The Los Angeles Kings announced early this morning that purple is being officially removed from their color palette next week after one last hurrah for the third jersey. See this tweet:

After a long discussion with Grimace, we've decided to retire purple from our color scheme. See us in them one last time next week.

— LA Kings (@LAKings) March 15, 2013

For my part, this is a disappointing development. With purple, the Kings always had a color scheme that was one of a kind.. In black, silver and white, technically they still do, but now it's just boring. Purple is associated with royalty and being named the Kings, this team was in a unique position to claim a color no other club could. Now they're retiring it?

So I'm not a fan of this change, obviously. I think it's a big downgrade. But that's enough editorializing for now. Let's get to the details of this retirement of purple.

Yesterday, Icethetics reader "Tyfighter77" shared a list of third jersey dates he attributes to "Kings TV analyst Jim Fox during Tuesday's game." This is regarding the black and purple sweater.

• Sat., March 16 — vs. San Jose Sharks
• Mon., March 18 — vs. Phoenix Coyotes
• Tues., March 19 — vs. Phoenix Coyotes

The Kings also wore black and purple on Tuesday night in Phoenix.

The real question is, of course, whether the Kings plan to continue sporting the retro "forum blue and gold" uniforms they've used occasionally over the past three seasons. This year, they've seen action on February 23 and March 9. The latter was the final Legends Night of the season and I remember reading somewhere that this would be the last time we'll see those throwback threads for a while (possibly years, but probably not for good).

My thanks to Aaron P., Steve M. and "Tyfighter77" for keeping me in the loop about this Kings news. You can attribute the lack of blog updates to the fact that I'm moving in two weeks and have been spending more time packing boxes than doing any research for the site. Thanks for understanding.