By now, the fact that the Kings fired Marc Crawford as head coach is not news to you, but before you dismiss the story as another unimportant matter of hockey news in a LaLaLand far away from the center of the hockey universe, give me a minute.

There’s something in this that needs to be given some thought, and I’ll quickly unpack it for you and then let you get on with your debate about Ovechkin’s MVP award or whether you think Hasek is first-ballot HOF material.

Precisely what matters about Crawford’s firing is this: the Kings said they were on a three-year rebuilding plan, going with youth etc. They worked the draft over the past two years. They aced with Kopitar. They got Jack Johnson from Carolina, then talked him into joining the NHL before his stint in college was up. They brought a series of youngsters up for a game or two to give them a taste of the bigs and to see what they could do. They lost way more games than they won, especially this past season, but so what, the reasoning went—the idea was to build a base.

And by most indications, they’re doing that. There’s finally a core of guys who seem like they’re in it for the long haul. There are prospects in the wings with real potential. There’s a sense of a plan. But now, again, there’s no coach, and things have to be refigured, personalities readjusted to match whoever gets the job, nerves and fears to be calmed because there’s a new man at the rudder.

Why?

Dean Lombardi, the GM, now says, according to Fox Sports, that Crawford wasn’t the guy to lead a youth movement. Now what the heck could that mean? I’m not saying that the Crow was the guy to lead the team. Maybe he wasn’t. But couldn’t Lombardi come up with something better than that? What are the criteria for being able to succeed with young players? Having a Stanley Cup ring? Being a former player? Being relatively young yourself? That’s what Crawford brought to the table.

Lombardi said that the team was going with youth rather than trying to build a contender, and Crawford wasn’t the guy to do it (again, reference the story at foxsports.com). Does that mean that if you try to win, sooner rather than later, you’re not doing your job somehow? Is that how sports works, or have I missed something?

He also said that they didn’t expect the team to be out of the playoffs in January, but that he never thought about firing the coach during the season. Does that not sound just a little bit contradictory?

In the end, according to the GM, it came down to a gut feeling. And so Crawford is gone.

How about this for a gut feeling—you’re never going to win anything until you get a goalie who can stop the damn puck.

You’re never going to win anything picking high in the draft order and passing up players that the entirety of the hockey world sees as the best prospects.

You’re never going to win when no one’s entirely sure that you’re not angling for a move to KC or Vegas sometime in the near future.

But firing the coach is somehow the answer.

Really, what does it do? It gives you another year or two’s excuse not to win—hey, we can’t win this year, we have a new guy at the helm! Well, that’s fine, but if Kings fans know what’s good for them, and the stuff I’m reading online says they do, they’ll hold Lombardi to the three-year commitment he made when he (and Crawford) came to town in 2006.

This year, Mr. GM, it’s win or you’re done.