This is “Down on the Farm,” your weekly Seattle Kraken prospects update. This week, we’ll have part two of our “midseason” mailbag, answering more of your questions from around the Kraken organization. (I have a few more questions I’d like to get to, so I think we’ll have a part three in the not-too-distant future. Keep the questions coming.) After that, we’ll have additional Kraken prospect news, video, and data updates, the Sound Of Hockey Prospect of the Week, and a preview of the week ahead, as always.
If you have a Seattle Kraken prospect–related question you’d like to see featured in a future column (or mailbag, pt. 3), drop us a note below or on X or BlueSky at @deepseahockey or @sound_hockey.
Seattle Kraken prospects mailbag
You’ve highlighted Julius Miettinen a few times recently. Have you upgraded him your last assessment which (I think) projected him as a future 3C for the Kraken?
Julius Miettinen has been lighting up the scoreboard of late. And Craig Button of TSN recently ranked Miettinen as Seattle’s top prospect and No. 21 overall in the sport. (Button had Jake O’Brien at No. 31.)
I think the probability of an NHL future for Miettinen is as high as it’s ever been, but I’m not sure I see his realistic high-end projection rising above a third-line center profile. He is skilled, athletic, and big, but none of those are true carrying or difference-making traits. In particular, I think his limitations as a puck carrier hold him back just a bit. If he develops further in that area, things could change. For now, I think he has everything to be a very solid player, and I’m fairly certain he will be a solid player. (I wouldn’t rank him No. 1 in the Kraken system personally.)
Can you do a little focus on the goalie situation in the system for next year. I understand Vyazovoi is expected to come over. What about Saarinen? Is there a logjam in the AHL next season?
The goalie position is an area of organizational depth over the medium term, but short-term roster management questions will need to be answered.
Resetting the depth chart, the Kraken have Philipp Grubauer and Joey Daccord under contract for the 2026-27 season at the NHL level. Matt Murray is a pending unrestricted free agent. Grubauer will be a free agent after next season.
Below the NHL level, the Kraken have Nikke Kokko, Victor Ostman, and Kim Saarinen signed to entry-level contracts. Kokko and Ostman have been playing in a timeshare at the AHL level this season, while Saarinen is the top goaltender for HPK in Liiga. Ostman’s deal expires after this season; he will be a restricted free agent this summer.
Additionally, the Kraken have drafted but not yet signed Visa Vedenpää (2023 sixth-round pick) and Semyon Vyazovoi (2021 sixth-round pick). Seattle has until next summer to sign Vedenpää, while it will continue to hold Vyazovoi’s rights indefinitely as a Russian-born player.
Working from the top down, assuming both Daccord and Grubauer are back, who is the third option? The team carried a third veteran option on the NHL roster this season, but I suspect that was due to a unique combination of uncertainty about Grubauer’s performance and the condensed schedule.
Looking at a more standard schedule in 2026-27 and an improved Grubauer (not to mention the CBA-negotiated emergency third goalie, which will go into effect next season), would the team be comfortable with Kokko as the third option at the AHL level?
It’s a close call because Kokko’s production has taken a step back behind a porous AHL defense. I’d project the team to protect itself by bringing in a veteran third option on the level of a Magnus Hellberg in the offseason. Ultimately, though, that player never sees significant time with the Kraken or the Firebirds if all are healthy, and Kokko earns the “next option” mantle coming out of training camp.
After that, how does the Coachella Valley depth chart stack up? I’ll suggest Vyazovoi signs his entry-level contract in the offseason, as the team has indicated is the expectation. Ostman then re-signs on a one-year deal. If Daccord, Grubauer, Kokko, and Vyazovoi are all healthy, Ostman may end up taking some starts at the ECHL level, but I suspect he earns plenty of AHL time as well. Saarinen stays in Liiga for one more season.
Then, for the 2027-28 season, Kokko or Vyazovoi could ascend to pair with Daccord at the NHL level, while the other could form a tandem with Saarinen in the AHL.
How should the “Data Score” be interpreted and how is it calculated?
I’ve seen this question come up a couple times in the comments, and each time I was meaning to answer it but never got around to it. So we’ll handle it here.
“Data Score” is a metric we at Sound Of Hockey developed to iterate on a bedrock NHL equivalency (“NHLe”) for use in comparing prospects. NHLe is a method to compare the scoring proficiency of players in the various professional and junior leagues across the globe. Sound Of Hockey uses Thibaud Chatel’s model, which is the most up-to-date public research in the area. Check out Chatel’s Substack for an in-depth discussion of NHLe. For the 2025-26 “Data Score,” Chatel’s newest model is used, which has been updated to account for 2024-25 season data.
Sound Of Hockey derives an NHLe base from the scoring data and adjusts for age, height and position. A modest upward adjustment also applies to low-scoring players competing in high-level professional leagues. From various studies, each of these factors has been shown to correlate with the probability of NHL success (typically measured by games played). Sound Of Hockey then normalizes the resulting output to generate the prospect’s “Data Score.” This number no longer projects NHL scoring but is (hopefully) useful in describing the relative strength of prospects. The methodology is reviewed in more detail here and here.
Notes on four Kraken prospects
Logan Morrison | F | Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL)
With two goals and two assists in two games last week, Morrison is your Sound Of Hockey Prospect of the Week. Morrison has been Coachella Valley’s top-line center this season, playing heavier minutes than players like Mitchell Stephens and John Hayden. Morrison has rewarded that confidence by coming up big for a team desperate for offense. His 26 goals and 53 total points are both fifth-most in the AHL. The players ahead of him are all older than the 23-year-old Morrison.
Ollie Josephson | F | Univ. of North Dakota (NCAA)
Josephson’s University of North Dakota team advanced to the semifinals of the NCHC Playoffs thanks in no small part to the Kraken prospect’s goal and four assists in two wins over the University of Nebraska Omaha. (Josephson had a point on 50 percent of his team’s goals.) North Dakota will square off against Minnesota Duluth on Saturday.
Zaccharya Wisdom and Western Michigan Univ. will take on Clarke Caswell and the Univ. of Denver at the same time in the other semifinal.
Barrett Hall | F | St. Cloud State Univ. (NCAA)
Barrett Hall’s St. Cloud State Huskies fell in the first round of the NCHC playoffs. Hall was held off the scoresheet and ends his junior season with an NCAA career-best 10 goals and 18 assists in 36 games.
Ben MacDonald | F | Harvard Univ. (NCAA)
MacDonald’s Harvard Crimson also advanced in the ECAC Playoffs last weekend with a 4-3 overtime win over St. Lawrence. Harvard will face a tough test this weekend, squaring off against Cornell in a best-of-three series.
Kraken prospects data update
Jani Nyman and Jagger Firkus joined Morrison with highly productive weeks. Nyman had two goals in two games (which is fairly standard), but he also contributed two really nice assists. If a playmaking element clicks for him with Firkus and Morrison, it could unlock his game even more moving forward. Firkus was equally impressive with a goal and two assists.
Firebirds forward Eduard Sale flashed a bit this week as well. He had two goals, which brings his season total to nine.
All of the organization’s goalies were strong this week, posting save percentages over .900.
Saarinen continues to lead Liiga with a .917 save percentage.
1: Alexis Bernier, Barrett Hall, Ollie Josephson, Tyson Jugnauth, Nikke Kokko, Oscar Fisker Mølgaard, Victor Ostman, Zaccharya Wisdom
Previewing the week ahead
This week’s Deep Sea Hockey Game of the Week is the Saturday afternoon NCHC semifinal matchup between Wisdom and Caswell.
Tracking 2026 NHL Draft prospects: Niklas Aram-Olsen
Aram-Olsen is this year’s consensus top-ranked player out of Norway. He is a prolific, pure-scoring forward with a 6-foot-1 frame. He has been held scoreless in limited minutes in the SHL this season, but has 20 goals and 20 assists in 29 games at the Swedish under-20 level. Aram-Olsen was No. 44 on our mid-season Big Board, but seems to be steadily on the rise. Corey Pronman of The Athletic had him at No. 24 in his recent ranking.
Curtis is a Sound Of Hockey contributor and member of the Kraken press corps. Curtis is an attorney by day, and he has read the NHL collective bargaining agreement and bylaws so you don’t have to. He can be found analyzing the Kraken, NHL Draft, and other hockey topics on Twitter and Bluesky @deepseahockey.
If you put this 5-1 Seattle Kraken loss to the Colorado Avalanche in a vacuum, it’s fine. The Avs are the best team in the NHL, and a loss against them is completely understandable. But in the context of it being the Kraken’s fourth straight loss, following defeats in three far more winnable games against the St. Louis Blues, Ottawa Senators, and Nashville Predators, at a time when the players should be desperately fighting for their playoff lives, this one feels like the bottom has fallen out on this organization.
With the loss, Seattle dropped out of a playoff position, falling a point behind the San Jose Sharks for the last wild card spot. The Kraken are now level in points with the Los Angeles Kings and the Predators in some kind of sad pillow fight between a bunch of teams that are refusing to win enough games to take control.
Here are Three Takeaways from a 5-1 Kraken loss to the Avalanche.
Takeaway 1: Terrible first period and “too much respect”
If Rodney Dangerfield were a hockey team, he would *not* be the Colorado Avalanche. Because it would be so weird for Rodney Dangerfield to say, “They’re giving me too much respect, I tell ya!”
Jokes aside, Lambert was furious with his hockey team after the game, indicating that the poor opening period was related to how good Seattle’s players expected Colorado’s players to perform.
“We’re probably showing them too much respect,” Lambert said. “I don’t necessarily know that it was a thing where, ‘Oh, gee, we’re not completely ready to go.’ We’re showing them too much respect. But they start rolling around in our zone, we have a system and a structure, and we just completely throw it down the drain. And they’re just making plays. It’s ridiculous.”
It really was a painful period to watch. Aside from Ryan Winterton missing the net on a rebound chance that should have been a goal, Seattle didn’t generate much of anything offensively, while Nathan MacKinnon and Martin Necas ran amok in the Kraken zone. Twice they connected on passes through the seam, and both times it resulted in goals—one for each player.
MacKinnon ended the night with four points (one goal, three assists), and Necas had a goal and an assist.
“It just seemed like every time [MacKinnon] got the puck, he knew where it was going, and he knew where the open man was, and a lot of times that was Marty with speed,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “They had good chemistry tonight.”
1-0 Avs.
Martin Necas after a nifty pass by MacKinnon, and the home crowd goes wild… Oh wait, those are Avalanche fans. pic.twitter.com/fdtBy831b3
Seattle woke up and pushed in the second period, but after Ryker Evans scored a pretty shorthanded goal to get the Kraken within 3-1 at 13:36, you just knew the next goal would be Colorado’s. Indeed, Nazem Kadri scored his first goal since returning to the Avalanche following his trade from the Flames at 17:11, and from then on there was just no chance of the Kraken getting back in the game.
Takeaway 2: Another interesting goalie decision
I was surprised that Lambert turned back to Joey Daccord last game after he gave up seven goals against the Ottawa Senators on Saturday, and I was even more surprised he tagged him again for this game instead of giving it to Philipp Grubauer to face his former team.
But Lambert also had a shorter hook in this one, smartly switching the netminders at the first intermission after Daccord had allowed three goals on 15 shots in that godforsaken first period.
“Let’s be clear, Joey played well last game,” Lambert said. “This was not any reflection on Joey tonight. Our team needed a wake-up call, so we put Grubi in, and we put him in in a tough spot—we were shorthanded when Grubi came in—and I thought he did a good job. We did a poor job tonight to clear the front of the net, they went to the net harder than we did, and things have to change if we’re planning on making the playoffs.”
The goalie choice probably didn’t matter in this game because the Kraken were dominated in the opening frame and hung Daccord out to dry. It’s still interesting that Lambert used Daccord in three straight games, though.
Takeaway 3: What is going on with Bobby McMann’s visa?
It is insane that Bobby McMann still has not made his debut for the Kraken. Six days have passed since his acquisition from Toronto in a deal made just under the wire of the NHL Trade Deadline last Friday.
Would McMann’s inclusion have meant a win against the Avalanche? Probably not. But he is a player who brings speed, energy, and (perhaps) a little jolt of positivity, and we saw what happened when Jacob Melanson first got inserted into the lineup earlier this season. So who knows what will happen when McMann finally plays?
Here’s what Lane Lambert said about the visa situation at morning skate on Thursday, when the team was still holding out some hope that it would go through in time for the game:
“As of right now, he’s not [cleared]. So it’s extremely disappointing right now, the uncertainty. We traded for him for a reason, to help our hockey club, and having him not be available to help our hockey team hurts our hockey team.”
Now, here are some excuses you may hear from the organization:
The deal was done on Friday, which meant the process couldn’t really begin until Monday due to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services offices being closed on the weekend.
McMann hasn’t played for a U.S.-based NHL team before (and apparently his time with the ECHL’s Wichita Thunder doesn’t seem to be helping him through this process).
The U.S. government doesn’t tend to work quickly.
While I’d love to blame the government, I’m having a hard time doing that in this case. Logan Stanley, who was seemingly in the same situation as McMann—a Canadian citizen who had never played for a U.S.-based team—has now played two games for the Buffalo Sabres since getting acquired from the Winnipeg Jets last Thursday. He first entered the Buffalo lineup on Tuesday, on the third full business day after the trade (Friday, Monday, Tuesday).
Even if you give the Kraken the benefit of the doubt and don’t count Friday—since the trade happened at 3 PM Eastern that day—we’re still four full business days removed from the McMann deal (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday).
I asked Lambert after the Avalanche game (and after McMann was out of the lineup for the third time since being acquired) if he had any insight into what the actual holdup is.
“I do not,” Lambert said. “Good question, but I don’t.”
Regardless of whether the issue is government bureaucracy, organizational mismanagement, or a combination of the two, this situation is getting downright embarrassing for the Kraken.
And what happens if McMann isn’t cleared on Friday? In that case, are we to assume he’s ineligible for either of the two games this weekend against the Vancouver Canucks and Florida Panthers because the USCIS offices are—again—closed on the weekend?
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.
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.
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.
That was a killer loss. The Kraken came out hot in the first period and appeared ready to roll to victory over the Nashville Predators. But things fell apart in the second, and a 2-0 lead quickly evaporated and turned into a 3-2 deficit.
While Seattle peppered Juuse Saros with 45 shots in the game, they couldn’t find the equalizer after falling behind and took another damaging ‘L’ as they continue to cling to the final wild-card spot in the Western Conference by the thinnest of margins.
“I thought we came out well, and then… our team hasn’t been in this position [fighting for a playoff spot] for a couple of calendar years,” coach Lane Lambert said. “And we’re showing it a little bit right now. We have to sustain for 60 minutes.”
Here are Three Takeaways after a crushing 4-2 Kraken loss to the Predators.
Takeaway 1: Second period collapse
The Kraken were riding high entering the second period after Kaapo Kakko had scored off a Shane Wright “pass off the pads” play to make it 1-0 at 2:14 and Matty Beniers had sniped from the right circle at 9:46 to make it 2-0.
It started with a long shift by Vince Dunn and Adam Larsson. Larsson looked like he was about to change, hustling to try to dump the puck into Nashville’s zone and coming to a stop right in front of the Kraken bench. But the puck was out of his reach, so he couldn’t get it deep, and Nashville began transitioning the other way.
Instead of signaling to the next man up to jump on, Larsson noticed Tyson Jost had gotten behind him, so he stayed out and sprinted back to the defensive zone. In doing so, he drifted into a bit of no-man’s land. Meanwhile, Fedor Svechkov faked Vince Dunn out and cut to the middle, finding Jost with plenty of time and space to pick a spot under the bar.
“Yeah. I mean, they came at us in the second,” Larsson said. “We got stuck out there a couple times.”
Moments later, after a Wright goal had been negated because Ryker Evans was tripped and slid into Juuse Saros before the puck arrived, Matthew Wood sliced through the fourth line and set up former Seattle Thunderbird Reid Schaefer for an easy tap-in to tie the game 2-2 at 10:19.
The backbreaker came four minutes later when 21-year-old defenseman Ryan Ufko turned into Cale Makar, walking Ryan Winterton and Ben Meyers before deking back to his right and tucking the puck behind Joey Daccord for one of the prettiest first career goals you’ll ever see.
Connor McDavid? No. Nathan MacKinnon? No. Cale Makar? No.
That was it. Three defensive lapses in a 10-minute stretch, and the Kraken gave away what should have been two standings points.
“I thought we started to lose battles in the second period, and we spent time in our zone,” Lambert said. “Of course, we had a couple of breakdowns, and they ended up scoring. So right now, it just seems like, in a sense—and it’s our responsibility—but in a sense, anything that can go wrong will go wrong.”
Takeaway 2: Turning back to Daccord
It was slightly surprising to see Lambert turn right back to Daccord after he gave up seven goals against the Ottawa Senators on Saturday. I didn’t mind it. It felt like a vote of confidence from the coaching staff that Daccord could bounce back quickly.
Daccord played fine against Nashville and got hung out to dry by his team during the second period, though he was ultimately outdueled by Juuse Saros, who finished with a whopping 43 saves against a Kraken team that suddenly decided to become a high-shot-volume club.
“I thought Joey was pretty good tonight,” Lambert said. “I felt that he made a number of good saves [against Ottawa], even though he did give up seven goals. It probably could have been 10 or 11, the way we were playing, so we looked at that aspect of it, and that’s the way we went.”
Takeaway 3: Matty Beniers steps up
Aside from Beniers’ beautiful goal in the first period, he also did something nobody in the building expected early in the third.
After Justin Barron laid a bad hit on Jared McCann, Beniers was the closest player to Barron and went right after him. After the two pushed and shoved for a moment, Beniers’ gloves were off and his fists were flying wildly in what turned out to be the first fight of his career.
“Canner got hit bad, and we’ve been talking about standing up for teammates, and so I tried to,” Beniers said. “No fights yet [in my hockey career]. That was the first one.”
After seeing that, I’m not convinced Beniers will turn into an enforcer anytime soon, but the willingness to do that showed real leadership from the young assistant captain and should have sparked his team.
Said Larsson: “It’s unbelievable to see. He’s such a big part of this team, and that’s huge.”
And Lambert: “We’re trying to create a culture where guys care about each other, and there’s no question that Matty did that. I’m satisfied whenever somebody does that for a teammate.”
While Beniers sat in the penalty box, several teammates skated over to congratulate him before the door closed. You could tell it meant something to the Kraken, even if it wasn’t enough to push them over the hump in the end.
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.
The Kraken were back on the ice Monday for what Lane Lambert called a “spirited, demanding practice.” During a battle drill in one of the end zones, Lambert blew his whistle and yelled a number of things, with one sentence making its way out of the rink and into the ears of onlooking reporters, clear as day.
“F***ing play hard!” he yelled, before blowing his whistle again and restarting the drill.
At the end of the on-ice session, Lambert pulled the whole team into the circle for a quieter conversation.
Seattle is now 2-4-0 since the restart from the Olympic break and is just barely holding the final playoff spot, with the San Jose Sharks and Los Angeles Kings both just one point behind.
“We’ve got to look ourselves in mirror,” defenseman Brandon Montour said. “Lane did a good job this morning, kind of just [making us realize] where we’re at as a group and where we should be and what we should be expecting out of each other. Obviously, he’s not happy with how things have been going lately, the energy level, the excitement level, the awareness of just kind of the position we’re in and how much it means and how every game is going to be tough.”
Those were similar sentiments to what Montour shared with the media on Saturday after the Ottawa beatdown, when he referred to the team’s fourth line as its “best line”—both a huge compliment to that trio but also a bit of a shot at the top three lines.
“Last game, obviously, it was a team that is in a similar position with us, fighting to get into the playoffs,” Montour said. “And they wanted it more, and that can’t be the case from here on out.”
“If you’re not excited to be in the games and every game, challenging yourself with teams that are pushing the same way you guys are, with 20 games left this close to the playoffs, then you’ve got another issue. And I think we’ve just got to get back to enjoying and having fun and be excited about the competitive teams that we’re playing and just thrive in those. Cherish that and challenge each other so that we can win those games.”
Lambert’s message has been received by the players. How will they respond Tuesday in a crucial game against the Nashville Predators?
Bobby McMann arrives but is unlikely to play Tuesday
29-year-old forward Bobby McMann, the Kraken’s lone acquisition ahead of Friday’s NHL Trade Deadline, skated with the team for the first time Monday. The Wainwright, Alberta, native looked big and fast, as advertised, but did not take regular line rushes. That indicated he will not play Tuesday while he continues to wait for his P-1A visa to process.
He did mix in a couple of times on the line with Eeli Tolvanen, Chandler Stephenson, and Freddy Gaudreau, with Tolvanen and Gaudreau each skipping a turn or two.
Asked by our buddy Everett Fitzhugh where Lambert sees McMann fitting into the lineup, Lambert said he views McMann as a top-six player for the Kraken, but isn’t sure yet how he will ultimately deploy him. I would guess the plan is for him to replace Gaudreau and skate alongside Stephenson and Tolvanen, but we’ll see how things shape up once McMann is eligible to play.
McMann does sound excited to be in Seattle and had plenty of good things to say about what he’s heard regarding the city, the organization, and the fanbase.
“[Getting traded] was pretty hectic, definitely a long flight,” McMann said. “I just tried to pack all my necessities, get it all in my bags. My girlfriend was a big help with that. And then [I was] just on the plane, got here Saturday night, and then had yesterday to explore, check out the facility here. Great facility, super spacious, all brand-new stuff. It’s pretty sweet to see it, and I’m excited.”
After playing his entire career in the Toronto organization, this represents a massive change for McMann. Still, he wasn’t blindsided by the move, especially after being held out of the Maple Leafs’ lineup for a couple of games for trade-related roster management reasons. The writing was very much on the wall that something was coming.
“It’s not easy, especially with Toronto, I’ve been there my whole career,” McMann said. “And then it was hard coming out of the lineup because I kind of knew something was going to happen, and I was going to switch spots. So then I was just playing the waiting game. It was about 48 hours where I was just kind of waiting, checking my phone every three minutes to see who was calling, if there was any news, and it was down to the last… maybe an extra five minutes on the clock after three o’clock when I got the call, so [the trade] must have went through right at the deadline there.”
McMann to eventually slot in for injured Schwartz
McMann’s arrival has created a big question mark about where he will eventually slot into the Kraken lineup. Remember, general manager Jason Botterill did not offload any players at the deadline, opting instead to add McMann to an already crowded roster in exchange for draft picks.
But a spot has opened up with the unfortunate news that Jaden Schwartz—who suffered a scary injury Saturday when Nick Cousins’ skate made contact with his face—will be out indefinitely. In that sense, McMann’s arrival helps solve that absence once his visa is processed.
But assuming everyone else stays healthy, another player will still have to come out of the lineup to accommodate McMann.
Here’s how the Kraken forwards took line rushes Monday.
Jared McCann / Matty Beniers / Jordan Eberle Eeli Tolvanen / Chandler Stephenson / Freddy Gaudreau* Kaapo Kakko / Shane Wright / Berkly Catton Ryan Winterton / Ben Meyers / Jacob Melanson *Bobby McMann rotated in for Gaudreau and then Tolvanen
Lambert didn’t provide much of an update on Schwartz beyond reaffirming his “indefinite” status. It was a startling and scary incident, so beyond everything else, we just wish Schwartz a speedy recovery.
Team illness seems to be clearing up
Nobody has used it as an excuse, but there was a bug that swept through the locker room and took Gaudreau and Lindgren out of the lineup Saturday. Both were back on the ice Monday, and Lambert spoke about the illness in the past tense, implying the issue may now be behind the team.
“The illness wasn’t great for us,” Lambert said. “I thought the energy was pretty good today… I thought some of the details that weren’t there Saturday night needed addressing. I thought the guys did a good job of addressing it.”
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.
