Kings 'Need to Make Dubois Better' According to Blake
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The hottest topic of the Los Angeles Kings’ season has undoubtedly been the play of New acquisition Pierre-Luc Dubois.
From the moment the trade went through, it was a lightning rod for discourse amongst Kings fans.
Some felt the Kings gave up too much for a player whose career has been marred by questions of his efforts and consistency.
Some felt a 60-point center with size was exactly what this team needed to get past the first round.
After 40 points in the regular season, one goal in the playoffs and spotty effort thought, the Dubois naysayers have been proven right so far.
Talks of a potential buy-out and trade have persisted over the last few weeks, however, with the announcement that the Kings would move forward with the same front office, those never held much weight.
Rob Blake confirmed Dubois would be a King moving forward and doubled down to say that the Kings need to do more for Dubois.
“We need to make (Dubois) better,” said Blake. “He’s had a consistent performance over his career so far and deviated from that this year. So it’s up to us as staff, coaches, and management here to help him become more productive for us.”
Obviously, Dubois himself needs to be better next year, no one is discounting that fact.
However, Blake’s not wrong, the Kings need to put Dubois in a better spot to succeed.
They traded for a player who was coming off back-to-back 60-point seasons with the Winnipeg Jets playing as a top-6 center and in front of the net on the power play.
Instead of continuing to use Dubois in this way, the Kings put him into a bottom-six role and onto the half-wall on the power play, a spot Dubois admitted he’s never played and doesn’t feel comfortable in.
Leaving us with a big question, why? Trading for a player only to immediately change everything that made him successful doesn’t make any sense.
When I asked Blake why they changed his role, he gave a deflected non-answer that was consistent throughout his availability.
It seemed like they had an idea with Dubois, pair him with Kevin Fiala on an all-offense third line that feasted on “easier” matchups.
When that failed to bear fruit early, the Kings seemed completely lost in how to use Dubois.
Blake’s admission that they need to find a way to use him better is a good step in potentially fixing the Dubois problem, but it’s a complete failing that after a full season they don’t know how to use him.
That should have been figured out last summer, if not before he was acquired. There also should have been a back up plan if the Dubois-Fiala combo didn’t work, and there wasn’t.
As I’ve said before, if they keep Dubois, and they are, the Kings have to commit to him.
They can’t bounce him around the bottom six next season. He needs to be stapled into the top six with some of the team’s best forwards all season.
He also needs to be in front on the power play, which also likely requires a tweak for the Kings’ power play to run it off the opposite half-wall.
Yes, Dubois should be able to adapt his game better and needs to perform regardless of context given his contract.
But we aren’t talking about what should happen, we’re talking about reality here.
To get anything close to Dubois’ best the Kings need to put him in the roles he’s found success in the past.
If they do that and he still underperforms, then you have a massive problem on your hands that would likely be a new GMs mess to clean up.
For now, they’re committed to Dubois and have to actually commit.
I’ll continue to say that Dubois would be better suited at wing, despite the player saying he feels he’s a center, but I wouldn’t be confident in the Kings moving him to wing next season.
Blake did say that if Quinton Byfield was moved back to center it could shift Dubois over, but reiterated that was a big if.
Whether it’s at wing or center, Dubois can’t spend another season on the half-wall or in the bottom six.
If he can return to being a 60-point player, the Kings have a lot of hope for next season, if he can’t, the Kings are in trouble.