TWO GAME OVER REACTION: BIZARRO SEASON
The LA Kings 2025-26 season is only two games in and I think I’ve already got a bead on what it is and what it will be.
Ordinarily I try to keep my wild overreactions to myself (or to my twitter account) but there’s a few days off so I’m calling it.
This is gonna be a Bizarro Season.
For those of you not inclined towards comic books, Seinfeld or common slang… Bizarro is a character from DC comics that is the “opposite” of Superman. He speaks backwards, his powers are backwards… he’s backwards. When he leaves he says hello, when he arrives he says goodbye, if he likes you he says he hates you. It’s pretty basic stuff I’m sure you get it.
The concept of a “Bizarro” Anything isn’t new. In the 8th season of Seinfeld, Elaine met “Bizarro” versions of Jerry, George and Kramer.
What does any of that have to do with the LA Kings or the 2025-26 Season?
I’M SO GLAD YOU ASKED!
It’s only been two games but we’ve already seen some subverted expectations.
THE DESERVE TO WIN-O-METER
The “Deserve To Win O’Meter” is dumb. There I said it. You know it, I know it… heck even the person who invented it probably knows it. It’s just a visual representation of which team an equation thinks “WOULD” win a certain percentage of the time IF you ran 1,000 simulations of that specific game based on the “data” fed into the equation. If you can’t sleep, here’s an explanation of how it works.
https://moneypuck.com/about.htm#meter
The reason I mention it today is that through two games, the Kings have beat their Meter.
Sorry… despite being in my late 40’s I’m a child.
The Kings were decisively outplayed in Game One by all accounts and yet… The Meter says they deserved to win. Barely.
In Game Two, the Kings choked away a 3-0 1st period lead but managed to claw their way back from a 5-3 deficit to win in a shootout. Neither team “deserved” to win that game but the Meter felt pretty strong about Vegas.
If you’re not following me, the Kings are 1-1 so far but they won the wrong game according to the nerds.
It’s only two games but every Bizarro journey begins with a single Bizarro step.
HOME AND AWAY
The Kings had the absolute best home record in the NHL in the 2024-25 season. In 41 games on home ice their record was 31-6-4. That’s 66 points, a 132 point pace over an 82 game season. The NHL record for most points in a season is 135. That’s how good the Kings were at home last season.
On the road, the Kings were 17-19-5. 39 points. That’s 39 points, a 78 point pace over an 82 game season. That’s not a playoff team. Hell that’s a lottery team.
There seems to be no compelling explanation for the disparity. I am not compelled by the argument that the home fans in LA are somehow responsible for that incredible record. The fans have been around since 1967 and last year was the best home record in franchise history.
Having said all that, after two games in the 2025-26 season, the Kings are 0-1-0 at home and 1-0-0 on the road.
It’s not a lot but I said this was a bold prediction. The Kings play 8 of their first 11 games on the road. We’ll find out pretty quickly if my prediction is completely wrong.
SHOOTOUTS
Since 2005-06 the Kings are 82-86 in the Shootout. Since 2014-15 they’re 26-39. This is not a team that has performed well in the shootout outside of a few random seasons.
Yet there they were at T-Mobile Arena making Vegas look like the Minnesota Hawks. (That’s a Mighty Ducks reference, kids.)
GOALIES
That brings us to the goalies. I get it, it’s two games. I’m not reading much into it but Kuemper was a Vezina Finalist last year and Forsberg was a backup goalie with a sub .500 record (11-12-3) for a Wild Card team.
So far Kuemper is 0-1-0 and Forsberg is 1-0-0. Bizarro.
NO GOALS AGAINST
The LA Kings have played two games and allowed nine goals. Brandt Clarke and Joel Edmundson have been on the ice for precisely none of them.
That COULD be explained by the pair playing the least amount of minutes of the six defensemen in the lineup. Through two games Edmundson and Clarke have both played just 34 minutes at all strengths.
It COULD be explained by the fact that they were on the ice against lesser opponents. Brandt Clarke played less than a minute against Nathan McKinnon’s line and less than two minutes against Eichel’s line.
It COULD be explained by all sorts of things… but I still think it’s neat. Last season, Edmundson and Clarke combined for the worst Goals Against Per 60 for any defensive pair with more than 200 minutes played. They also had the highest xGA/60. This season they’ve played the fewest minutes as a pair through two games but they haven’t been on the ice for any goals and they have the best xGA/60.
Plenty of time for my prediction to go wrong but through two games… BIZARRO SEASON
SPECIAL TEAMS
Through two games the Kings are 40% (2/5) on the Power Play. It’s early. That’s not that bizarre.
Through two games the Kings have taken 12 penalties. That’s 6 per game. It’s a statistically irrelevant sample size BUT it’s a bit bizarre compared to the Kings of the 2024-25 season that were penalized 2.89 times per game. Sample size matters and it matters a lot so this is by far the weakest reason to think we’re looking at a Bizarro Season but the Kings currently have a higher number of penalties per game and a lower Penalty Kill success rate from last season. Keep your eye on those numbers for signs of a true bizarro season.
So there you have it. There’s my incredibly over reactionary take on the season through two games.
Bizarro season. Buckle up.
