The Kings will be keeping their trade deadline acquisition away from the open market. The team announced they’ve signed winger Andrei Kuzmenko to a one-year extension worth $4.3MM.
The 29-year-old took the NHL by storm in his first season in 2022-23, notching 39 goals and 35 assists in 79 games with Vancouver. However, there was a bit of a red flag considering that his shooting percentage came in at 27.3%, well above the NHL average and a rate that wasn’t going to be sustainable. Unable to agree on a long-term commitment, the two sides eventually settled on a two-year, $10MM bridge deal to keep him in the fold with the Canucks.
Unfortunately for Kuzmenko and Vancouver, his second season didn’t go anywhere near as well as the first. After a quiet first half, he was included as salary ballast in the trade that sent Elias Lindholm to the Canucks. With a bigger opportunity in Calgary, Kuzmenko made the most of it, putting up 25 points in 29 games down the stretch with the Flames, providing some optimism that he could be a key contributor for them heading into 2024-25.
But things didn’t go that way this past season. Instead of picking up where he left off, Kuzmenko languished, notching just four goals and 11 assists in 37 games to start the year, resulting in him once again being included as salary ballast in a swap, this time to Philadelphia as part of the move that saw Morgan Frost and Joel Farabee go to Calgary. Kuzmenko did well in seven games with the Flyers before being flipped again, this time to Los Angeles at the trade deadline in a move aimed at giving the Kings some extra scoring.
Kuzmenko was indeed able to provide that, tallying five goals along with a dozen assists in 22 games down the stretch before averaging a point per game in six playoff outings. That performance was enough to land him the 19th spot in our Top 50 UFA ranking but instead, he won’t test the open market and will stay in a spot where things went well over the last few months. Perhaps with a full-season performance like he finished 2024-25 with, Kuzmenko will be in better shape to command a longer-term pact on the open market next summer.
With the signing, the Kings are down to a little under $20MM in cap space, per PuckPedia. As things stand, GM Ken Holland will be set to try to make a splash either in free agency or the trade market although that number could still come down if he’s able to work out an agreement with pending UFA blueliner Vladislav Gavrikov in the coming hours.
Photo courtesy of Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images.