Is Sutter on thin ice in LA? Should he be?

[longsuffering]

An 0-3 start to the season. 3 losses at home, outscored 12-2.

Has Sutter lost the room?

[TheAlpineOracle]

He has to be. Especially after the locker room incidents last year.

[skudr248]

With all the #### that team has dealt with over the last year and something, it is pretty inevitable this team is going to decline sometime or another. Don't believe it's 100% Sutter's the reason, but whatever I don't even care, go flames.

[Vinny01]

He likely is the first coach to be fired. Coaches like Darryl have a shelf life 4 years, 2 Cups and a loss in the WCF is a great run

Not to derail the thread but I think Hartley is in a similar boat. I think he has 2 years max left in Calgary because he is just such a demanding coach

[GranteedEV]

From their last cup winning team, Lombardi has failed to fill the holes left by:

Slava Voynov
Willie Mitchell
Justin Williams
Jarrett Stoll
Robyn Regehr

Plus they gave away Martin Jones for a pending UFA. Their cap situation is a mess too, with Kopitar's contract negotiations seemingly being a huge distraction in his individual play.

Sutter could have the full attention of the room, but you still need a good mix of players. With Lombardi's brutal Sekera for a first rounder trade, along with Lucic for 2015 first, he has pissed away the immediate future on bad gambles and should be the first man fired before Sutter. Since 2012, the Kings have had one first rounder (Tanner Pearson). They traded their 2012 first for Carter, their 2014 first for Gaborik, their 2015 first for Lucic, and 2016 first and 2014 second rounder for Sekera.

That's a lot of futures traded, and the only one of them that really, genuinely made sense was Jeff Carter.

[SuperMatt18]

Quick hasn't been good, losing Voynov has hurt their offense, and you have to think the other veterans can't be too happy with how Richards was treated.

That plus an aging core that has played a lot of tough hockey, but probably aren't as motivated to work as hard with 2 cups to their name already.

[Fire of the Phoenix]

The team is just not very good anymore. Lucic is overrated and they're getting older/declining. They're just lucky they struck gold with some of their draft picks (Toffoli, Pearson) and have Doughty otherwise they would be bottom 5 team. I would fire Lombardi and let the new guy decide Sutter's fate.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

He likely is the first coach to be fired. Coaches like Darryl have a shelf life 4 years, 2 Cups and a loss in the WCF is a great run

Not to derail the thread but I think Hartley is in a similar boat. I think he has 2 years max left in Calgary because he is just such a demanding coach

This is sort of what I was thinking.

I dont think he should be based on the trials and tribulations of the last season, especially in conjunction with his successes, but at the end of the day we've always known that Sutter only works within limits and he may have arrived at those limits in spite of the circus surrounding the team.

I would think that his successful results would have bought his shelf life another year or two, but that could be off-set by the absolute Gong-Show the LA Kings put on last year.

[longsuffering]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

He likely is the first coach to be fired. Coaches like Darryl have a shelf life 4 years, 2 Cups and a loss in the WCF is a great run

Not to derail the thread but I think Hartley is in a similar boat. I think he has 2 years max left in Calgary because he is just such a demanding coach

That's thread worthy on its own. You should start a thread.

[heep223]

Wouldn't be surprised at all if Sutter has lost the room, just based on the length of his tenor and the type of coach he is. Pure speculation though. I also wouldn't be in the least bit surprised if LA (and/or Chicago) missed the playoffs this season.

[SuperMatt18]

I will add if he does get fired then the St.Louis Blues should be first in line to try to add him.

He doesn't have a long shelf life but he can get teams over the hump in the short term.

[automaton 3]

iirc Darryl admitted that his coaching style has a shelf-life when he was with the Flames.

I think they'll give him a bit more time, but it has not looked very good so far.

Lombardi has not handled the cap or the off-ice issues well, he should also be feeling some heat.

[TheAlpineOracle]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

He likely is the first coach to be fired. Coaches like Darryl have a shelf life 4 years, 2 Cups and a loss in the WCF is a great run

Not to derail the thread but I think Hartley is in a similar boat. I think he has 2 years max left in Calgary because he is just such a demanding coach

Hartley and Sutter both demand a lot from their players, but that is where the similarities end. Hartley seems to be well-liked in the locker room, and plays a fast-tempo offensive system. Sutter wears on his players and plays a boring system.

[saillias]

He will take the fall but it's Lombardi who deserves it.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

I will add if he does get fired then the St.Louis Blues should be first in line to try to add him.

He doesn't have a long shelf life but he can get teams over the hump in the short term.

Yep. He's showed that if given a contending roster he can take them over the hump. The Blues make a lot of sense in this regard. That said he's old school demanding an with that comes a shelf life. It's not his fault the team is kind of a mess but coaches are the easiest piece to replace in the cap world where it's difficult to make significant roster changes. I expect that Lombardi is on just as thin of ice as he hasn't exactly had a great last season as GM.

[Northendzone]

thinking about weighing in with some "sutter should ahve never have left calgary" comment......

[CroFlames]

Lombardi's sins are not Darryl's fault.

Although Darryl most likely pays the price if they are still out by Christmas.

[saillias]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

Yep. He's showed that if given a contending roster he can take them over the hump. The Blues make a lot of sense in this regard. That said he's old school demanding an with that comes a shelf life. It's not his fault the team is kind of a mess but coaches are the easiest piece to replace in the cap world where it's difficult to make significant roster changes. I expect that Lombardi is on just as thin of ice as he hasn't exactly had a great last season as GM.

A coaching swap might work well for both teams. Both have rumblings of tuning out their coach.

[sharkov]

Even if he was, he'd find work quickly if he got canned

[Psytic]

I'm also going to go with they are not that good anymore. They have been getting away for years with lackluster play all season long, it was going to catch up with them sooner or later.