Fox’s tales: The Kings are still learning how to win

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Jim Fox is a former Kings forward and the award-winning color commentator for Kings telecasts on Fox Sports West. He played for the Kings from 1980-1990 and ranks eighth on the Kings’ all-time scoring list. You can get more insight from Jim and about the L.A. Kings at www.lakings.com.

When the Kings are on the road, I’ll be checking in at least once a week, probably twice a week, just trying to catch up on how the Kings are doing. I will try to stay away from recapping the play-by-play of games and try to touch on trends and patterns regarding the Kings and how it fits in to the rest of the NHL. Once in a while I may touch on some leaguewide issues, but I will try to keep it to the Kings. At times, I might look back on some playing days memories of the cities we travel to, or overall impressions of the cities and buildings we visit. If you have anything you want me to touch on, let me know and I’ll do my best to get you the info.

As a team, the Kings have shown they can be effective and can more than hold their own. The next step is upon them. Now it’s about the old cliché, “learning how to win”. They are still a young team, but as a group they are one more year experienced. The personnel has been upgraded. It isn’t at the top of the league quite yet, but improvements have been made.

Now it is about learning to deal with the critical moments that come up in every game. Understanding the flow and momentum shifts that happen in all games and learning how to deal with them, and becoming more comfortable with them. How to keep controlling a game once you have established that control. Doing all of the little things that when added together make up a solid, 60-minute effort.

Some examples would be executing a crisp breakout on a power play to keep the momentum in your favor, making sure the discipline is there so you don’t take offensive zone penalties, when you are on a shorthanded attack make sure you shoot the puck to the proper side of the net, so if you miss the net you don’t trap your teammates and allow a counter attack that becomes dangerous, and last, but not limited to, when the opposition has pulled the goaltender, work as a five man unit with the No. 1 priority of getting the puck deep.

The biggest issue might be understanding that the team is good enough, as far as personnel goes, to compete every night. “Measuring stick” games against the Detroit Red Wings and other top teams are important to get a true evaluation of where the team stands, but the only measuring stick should be measuring themselves against themselves. The team is in the process of learning to believe that it is good enough to get the job done. It is more about their execution than it is about what the opposition is doing.

Making the step from a young team to a mature team, understanding how little plays can have cumulative effects of a game, will come and it will become an automatic part of their game. They are not there yet, but they are on their way. I talked to veteran defenseman Sean O’Donnell and he may have summed it up as well as anyone. He said, “We have the ability to win. We have to realize that many times the team that wins is the team that makes fewer mistakes. It isn’t always the better team.”

Alexander Frolov must become a bigger part of this team in both ends of the ice. He has been placed on a line whose main priority is to be the shutdown line, but with his skills he must find a way to be more productive. Over the years, I have found that I have been a bigger supporter of Frolov than most, but I certainly understand the issues of inconsistency and that has to be kept at a minimum. Since he will be a free agent at the end of this season, the clock is ticking on whether the Kings feel they can sign him or whether they feel he must be moved to get some compensation. There is a potential for that to be a distraction for any player and the best way to make this scenario work out in a positive manner, for everyone involved, is to be on top of your game. Frolov has shown in the past that he can be a puck possession-dominant player. This has not been a big enough part of his game so far this season.

The main focus of any team is the goaltending. That focus was even bigger for the Kings this year because of Jonathan Quick’s effective first season. So far this year, he has not been up to par. In talking with him earlier in the year, he was working on his set position, the fundamentals of how to get positioned as the attack is coming at you. He felt he was a little too anxious and was trying to save the puck before the shot was taken. Sounds like a big issue, but it is a normal step in the development of a young goaltender. That is usually an indication of a goalie who feels he still has something to prove, instead of knowing that you belong.

I believe he will get this corrected. Looking back to last year, he showed that he has everything necessary, and more, to become a true No. 1 goalie. He is just trying to learn how to be comfortable in the new role of being the No. 1 go-to guy.

Expectations have gone up for the whole team, with much of those expectations going up for the goaltending. Once Jonathan comes to terms with that, I feel confident that he will handle the duties and provide goaltending the Kings have not had in a long time. It’s probably more about concentration and focus than it is about technique. You can make the assumption that he may be thinking about the results of a game, instead of the process that needs to be executed before you get the results. Once again, I feel he will become comfortable and give the Kings the goaltending any playoff contender needs.

Let’s focus on a couple of young defensemen. Davis Drewiske is playing in his first full season. He leads the Kings in plus/minus at plus-five and is starting to get a comfortable feel regarding his role and his abilities. He has that enviable combination of being a good skate with fairly good size. His skating allows him the get out of trouble with his footwork. His size allows him to be a solid defender and as Coach Terry Murray likes to say, “Hard and heavy” down low, and normally he stays under control when making contact. He rarely gets caught out of position and runs around.

Expectations were not too high for him coming into the season, but he is a good fit right now. History tells us that you can never have enough defensemen, and in the salary-cap era, you need the younger and less expensive players to play important roles on a team.

The other young defenseman is looked on in a completely different light than Drewiske. From the first day Jack Johnson entered the NHL, the spotlight was on him. He was a more than popular, dynamic defenseman from the University of Michigan and his skill level (passing/skating) were already at the NHL level. Expectations were sky-high and during his first year, he did everything he could to live up to them. His second year, last season, his development was interrupted by a major shoulder injury. Now in his third year, he is trying to find where he fits into the team and so far, he has done most everything he been asked to do.

He still has a tendency to chase things in the team’s zone, but that seems to be getting better. His partner this year has been Rob Scuderi and the calming “safety net support” that Scuderi supplies, has been good for Jack. Jack has also made adjustment to his physique. After his first year, at 200 pounds, he felt he had to bulk up since he found it difficult in battles against Western Conference forwards such as Joe Thornton, Ryan Getzlaf and Jarome Iginla. He put on 30 pounds and looked forward to being much stronger in his second year. The shoulder injury was a devastating blow to his development but the coaching staff felt that he was also a step off the pace because of his added bulk.

I should mention that in no way was his added weight considered overweight in the negative sense. Jack is one of the most dedicated athletes and as a “gym-rat”; he is always trying to improve his conditioning and strength. He just put too much bulk onto his frame and it affected his mobility. Now he is down to a solid 215 pounds and his mobility has allowed him to be effective at both ends. With the puck, he can get into the rush quicker and in the defensive zone; he can close the gap and make contact more effectively.

We did have a chance to sit down with Bill Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner , while in New York. Unfortunately, Commissioner Gary Bettman was not available. Too bad, because many of you had some interesting questions you wanted me to ask him. Most of our conversations were off the record, although Mr. Daly offered to answer anything on the record.

Along with Bob Miller (FOX Sports West Play-By-Play), Nick Nickson (Kings Radio Play-by-Play) and Rich Hammond (lakings.com), we had a nice chat for about an hour. One thing I can say, Mr. Daly is an impressive spokesperson. His background is law, but he is very personable and his communication skills are second to none.

An area I did ask him about was the NHL’s position on future participation in the Olympic Games. The 2010 games are in Vancouver, Canada, and the NHL will have full participation. After that, things are still uncertain, so I asked him about the concerns the league has regarding a decision to go forward with participation in the Olympics.

“Some of the concerns are business interruption in North America and what that does to the local businesses of our clubs. I think there’s a concern about injuries and the effect that injuries can have on individual team’s performance and also on completive balance. Also, the competitive inequities regarding significant player participation, from a team standpoint versus nonsignificant participation are a concern.

‘Obviously an Olympics in North America, where the time zone is friendly and there is a greater connection to our primary fan base, the reception has been typically very positive I expect it to be positive in Vancouver. When we have play halfway around the globe and the time zone is not that friendly and where the exposure is not so great, the concern on the business interruption side seems to be a little higher.”

Well put by the deputy commissioner. The point that deals with the competitive issues of some teams having more Olympians than others is very interesting. The last time the Olympics were played, the NHL playoffs that followed experienced something that had never seen before. In the first round of the playoffs, in the Western Conference, the top four seeds lost the first round. As top teams, they had many Olympians performing and did not get the rest that other teams did. Did their players burn out with the long season and the Olympics? Something to consider.

Mr. Daly proved to be a persuasive speaker, but I still would love to see the NHL participate. The players want it and polls have shown that the fans want it. His points were all well founded and well presented, but sometimes an event like the Olympics overrides everything. The 2014 games will be in Russia, hotbed for hockey.

-- Jim Fox