Injuries in hockey are inevitable. It’s a high-speed, high-intensity, chaotic game in which a player can be doing everything right, and yet, in the blink of an eye, their whole season can be derailed.
For the Seattle Kraken, they may have enough talent to make the playoffs for just the second time in their short history—and the first time since the 2022-23 season. But there’s no doubt that for Seattle to even have a sniff of contention, the roster has to stay relatively healthy throughout the regular season.
During training camp and preseason—before the puck even officially drops—the last thing you want to hear about is key veteran players dealing with injuries.
And yet, here we are.
Chandler Stephenson leaves Tuesday’s game
Seattle’s lineup looked very different Tuesday in an uninspiring 4-1 loss at Calgary compared to the group that played Sunday in a 5-3 home win against Vancouver. In fact, the only two Kraken players to appear in both games were Berkly Catton and Ryker Evans.
One of the veterans making his preseason debut Tuesday was Chandler Stephenson, who Seattle hopes can emerge as a top distributor for newcomers like Mason Marchment, who also played his first game against the Flames.
Stephenson came up lame after this play in the closing moments of the second period and did not return for the third.
Uh oh. Chandler Stephenson went down the tunnel after this play… pic.twitter.com/vfGcMUO3b2
— Sound Of Hockey (@sound_hockey) September 24, 2025
The Kraken only announced that Stephenson was being “evaluated” by the medical staff, and coach Lane Lambert echoed that message in his post-game availability on Tuesday. “I have not heard anything,” Lambert said. “What I’ve heard is that he’s going to be evaluated [Wednesday].”
Unsurprisingly, Stephenson was not on the ice for practice Wednesday.
Jared McCann not at 100 percent
The Kraken desperately need Jared McCann to return to goal-scoring prominence this season after producing at a relatively low clip by his standards (though he still led the team in scoring with 61 points and buried 22 goals) in 2024-25.
One thing that likely hindered McCann’s production last season was an injury he played through for much of the campaign. He confirmed at the end of the year that he would undergo a procedure, and earlier this week he told us that recovery from that procedure kept him off the ice for most of the summer.
“I’m just taking it one day at a time right now. I wasn’t able to skate, really, that much in the summer, unfortunately. But I’m feeling pretty good, and hopefully it keeps going well.”
That comment came Saturday. On Sunday, the team announced McCann was day-to-day with a lower-body injury.
Asked about McCann’s status following the game against the Canucks, Lambert said, “He didn’t get a lot of chance to skate this summer. If you ask any one of those players in that room how training camp has been and how the first four days have been, they’re going to say, ‘Extremely difficult.’ And so, there’s a maintenance portion for him. It’s been a tough camp so far.”
That doesn’t sound like Lambert and the team expect McCann to miss significant time, but it is concerning that Seattle’s best scorer is trying to ramp up for the season, and his body isn’t responding the way he had hoped.
The good news is that when McCann has been on the ice, he’s looked mostly like his old self—aside from a few moments where he’s flexed his leg. He looks fast, and his shot is as wicked as ever.
Here’s hoping this issue doesn’t linger into the season. But like Stephenson, McCann was also absent from practice Wednesday.
Ryan Lindgren working his way back
We didn’t see it happen, but we heard that offseason acquisition Ryan Lindgren took a puck to the face during Sunday morning’s practice, forcing him to leave the ice. He has yet to appear in a preseason game.
There’s some good news, though. Lambert didn’t express much concern, indicating the team expects Lindgren to be fine. He skated on his own in a red non-contact jersey Tuesday and returned to skate with the non-game group Wednesday.
Ryan Lindgren is on the ice with the non-game group in a regular blue jersey at #SeaKraken camp. His left eye is still noticeably black. pic.twitter.com/TAEDGvXNAo
— Sound Of Hockey (@sound_hockey) September 24, 2025
Brandon Montour yet to skate in camp
Through all of this, top defenseman Brandon Montour still hasn’t skated with the team in training camp. Montour had a bursa removed from his ankle on the eve of camp and has been seen around Kraken Community Iceplex on crutches, chatting and laughing with team staff.
He did participate in pre-camp captains’ practices, and we’ve heard he had been dealing with the issue for a while this offseason before deciding to have the procedure so it wouldn’t bother him all season.
The team initially announced he’d be out for two weeks, which would put his projected return around next Wednesday. We’ll see…
Kraken need good health
The injury bug bites every team, every season; it’s just a matter of when—and how hard—it bites. For the Kraken, though, they simply can’t afford for key players to miss significant time if they want to be playing meaningful games late in the season.
On the plus side, there are still two full weeks before the games start to count, giving these banged-up players some runway to recover. The question is: Will they all be ready in time for Seattle’s Opening Night matchup against the Anaheim Ducks on Oct. 9? Or will Seattle already be testing its depth from the drop of the puck?
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UPDATE: Add Kaapo Kakko to the injured list. He left Seattle’s 4-1 win in Edmonton in the first period after taking a wicked two-handed slash on the left hand from Oilers defenseman Beau Akey.
Here's where Kaapo Kakko got hurt. Nasty two-hander by Beau Akey. #SeaKraken https://t.co/gyRFR3tNMx pic.twitter.com/vNZa6YJT4E
— Sound Of Hockey (@sound_hockey) September 25, 2025
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.
Good news- I talked to Jared at SeaTac while waiting for our flight to JFK (it was like 6am on Sunday) and he said he was doing good, and just had to run back to Ontario to take care of a family thing. He’s excited for the year and assured me he wasn’t traded or anything. So I think the lower body injury is a bit of team cover.
Add Kaapo Kakko to the list
The Athletic really hates the Kraken, they’re projected to be a bottom 5 team again. I just don’t see it. I can see a middling team, maybe a bubble wild card team, but not bottom of the league. Daccord in net sets that as the floor, and that’s if everything else goes wrong.
“The Athletic really hates the Kraken, they’ve projected them to be a bottom 5 team AGAIN.”
The Athletics preseason prediction (for last year) predicted to finish 25th and they ultimately finished 26th. Can’t argue “hate” if their prediction was basically spot on. Do you specific (earlier) examples of the Athletic’s “Kraken hatred?” Regarding this year’s projection, they spelled out their ranking criteria/process, do you have objections to their ranking process?
The Athletic’s recent ranking of NHL pipelines put them at 6th overall. Post free-agency DL ranked the Kraken as having the 6th best offseason. While this year’s prediction seems a tad pessimisti I’m not seeing alot of hate here.
I think hatred is a bit strong. One thing that stands out to me is comparing the write up on the Kraken to the write up on the Ducks. It seems their optimism for Anaheim and their pessimism for Seattle comes down to some significant assumption… No.1 being Quennville.
Dom’s model projects them to have the worst defense in the league and last season only Chicago and San Jose scored less… but they’re optimistic?
As to the ranking process… it’s simply Dom’s model. I have a ton of problems with Dom’s model. It’s been all over the place on the Kraken every season. Last year they had the Kraken putting up 87 points and finishing 22nd in the league (not 25th) while they finished tied for 27th with Boston and Philadelphia at 76 points. I wouldn’t call that “spot on”. Additionally, the Luszczyszyn model had the Kraken offense projected 28th and the defense 12th. These were a lot closer to exactly backwards.
I enjoy the Athletic a lot, but I don’t put a lot of stock in their Seattle coverage.
It’s a quant-based, based initially GSVA and he’s added more factors/complexity over time to adapt he’s transparent and mades adjustments, e.g. moving away from Corsi to expected goals adding defensive and offensive ratings etc. Any quant model is fraught with difficulties, but DL is transparent about his model’s shortcomings and the changes he’s made to improve its’ efficacy.
Regarding the whole Anaheim thing – I don’t have the individual player detail, but his his projected performance for the Ducks (vis-vis the Kraken) is most certainly based projections for the likes of Leo Carlsson, Mason McTavish, Cutter Gauthier Owen Zellweger, Pavel Mintyukov and Jackson LaCombe. Most of whom saw significant improvment in their personal +/- YOY.
Regarding the whole Joel Queneville thing – reread DL’s synopsis. He added 4 points to Anaheim’s projection based on JQ’s presence. Not exactly earthshattering.
Anaheim has a core of young ascendant players the Kraken can’t even come close to matching. The addition of veterans like Chris Kreider and Mikael Granlund suggests that management THINKS they have a chance to make and compete in the playoffs. THAT’s the basis for DL’s projection.
Got it.
So just a bit of follow up.
I’m pretty familiar with Dom’s model and it’s evolution from GSVA to Net Rating. I’m also familiar with his own misgivings about it’s situational limitations and defensive shortcomings. I get all that. I think when folks talk about the Athletic “hating” the Kraken it goes more to the narrative around these “projections”.
My skepticism about Dom’s model is more about it’s reflection of expectations for a team like Seattle whose improvement is more related to defensive and depth dynamics than offensive outputs. When it comes to the Ducks, I’m plenty willing to accept his 82 point projection… it’s the narrative that goes with it that’s hard to reconcile.
As you point out TFL, Quenneville is worth four standings points. This is not quantifiable in the model, so if we just back that out… Dom’s model has Anaheim projected to win less than one more game than Seattle… but when you read the write-ups – it’s all roses and wine in So-Cal and doom and gloom in the PNW. And you think that’s because McTavish, Carlsson and Gauthier are “next level” compared to the Kraken prospects? Did you read the Athletic’s own defensive analysis of those three? Remember Zegras? I feel like this is really trying to have it both ways. There is a reason Anaheim had such a horrible goal differential last season, but the write-up is happy to assume it was somehow inflated.
To me here’s the problem. Dom’s model pretty much has these two teams practically identical in terms of projection but one has been following the “popular” tank model and the other has not. If you’re simply relying on the “analytics”, you can’t separate these teams, but if you want to dive into the narratives… well, Anaheim has been tanking for seven years… but Seattle… “I don’t understand what they’re doing”.
We can go back and forth on this. I fully expect Seattle to finish ahead of Anaheim this season. Furthermore, I think the Ducks roster construction presents serious challenges if things go sideways for them this year…again. I’m no analyst, but I think the Ducks are in a more precarious position than the Kraken. I think if you’re a fan of the tank, you want to make a case that the Ducks are due, regardless of what the model might say.
For me, this argument will be decided during the regular season… I’m taking Seattle. I also think the Kraken are much more likely to push for a playoff spot than Anaheim.
Go Kraken!!!
Jagger Firkus looked like his hand was injured last game, after he scored and returning to the bench he removed his glove to get his line of fistbumps.
Unfortunate in the preseason how some hack like Beau Aiky, who may never see the light of day in the NHL, can break the hand of a player like Kakko and put him out for 6 weeks. Ugh.