There is No Pause in Jeff Solomon's Preparation for the Future

The NHL season is more than a month into its unexpected pause due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Players have been sent home, the office headquarters are vacant, and the immediate future of the 2019-20 season is still unknown.

Unfortunately, hockey on the ice is at a standstill, but the work for Jeff Solomon behind the scenes has picked up.

As Executive Vice President of Hockey Operations and Legal Affairs for the Kings, Solomon continues to evaluate the present and future of the roster from personnel and financial stand points as he and the rest of the Hockey Operations staff work alongside General Manager Rob Blake to build another Stanley Cup contending roster.

"The NHL's pause has sped up our work from the Hockey Operations side. A lot of what we'd be doing in the offseason, we're handling now. But we now have more time to evaluate our players as a group in Hockey Operations," Solomon explained.

NHL pause or not, Solomon, now in his 14th year with the Kings has been busy at home planning and preparing for the Kings future.

During this hockey hiatus, Solomon has been the key component in getting pen-to-paper with the recent signings of the 2018 third-round draft pick Tyler Madden - acquired from Vancouver in the Tyler Toffoli trade - and the second team All-American, 2017 fifth-round draft pick Cole Hults to entry-level contracts.

Moreover, Solomon also guided the smooth re-signing of defenseman Kurtis MacDermid to a two-year extension worth $875,000 annually.

Though Solomon has been busy working every new contract into the future of the Kings roster, the recent signings have been planned and expected within the organization.

"The NHL's pause hasn't affected our ability to prepare for the future in any way. We plan years out for our roster and prospects," said Solomon, "three to five years in fact." And while the signings of Madden and Hults are intended to launch two hopeful careers, it isn't just the NHL's pause that halts the Kings prospects from working their way up to a Kings uniform.

"At the end of the college and juniors' seasons, it's nice to have the opportunity for our players to get a little bit of AHL experience in Ontario. Unfortunately, as of right now, like the NHL, we don't know what the future holds for the remainder of the AHL season… We as an organization value that experience because it gives the newly signed players an idea of what to expect coming into our training camp the following year."

Quietly, one of the contributors to the Kings success over the past dozen years has been analytics. Solomon, who has always been a "numbers guy" began digging deeper into analytics when he started with the Kings as the VP of Hockey Operations at the start of the 2007-08 season.

"It's something I've been fascinated with for a long time," he said.

Solomon and Hockey Operations would then spend the next few years analyzing the analytical information and its value in hockey. Ahead of the curve, Solomon and the Kings were able to apply his and the organization's belief in advanced statistics, crafted mainly around shot-based metrics that contributed to two Stanley Cup winning rosters.

Fast forward to present day and the Kings are in prime position for a bright future. Again, analytics are playing a key role in getting back to the Cup contending ways. The popularity of analytics within sports continues to grow and the Kings are firm believers.

"The organization from the top down is always looking to get better and gain a competitive edge when evaluating our team and the teams around the league," Soloma said. "That very much includes analytics."

This belief in analytics is reflected in their hires as they brought hockey analytics pioneer and author of three hockey analytics books Rob Vollman onto the Kings staff full-time as a Senior Analyst in 2018.

The future of the hockey season may still be unknown, but Solomon and all of Hockey Operations are certain that the inclusion of taking an analytical approach will strengthen the Kings' roster.

"Analytics help us try to plan our rosters and prepare to fill open spots," he said. "We make adjustments as time passes, it's not a perfect science, but it is extremely useful."

The Kings were one of the first NHL organizations to invest in analytics and continue to be one of the most committed. It has attributed to building one of the best prospect pools in the NHL and will play a factor in the upcoming 2020 Draft... whenever that may be.

As for Solomon and the Hockey Operations staff, they will continue to pursue the analytics of players results, team results, season results and any extra information that a box score doesn't tell you.

The task at hand? Let the numbers and projections speak for themselves, evaluate, confer and build toward another championship roster.