Jordan Spence Traded to the Ottawa Senators

The Kings eventually traded the 67th overall pick to the Carolina Hurricanes for the 125th overall pick this year and a third-round pick in 2026. Essentially, that’s a fourth-round pick in 2025 and a third and sixth-round pick in 2026 for the 24-year-old.

My initial reaction

The Kings traded one of their few puck-moving defensemen for peanuts. However, that’s not the biggest story for me from this trade. Let’s turn back the clock to July of 2021. The Kings had a plethora of right-handed defensemen in their prospect pool that was ranked first or second (depending on who you follow), along with Drew Doughty, Sean Walker, and Matt Roy on the roster.

Below is the list of right-handed prospects the Kings had in their prospect pool in 2021:

• Brandt Clarke
• Brock Faber
• Sean Durzi
• Jordan Spence
• Helge Grans

Clarke is the only one remaining from those five defensemen. Faber, the first one to be traded, was moved along with a 2022 first-round pick for Kevin Fiala. Grans and Walker were moved 11 months later as part of the Cal Petersen salary cap dump, with the Kings retaining two million dollars of Ivan Provorov’s salary for the next two years. Durzi would be traded less than a month later for a 2024 second-round pick. That draft pick would be included in the Pierre-Luc Dubois trade. After a tumultuous season in Los Angeles, Dubois would be traded for Darcy Kuemper in a one-for-one swap. Roy walked for nothing, signing a six-year deal with the Washington Capitals in free agency.

Having a deep right side on defense in the prospect pool, with three of them being given away for pennies, is a theme of asset mismanagement. To have that depth on the right side in your pipeline and getting little in return is a tough pill to swallow for Kings fans.