LOS ANGELES -- There's been an emerging trend of mediocrity in the NHL this season. With the league closing in on the halfway mark, there's a consensus that there are a few great teams, a few terrible teams, and loads of just okay teams.
In their current run, winning eight of their last 10 games, including wins against some of the top teams, some people are pushing the Los Angeles Kings into that tier of a few great teams. In most outlets' power rankings, the Kings are universally ranked in the top 8-10 and are in the top five in quite a few now.
This leaves general manager Rob Blake with a bit of a conundrum: Does he buy into this team's hype, or does he treat them like a true contender after three straight seasons of failing in the first round?
It's a difficult question to answer at this point, we're almost halfway through the season, but the Kings found themselves in a similar spot last season in December, only to fire their coach two months later. It's too early to determine exactly who this team is, but we're already hearing rumblings of Blake wanting to improve this team via trade. Before getting into potential trades, let's look at the team as is.
One of my biggest criticisms of this team in recent years is the lack of truly elite talent, an inability to match the Connor McDavids of this world with similar talent. This season, the Kings have got that level of performance from Anze Kopitar and Adrian Kempe. Kopitar is on pace for a career-high 93 points, and Kempe is on pace for a career-high 82, including 41 goals.
While I'm not comparing the two players to McDavid and Leon Draisaitl in Edmonton, they're providing the firepower needed to duke it out with those two in the postseason, something LA has missed in the last few seasons. They're also finally getting production from the blue line and have some serious depth scoring in the form of Alex Laferriere and Warren Foegele.
They still aren't an extremely high-powered offense, but they've got two players consistently taking over games and the necessary depth scoring to complement their league-leading defensive numbers.
They've also gotten solid goaltending from Darcy Kuemper and David Rittich. Neither goalie will sniff a Vezina nomination, but they aren't losing the Kings games either and that's all they need.
Then there's the return of Drew Doughty, the first-ballot Hall of Fame leader on the blue line. There's a lot to be excited about in Doughty's return but I question how much he raises this team's ceiling. They can't get better defensively and while Doughty is immensely skilled he isn't massively raising the team's offensive numbers.
The return of a 25+ minute a night player is going to improve any team and maybe Doughty significantly improves a reeling Kings power play, but it's a wait-and-see situation for me. We'll also have to see how potentially decreased ice time for Brandt Clarke and the decreased ice time of Vladislav Gavrikov impacts the blue line.
The Kings will be a better team with Doughty back, the question is, how much better?
All in all, is this team as they are a contender? Should Blake buy on their current hype? Probably not, but he shouldn't sell on it either. It's unlikely Kopitar will continue his torrent pace deep into the season and into the playoffs and I'm still not convinced this team beats the likes of Edmonton, Vegas or even Vancouver in a seven-game series. But unlike last season where I felt the Kings should be selling assets like Matt Roy at the deadline, I think they should stand pat with their current roster this year.
This current roster is playing well enough to be shown faith, even if Blake doesn't add much to it. Let Doughty's return be your big "acquisition" this season and see how things go.
That brings us back to the aforementioned trade rumors. I don't see the point in making a trade for LA. They don't have the assets to significantly improve this team and the emergence of Laferriere and Alex Turcotte renders a trade pointless. Unless something massively changes in the next few months, a deadline acquisition feels like a trade for the sake of it.
A right-shot scoring winger could help this team, but who are they getting that's better than their current players? Are they going to trade a third first-round pick in four years, or recent first-round pick Liam Greentree? They shouldn't, and anyone who comes in for less than that is unlikely to be an upgrade on what they already have.
Maybe there's a hockey trade to be made around the deadline, but for now, it doesn't make sense. Don't mess with what has been a winning formula and go big game hunting, last time the Kings did that, they ended up with Pierre-Luc Dubois.
The Kings shouldn't fully buy their current hype and shouldn't view themselves as contenders, but they should be optimistic about this roster and give them every opportunity to prove a point deep into the season.