I for one will be pissed off if Lombardi is fired. I've suffered through being a Kings fan for almost 30 years and, until now, NEVER has the management chosen to really build this team. Until Lombardi, it seems that the Kings management would flip-flop every year or two about whether the team was going through a rebuild or whether they were going to acquire veterans and make a run for the cup. The end result is nothing.
This team is underachieving no doubt, but as a long time fan, I feel the organization is in better shape than is has ever been in. Lombardi needs at least two more years after this one before he can truly be evaluated and, if deemed ineffective, let go.
Anyone who thought that the Kings would be winners within the first three years after his hiring was crazy. This is what a TRUE rebuild is. Let it continue its course.

Sorry, but I'm on that Crawford and Lombardi bandwagon of thinking. Stay the course. We've seen it time and time again with this team. Start rebuilding, feel the pressure from the fans, build a somewhat reserve list and then trade it all away for a quick fix. Not anymore.
Everyone knows that it's killing both Crawford and Lombardi to see how poorly this team is doing. But, everyone has also noticed that the best players on the team are not the veterans, it's Kopitar, Brown, Frolov, Cammalleri, O'Sullivan and Johnson. That's what gets me excited about this team. I admit, they are the reason I pay $200 a season for Center Ice. They're a treat to watch, and a to see them develop at the pace they have is even a bigger treat. That's who we should all be focussed on, cause those are the players that are still gonna be here after the Blake's, and the Modry's and the Thornton's and Willsie's are all gone. Those are the player's that are going to lead this team once they make the playoffs.
I leave you with this. "With the first overall pick in the 2008 NHL Entry Draft, the Los Angeles Kings are pround to select, from the Ontario Leagues Sarnia Sting, center Steve Stamkos."

Brilliant column for one spectacular reason: it is so blatantly honest. Don't know why, but I cracked a smile several times when our club's embarassing statistics. It's like I'm proud of the mediocrity, of the loyalty which springs from that pride.

Maybe it's because I hope it will be worth it in the end (something that's getting harder and harder to believe these days), but as I always say, a loss is a loss. Does it matter if you are dead-last in the league, or the first loser who has to watch as the opponents hoist the Cup? It would be nice to be a legitimate challenger, but our time will come.

Won't it?

great article..

and yes after 40 years we have paid our freagin dues.

I want to say THANK YOU, for writing what every kings fan has been thinking for a very long long time.I have been a fan since i was born.I got to see the boys play at the fourm.In the nice purple and gold.So i also remember the #99 days.Now to today.Everything in your article to me was 100% true.I could not belive it.My friends and i have been saying the same thing for about 5 or more years.Finally someone in sports says all the things that need to be said about this poor team and it,s diehard fans.That i am truely one of.What got me the most was what you said about their goalie.OK we had MR.VASHON and the sometimes good and not good MR.RUDHY.Hope i spelled those right.WE NEED A GOALIE LIKE NOBODY DOES.WE AS FANS DESERVE IT.I will never give up on my team know matter how bad it gets.Really how much worse can it get.They got it before us.THATS CRUHSING!

The article is nothing we haven't heard before (as accurate as it is) from a non-fan who turns to hockey stories about once per decade. As a former San Bernardinan, I can tell you that my pug-dog knows more about hockey than Oberjuerge, the yellow journalist of SoCal sports. So swallow his bitter pill with a grain of salt. As to us (overly?) loyal Kings fans, I guess we play the waiting game. If it's frustrating to us to be the worst, think how much more so for the players, coach & GM.

I am still waiting to see or hear Mr. Lombardi admit how bad he has messed up with the current team over the last 2 years. I keep hearing about the future, like I have been over the past many years, and I hope that things work out, but his current player decisions have been disastrous and we never hear anything about that from him.

Nice article. Thanks for linking to it.

Camalleri is right. IF some of the guys on this Kings team get to a Cup, it will be VERY sweet.

As it will be for us fans who will stick it out through this, the worst year in franchise history.

We complain because we care.

Teddy Purcell makes the AHL all-star team as a starter.
This kid looks good and is tearing up the AHL!

Oops.......I forgot the link........http://www.theahl.com/news/league/index.html?article_id=8274

ACCOUNTABILITY. Does anybody in this organization know what this stands for? If I hear one more post about how great Lombardi is about building from the ground up, I'm gonna puke!

Let's look at DL's track record since he became GM. Anthony, feel free to chime in at any time!

Starting with the hiring of Marc Crawford. They supposedly spent twelve hours talking hockey and Crow's committment to winning. Apparently they didn't talk long enough!

Then there's the Dan Cloutier debacle. Gee, let's give him a two year six million dollar contract extension before he's even played a regular season game for the Kings. Brilliant move Dean!!

Let's gut the only talent we have on the team. Do the names Demitra, Conroy & Norstrom mean anything? Yes we did obtain Patrick O'Sullivan, but it cost us our most gifted offensive forward.

Let's move on to the Rob Blake free agent signing. I truly wonder if this was Dean's choice, or if management forced this upon him? Needless to say, Rob has not stirred memories of his Norris Trophy winning season of 1998. Now he's publically stated that he would "waive his no trade clause" to be moved to a contending team. NICE MOVE ROB! That certainly should not ruffle any feathers in the Kings dressing room. Strip him of his captaincy immediately and place it upon Dustin Brown, one of the few players on the Kings roster who plays all out.

I haven't even mentioned Dean's free agent signings of Scott Thornton, Brian Willsie or Alyn McCauley. His loyalty to his former Shark players was has been a little too much to take! Oh and by the way, has San Jose won the Stanley Cup yet?

I haven't even gotten to last summers free agent signing spree. Dean stated "we need to fill six or seven holes..." Gee, if you hadn't traded away Demitra, Conroy or Norstrom, you wouldn't have needed so many new faces!

Does anybody at AEG even care that the Kings are the laughing stock of the entire NHL? Do everyone a big favor and sell the team to someone who does actually care!

Tim Leiweke, where the hell are you?

While a distant fan, I have followed the kings since the days of Carson's rookie year and have never been so completely disgusted with the lack of effort as a team that I have seen the past few years. While I was not keen on the idea of bringing the Vancouver Canucks to SoCal I had hoped that MC would be able to bring the team together like he did in Colorado. I think there was more team spirit under Andy Murray. While his methods may have grated on some, he got better results with less talent.

And I agree... we complain because we care! Well put Paul.

petey,
I wouldn't bet on Lombardi picking Stamkos, even in the unlikely event that we get the #1 pick. 99% of GMs draft on the philosophy of taking the best player available. Lombardi is the 1% and drafts by character and position. Basically whoever has the best attitude out of Doughty, Schenn, Bogosian, etc. We should still get a great player, hopefully. But I'd love it if he did take Stamkos.

I haven't even mentioned Dean's free agent signings of Scott Thornton, Brian Willsie or Alyn McCauley. His loyalty to his former Shark players was has been a little too much to take! Oh and by the way, has San Jose won the Stanley Cup yet?

Just a point of clarification, Brian Willsie was never a member of the Shark organization.

He WAS not good enough to consistently stick with a good Avs team, however.

Great article by the only person I respect at the LA Times, Helene Elliott, I sure do miss her covering the Kings, but she has a great take on them in her article, check it out.
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-elliott10jan10,0,935870.column?coll=la-home-sports

David
I'm here to make you puke.

We've all been suffering equally since becoming Kings fans because we've never won a thing.
I would rather be fighting for a playoff spot now, but I understand that this organization was in such bad shape that it would be almost impossible to win right away. We never had the young talent to trade for top veterans. Any talent that we had, was given up for aging stiffs.
DL came in and has gutted the organization and is trying to rebuild from scratch. By doing so, we have to realize you can't win right away and we'll have to go through some ugly periods. That's where we are now. DL has admitted that the F/A signings were not going to turn the franchise around, but were cheap fill-in players. He didn't sign the Thornton's, Willsie's, Modry's to long term deals. Once the young players are ready they will take over those spots and form the nucleus of what hopefully will be a championship caliber team.
If he's wrong, we are no better or worse than we were before.
San Jose never won a championship, but they were a upper tier team in the league and have been for a while. He built that org from scratch. I'll take what he did there in a heartbeat. Winning a championship not only takes talent, but a lot of luck. You can have the best team and run into a hot goalie in the playoffs and there goes your championship.
I can't argue with trading Demitra, Conroy, or Norstrom. We got back Sully for Demitra. In a few years when we are ready to win (hopefully) Demitra would be past his prime or getting close, while Sully will be reaching his prime.
Conroy? He sucked while he was here. thank God we dumped him. I loved Matty, but we got a 1st round pick. Again, he wasn't going to be around when we're ready to win, but maybe that player we pick will be a key to our winning.
It's worth a shot. Nothing else has worked. Who knows, maybe we'll win a cup, but at least lets be a top level team with a chance to win it all for years to come.

Is today Groundhog day? Just curious.

David,

I'm all talked out. Or should i Say typed out. THese Dumbardi fanatics need to see more of the same losing, in order to see it from our point of view.
This G.M. has failed to fill the most important spot on a hockey roster.
As a result we got a carear minor leaguer and a journeyman pretending to be #1 goalies.
His free agent signings have been absolutely pathetic and pitiful. I've never seen a G.M. waste so much money on Garbage players. And dont forget the Lubo signing for $25 Million. He's gonna seriously regret that. It may even get him fired.
I'm getting real tired with all this talk about the future. Our future is not as solid as some of you think. Draft picks and prospects mean NOTHING if these players turn into BUSTS. Look at the statistics, more than half of first round picks never fulfill their expectations.
I wonder what DL's excuse will be if the Purcell's the Boyle's the Berniers or Hickey's don't pan out (though I hope they do).
If we keep going in this direction, it will take years before we see the playoffs or even an above average team.
He was lucky to get the San Jose G.M. job, and did very little with it. Like Marc Nathan said "where's the cup".
He's mot smart enough or skilled enough to be a G.M. in this league.

"Let's look at DL's track record since he became GM"--pretty one sided analysis given that you completely blew off his draft record (4 picks (Bernier, Simmonds, Hickey, Moller) in the last WJC for example and acquiring/signing of young guys like johnson and purcell (AHL rookie scoring leader)- as this team is in a clear a rebuilding movement these are the things that are going to matter. The kings had a decent pool of talent thanks to Taylor, but Lomardi has made the kings pool of young talent something all other teams can envy. The Kings suck now, but i for one am enjoying the ride cause i can see what's coming up the pipeline. Since the vets are playing so bad now, i wouldn't be surprised to see a few more younsters getting their feet wet this year.

I forgot to mention that Dean locked up two keys to the future, Brown and Visnovsky (though he's not having the best year right now) to long-term deals.

I find it very hard to believe that, if the kings get the 1st overall pick, they pick someone other than stamkos. That'd kind of be like the penguins taking bobby ryan over crosby. Stamkos is the kind of player you can't pass on. Don't get me wrong, doughty and a few of the other top defenseman would be welcome additions to the defensive prospect pool, but certainly not at the expense of stamkos. He's on a different level than the rest of the players in the draft.

-J

The Helene Elliott article was interesting because she obviously protected Lombardi in her piece. Not once did she mention the awful free agent acquisitions of DL.

Also, DL seems to be one of those guys adept at sticking his finger up in the air and figuring out which way the wind is blowing.

And because of that - and trust me on this - Crawford is going to take the fall. I'm not saying that would be such a bad decision, but the point is DL will protect himself at all costs.

However, once Crawford is let go, Lombardi is out of mulligans. And that is why Crawford is safe until the end of the season.

BTW, Helene's story was annoying because she so obviously protects DL. He must really be one of her top NHL sources!

Before you get too excited about the prospect of Stamkos coming to the Kings in the draft, remember this ...

YOU HAVE TO WIN THE DRAFT LOTTERY TO GET THE NO. 1 PICK IN THE DRAFT!

Just because you finish with the WORST record in the league does NOT guarantee you the No. 1 pick in the draft! And judging by the Kings' luck in recent seasons, leave it to them to lose the draft LOTTERY, too!

BTW, it was a great column in the Times by Helene Elliott, what I've been saying all along in this blog: To DL, please bring up ALL THE YOUNG STUDS and let them build and learn for NEXT season now! We did it with Kopitar and Brown and Frolov, and they have panned out pretty well, eh?

Ex-sportswriter- All the discussion about stamkos was IF the kings had the 1st overall pick, not just the worst record. Just a hunch, but anyone who knows stamkos' name, or any undrafted junio player for that matter, probably is aware of the draft lottery.

Fair point though- since 1995, only 5 teams with the worst record have picked 1st, and only once in the 2000 decade has that happened (06 draft).

-J