Fiala deal leaves Kings vulnerable to dual offer sheet strategy

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The Los Angeles Kings adding star winger Kevin Fiala in a deal with the Minnesota Wild last week certainly shuffled the deck in the Western Conference. A pesky playoff team last season, the Kings addressed a core need – scoring firepower – for a prospect and a first-round pick in the upcoming draft.

Any time there’s an opportunity to add a player fresh off a 33-goal and 85-point season, you must consider the deal. But there is an opportunity cost here. By way of the trade, the Kings also added a $55.1 million liability to their balance sheet, one that will hit their cap to the tune of $7.9 million each year.

That’s particularly notable considering the NHL’s current economic landscape. With the salary cap at $82.5-million, the Kings – who have just 36 rostered players and just under $12 million in remaining cap space – have a limited amount of money remaining for an awful lot of roster spots to fill. Of particular note: The Kings have seven restricted free agents to take care of this off-season.

This is where an opportunistic rival team can take advantage of Los Angeles’ bet on Fiala. Amongst those seven restricted free agents are several valuable players who would normally command a pretty penny in an unrestricted market. The Kings likely hope to reach bridge deals with a number of these players for the next couple of seasons, while trying to secure 35-goal scorer Adrian Kempe at most any cost.

But there are a lot of other names who played consequential minutes for this team a season ago, and that’s across both position groups:

And so, it’s once again time to discuss the dual offer sheet strategy.

For years now, we have talked about tendering dual offer sheets to cap-distressed or cash-poor teams to