his salary). Kuzmenko, a 27-year-old rookie sensation in Vancouver only two years ago, struggled in his sophomore season, was dealt to Calgary, stank out all of Alberta, was dumped on the Flyers, where he played seven decent games and now gets flipped to a contender. (Semi.) He's a UFA at year's end, so we will see if he's got a decent audition in him, I suppose.
Much more importantly, this GETS ALEX TURCOTTE OFF OF THE FIRST LINE. I'm in favor of anything that accomplishes that, up to bomb threats and possibly a plague of locusts. Begone, ye bust!
Scouting reports on Kuzmenko claim he's too slow and lazy on defence. Not caring! Still better than Turcotte.
(Alex Turcotte's dad, Alfie Turcotte, was a #1 pick of Montreal in the late 1970s. He sucked, too.)
So bring on Kuzmenko! I grant you, I'd be willing to play Jerry Koosman over Turcotte, but still.
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