The Seattle Kraken answered one of their biggest offseason questions on Thursday when they announced that Lane Lambert had been hired to become the third head coach in franchise history. We expect Lambert to be formally introduced to the market next week, so we will surely have more coverage of the hiring coming down the pike, in addition to what John Barr published on Thursday. So, stay tuned for more on that front.
While we were waiting for that major personnel decision, we also got to thinking about how newly appointed general manager Jason Botterill can improve his team’s on-ice performance this offseason. Curtis Isacke laid out what he thinks should be the team’s top priorities in a fantastic piece from Wednesday, so give that a read if you haven’t.
In his end-of-season press conference, Botterill alluded to seeking more players (and a coach, for that matter) who can help the team get to the front of the net in the offensive end and do a better job of protecting that same area in the defensive zone. To us at Sound Of Hockey, this screams more Jaden Schwartz-types, but also younger.
Adding one or more players like that—a tall task in and of itself—should make the team more competitive, but it likely won’t be enough on its own. As has been the case since the team’s inception, there remains an obvious dearth of star power at the top of Seattle’s lineup. There still is no one player who can—when the chips are down—put the team on his back and go get the desperately needed goal, even when he’s not having his best night or the team looks like it’s skating in quicksand.
How do the Kraken get such a player? One route requires patience: drafting and developing. Seattle has drafted well over its first four years, and it is possible that a home-grown forward like Matty Beniers, Shane Wright, or Berkly Catton could grow into a star offensive producer. But if that comes to fruition for any of the three, it will still take at least a couple of years—and in the case of Catton, he’s likely four or more seasons from becoming a reliable scorer at the NHL level.
It’s no secret the organization wants to become competitive immediately, though, so how can the front office expedite its improvement? Well, the other routes are through trade, free agency, or the rarely executed offer sheet. The Kraken made a couple of splashy signings last summer in Chandler Stephenson and Brandon Montour, and they could look to do that again this summer. The free agent class is relatively thin, but it is buoyed by one big-time, elite winger highlighting the top of the group: Mitch Marner.
At face value, Marner doesn’t even really fit the mold of what the Kraken are purportedly looking for, but landing a player like him would instantly improve the offense. Could they do it? Should they? Let’s investigate.
Mitch Marner is a bona fide star
The Toronto Maple Leafs are a team in flux after they were bounced from the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs by the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers in seven games. In 13 postseason games across two series, Marner was second on the team in scoring with 13 points (2-11=13), behind only William Nylander (6-9=15).
One would think that a hometown product who grew up idolizing the Leafs, led a star-studded roster during the regular season with a whopping 102 points (27-75=102), and then put up a point-per-game in the playoffs would have earned some grace from the Toronto fanbase.
Instead, as the Panthers embarrassed the Maple Leafs for the second time in three games, closing them out with a 6-1 spanking that left Toronto’s fans wanting back the thousands of dollars they spent on Game 7 tickets, Marner was booed. With his contract set to expire after the season, Marner—in what may end up being his final game for his beloved hometown team—was booed by the Maple Leafs fans.
Although Marner’s exit from the so-called “Center of the Hockey Universe” is still not a foregone conclusion—he could still end up re-signing there—calls for change in the market have led to Brendan Shanahan’s ouster as the team’s president, and a desire for a shakeup to the roster could very well lead to a divorce between Marner and the Leafs. Leafs GM Brad Treliving added some fuel to that speculation when he said in his season-end press conference that “there’s some DNA that has to change in our team” this offseason.
Despite the sentiments of the home crowd in Toronto, which seems to have grown tired of the “Core Four” of Auston Matthews, Nylander, Marner, and John Tavares falling short of their sky-high expectations, there is no denying that Marner is a superstar player who will immediately elevate the team that lands him this offseason (assuming he does move).
Marner, 28, was the fourth-overall pick of the Leafs in the 2015 NHL Draft. He quickly emerged as a budding star, scoring 61 points (19-42=61) as a rookie in 2016-17, the same season Matthews debuted and racked up 40 goals and 29 assists. Since then, Marner has done nothing but produce, averaging 1.13 points per game over nine seasons.
2024-25 was Marner’s first time breaching the 100-point mark in a season, though he hit 97 (35-62=97) and 99 (30-69=99) in 2021-22 and 2022-23. Fast, creative, and shifty, Marner—sometimes overshadowed by Matthews for his goal-scoring prowess—is a top talent in the NHL.
What would it take to land Marner?
With more than $20 million in projected cap space and the ability to create more if needed, the Kraken are well positioned to make an offer to Marner that could carry the largest average annual value in NHL history, somewhere in the seven-year, $14 million range. That would put him ahead of Matthews, who currently holds the highest annual salary at $13.25 million.
There’s also suddenly an obvious connection between Marner and the Kraken via the hiring of Lambert, who spent last season as an associate coach for the Leafs. We can’t help but wonder how Lambert’s relationship is with Marner…
The problem is that if Marner does hit the market when free agency opens on July 1, there are many teams in the NHL that will want his services and will be willing to pay out the nose to acquire them. Is Seattle a desirable destination for a player of Marner’s ilk? That remains to be seen. Without being able to position themselves as proven winners, Botterill and the Kraken front office would face an uphill battle in proving to Marner that their vision for the future is one that will bring him sustained success through what could be the remainder of his career.
While most in the NHL laud the Kraken facilities and organization as “first class,” will the massive dollars and promise of future wins (as opposed to past ones) be enough to lure Marner to move 2,500 miles across the continent?
Should the Kraken try to land Marner?
Bad decisions in free agency can kill a franchise and make a front office look silly for years, especially when we’re talking about the level of financial investment and salary cap commitment that Marner will require. Plus, is Marner even really a fit for Seattle? The team has more playmakers than goal scorers, and although Marner has scored 221 goals in his career, this is not his primary skill. He also doesn’t strike me as a guy who’s going to battle his way into the dirty areas at either end of the ice, something Botterill said he wants to focus on adding this offseason.
Those are some reasons why the Kraken may opt to pass on the theoretical Marner sweepstakes, if they even come to fruition. Yet, with all these things in mind, and even with the unlikelihood of Marner coming to the Pacific Northwest, we at Sound Of Hockey still think it’s worth a try.
Marner would be the best player to hit the open market since Artemi Panarin did in 2019, so if the Kraken want to sprinkle in elite talent and make a big step toward contention, this is the fastest way to do it. Mitch Marner types simply do not become available.
What say you, folks? Would you try to sign Marner?
Darren Brown
Darren Brown is the Chief Content Officer at soundofhockey.com and the host of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. He is a member of the PHWA and is also usually SOH’s Twitter intern (but please pretend you don’t know that). Follow him @DarrenFunBrown and @sound_hockey or email darren@soundofhockey.com.
I know they are rare, but given the situation in Toronto, might Ferris and Treliving consider a sign and trade?
Well, I’m sort of jury out on the Leafs. They have some weird dynamics going on which is holding them back from being great
i have no idea if Marner is part of that and in what capacity. It makes me a little nervous.
Besides, yesterday somebody told me the Leafs are jinxed!
Signing Marner would also be a god send for the ownership. It would definitely bring fans to games and new STH. They’ll probably do it for that reason alone.
Unfortunately we hired a Leafs coach and this may well happen but this will be another Burakowski mistake. He scores because he played with one of the best players in the league just like Burakowski played with McKinnon. Let some one else make that mistake
Burky and Marner are no where near the same level of talent though. Marner would be sure to be at minimum a PPG player for the Kraken, the real question is does he fit with the org and does his contract restrict us from doing more productive things. Personally I think there are several other trade targets that would be wiser moves in the long term that I would consider long before Marner.
Please, no – more serial losers are not what this team needs ^^
The last thing this team needs to do is to lock up more money, long term with players headed into the backend of their careers. Marner isn’t the type of difference maker this type of risk is worth taking.
At least he’s only 27, 3 years younger than the guys they signed last offseason.
He’s 28 but even at 25 to me he’s not the type of player you give the 7 years and $105 million or more it will take to sign. Not to mention this organization is so far from being truly competitive it wouldn’t make a difference now and potentially create huge problems when they could be competitive.
Didn’t even read the article. No.
Not to be rude, I actually didn’t have time…answer is still “No.”
Absolutely yes. I don’t see a single reasonable, fact-based argument against it, apart from personal judgments and assessments
Signing Marner is definitely the strongest move the organization will make in five years. An clear signal of a change in direction and management’s determination to win.
There’s no point in arguing whether this player is right for Seattle or not when we’re in 6th place from the bottom. We’re not Carolina, who needs one ingredient to reach finals – we need everything, especially the entire first line. And when talking about a top-10 player in the league, who is productive, smart and entertaining, equally useful at both ends, of course you have to try to get him.
As for him not being a deal breaker, that’s quite likely. But that just means that more signings of a similar caliber are needed, while Marner makes that journey much shorter.
Totally agree. Players of his caliber rarely ever hit the market. The real obstacle will be teams like Chicago who have even more cap space and desperation to be better. I wouldn’t be surprised if his AAV eclipsed $15M.
I’d rather sign Jonathan Toews.
Why? He’s 37 and hasn’t played in 3 years.
Start the discussion with a reality check. Would Marner leave the east to go west? If he did, would the Kraken be the type of team he would sign with?
The likely answer to no. 1 is No. As far as I understand, he has a young family, so probably stays in the east. If he did go west to escape the nonsense, he probably would go no further than either a perpetual playoff team like the Avs and NateDog or a potential serial future playoff team like SJ. There is zero chance in any universe there is anything about the Kraken hockey roster and its potential that could possibly attract him. What possible reason can anyone come up with why he would come here? I can’t think of one.
I hope the Kraken will at least do their due diligence on Marner to gauge his asking price and whether he would even want to come to Seattle. He’s undoubtedly a star player who would improve the Kraken, but even if they did sign him I’d be a bit wary of them getting a worthwhile return on their investment. A lot of Marner’s points come from assists, so his raw point totals would probably take a hit, simply because Seattle doesn’t have the same quality of finishers as Toronto. So if the Kraken are going to make a serious run at Marner, it can’t just be ‘sign Mitch Marner and call it a day.’ They’d need to have a plan in place to find additional players who can reliably finish off the chances he creates.
Fit is very much an issue. I do not imagine that anyone wants to bring Marner in to play on Matty’s right given that Kaapo Kakko is occupying that spot nicely at a fraction of the cost of a Mitch Marner. He could play alongside Stephenson, but both of them are more creators than finishers. Who is going to score the goals on that line? Maybe Jared McCann? …Actually, my goodness, does that sound good. The more I think of it, the more I imagine Jared blowing past his forty-goal total from Year 2. Every time he gets paired with a really good right winger (eg. Jordan Eberle) who is good at shooting and better at passing he goes off. I think I just talked myself out of my previous position. Yeah, go get Marner!
He would be a nice add, however it’s going to be difficult. Gimme more Predators please!
“Would you try to sign Marner?”
I can’t promise I’d try. But I’d try to try.
I would prefer we looked at teams wanting to sign Marner but lacking the cap space (Vegas, Colorado, St. Louis) and made ourselves available to take a few choice players off their hands. We’re not going to sign any big-money free agents; might as well take advantage of teams trying to do so with a Bjorkstrand-type deal or two.
Take Vegas: you know they’ll want in but only have $9.6mil in cap space and a ton of UFAs. Mitch will cost between $12.5-14mil AAV so how do we help them get there? Ivan Barbashev alone would do it at $5mil AAV (and with only an eight-team no-trade list) but some combination of Brandon Roy ($3mil AAV), Keegan Kolesar ($2.5mil AAV), and/or Brett Howden ($2.5mil AAV) would clear enough space as well. Or one of those forwards and Zach Whitecloud ($2.75mil AAV) as a veteran D-man to pair with Ryker. Vegas could sign Marner and have enough room to fill out the remaining roster with olds looking for one last Cup run while we get either two big, physical middle-six forwards or one big, physical middle-six forward and a solid defenseman, all on reasonable contracts. And all it would cost is a couple draft picks.
This is the sort of roster-improving deal I’d like to see this summer. Not splashy, but still an upgrade, with nothing that will lock us out of the free agent bonanza next summer or block any of the youngsters should they make a case for themselves in training camp.
Now that’s really good thinking right there. Don’t be the team than makes the big, splashy signing that is just as likely to flop. Be the team that takes advantage of the opportunity created by the team that makes the big, splashy signing.
I want nothing from the Avs, everything we get from them turns to coal 😂
I do like this strategy although aging vets is not the right direction. Maybe if we are looking for a stopgap under contract for a few years it’s a road worth exploring.
We are at an interesting point, not a team that should be willing to eat someone’s cap but also not a team that really benefits from one big signing. We’ve put ourselves in a state of mediocrity with no easy way out. I’m really a believer that we should be working off a three year plan and not necessarily worry about the playoffs short term as much as ownership does.
I like this reasoning. Even though I’m a know nothing, I like it. Wouldn’t mind having Marner, but probably not realistic, and possibly shouldn’t be.
Year two the Kraken had a team that ran all 4 lines of relentless pressure and had balance scoring.
The core of the group is basically still intact, but missing key players like Donado, Geekie, Sprong and a couple others that contributed and together they all surprisingly did gel as a team.
With the right additions this offseason they can rise up and surprise the league once again.
Hopefully Lane Lambert and his yet known assistants will spark a winning attitude that leads to success sooner than expected.
I think this is an important point…
In year two there was a lot of chatter about the Kraken’s unsustainable 11.57 shooting percentage. This season six teams finished tge regular season with shooting percentages above 11.57.
The game has changed, but following that season, I feel like Hakstol leaned into old time “shoot the puck” and Bylsma did the same.
Very good point, the game has changed, goaltending has improved and shots have become less important than quality chances. Eddie O are you paying attention to the modern game?
If he were about 3 years older, maybe the Kraken would sign him to a 7 year deal.
I liked the post about being a facilitator. This team needs to recognize they aren’t in a window of opportunity and act accordingly, unlike last off-season.