New Seattle Kraken forward Bobby McMann is still playing the waiting game for his work visa to come through after he was acquired from the Toronto Maple Leafs in a trade that was completed mere minutes before the NHL Trade Deadline on Friday. Whether he plays Thursday against the Avalanche depends on if his paperwork comes through in time, which—as of morning skate—it still had not.

Regardless of whether he makes his Kraken debut at home against Colorado on Thursday or on the road in Vancouver on Saturday, his arrival in the lineup is coming. So the time is nigh to get to know the 6-foot-2, 217-pound “well-rounded” Alberta native a bit more before you see him don a Seattle sweater for the first time.

Get to know the guy that fellow former Maple Leaf Matt Murray called, “A great, great guy… As a player, he’s like a power forward with a lot of skill, as well. He’s fast, big, strong, great shot, really good shooter. He can do a lot for the team offensively. He’ll be really good for us.”

A long, winding road to the NHL

McMann has an interesting backstory. Although he’s 29 years old, he only became a true full-time NHLer last season after playing 56 games with the Maple Leafs in 2023-24 and six games that year with the Toronto Marlies of the American Hockey League. But in his limited NHL time, he has been productive, scoring 15 goals in those 56 games two seasons ago and 20 goals in 74 games last season. This year, he already has 19 in 60 games.

So what took so long for him to get here? For one, he wasn’t drafted. He maintains that the NHL was always his dream, but he had to take the long road—three years in the Tier II Alberta Junior Hockey League, followed by four full seasons at Colgate University. Even after graduating, he didn’t immediately land an NHL deal, instead signing with the Marlies on an AHL contract and spending parts of the next two seasons in the ECHL.

“I definitely took a longer route to get here, even three years of juniors, four years of college, East Coast League, American League,” McMann recalled. “Each one of those steps, sometimes they’re a hard pill to swallow, getting sent down to the East Coast, or even that second year, not making the Marlies there in the American League and going to [the Newfoundland Growlers].”

Yet he persevered and says every step of the long journey was worthwhile.

“Those are hard things to do, but I think they’re so good at building character and building a resilience in yourself and understanding, ‘Ok, where am I at? Where’s my head at? How do I get through this? How do I control what I can control?’”

While McMann went through times where he had to look inward about his situation and his future, he says he never wavered in his belief that he would eventually make the NHL.

“Some of those moves, without them, without those hard times, I wouldn’t have stuck in the NHL as fast as I did. I think those were massive for me, learning about myself and trying to figure out, ‘How can I stick around here, and how can I do what I just did in a previous level after making that jump?’”

A well-rounded player

Many times, when a player takes the college hockey route to the NHL, they play a season or two in the NCAA and then leave early to turn pro. For a player like McMann, who went undrafted, it’s more common to stay all four years and then see what opportunities arise afterward.

In choosing Colgate University, McMann kept hockey as his primary focus but also challenged himself academically, majoring in economics with a minor in theater.

“I was always… Hockey was the dream,” McMann said. “I like rounding out all aspects of my life, and I wanted to do well in school, and that was a school that I knew was challenging. I knew it would take a lot to manage my time and manage the academics as well as the athletics, but hockey was always the main focus, and that’s what I was trying to do.”

Comically, his Wikipedia page mentions these academic interests, so he has already been asked about his theater background several times since arriving in Seattle.

“I didn’t know that [my Wikipedia page] said that,” McMann said with a laugh. “I didn’t even realize— I used to look up Wikipedia pages all the time. I didn’t know that I had one. I think it’s fine… As long as it’s accurate, that’s cool.”

For what it’s worth, McMann says he hasn’t been able to see that many shows, but Jersey Boys is his favorite that he’s attended, and he loved a recent stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child that he saw in Toronto.

As for the economics major, he said it was the closest thing to a business program that Colgate offered, and he enjoys understanding the “why and how” behind things.

Outside of hockey and theater, McMann also enjoys golf (he says he hits his driver “long but not straight” and could use some work with his irons but putts well), coffee, and reading.

McMann practiced Wednesday rotating in and out of the fourth line, but Lane Lambert said that was simply to prepare in case his visa does not come through in time for the game. Whenever it does come through, expect him to slot higher in the lineup, most likely on the second line.

Jaden Schwartz on the road to recovery

At practice Wednesday, Lambert also provided an update on injured forward Jaden Schwartz, who is out indefinitely after being accidentally kicked in the face by Nick Cousins during Seattle’s 7-4 loss to the Ottawa Senators on Saturday.

“He’s on the road to recovery. Obviously, it’s going to take some time but he will [recover], and thank goodness for that,” Lambert said. “I was probably from me to you [reporter] away when it happened, or a little farther, I guess. But the impact of it, the noise of it, the fact that the skate hit him flat, as opposed to potentially the other way was… we’re all real thankful for that.”

So it appears Schwartz avoided a true worst-case scenario, but don’t expect him back in the lineup anytime soon.