Darryl Sutter on the Kings’ trade acquisitions

On today’s transactions:
I think, first, the young defenseman, obviously the organization felt that there was a lot of really good young forwards in our organization and not great depth in defense, so that’s obviously Brayden McNabb. I think the Gaborik and Frattin deal was pretty clear. I think Fratts wasn’t playing here, and it’s a good opportunity for Fratts, and we’ll see if Gaborik can fit into our type of game.

On Marian Gaborik missing games earlier this year due to injury:
He should be fresh then, right?

On whether Gaborik will play against Winnipeg:
I couldn’t really tell you. How would I know? I just got told 10 minutes ago. He’s a European going to another country to play. There are immigration issues, travel issues – all those things.

On whether he senses that the trading deadline is “difficult” for players:
Difficult if you’re a bad team.

On what he recalls from Gaborik from when he was in Minnesota:
I’ve coached against him lots in Minnesota as a young guy, but that’s a long time ago, too. You know, if you look at his last four or five years, he’s scored a goal every four games, every three games, every two games. But there’s a lot more to the game than goal scoring. You have to be a part of a successful team and part of a nucleus of a group that’s used to winning is the next part.

On Gaborik being able to “make something out of nothing”:
Over the course of his career, he’s probably around a point a game or so. It’s based on the whole package. There’s no specials in today’s game if you want to be on a good team.

On whether he had seen much of Brayden McNabb when he was in junior hockey:
Obviously, yeah. I’ve seen him play four or five years. He was the captain on Kootenay. But, again, that’s like talking about Gaborik, too. When you haven’t seen guys play live, then you have to evaluate ‘em when you get ‘em.