Kings avoid Jiricek sweepstakes – Yahoo Sports

Following up on a subject we covered here on Saturday, Defenseman David Jiricek has been traded from the Columbus Blue Jackets to the Minnesota Wild.

Rumors began circulating that the Los Angeles Kings may have been in the running to acquire the former sixth-overall draft pick, when SportsNet’s Chris Johnston reported that a, “[s]ource close to [him said] that Jiricek boarded a flight to Los Angeles,” ahead of the Kings’ contest against the Ottawa Senators.

Immediately after trading for him, Minnesota assigned Jiricek to the American Hockey League’s (AHL) Iowa Wild.

This was nothing more than a paper transaction giving General Manager, Bill Guerin, time to assess his roster and trim down to twenty-three players; later swapping Jiricek with Forward Travis Boyd who has spent most of the season with the AHL’s Wild as one of their alternate captains.

The Hockey News’ Connor Doyle suggested that if the Kings were in the Jiricek sweepstakes, Forward Trevor Moore would have likely been the centerpiece of that trade.

The trade between Columbus and Minnesota leaned heavy on a young prospect (Hunt) and a future first-round NHL Entry Draft pick which is top-5 protected. The Kings do have their 2025 first-round pick, and at this point would be more valuable than Minnesota’s, sitting at fourth and second in the Western Conference standings, respectively.

LA is backlogged with right-shot Defensemen and have been for some time. Their deep prospect pool allowed them to move Brock Faber to the Wild in exchange for Forward Kevin Fiala, and Helge Grans to the Philadelphia Flyers to dump Goaltender Cal Petersen and his salary. The Kings chose to make those moves largely on the faith that both Brandt Clarke and Jordan Spence would be future building blocks for the organization.

Gambling on Clarke was a no-brainer, but General Manager Rob Blake’s decision to ride with Spence over Faber has drawn criticism from fans who have a pitchfork in one hand and a torch in the other.

In order to make a trade work with the Blue Jackets to get Jiricek (at this point I’m just spinning my wheels, here), Spence would have likely been included in the trade to satiate Columbus’ desire to get a younger player/prospect to build upon, than the twenty-nine-year-old Moore.

The pitchforks would have likely turned into spears, at that point, with fans irate that the club had to move out additional capital in order to rebuild their Defensive unit — which, again, at one point had Faber who was a finalist for the Calder Memorial Trophy, last season.

Ultimately, it’s all a moot point. The Kings have neither lost nor gained anything. How this does affect the Kings, though, is whether or not Jiricek is in the Wild’s lineup, next Saturday, when LA hosts Minnesota for their second-of-three meetings, this season.

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