Kings Director of Scouting Mark Yannetti talks prospects, development

Heading into his 18th season with the Kings, Director of Scouting Mark Yannetti has his sights set on the upcoming 2024 NHL Draft in Las Vegas on Friday and Saturday later this week. We’ll get to that.

For today, Yannetti shared thoughts on several Kings prospects throughout the pipeline and in the system, players who he and the Kings have drafted and individuals who are currently developing towards the ultimate goal of being NHL players. From players who are just starting the crack the NHL to some of last year’s draft picks, Yannetti gave updates on a number of notable draft picks.

Yannetti began by complimenting the growth of the former 2018 second-round draft pick Akil Thomas and his current value in the Kings organization.

“We finally saw return on Akil Thomas this year [after multiple injury-riddled seasons],” he said. “We saw the kind of player he could be. That’s an exciting one to think about, seeing the return on a guy you selected in 2018. Now he could be on the Kings roster as a value pick and someone who could maybe he could be the F10 [on the Kings forward depth chart].”

Yannetti expanded on Thomas’s potential value to the Kings, both because of his development and the contract he signed earlier this summer. Thomas signed a deal that has him at just $775,000 against the NHL’s salary cap. That’s a value if Thomas can deliver even in a bottom-six capacity.

“I think Akil can make a difference to help [the Kings] win,” Yannetti added. “You see some of the things he did when he came up when he was healthy late in the season. Same thing when he was in Ontario with some of the things he did on the ice. You need younger players making an impact more and you see it in a lot of places. So, you almost have to integrate younger players earlier because they’re ready earlier. It’s so much more cost effective to put Akil in the lineup than it is to go out and get one of these guys for $2 million or $3 million.”

Yannetti also touched on the situations of a pair of European defensemen selected in 2021 and 2023 in Kirill Kirsanov and Jakub Dvorak. Kirsanov, from Russia, and Dvorak out of Czechia both opted to stay in their homelands after being drafted by the Kings in the last two years. For development reasons, Yannetti might have preferred to see a player like Dvorak come to North America sooner than he did. He believes the player has a say in his own process, though, and supported the decision that was made.

“We will support the player’s decision to stay,” he explained. “I think the best path for Jakub would have been coming over right away. Those [European] leagues don’t like playing young guys and [Dvorak] played in that [professional Czech] league a little bit as a 17-year-old. He played 21 games before his injury in his draft here but if something goes wrong in [higher-level European leagues] they get rid of the young guys, but there’s also something to be said for comfort. If they’re not ready to come over and you force the issue, they can [miss being there]. You can’t force the issue, you’ll run into problems. So, I think you have to listen to him.”

Dvorak subsequently left Czechia midseason, after veterans were brought into a team towards the bottom of the table. He ultimately joined the Swift Current Broncos of the WHL and played 21 games in the regular season, as well as nine more in the playoffs. He could continue on that path as a 19-year-old and he’s already signed his entry-level contract. A younger player in the process, but the Kings are still high on his potential.

As for Kirsanov, the Russian defender faces a more complex situation in terms of being able to leave Russia because of contractual agreements between the NHL and KHL. Regarding Kirsanov, Yannetti has maintained from his draft day on that he was a player with a shorter timeline to the NHL. Someone who did not need as long of a development curve to be NHL ready, though that could perhaps be in a role that is lower in the lineup.

“The KHL is a great league, it’s arguably the second-best league in the world, it’s elite, but it’s not a very good league for young players,” Yannetti said. “I don’t care what they say, you watch Matvei Mitchkov [the Flyers first round draft pick in the 2023 draft], get no ice time and traded, I wish I could sit down with Russian players and make them understand it’s not a very good development league. However, if I’m a Russian and I have a chance to play in the KHL, [why] would I not play there? It’s my home country, it’s prestigious, you get more money there, they can pay more than we can at that age……that said, I think that had he come over [to Los Angeles] and had the chance to work with our development staff, in the ways that other guys have and stuff, he would be further along. I think he is very close to being ready to play [in the NHL] right now, that hasn’t changed. He’s a better player today than he was when we drafted him. I think he could be a lot better, depending on circumstance, but I if I could, if I could wave a wand and get Kirill this year, I think he’d have a chance at least to make the Kings team. I just think he would have had a better chance to make it a couple years ago when he was drafted, but I certainly think he is the same player with the same value.”

Among players who have recently signed their entry-level contracts, Yannetti had high praise for seventh-round selection Kaleb Lawrence, who took strides this season playing with OHL-London. How excited are we about Kaleb Lawrence?

At 6–7, 229-pounds, Lawrence has blossomed this season after essentially not having played a game of hockey for two straight seasons from 2020-22. Starting to put all things together, Lawrence has Yannetti impressed.

“Since December or January this year, we’re extraordinarily excited [about Lawrence],” Yannetti said. “We drafted him because we liked him and we couldn’t get him to go to our camp because he’d already chose to go the Calgary Flames camp. So, if we wanted Lawrence, we had to draft him. He provides size, but he’s got skill and sense too. You don’t see a package like that. He had missed years of hockey so it’s really exciting because of where he came from and some of the adversity he fought through. It’s exciting because the light goes off for different kids at different times……Lawrence got traded twice and until he gets to London Knights, if Kaleb didn’t go to London, I wonder where we’d be right now. We’ve been preaching certain things for him for a couple years now and credit to the kid too, he has to do everything that we want to see out of him. He started to do and then he started to do more consistently, and then started to do better. Then the consistency, he’s made leaps and bounds. He made two years of development in six months.”

Lawrence is a big dude. And he plays to his size.

He was suspended twice in the OHL playoffs for his style of play. Not to say suspensions are a good thing, but he’s willing to play physically and on that edge. It’s part of the game he’s got to deliver at the NHL level.

“One of the things we like about him is the edge he can play with, and that’s one of the things that would ebb and flow before this year,” Yannetti said. “He’s playing great, he’s their second-line center, [London’s] rolling through the playoffs. I don’t think it’s as big a hit as the OHL does, because I’m biased, but he takes a two-minute penalty, maybe, and they suspended for five games. Then he comes back and he’s rolling again, and they’re really excited. Then he takes another two-minute penalty, and they suspend him for five more games……it’s exciting, because if he can continue, it’s easy to do for six months, but if you can continue to do this, and it becomes a staple of who he is, he adds a size based, skill based, sense based, edge based element in various degrees. You don’t usually get all of those. So, if he can keep that kind of play and he can keep those attributes together like he has for six months, it’s something we don’t have in the organization right now.”

Photo by Chris Tanouye/Getty Images

Lastly, Yannetti touched on the lack of offensive production from the 2022 second-round pick Jack Hughes since being drafted.

“There were a couple artificial reasons as to why, Jack’s not as sexy in terms of he didn’t put up 100 points in WHL, he wasn’t a top 15 pick who fell, he’s a really solid player, a 200-foot player,” Yannetti said. “He’s solid on the defense. He’s a sense-based guy. He’s young, he should have been playing in the USHL the year we drafted him where he maybe, all of the sudden, he puts up 70 or 80 points in that league. He’s a solid component at Boston University on a team with national championship aspirations. He’s playing, second line minutes there, so there’s a couple reasons, maybe he’s not the first names on people’s tongues.”

As for Yannetti’s hopes on Hughes’ future, he pointed to a player he’d like to see add strength and weight, which can benefit his professional prospects.

“I’d like to see him gain a little bit more weight and a little more strength,” he added. “He’s probably a little bit behind in terms of physical development, maybe a little more on the Nick Dowd scale physically, which is going to make him take longer, but now this summer, this is the summer you hope he makes a sizable gain in terms of strength and mass.”

Photo by David Berding/Getty Images