The Seattle Kraken signaled they were going to be major players in NHL free agency when they chose not to qualify restricted free agents Haydn Fleury, Dennis Cholowski, Daniel Sprong, and Ryan Donato. This is consistent with the theme of being “aggressive” in free agency, which we continued to hear was the plan from general manager Ron Francis toward the end of the regular season. The Kraken are now armed with the cap space and roster spots to target some of the higher-end players available. Based on roster projections, we believe the Kraken will add at least two top-six forwards and one defenseman. Let’s look at some of the top free agents the Kraken may target on Wednesday when free agency opens in the NHL.
Free agent forwards
Johnny Gaudreau
Gaudreau is a unicorn. This type of player rarely makes it to free agency, and he is the cream of the crop in this year’s free agent group. He is coming off his best season ever with 40 goals and 75 assists. Gaudreau will have many suitors, but there is only a handful of teams that have the cap space to pay him the $10+ million dollars times seven years that is expected out of his next deal. As a fit, Gaudreau would be perfect for Seattle, but the 28-year-old winger may seek out a more immediate cup contender.
Need fit: 10/10
Likelihood of signing with Seattle: low
Ondrej Palat
Palat is an outstanding playmaker that can score goals. He has a knack for scoring when the team needs a goal the most, which includes the 2022 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs. It will still be a surprise to see Palat reach free agency, but we are less than 24 hours away, and it looks like he will hit the market. Palat would be another great piece for the Kraken and plays a strong two-way game that the team values.
Strome is another forward coming off a career year for the New York Rangers. He plays a very versatile game and has been steady for the Rangers. He is not flashy but can play on the power play and penalty kill, which the Kraken desperately need to improve. Strome fits the DNA of the type of player the Kraken value, a two-way, defensively responsible player. If the Kraken do not land the Johnny Gaudreau unicorn, the Kraken will need to add goal scoring by committee.
Need fit: 8/10
Likelihood: medium
Andre Burakovsky
Burakovsky scores goals. He has a great shot and sometimes gets a reputation of being a bit one dimensional, but his underlaying defensive metrics this season are sound. There is always a concern his contributions are overstated by playing with such a powerhouse team like the Colorado Avalanche. 2021-22 was a career high in goals scored for the 27-year-old, but the rate in which he scores goals has been consistent in prior seasons. The Kraken need goal scoring and Burakovsky fits the profile.
It is rare that a player is traded away at the trade deadline, only to return to his old team the following season. Jarnkrok had a rough start in his time in Seattle with COVID and an injury, but he eventually got the puck to bounce his way. He was the classic two-way forward that this team values. Unfortunately for Jarnkrok, his success in Seattle did not translate to success in Calgary. If the Kraken aim to add three forwards in free-agency, Jarnkrok would make a lot of sense.
Need fit: 7/10
Likelihood: good
Free agent defensemen
John Klingberg
Klingberg is the Johnny Gaudreau of the defensive free agent crop. He is hands down the best available in a thin defense market and will certainly get paid for his services. Klingberg is expected to sign a seven-year deal in the range of $6.5 million a year. The smooth-skating offensive-minded defenseman would be a sight for sore eyes in Seattle. The strength of the Kraken is their top-four defensemen, but they could use a bit more offense. Klingberg would undoubtedly step into quarterbacking the first power play unit.
Need fit: 9/10
Likelihood: good
Colin Miller
If the Kraken lose the Klingberg sweepstakes or just look to be more responsible in their spending, they could look to add another depth defenseman. Miller fits the profile and is probably the most likely candidate in this tier. The 29-year-old defenseman is a solid player that would fit well on the third pair and provide the Kraken some contingency if one of their few right-shot defensemen goes down with an injury.
Need fit: 9/10
Likelihood: medium
It is important to remember that there will be a lot of teams bidding on these players in free agency, and the probability of landing one specific player is mathematically low. Seattle’s advantage is that they have the cap space to pay for these players, and Washington State is one of the few NHL markets with no state income taxes. No matter what happens, it will be a fascinating free agency period to watch. Enjoy it.
The Seattle Kraken announced they have extended qualifying offers to six out of their ten restricted free agents on Monday. Karson Kuhlman (signed), Morgan Geekie, Kole Lind, Alexander True, Carsen Twarynski, and Cale Fleury all received their qualifying offers, while Ryan Donato, Haydn Fleury, Daniel Sprong, and Dennis Cholowski did not.
A qualifying offer is simply a starting point, and depending on the player’s previous contract, there are different requirements for what must be offered. Teams had to extend qualifying offers to any restricted free agent by Monday’s 2 p.m. Pacific deadline to retain their negotiation rights. Since Donato, Fleury, Sprong, and Cholowski did not receive qualifying offers, they will become unrestricted free agents when NHL free agency opens on Wednesday.
RFA forwards receiving qualifying offers
Karson Kuhlman seemed to hit his stride and fit in very well with the Seattle Kraken after getting claimed off waivers in January from Boston. Kuhlman will not impress you with his statistics, but the speedy winger plays a strong two-way game and became a regular on the penalty kill. He signed his deal, so he is back for at least one more year at $825K.
Morgan Geekie might not have had the season he wanted but still had seven goals in 73 games and at times showed the potential that a lot of folks expect out of this 23-year-old forward. Geekie was on a one-year $750,000 contract and is now expected to get a pay increase with a multi-year deal.
Kole Lind is an interesting one. Prior to this season, Lind had not played a full season since 2019-20 when he was with the Utica Comets. He spent much of the 2021-22 season with the Kraken’s temporary AHL affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers. He put up 17 goals in 46 games before getting called up to Seattle in late March. The 23-year-old has potential, and the 2022-23 season should be a big indicator of his future at the NHL level.
Former Seattle Thunderbird Alex True, has had success at the AHL level, but that has not yet translated to the NHL. True had 42 points over 60 games while playing for the Charlotte Checkers this year but did not register a point in the eight games he played with the Kraken during the 2021-22 campaign.
Carsen Twarynski played the entire season with the Charlotte Checkers and amassed 18 points in 71 games.
Unqualified forwards
Ryan Donato signed a one-year $750,000 deal right before training camp last fall. He had a strong 2021-22 season with the Kraken, netting 16 goals over 74 games played. Donato was arbitration eligible and was due for a significant pay bump this offseason, but with Seattle expecting to be active in free agency, our thought is the team no longer foresees a need for him up front.
Daniel Sprong came to Seattle by way of a trade-deadline deal involving Marcus Johansson going to Washington. Sprong scored six goals over 16 games with Seattle, which was tied for the most goals on the team since it acquired him on March 21. We weren’t terribly surprised he didn’t receive a QO.
RFA defensemen receiving qualifying offers
Cale Fleury was the top scoring defenseman on the Checkers this year. He had 33 points in 58 games including seven goals. The younger Fleury was a late-season callup to Seattle, and although he did not register a point, he looked like he was plenty capable of being a regular NHL player.
Unqualified defensemen
Haydn Fleury was a rostered Seattle Kraken player all season but only got in 36 games of the 82. Part of the reason for the low participation was injuries, but more commonly, he was a healthy scratch, crowded out of the Kraken’s overstaffed blue line.
Dennis Cholowski was an original Seattle Kraken Expansion Draft selection. The Washington Capitals claimed Cholowski off waivers when the Kraken were trying to assign him to Charlotte at the beginning of the season. He would only get in seven games in Washington, before going back on waivers, getting re-claimed by Seattle, and finally being assigned to Charlotte. He did get recalled for four games with the Kraken down the stretch.
For the players that were not qualified, they will enter free agency as unrestricted free agents. NHL free agency opens Wednesday at 9 a.m. Pacific time.
Complete and utter chaos. But Corey Pronman called it. And I doubted it. It is easy to imagine both Matty Beniers and Shane Wright donning the Deep Sea Blue in Seattle’s top-six forward group for many years to come. He was not on our radar in the mock draft, as we assumed he would be long gone. This is a fantastic break for the Kraken.
Wright was No. 1 on the Big Board and No. 1 in my analytics rankings. There were no players higher on either list available at the time of Seattle’s selection, obviously.
What does he look like on the ice?
What are scouts saying?
“[Wright] is such a well-rounded player because of how well he thinks the game. His success is built around micro play driving and terrific reads, with and without the puck. He anticipates the actions of his teammates and those of the opposition so well, and this puts him a step ahead of the competition on many nights. When you combine this with his high-end skill, elite shooting mechanics, and strong skating ability, you have a player who should become a more than reliable top-six forward at the NHL level.” – McKeen’s
Closely scrutinized as the likely No. 1 pick all year, he was mostly commonly criticized for simply being “very good” but not great. Scouts also seemed hung up on a calm demeanor on the ice that at times gives the impression of disengagement. (Think the opposite of Yanni Gourde’s demeanor.) But the production was there. He led the OHL in points per game among draft eligible players and ended up No. 1 overall on my analytics board. The Kingston offense ran through him; he made everything work. Scouts put elite grades on his passing and hockey sense. His defense, physicality, skating, and shot all check in solidly above average too. This provides a solid floor for Wright as a top-six forward, with upside to be an All-Star. This is a tremendous outcome for the Kraken.
With the NHL Draft just two days away, Kraken general manager Ron Francis addressed local Seattle media on Tuesday after two significant hires were announced by the organization.
The first new hire was Steve Briere, who joins the team as goaltending coach, replacing Andrew Allen in the role after just one season. Briere spent seven seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs, where he worked with Kraken head coach Dave Hakstol. Frederik Andersen and Jack Campbell were both All-Stars while under Briere’s tutelage.
The second was the hiring of Jessica Campbell as the first assistant coach for the Coachella Valley Firebirds, making her the first female assistant coach in AHL history.
Here are some of the highlights and our reactions from the Ron Francis press conference.
On the hiring of Steve Briere as next goaltending coach
Francis called out the fact that Briere has “more experience,” and said, “Based on how things went last year, that was a key component of what we were looking for.” That is not a direct slight at Allen, but it does sound like Seattle was trying to find somebody who had been around the league longer and had more of a track record of coaching successful goalies.
We do like the Briere hire, mostly because several goalies showed improvement in a market known for intense scrutiny while Briere was with the Maple Leafs. Though Campbell had some tough stretches in 2021-22, he took huge steps in his career with Briere guiding him.
Here’s hoping things go a bit better in Seattle’s crease next season.
On the backup goalie situation, other areas of improvement
Speaking of Seattle’s goal crease, the Kraken have plenty of question marks in that area for 2022-23. Chris Driedger is out long term, recovering from ACL surgery, and Joey Daccord has not yet shown he’s ready for a full-time NHL role. Francis said Daccord is “certainly one of the options,” but didn’t cut it off there, as we would have expected him to do if he planned to actually have Daccord in the NHL next season.
“We have to now not only get a guy to work with [Philipp Grubauer] up top, but now with our franchise starting up in Coachella Valley, we need a couple of guys there, and we also need somebody that we have as a fifth guy in our organization.”
So, that practically confirms that Francis does want to find somebody externally to back up at the NHL level.
As for other areas that the team wants to improve this offseason, Francis said the team is looking for scoring, acknowledging that’s hard to find, and also indicated that although the team is comfortable with Jamie Oleksiak and Carson Soucy playing the right side, finding a right-shot defenseman is “certainly something we would be open to.”
On the hiring of Jessica Campbell as assistant coach in Coachella Valley
Francis said the hiring process for an assistant coach at the AHL level started as soon as Dan Bylsma became the head coach for the Coachella Valley Firebirds. Bylsma asked if Francis was “open to all candidates, male and female,” to which Francis replied, “Absolutely.”
“In Jessica’s case, I think she combines a lot of interesting things,” Francis said. “She’s got a strong background as a skating coach and some skill stuff, so that’s intriguing to bring in… We think she’s got a bright future in the game, and we’re excited to bring her into our fold and have her work with our prospects as we try to build up the Kraken from the ground up.”
— Coachella Valley Firebirds (@Firebirds) July 5, 2022
Campbell and Bylsma also addressed media a bit later Tuesday. Bylsma said that Campbell’s name just kept coming up in his search for his assistant coach, and he eventually decided to reach out to her through a blanket email address for her skating school. On receiving the email, Campbell thought, “Is this spam?!”
“I’m very excited, obviously,” Campbell said. “It’s really special to be part of any first, and honestly, being at the start of Coachella Valley, I think I’m just very grateful and honored to take this next step and to work alongside someone like Dan. For me it was a very easy ‘yes.’”
Campbell is awesome. The Kraken continue to push the envelope of change for a game that so frequently has its culture as a white-male-dominated sport come into question. Cool stuff.
On the upcoming draft
Seattle has 12 picks in the NHL Entry Draft, which will be held Thursday and Friday in Montreal. Francis had previously indicated that he didn’t expect to necessarily use all those picks. But now that we’re within just a few days of the draft, and none of the picks have yet been moved, it’s becoming more likely the Kraken will simply use the selections to build up their almost-non-existent prospect pool.
Francis did imply that he has had conversations with other teams about players (Seattle was rumored to be involved in talks with Minnesota for Kevin Fiala, before he was traded to Los Angeles), but he says the Kraken’s situation is a bit unique, being that the organization only has a handful of prospects.
“Teams are looking for not only picks but prospects, and it puts us in a little bit of a tougher situation,” he said. Still, he says Seattle is exploring all avenues and could move picks for players or even picks for other picks.
As for moving the No. 4 overall pick?
“I would never say never, but it would have to be a pretty special player [coming back to us] for us to move that No. 4.”
Last week we wrote about the gap in the Seattle Kraken goal differential compared with better teams and illustrated the target goal differential the team would need to hit to become playoff contenders. This week we are going through a goal forecasting exercise to estimate the number of goals on the current roster and what might be needed during free agency.
This is an over-simplified analysis and does not consider a lot of the additional skill sets and factors that would be considered by general manager Ron Francis and team. There are a lot of assumptions and gaps in the process, but directionally, this team clearly needs goal scoring to become contenders, and this sheds some light on how much more it needs.
Goal scoring projections for known or expected players next season
We recognize that the roster can and will change between now and the start of the 2022-23 season, but there are several assumptions we can make about the current rosters, specifically which players we can pencil into the lineup.
Forwards
Assuming there are no major trades or injuries before the season starts, we expect Alex Wennberg, Jaden Schwartz, Jared McCann, Jordan Eberle, Matty Beniers, Yanni Gourde, Brandon Tanev, Joonas Donskoi, and Max McCormick to play somewhere in the Kraken organization. Except for McCormick, all are expected to play in the NHL full-time. For now, we are going to also assume that the list of restricted free agents will also remain with the franchise. Those players are Ryan Donato, Daniel Sprong, Kole Lind, Alexander True, Morgan Geekie, and Karson Kuhlman. There is a chance that one or two of those players do not get qualified, which would mean they become unrestricted free agents and likely play somewhere else.
Defense
On defense, Adam Larsson, Carson Soucy, Jamie Oleksiak, Vince Dunn, and Will Borgen are all under contract, while Haydn Fleury, Cale Fleury, and Dennis Cholowski are restricted free agents. For now, we are assuming that all three RFA’s are qualified and will be back with the organization next season.
Player game capacity
Just because they are in the organization does not guarantee they are playing each game. The typical NHL line-up every night is 12 forwards and 6 defensemen. Project that over 82 games and you have 984 forward games and 492 defenseman games. We are going to call that “player game capacity.”
Forecasting the lineup
To keep this very simple, we are forecasting the number of games each player plays by looking at his utilization and assessment of his play in 2021-22. The number of games that the players actually play will obviously vary from the forecast, but we feel this is a good starting point that will balance out across the team.
Here is a look at the forwards:
Assumption Notes:
Schwartz and Tanev are estimated at 75 percent of games because they are coming back from injuries that might be nagging or create some level of uncertainty.
Geekie and Donskoi are estimated at 75 percent because they were healthy scratched a few times last year. Both could end up playing over 90 percent of the games but for now we are sticking with the 75 percent.
The forecast total of the current roster is not at the full 984 player game capacity because we anticipate the signing of two skilled forwards during free agency that are expected to play in 90 percent of the games.
Here is a look at the defense:
Assumption Notes:
We are confident that Larsson, Soucy, Oleksiak, and Dunn will be in the lineup every night if healthy. After that we become less confident in how much others will play.
Cale Fleury had an excellent season in the AHL and could draw into more than 20 games this season, but for now, we are expecting him to weave in and out of the lineup.
We are forecasting one defenseman signing in free agency. If the team does not sign a defenseman during free agency, we are reasonably confident that the bottom four defensemen listed can play more regularly next season.
Forecast the goal scoring
With the intent of keeping it simple, we are going to forecast goal scoring at the same rate the players had during the NHL 2021-22 season. We acknowledge this will not be accurate, but on the aggregate, we think this is a fair and reasonable starting point.
Here is a look at the forwards:
Assumption Notes:
Brandon Tanev’s goal scoring pace in 2021-22 was well above expected before he got hurt, so there could be a regression in his goal production per game. His 14.4 goals could be a little high.
Morgan Geekie is someone we expect to take a step forward this season. His 5.9 goals feels a little low.
Joonas Donskoi struggled to find the net last year and estimating his goal forecast on last year’s production rate yields an extremely low estimate.
Here is a look at the defensemen:
Assumption Notes:
Dunn should benefit from a full year on the team’s top power play unit. A spot there opened after the 2021-22 trade deadline move that sent Mark Giordano to Toronto. This should help his scoring opportunities and production.
We expect a moderate increase from Jamie Oleksiak next season, but for now, we are leaving it at zero goals based on his 2021-22 pace.
Putting it all together
In our last post we mentioned the target for becoming playoff contenders is to have a negative five adjusted goal differential. We mentioned that we are assuming a slight and reasonable improvement of 10 fewer goals allowed on the season from the Seattle Kraken goalies. This is based on expected regressions to Grubauer’s traditional numbers and his play down the stretch of last season. Such an improvement would put the estimated goals against at 248. Based on the exercise in this post, we are forecasting 197.4 goals from the current rostered players. That leaves us with a current goal differential of -50.6 goals and a gap of 45.6 goals to reach the negative five goal target.
If the Kraken intend to be aggressive in free agency to become a contender, there are plenty of candidates on the market that can help close that gap to become contenders. We estimate that the Kraken could sign at least two skilled forwards and one skilled defenseman during free agency.
In the next post we will breakdown the potential free agent targets and the likelihood they could sign in Seattle.
At the end of the inaugural season for the Seattle Kraken, the team’s roster looked very different from how it looked in Oct., 2021, when the team played its first game. General manager Ron Francis was active at the NHL Trade Deadline, and he shed six regular players to (mostly) contending teams in exchange for a bevy of draft picks. Now, with one round of the playoffs in the rearview and the second round underway, we felt it was time to check in on former Kraken players to see how they fared after being dealt.
Mason Appleton
We will ease you into it with a check-in on Mason Appleton. Appleton’s time in Seattle was underwhelming. He just never seemed to find his footing with the team and ended up getting traded back to the club from which he was plucked in the Expansion Draft. After scoring six goals and 11 assists for Seattle in 49 games, the 26-year-old forward returned to the Winnipeg Jets and amassed just four more points in the final 19 games of the season.
Mason Appleton was traded to the Winnipeg Jets. (Photo/Brian Liesse)
The Jets did not qualify for the playoffs, and Appleton’s contract is now up. He is a restricted free agent and has arbitration rights. It wasn’t much of a return, but we thought at the deadline that a fourth-round pick was fair, and this still seems accurate.
Jeremy Lauzon
The second-round pick that Francis got for Jeremy Lauzon raised some eye brows when the transaction went through. Lauzon (somewhat unfairly) drew the ire of a lot of Kraken fans when he was in Seattle, thanks to some early-season defensive struggles. He improved as the season went on, but we still recall seeing some surprised reactions that he fetched a second-round pick on the trade market.
With his new team, the Nashville Predators, Lauzon injured his leg on April 16 against Chicago and missed the last seven games of the regular season and Game 1 of the team’s series against Colorado. He returned to play Games 2, 3, and 4, which was just long enough to feel the full wrath of the Avalanche, who swept the Preds and sent them home with a whimper.
Lauzon had no points in his three playoff games, was minus three, and averaged a little under 17 minutes of ice time. He had one goal and one assist for Nashville in 13 games of regular-season play. Lauzon is a restricted free agent with arbitration rights this offseason.
The return that Francis got for Lauzon looks even better with Nashville’s early exit, as Seattle will select No. 49 overall with that pick.
Mark Giordano and Colin Blackwell
Some (but not all) of us felt a little bad for the Maple Leafs after they lost to the two-time defending Stanley Cup champions in seven games in the first round. The hot takes about Toronto’s continuing postseason failures were running rampant, but thankfully the bulk of the disdain did not seem to be directed at Mark Giordano or Colin Blackwell.
Giordano and Blackwell were two players who performed well during their respective tenures in Seattle, and they were two of the most affable guys in the organization when dealing with the media, which we certainly appreciated.
So, we were sad to see both of them go and were quietly hoping to see them succeed. But, the Leafs decided to make like trees and… leave… early in the postseason yet again.
Colin Blackwell joined Mark Giordano in Toronto after the NHL Trade Deadline. (Photo/Brian Liesse)
Giordano played a big role on the blue line for Toronto and logged at least 18 minutes per night against the Lightning. He registered assists in Games 5 and 6, but was otherwise held off the scoresheet. In 20 regular season games for his hometown team, Gio had two goals and 10 assists after posting 23 points for Seattle.
As for Blackwell, the grinding forward predictably played a depth role after leaving the Kraken. He added just three regular-season points, plus one goal and one assist in the playoffs.
What happens for these players now? Both are on expiring contracts and are set to become unrestricted free agents this summer. Giordano is 38 years old, but never gave any indication he was ready to hang it up. Blackwell is 29 and can bring value to a third- or fourth-line role. Maybe Seattle will try to get him back?
Marcus Johansson
Marcus Johansson was a pleasant surprise as a Kraken player. Signed to a one-year deal late last offseason, we had low expectations for the veteran forward. But he ended up playing a huge role for Seattle, typically in a top-six spot, and serving as the bumper on the power play most nights.
Johansson was traded to one of his old teams, the Washington Capitals, at the deadline and had three goals and three assists in the regular season after the move. He then added one goal and one assist in Washington’s six-game loss to the Florida Panthers.
Johansson is also a UFA and has played for six different teams since the 2018-19 season. He’s still just 31 years old, though, so he will surely be looking for a multi-year deal.
Calle Jarnkrok
Of the players traded away at the deadline, Calle Jarnkrok is the lone player on a team that survived the first round. His Flames defeated the Dallas Stars in a thrilling Game 7 that went to overtime, and Calgary now moves on to a much-anticipated Battle of Alberta in the conference semifinals.
Jarnkrok had an interesting season for Seattle. He was sick with COVID, then injured, then injured again, and got off to a horrible start as a result. Once finally healthy, he turned it on and ended up having a solid campaign with 12 goals and 14 assists in 49 games for the Kraken.
Calle Jarnkrok and the Calgary Flames advanced to the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. (Photo/Brian Liesse)
Since moving to Calgary, Jarnkrok hasn’t produced much offensively. He has yet to score a goal for the Flames in the regular season or playoffs, and had just five total assists with one of those coming in the Dallas playoff series.
Jarnkrok’s underlying numbers have been good, and coach Darryl Sutter has been using him regularly in a checking role.
Jarnkrok, 30, is an unrestricted free agent too following his playoff run.
