Rob Scuderi is now a Los Angeles King and he went there for the money let’s not deny it. Let’s also not begrudge him for that. For some people money is just that important and I can understand a 30 year old defenseman who gave everything he had during a Stanley Cup run wanting to cash in. But now rumors are circulating that perhaps even though Scuds wanted to return to the Penguins, that became practically impossible simply because he waited too long.

In an article today by Rob Rossi of the Tribune Review we see evidence of this:

Not that Scuderi ran to the Los Angeles Kings, who signed him to a four-year deal at an annual salary of $3.4 million yesterday afternoon.

According to some teammates, Scuderi waited too long before choosing the Kings over the Penguins, who are thought to have offered a five-year deal worth $10 million total.

“They’re probably right,” Scuderi said. “I thought I held out for a while, but with respect to L.A. you just can’t … look, it was time to make a decision.

“I always had always hoped maybe something could be worked out (with the Penguins). It was strictly a numbers thing, not a lack of need or want.”

Probably the fact that Scuds had never had teams throwing oodles of money at him in the past and his inexperience in the matters of contracts could be blamed, but what about his agent? Was it Scuds or his agent looking for a bigger cut that convinced Scuderi to keep looking around when several teams including the Penguins had made him offers or he was at least in negotiation with them? Teams like according to reports the Wild, the Rangers, the Lightning and the Stars were all reportedly interested.

Scuderi’s comment about it being time to “make a decision” was probably the most telling of the article. Because while he waited teams were signing free agents left and right making less cap room on their rosters available for someone like Scuderi. Some teams probably even had to withdraw offers or modify them as other players were signed and Scuds no doubt saw his potential paycheck dwindling so he pulled the gun. His comments seem to indicate that he is not happy about heading to the Kings but the paycheck he will be getting will ease that discomfort somewhat as more than likely he will be sitting at home next spring watching some of the teams he held out on making a run for Lord Stanley’s Cup.

The Los Angeles Kings perhaps thought that they might be giant killers for the second night in a row. Before last night’s showdown with the Penguins the Kings had knocked off Eastern Conference leading Boston. But then again, who hasn’t lately?

It was clear from early on when the Penguins handed the Kings several early power play opportunities on which they failed to scored that Los Angeles was just simply over matched. Crosby (28) opened the scoring at 12:33 of the first by taking the puck off the wall and walking in on Kings netminder Jonathan Quick who he beat high to the glove side. Later in the same period Evgeni Malkin (33) scored on the power play to make the game 2-0 at the end of 20 minutes. Tyler Kennedy (13) and Bill Guerin (19) both added goals in the second to make it 4-0 before the Kings Handzus (17) finally found the net on the power play in the third to make it 4-1.

There was not much of a surprise that the Penguins took care of business at home versus Los Angeles considering the Kings are one of the worst teams in the league while Pittsburgh has been one of the hottest lately. Fleury made 24 saves on the night.

The win keeps the Penguins in 5th place in the East and just behind Philadelphia who also won on Friday but also have three full games in hand setting up a Sunday showdown between the two teams at the Igloo. Honestly, if the Penguins want any chance of leapfrogging the Flyers they will have to dip down deep and win another game.