The Verdict Is In — The Fourth Period
That is where Laughton matters.
Laughton is not a classic second-line center in the 65-point, possession-dominating sense. He is something different, and something the Kings needed. He brings pace, competitiveness, defensive conscience and positional flexibility. He can take tough draws, play against better players and kill penalties. He can move up to a second-line role when the matchup calls for it or settle into a more natural third-line center role when the Kings want to spread their lineup. That’s why his return was critical to next season’s success.
He gives Laviolette options and that matters more now than it did a year ago.
The Kings are no longer building their center structure around the certainty of Kopitar. They are building around the possibility of Byfield becoming the player they believe he can be. That means they need support pieces who can absorb difficult minutes without asking the coaching staff to compromise Byfield’s offensive growth.
Laughton can do that.
Haula can too.
Haula is a different kind of addition, but the role is easy to understand. He is veteran insurance at a position where the Kings could not afford to be thin. He can still skate, forecheck, handle defensive responsibility and provide enough offense to avoid becoming a pure fourth-line specialist. The Kings signed him to make their entire lineup more functional, an important facet in a post-Kopitar roster.
The ripple effect from losing a player like Kopitar is not limited to his line. Suddenly, someone else has to take more defensive-zone starts and handle the tougher faceoffs. Someone else has to move into the first penalty-killing unit and must be trusted late in a one-goal game. Haula and Laughton give the Kings two players who can carry those responsibilities in different ways to make the middle of the ice more stable.
And they help the Kings preserve an identity that has long been based on being difficult to play through rather than simply difficult to score against.
Zuccarello Is the Offensive Bet
Of all the Kings’ July 1 additions, Zuccarello may be the most interesting from a pure offensive standpoint.
The contract is low-risk: one-year, $1 million base salary and a $5 million bonus for playing in 10 games and potentially $500,000 for playoff victories in Round 1 and 2. Since the deal is a 35+ age contract, Holland will have the option to push the bonus to next season for cap management.
Zuccarello had 54 points in 59 games last season with Minnesota and brings a level of offensive intelligence the Kings do not have in abundance. He can create off the half wall, distribute on the powerplay and find seams that other players do not see. For a team that has often had to work extremely hard for every chance, that is not a minor addition.
Like Panarin, Zuccarello gives them another player who can manipulate coverage. He is not going to drive a line physically, not going to be the answer against a heavy forecheck. At 38, there are going to be obvious questions about pace, durability and whether his production translates cleanly into a new environment.
But that is why the deal works.
The Kings are not paying for his past; they are betting that he can still create enough offense to help a powerplay that needs more imagination and give their top-six a player who sees the game at a different level.
The best version of the Zuccarello addition is not asking him to carry a line. It is putting him beside players who can retrieve pucks, push the pace and create space for him to make plays. Put him with a center who can get through the middle of the ice. Utilize him on a power-play unit where he can operate as a distributor and let his hockey sense do the work.
Perry Gives Them Something the Kings Know They Need in April
Perry is not being added because the Kings expect him to become younger. They know what they are getting and at 41 he is the same player who signed on 12 months ago.
His skating is what it is and the days of asking him to play fast, heavy minutes every night are gone but Perry still understands where offense comes from when the games get tighter.
He gets to the net and gets under opponents’ skin. He creates chaos around the crease, understands powerplay timing and knows how to make a shift uncomfortable. That value has always mattered to the Kings and it may matter even more now.
The question is not whether Perry can play 82 games in a prominent top-six role, he should not be asked to, the question is whether he can give the Kings 12-to-15 useful minutes on the nights when the lineup needs more bite, more net-front presence and more playoff-style competence.
The answer to that is likely yes.
Perry and Zuccarello cannot solve the offense by themselves, and Haula and Laughton were not brought in to do that.
But together, the Kings have added different types of support: skill, passing, net-front presence, matchup reliability, faceoff depth and veteran awareness.
That is a more complete forward group than the one they had before July 1.
But… The Problem Is Still on Defense
This is where the July 1 picture remains underwhelming. Clarke is the obvious exception – he led Kings defensemen with 40 points, ranked just outside the NHL’s top-10 in controlled entries, and graded as one of the league’s better possession-exit defensemen. Drew Doughty also remained strong as a transition passer, finishing top-20 among defensemen in defensive-zone completed passes and success rate, per Sportlogiq. Brian Dumoulin was more quietly useful than the public narrative suggested, ranking third among Kings defensemen in controlled entries and exits.
But the rest of the picture explains why the problem still exists. Joel Edmundson carried the puck out less than any regular Kings defenseman, even if he did so efficiently, Mikey Anderson strength is defensive disruption, not transition creation and Cody Ceci’s numbers were bluntly poor. Ceci was the team’s least effective regular defenseman at turning retrievals into exits, with one of the NHL’s worst even strength entry denial rates and bottom-15 passing percentages on outlet and stretch passes. The teamwide effect was serious enough that Los Angeles ranked last in defensemen’s goals and 30th overall in defensemen’s points.
Erik Gustafsson and Scott Perunovich are not meaningless acquisitions. Gustafsson is a historically offensive defenseman on a cheap one-year deal, and Perunovich just posted 49 AHL points in 64 games. But at $1 million and on a two-way contract, respectively, these are hedge moves, not top-four solutions. They improve the competition pool; they do not eliminate the structural reliance on Clarke and Doughty to solve almost every clean breakout problem.
The Kings have had too many games where they defend the first chance but fail to end the shift. A defenseman retrieves the puck, but the first pass is not there. The puck gets rimmed around the boards, the forwards are forced to stop, turn back and support deeper. The exit becomes a chip letting the opposition regroup and the puck comes back. That sequence drains a team. It is hard on the forwards and makes it harder for skilled players to attack with speed. It turns every rush into a grind. And it is why the absence of a true puck-moving defensive acquisition remains the biggest unfinished item on the Kings’ summer list.
Los Angeles can become stronger at center and more creative on the wing, but that only goes so far if the puck cannot get to those players cleanly.
The Kings need someone who can retrieve a puck under pressure and turn it into possession. They need someone who can hit the middle of the ice, who can activate off the rush, hold the offensive blue line and create a second layer of attack. Clarke may become that player. He has the vision and skill to be the Kings’ most important offensive defenseman, but it is unfair to ask him to solve the entire transition problem by himself.
The Kings need help around him and that player did not arrive on July 1.
The Verdict: Better, But Not Yet Complete
There is no question the Kings are a more functional team.
They addressed the emergency at center by adding help to an offense that needed more skill and more crease presence. They have improved their forward group, but they have not yet fixed the issue that can prevent those additions from having their full impact. They still need a puck-moving defenseman.
Despite spending close to the salary cap ceiling of $103 million, they did not address the fundamental blueline issue and until they do, this remains a better roster – but not yet a complete one and not yet a serious Stanley Cup contender.
That is the July 1 verdict.
