The problem is that in the "old days" if a team wasnt happy with their captain, they could just trade him and never have to worry about this even being an issue. There always seemed to be a team willing to bite on a player like Brown. Now in the cap era, teams just wont take that chance as he is not worth the cap hit.
My first reaction was that this was a classless move by the Kings, but I have changed my mind as I think I was wrong. You have to do what is best for the team overall, and if you feel the guy is not the person to lead your team, you can't just leave things be for 6 more years.