{"id":139213,"date":"2023-07-07T20:58:05","date_gmt":"2023-07-08T00:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=139213"},"modified":"2023-07-07T20:58:05","modified_gmt":"2023-07-08T00:58:05","slug":"tobias-bjornfot-signs-contract-los-angeles-kings-free-agency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2023\/07\/07\/tobias-bjornfot-signs-contract-los-angeles-kings-free-agency\/","title":{"rendered":"Tobias Bjornfot Signs Contract with the Los Angelese Kings in Free Agency"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2023\/07\/06\/los-angeles-kings-lock-up-franchise-centre-anze-kopitar\/\" target=\"_self\">Los Angeles Kings<\/a> came to terms on a new contract with defenceman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/b\/bjornto01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tobias Bjornfot<\/a>. The contract ends after two years, carrying a $775,000 cap hit each season. This qualifies as a bridge deal, as he remains an RFA upon expiration. He just wrapped up his entry-level deal with the Kings, the same team that drafted him in the first round back in 2019 (18th overall).<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">We have signed three players to NHL contracts, including:<\/p>\n<p>\u25aa\ufe0fD Tobias Bjornfot (2 years, $775K)<br \/>\n\u25aa\ufe0fF Samuel Fagemo (1 year, 2-way, $775K)<br \/>\n\u25aa\ufe0fF Tyler Madden (1 year, 2-way, $775K)<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udcf0 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/zsmBpuURKJ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/zsmBpuURKJ<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/RVokw76jeO\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/RVokw76jeO<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 LA Kings (@LAKings) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/LAKings\/status\/1677430070401458176?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">July 7, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Tobias Bjornfot Signs New Contract with Los Angeles Kings<\/h2>\n<p>In 116 career games, Bjornfot collected one goal and 14 assists for 15 career points. He spent all of 2021-22 with the big club, but only logged ten games (one assist) for LA last year. In the AHL with the Ontario Reign, he accumulated 12 points in 50 games played across 2022-23. He&#8217;ll be a player in the Kings training camp hoping to secure his full-time spot again in the NHL.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, Bjornfot saw an uptick in offensive zone utilization while playing with the Kings. Yes, the sample size was small, but his advanced statistics improved drastically. His <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/b\/bjornto01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">relative<\/a> Corsi-for percentage came in at -0.5%, after ranking at -6.9% or worse in all years prior. He averaged 16:28 in icetime across his NHL career, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.naturalstattrick.com\/playerreport.php?fromseason=20222023&amp;thruseason=20222023&amp;playerid=8481600&amp;sit=all&amp;stype=2\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">with<\/a> 103 blocks and 101 hits as well.<\/p>\n<h3>What this Means for the Future<\/h3>\n<p>The Kings sit just over the league salary cap for next season, so likely need to make another move before the season begins. Otherwise, they have to bury money in the AHL or on injured reserve to become cap compliant. Besides Bjornfot, the Kings have six other defenceman sitting on the NHL roster today. That includes a few lineup mainstays in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/d\/doughdr01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Drew Doughty<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/gavrivl01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Vladislav Gavrikov<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/a\/andermi02.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Michael Anderson<\/a>, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/r\/royma04.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Matt Roy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>They also feature <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/e\/engluan01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andreas Englund<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/c\/clarkbr02.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Brandt Clarke<\/a> on the blueline. Clarke, 20, wants to carve out an NHL role after two seasons in the system. His entry-level contract already slid twice, so he still remains on that contract for the next three years. Thanks to the nature of the contract, Bjornfot remains under team control even upon its end in the summer of 2025. With another seven defencemen in their pipeline too, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/c\/connake01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2023-07-07_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kevin Connauton<\/a>, the Kings have tons of competition set for training camp.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo Credit: Timothy T. Ludwig-USA TODAY Sports<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Los Angeles Kings came to terms on a new contract with defenceman Tobias Bjornfot. The contract ends after two years, carrying a $775,000 cap hit each season. This qualifies as a bridge deal, as he remains an RFA upon expiration. He just wrapped up his entry-level deal with the Kings, the same team that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2377,"featured_media":139220,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[24,4547,34,4548],"tags":[6025,5769,662,3810],"class_list":["post-139213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kings","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-los-angeles-kings-analysis","tag-los-angeles-kings-news","tag-nhl-free-agency","tag-tobias-bjornfot"],"modified_by":"Alec Roberson","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2377"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139220"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}