Dylan Larkin’s reported trade request out of Detroit has quickly turned into one of the NHL’s defining offseason storylines—and the Kings are among the teams now forced to seriously weigh what it would take to get involved.
The Kings don’t have a center problem this summer—they have a decision they can’t really delay much longer, and Dylan Larkin just made it harder to pretend otherwise.
That conversation picked up real traction in early June when Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported that Larkin had requested a trade from the Detroit Red Wings. Whether it ultimately leads anywhere is still unclear, but it was enough to immediately put teams like Los Angeles on notice given what a player of his caliber would mean to their roster structure.
In Detroit, this hasn’t been a sudden shift so much as a slow build. Larkin’s frustration with the direction of the organization has been there for years, but it’s become increasingly visible. Last season, it finally surfaced in a more public way. The Red Wings, for stretches, looked like a team ready to finally snap a nine-year playoff drought, only to fall apart late and miss again.
What really lingered afterward was the tone. At the end of the season, Larkin openly questioned the organization’s approach, specifically pointing to the lack of deadline additions as a missed opportunity to push forward. That didn’t sit well with Steve Yzerman, who made it clear the exchange between the two didn’t stay on the surface.
“I’ve addressed Dylan’s comments directly with Dylan, and I will not elaborate,” Yzerman said. “If Dylan wants to share what I had to say with him, he’s more than welcome.”
Since then, there hasn’t exactly been a sense that things were smoothed over. Even if both sides have continued professionally, the feeling around the situation is that the relationship hasn’t meaningfully moved forward.
That backdrop matters in Los Angeles because the Kings are dealing with their own transition point. With Anže Kopitar now retired, they’re not easing into a new era—they’re fully in it. The top of the lineup is open, and general manager Ken Holland is staring at a familiar kind of challenge: finding a true first-line center who can stabilize the structure of the forward group.
If Larkin ever becomes genuinely available, he fits that need without much hesitation. He drives play through the middle, competes in all three zones, and brings a pace that would immediately reshape how the Kings attack. More than anything, he would give a lineup that has felt fluid for years a clear point of stability.
There’s also the obvious historical thread between Larkin and Holland. Holland, who led the Red Wings to four Stanley Cups during his tenure in Detroit, was the general manager who drafted Larkin. That shared history doesn’t guarantee anything in a trade market shaped by leverage and timing, but it does give both sides a starting point of familiarity if conversations ever intensify.
If Los Angeles did get traction here, the structure is easy to picture: Larkin anchoring the top line, with Quinton Byfield continuing his development into a heavier, more complete second-line center role.
From there, the ripple effects are obvious. Adrian Kempe remains one of the Kings’ most reliable forwards, capable of driving play regardless of linemates. But a move like this would be about more than talent—it would finally give the roster a defined hierarchy down the middle, something Los Angeles has been searching for since its competitive core began to shift.
The complication, as always, is cost. The Kings don’t have an unlimited pool of prospects, and any serious pursuit of a player like Larkin would force a hard conversation about present ambition versus future flexibility. It’s the kind of decision that tends to separate curiosity from real intent.
Even so, there are enough veteran pieces on the roster to at least open dialogue, depending on how Detroit under Steve Yzerman approaches its own timeline. The Red Wings have been patient in their build, but they’ve also shown a willingness to pivot if the return meaningfully advances their long-term direction.
And while it won’t decide a deal on its own, there are still familiar organizational ties in the background—Todd McLellan’s time in Los Angeles among them—that make the early stages of any discussion a little more natural.
For now, this sits where most major offseason storylines do: unresolved, closely watched, and just real enough to matter. The Kings will be in the mix. The only question is whether they simply monitor it—or decide they need to act before the opportunity moves on without them.
