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Darryl Sutter tends to family farm as lockout continues

Vancouver Canucks v Los Angeles Kings - Game Four

LOS ANGELES, CA - APRIL 18: Head Coach Darryl Sutter of the Los Angeles Kings reacts after the goal of Henrik Sedin #33 of the Vancouver Canucks to take a 3-1 lead during the third period at Staples Center on April 18, 2012 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)

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Darryl Sutter went from leaving the Calgary Flames in disgrace to joining the Los Angeles Kings as their head coach and leading them to the Stanley Cup. After all that, he’s still farming instead of kicking off training camp.

“It was really good and then we had some hail here in August that knocked it out a bit,” Sutter told the Los Angeles Times. “But it’s pretty good.”

Sutter has continued to visit Los Angeles over the summer, but he can’t start to defend the Cup until the lockout’s over.

“It’s just unsettling because you don’t know your timeline,” Sutter said. “As a coach you’re giving the players a target that they always want to work on for their training and we should have had our medicals [Friday].

“The worst part, quite honestly, from a coaching standpoint about all of this is you’re not allowed contact with your players. That’s just something that for me is important because you know what, the relationships that you have with them, you want to be able to talk to them and now you can’t.”

With that in mind, he plans to remain in Alberta until he has a better idea of what’s going on or Kings GM Dean Lombardi gives him an assignment.

If there’s a silver lining to all of this from the Kings’ perspective, it’s that with all of September’s preseason games canceled, the Los Angeles Kings will get a bit more time to recover after their long playoff run.