All hail the Kings: Jeff Carter (77), Drew Doughty (8), Mike Richards (10), Rob Scuderi (7), Dustin Penner and company are winning with confidence and uncommon authority. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

It’s still a good month before the captain of an NHL team hoists the Stanley Cup over his head and a lot can happen between now and then. But on the basis of the first three games in the Conference Championship round, there is no more impressive team at this moment than the Los Angeles Kings.

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The Blues hope to get defenseman Alex Pietrangelo back from his injuries, but it will take a team-wide effort to get St. Louis out of its surprising funk vs. the Kings. (Andrew D. Bernstein/NHLI via Getty Images)

What a curious little theme we’ve had going recently in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs — addition by subtraction. The Devils were forced to play without sniper Ilya Kovalchuk and came up with a fine road performance in beating the Flyers 4-1 on Tuesday. The Capitals cut into Alex Ovechkin’s ice time in Monday’s Game 2 and beat the Rangers 3-2 (although he was certainly out there a lot in Game 3′s near-doubleheader loss to New York). The Predators, playing poorly and down 2-0 in games to the Coyotes, suspended their two top scorers for Wednesday’s Game 3 at home and pulled off one of their trademark textbook  victories, a 2-0 Pekka Rinne shutout.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work that way for the Blues earlier this week. They were without their best defenseman — maybe their best player — in Alex Pietrangelo for Game 2 at home against the Kings, and rather than respond positively to the adversity, they played their worst period in memory, falling behind 4-0, never recovering, and ultimately losing 5-2. Now, they must skate in Los Angeles for the next pair, and the upstart Kings have a chance to put them in the sleeperhold.

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Jeff Carter scored 15 goals with 10 assists in 39 games for the Blue Jackets. (Matt Pearce/Icon SMI)

There have been few trades consummated as the NHL approaches the trade deadline and none involving players who could be considered top-end talent. But the Thursday evening swap between the Columbus Blue Jackets and the Los Angeles Kings — in which the Kings gave up defenseman Jack Johnson, a former third overall draft pick, and a future first-round pick in exchange for another former first-round pick, Jeff Carter — marked a deal involving big names that could kick start more movement as the Monday deadline approaches.

“This isn’t a rental. This isn’t your classic trade deadline deal,” Kings GM Dean Lombardi said Thursday night. “This is a good young player for a good young player. This is a hockey deal.”

It’s a deal that theoretically helps both teams. The Kings, who have won once in their last seven games and twice in their last 10, are fighting for their playoff lives after many believed they’d be a Stanley Cup contender this year. They are the worst scoring team in the NHL, averaging only 2.05 goals a game, which is low by historic proportions. They’ve been shut out three times this month and held to one goal four other times. In Carter, they get a forward who has three times topped the 30-goal mark when he played for the Flyers and in 2008-09 hit for 46.

He’s got good size, is an excellent skater with a hard shot and has the ability to play either wing or center and kill penalties. The Blue Jackets acquired him to be the center they’ve never had for Rick Nash, their excellent winger, who has been the subject of the most trade speculation the last few weeks. But the chemistry wasn’t right. Carter is not a distributor of the puck as much as he’s a sniper himself. If he produces, he’ll be a big asset for the Kings.

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Center Jeff Carter is available in the Blue Jackets' fire sale and the Kings need some scoring. A match? (John Grieshop/Getty Images)

The NHL trade deadline arrives on Feb. 27 and unlike last year when February turned into trade season, there has been little movement thus far. As Kevin Allen noted last week in USA Today, the trade market appears to be stalled with many teams still evaluating their situation.  Should they be “buyers” or “sellers”? Asking prices for potential trade targets are said to be prohibitively high.

The first deal, however, could break things open. That may not happen until we get closer to deadline day and the undecided teams determine for sure if they want to build for next season or take a shot at the playoffs. Then the “buyers” — the teams hoping for a playoff spot or a deep postseason run — will have more trading partners among the “sellers,” who will be looking more long term while trying to clear out cap space for future moves or acquiring useful players now.

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Devils winger Zach Parise and Sabres goaltender Ryan Miller are two of the biggest Eastern Conference names in the trade rumor mill, but dealing them carries major implications for their respective teams. (Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)

The NHL trade deadline arrives on Feb. 27 and unlike last year when February turned into trade season, there has been little movement thus far. As Kevin Allen noted last week in USA Today, the trade market appears to be stalled with many teams still evaluating their situations.  Asking prices for potential trade targets are said to be prohibitively high.

The first deal, however, could break things open. That may not happen until we get closer to deadline day and the undecided teams determine for sure if they want to build for next season or take a shot at the playoffs. Then the “buyers” — the teams hoping for a playoff spot or a deep postseason run — will have more trading partners among the “sellers,” who will be looking more long term while trying to clear out cap space for future moves or acquiring useful players now.

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Blue Jackets fans have had little to cheer since the team's first season in 2000-01. (Terry Gilliam/AP)

As this unusually calamitous NHL season pauses for a few days, the bleary eyes of the hockey world will try to focus on the big All-Star Weekend party in Ottawa. But about 650 miles to the southwest, a much smaller hockey gathering on Saturday will be less jovial. In fact, it will be somewhat angry.

In front of Nationwide Arena in Columbus, perhaps a few hundred fans will gather to protest the state of the Blue Jackets, the league’s worst team and a franchise that has never really achieved much of anything. They want team president Mike Priest and GM Scott Howson replaced — things that owner John P. McConnell told Aaron Portzline of The Columbus Dispatch in Friday’s edition he is not contemplating — and they want a fresh start for a team that had only 13 wins in 49 games before the break. This stands to become the Blue Jackets’ worst season yet.

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Like so much that has gone wrong for the Blue Jackets throughout their history, adding Jeff Carter (left) to help set up sniper Rick Nash (right) has turned out to be a miserable failure. (Photo by Terry Gilliam/AP)

It seemed as if the electrician arrived shortly after the Blue Jackets’ lost 7-4 to the no longer mighty Ducks on Sunday to fix the lightbulb over GM Scott Howson’s head. When it went on at last, a bright idea arrived: It was time to fire the coach of the NHL’s 30th-best team.

The truth is, the Jackets aren’t exactly swimming in money and they didn’t relish the thought of having to pay yet another coach not to coach. Further to Howson’s credit, he was loyal to Scott Arniel, his hand-picked selection, for longer than anybody expected. Arniel might well have what it takes to be a good bench boss — the players never quit on him – but Scotty Bowman couldn’t turn this impoverished group into winners. That task now falls to Arniel’s former assistant, Todd Richards, who had been head coach of the Minnesota Wild for the last couple of years while not getting them to the playoffs either time.

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Ex-Penguins favorite Jaromir Jagr is stunned by the level of animosity that Pittsburgh fans have for him. (Cliff Welch/Icon SMI)

With cameras everywhere, especially from HBO, the Flyers play their biggest rival on Thursday night in Pittsburgh. It will be the first trip back in the hated orange and black for two notable ex-Penguins, Max Talbot and Jaromir Jagr.

The welcome for Jagr likely won’t be any friendlier than it was when he returned with the Capitals and Rangers. He was loudly booed in the city where he began his career and once ranked second only to Mario Lemieux in adoration. In fact, the fans’ hostility might be more amped considering that Jagr flirted with signing with Pittsburgh last summer before reaching a deal with Philly.

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Hoping for an offensive boost, the Wild are hoping that Dany Heatley's 26 goals and apparent lack of speed last season were a mere blip in his otherwise productive career. (Jason O. Watson/US PRESSWIRE)

The moves – and non-moves – that NHL teams have made for the upcoming season can leave one either jubilant or very puzzled. We looked at a few that we called “science experiments” in early July and it has indeed been a wild summer of roster movement. There are few sure things in the world (hey, if you want a guarantee, buy a washing machine) and here are nine situations that might be considered some of the biggest gambles in the league. As with our looks at rookies last week (here and here), these are not in any particular order and not intended to be a definitive list. Just some thoughts as we head toward training camp.

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Ex-Wild blueliner Brent Burns will help the Sharks, but at a very steep price. (Mark Humphrey/AP)

With apologies to my friend and colleague Adrian Dater, saying for certain which NHL teams were winners and losers during all the trading and drafting that began last week is as risky as the draft itself — which essentially tries to project which teenaged players will make it to the NHL sometime in the next few years. Various researchers have shown that only about 16 percent of the kids who are drafted have decent careers — in some years, that figure has dropped to nearly 11 percent — and almost all the success stories come from first- and second-rounders.

While we’ll need time to watch how these young players develop, there were a number of interesting moves during the weekend that will have a more immediate impact. It’s worth venturing a few thoughts on them.
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