On Thursday, the Seattle Kraken announced an organizational first: a trade involving a team-drafted prospect. The Kraken sent their 2021 fourth-round pick Tucker Robertson to the Philadelphia Flyers in a one-for-one exchange for Jon-Randall Avon. As it turns out, there are a number of parallels and similarities between the two players.
The two forwards are 22-year-old Ontario natives born within two weeks of each other in the summer of 2003. After successful youth hockey performances, each was drafted to the Peterborough Petes with picks in the 2019 OHL Priority Selection. They then played 150-plus OHL games together in Peterborough, culminating with each being part of the leadership group on the 2022-23 Petes team that won the OHL Championship.
Since departing the OHL, each has played in the professional minor leagues, mostly in the AHL. Avon has 35 points in 125 AHL games with Lehigh Valley in that span—for .28 points per game. For his part, Robertson has 19 points in 77 AHL games with Coachella Valley—for .25 points per game. Robertson also had 14 points in the 13 ECHL games. All of these statistical similarities put them in a very similar place in our recent “data-only” NHL-affiliated prospect ranking: Avon was No. 500 and Robertson was No. 535.
At this point you might be wondering (fairly) why the Kraken made this fairly minor prospect swap at all if the players are so similar. I suspect both long-term and short-term roster dynamics could be at play.
This is the last season of both Avon and Robertson’s three-year, entry-level contracts. My guess is the organizations had doubts the players they traded would factor into their future plans beyond the current contract. Now, each player gets a fresh start and opportunity to impress a team that may be more inclined to re-sign them beyond this year.
It’s also possible the teams doubted the traded players would be AHL regulars this season. Earlier this offseason, I had Robertson as low as sixth on the Coachella Valley center depth chart. Avon was in the Lehigh Valley lineup for the large majority of last season but was scratched for the team’s AHL playoff games. It’s likely Seattle views Avon, who has skated mostly as a winger professionally, as a better organizational fit and more likely to have an AHL role this coming year, given the team’s other options.
Why so? That’s where the film review comes in. In this special trade edition of the Friday Film Room, we’ll take a first look at Avon’s game, followed by our more typical game film and progress reports on forward Berkly Catton and goalie Kim Saarinen. If you have questions or Film Room requests, don’t hesitate to reach out below or on social media @deepseahockey or @sound_hockey.
J.R. Avon | Forward | 22 years old | Undrafted Free Agent (Flyers)
Video: All Shifts | Lehigh Valley Phantoms vs. Bridgeport Islanders (AHL) | Apr. 2, 2025
Notes: J.R. Avon brings a starkly different set of physical tools from a 6-foot-0 frame when compared with the smaller, cerebral Robertson. Between the two, I’d rate Robertson’s hockey sense, skill level, and center aptitude ahead of Avon, whereas Avon has the decided advantage in size, skating, physicality, and compete.
I think it’s fair to say that Robertson’s pure offensive upside is higher; Robertson was a significantly better junior scorer, for example. Over the last two years, however, I’ve come to doubt whether Robertson will be able to manifest that production in the professional ranks. While he is creative and smart, his physical limitations both in terms of size and speed have significantly hampered his ability to create space for himself or teammates offensively. Even if he can break through at the AHL level, I suspect Robertson’s most optimistic peak might be an Andrew Poturalski-type career arc—i.e., a player who tops out just below the NHL level due to pace and size limitations.
In contrast, Avon displays NHL-level skating and tenacity both forechecking and backchecking from the wing position. In the two games I’ve viewed so far, his ability to pressure the puck on his own created turnovers and space for his team to make a line change in situations I would not have expected. When the play is mired through the neutral zone, he can flip the ice by winning simple dump-and-chase plays with speed and physicality.
While his size is only average, he displays a willingness and aptitude to engage physically. His ability to win puck battles and overall board work is above average. He was often the tip-of-the-spear F1 in a neutral-zone forecheck.
Avon does not standout as a plus playmaker or possession player, but he has enough ability with the puck on his stick to take open ice in transition and run effective offensive-zone cycles and give-and-go sequences. He does good work off the puck offensively to find open space and will shoot if he is uncovered. Most of his goals are of the “dirty” variety and come from his willingness to work to the net front when the play dictates.
Avon skated in a fourth-line role, without special teams responsibilities in the games I viewed. This puts him at the very bottom of the AHL depth chart. I would have liked to see if he could produce on the penalty kill, but I did not see those opportunities in the games I watched.
I’d project Avon to compete for a fourth-line left wing role with Coachella Valley (with Lleyton Roed perhaps moving up into more of a middle-six left-wing role). In a best-case scenario, I could see Avon’s skills translating to a similar role at the NHL level, but there is a lot to prove still in the AHL—particularly from a point production standpoint—before he could get into that conversation.
Berkly Catton | Forward | 19 years old | 2024 first-round pick (signed)
Video: All Shifts | Spokane Chiefs vs. Medicine Hat Tigers (NCAA) | May 11, 2025
Notes: On a recent episode of the excellent Called Up podcast, Good-Friend-of-the-Pod and Flo Hockey analyst Chris Peters asked Elite Prospects‘ Cam Robinson about Elite Prospects’ decision to rank Catton below many members of the 2025 draft class (including Jake O’Brien) in its recent NHL-affiliated prospect ranking.
Robinson’s answer surprised me a bit. Robinson said that Elite Prospects was concerned whether Catton could translate his offensive production to the NHL level. In their view, Catton relied on lower-pace, ice-scanning plays to generate points and these plays do not work as well in the professional ranks where defenses deny space much more quickly. This may be a dated criticism of Catton’s game, though.
Toward the end of the 2024-25 WHL season and throughout the playoffs, I saw Catton working to create offense without losing any pace—and doing it effectively. Pair this with physical commitment off the ice (he came in second in the team’s athletic testing at development camp this summer), clear progress in his first-step skating explosiveness, and some added details in his off-the-puck play in all three zones, and I think Catton has taken strides to make his game “translate” professionally in every area he can.
If I were stretching to find areas to critique, Catton gets himself in trouble when he attempts to defeat a defender one-on-one at the offensive blue line or in other vulnerable positions. He often prevails—but when he does not he either concedes advantages or gets desperate obstructing his opponent with his stick, leading to penalties. Those types of plays will not work regularly at the NHL level, and he needs to learn when the situation dictates a simpler, conservative play. He also needs to use his skating more defensively because he can get caught reaching with his stick at times.
Beyond that, Catton is self-evidently limited in his size and physicality, but he has the speed, skill, and hockey sense to win in other ways. He could play center, but I continue to think of him as a playmaking, point-per-game winger at his peak. And I think we could see that version of Catton sooner rather than later.
Kim Saarinen | Goalie | 19 years old | 2024 third-round pick (signed)
Video: All Shots Against | Finland U19 vs. Sweden U19 | Apr. 20, 2025
Notes: Kim Saarinen is coming off a standout rookie season for HPK in Liiga, Finland’s top professional league, finishing third in save percentage as an 18-year-old. Few goalies have achieved such success at such a young age in Liiga—not even fellow Kraken prospect Nikke Kokko was as productive at the same stage. Equally encouraging, Saarinen continues to earn starts for Finland’s national team on the international stage. Earlier this summer we profiled Saarinen’s strong work at the 2025 World Junior Summer Showcase.
Corey Pronman of The Athletic arched my eyebrow a bit when he ranked Saarinen as Seattle’s best goalie prospect (above Kokko) in his recent prospect ranking. You could argue Saarinen has a pure skill advantage; it is close, but I’d probably still lean toward Kokko. And Kokko has successfully transitioned to the North American game already with a standout rookie AHL season. I like Saarinen a lot, but he will be behind Kokko in my forthcoming preseason Kraken prospects ranking.
2025-26 season outlook: Tandem starter role in Liiga
System Rank: No. 16 (No. 3 goalie behind Kokko and narrowly behind Semyon Vyazovoy)
Peak Projection (50th percentile outcome): NHL spot starter or backup (ETA: 2028-29)
Curtis Isacke
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.
After much teasing, the Seattle Kraken officially unveiled their new third jerseys on Thursday: a black kit featuring a glow-in-the-dark version of the team’s primary logo as its main crest, glow-in-the-dark nameplates and numbers, and a lot of stripes up the sleeves and on the socks.
“When we set out to design a third jersey, we wanted to create something a bit more menacing and intense,” said Kraken vice president of brand Aaron Wiggan in a press release. “We drew our inspiration from the eerie shadows of the deep Pacific Northwest waters. The result is the franchise’s first all-black kit that includes an Ice Blue, glow-in-the-dark outline on the crest – a nod to the incredible bioluminescence found in these waters. We’re extremely proud of how it turned out, and we can’t wait to see our players and fans in this new look.”
Photos courtesy of Seattle Kraken.
Added Kraken captain Jordan Eberle: “This is an exciting new look for our team, and the jersey is phenomenal. The glow-in-the-dark element is really unique, and it’s such an eye-catching look. I love the inspiration behind it and all the details that went into the design. We hope it will add to the incredible atmosphere at Climate Pledge Arena.”
I’ve always been a sucker for black uniforms (I loved the all-black San Jose “stealth” jerseys, for example), so while I personally predicted these new jerseys would be red—since “Red Alert” was the only existing color in the Kraken’s palette that hadn’t yet been used as a primary—I was pleasantly surprised to see that the teaser videos’ references to “the abyss” were hinting at black uniforms.
I do like that, and the “bioluminescence”-inspired logo will pop nicely, especially when the lights go down in the arena for the pre-game show. What I’m not sold on yet, without seeing the kits in person, is the extra striping up the sleeves and socks (though the Kraken have said the stripes are a nod to sonar, which I admit is a neat touch). I recall giving the New York Rangers a hard time for their navy blue third jerseys that had a gazillion stripes on the sleeves because of how busy they looked. Seattle’s jerseys don’t have nearly as many stripes as those Rangers thirds, but that detail is the one that gave me pause.
Holistically, though, I think it’s a unique look, and it will be fun to see the Kraken don black. I also think there are opportunities for Game Ops to make the show at Climate Pledge Arena even more eerie on nights when the arena transforms from “The Deep” to “The Abyss.”
Seattle will wear the new uniforms for 12 home games this season, starting Nov. 1 against the aforementioned Rangers. Here’s the full list of when they will wear the new kits:
Nov. 1 vs. New York Rangers
Nov. 5 vs. San Jose
Nov. 26 vs. Dallas
Dec. 4 at Edmonton
Dec. 8 vs. Minnesota
Dec. 29 vs. Vancouver
Jan. 6 vs. Boston
Jan. 23 vs. Anaheim
Jan. 25 vs. New Jersey
March 4 vs. St. Louis
March 12 vs. Colorado
April 9 vs. Vegas
Preorder for the jerseys for Kraken season ticket members starts Friday and runs through Sept. 10. Presales for the public start Sept. 11.
What say you, Kraken fans? Do you like these new third jerseys?
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.
Welcome to Week 2 of Friday Film Room. In this recurring series, we provide new gameplay video of three players in the Kraken organization and analyze recent trends or progress in their play. Our goal is to cover as many players as possible as we proceed through the year—including those that aren’t always front and center in prospect reports. If you have questions or Film Room requests, don’t hesitate to reach out below or on social media @deepseahockey or @sound_hockey.
Lukas Dragicevic | Defense | 20 years old | 2023 second-round pick (signed)
Video: All Shifts | Prince Albert Raiders vs. Edmonton Oil Kings (OHL) | Apr. 1, 2025
Notes: Dragicevic has put up rare offensive numbers as a junior hockey blueliner. Among all WHL defensemen since the turn of the century, Dragicevic’s 227 total regular-season points are sixth-most, just behind NHL players Tyson Barrie and Ty Smith.
The offensive package isn’t flashy, but Dragicevic has all of the tools to create points from the blue line in the offensive zone. His offensive vision and passing are strong attributes. He can manipulate the puck to create shooting lanes and rebounds for his teammates. And he has the feel to take open ice and tight-area handling skill to defeat challenges. To top it off, he does it all from a projectable 6-foot-2, 196-pound frame.
His skating will likely need to take a significant step forward if he is going to maintain his play style into the pro ranks moving forward, but his offense projects as NHL-worthy.
Why then has Dragicevic never earned national prospect reputation? The answer lies in his defensive instincts, which look inconsistent or worse, depending on your viewing. He flashed a broader range of defensive tools this past year, but when I watch him, I often leave perplexed by his play-to-play judgment and concerned that his defense is not going to work at professional levels.
In defensive transition, he’s not particularly effective disrupting plays at the blue line or breaking opponent momentum when he is skating backwards. It tends to be tentative and overly conservative. Even when he’s making the right reads, the results are inconsistent.
In the defensive zone, he is often either chasing the play around the exterior or deadening his feet in the crease and passively covering the middle of the ice. Either way, there’s too much puck watching and not enough anticipation. He concedes too much space for junior-level competition to make plays. He has the strength to win his share of puck battles in the open ice or along the boards if he committed to it, but he is often a step slow to engage, conceding advantages to the opposition.
His breakout passes are a strong aspect of his in-zone defensive play. For example, early in the first period in the game above, he recovers a dump-in, draws in the defense, and reverses the puck to his teammate for a clean, efficient breakout.
Overall, it could be that Dragicevic has not received the instruction and reps—both technically and schematically—that he needs. Remember, he’s only been playing defense for a few seasons after transitioning from forward. It’s possible that he takes big strides as he moves into the well-coached professional environment in Coachella Valley this season. If so, these concerns could eventually be a thing of the past. (Defensive skill can come later in a player’s development.) Even just a steady progression could yield a player capable of a sheltered, third-pair and second-unit power-play NHL role. That said, he may have fallen behind the older and smaller Tyson Jugnauth on the organization’s depth chart for that kind of role.
More on Dragicevic: Check out our interview with Lukas Dragicevic from 2024 training camp.
2025-26 season outlook: Competing for time for Coachella Valley (AHL).
System rank: No. 18 (No. 5 defenseman)
Peak projection (50th percentile outcome): NHL cup of coffee (ETA: 2027-28)
Justin Janicke | Forward | 22 years old | 2021 seventh-round pick (rights expired)
Video: All Shifts | Notre Dame Univ. vs. Univ. of Wisconsin (NCAA) | Nov. 1, 2024
Notes: Justin Janicke is a just a solid, dependable player in all aspects. He can be trusted to do the right thing in all three zones, no matter the personnel or game clock situation. He was a leader at Notre Dame by his senior year, and that maturity comes across in talking with him. He seems a like a “glue” type in a dressing room that any team should be happy to have in the organization.
His skills top out in the average range. His shot is solid, including manipulation skills pre-shot to deceive the goaltender. His skating is solid, and he plays with adequate strength. He has good vision with the puck on his stick, but he’s not a volume scorer or creator. He’s more of a complimentary type who will do the little things like net drives, clear outs, screens, and cycles to create offense. He’s defensively responsible and doesn’t cheat that aspect.
By pro standards, he is a bit undersized and is likely limited to the wing. Lacking a dynamic skill or carrying trait, it is hard to project the additional development that will be necessary to achieve an NHL career. If he does get there, it will be through sheer force of will. Players in his category—needing four NCAA years to achieve top-end amateur production—rarely become long-term or impact professionals. That said, there is a lot to like in the way Janicke goes about his business.
2025-26 season outlook: ECHL lineup regular with some games at the AHL level
System Rank: Outside top 20
Peak Projection (50th percentile outcome): Middle-six AHL player (ETA: 2027-28)
Karl Annborn | Defenseman | 18 years old | 2025 seventh-round pick (unsigned)
Video: All Shots Against | Sweden U20 vs. Switzerland U20 | Aug. 28, 2025
Notes: It seems the Swedish national team is higher on Karl Annborn than NHL draft scouts. Rewind to a year ago, and the defenseman was skating in a top-four and power-play quarterback role for the Sweden under-20 team—as a 17-year-old. Granted, that was in an August tournament bypassed by some of the top U20 players, but it was an impressive achievement nonetheless. Ultimately, Annborn fell a bit in the draft to the perception that his play had plateaued, but it is notable to me the national team confidence in him has not waned. As recently as Thursday, he was getting high-level U20 development opportunities on the international stage, and he never looks overmatched or out of place.
Another reason Annborn may have slid in the draft is the perceived lack of a standout, dynamic element. His size, skating, physicality, and skill level all check in as solid and pro-projectable at this stage, but there is not an obvious carrying trait as there is with some of Seattle’s more notable defensive prospects like Blake Fiddler (size and athleticism) or Dragicevic (offensive skill level). I like what I’ve seen from Annborn with the puck on his stick breaking out from the defensive zone and along the blue line in the offensive zone. While there may not be high-end creativity, he shows the ability to make efficient, sound plays.
Annborn has a long development runway ahead of him in the Swedish league, and there is plenty of reason to think he has a North American pro future if his skill level and production can continue to progress.
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.
As the offseason winds down for the Seattle Kraken, they look to the 2025-26 season with hopes for massive improvement in a particular area; because they literally couldn’t have gotten worse in this area last season. The Kraken went winless (and even pointless) in the second leg of back-to-back games in 2024-25, finishing 0-12-0 in that scenario.
Going 0-12 was enough to raise questions, prompting president of hockey operations Ron Francis to address the issue in his end-of-season press conference.
“So [losing all back-to-back games] was a question that we struggled with finding an answer to, and asking the players, there really wasn’t a simple solution to it. We’ve got to find a way to be better in back-to-back games.
“I mean, 0-12, if you go .500, which is probably the norm, that’s 12 points and puts us in a different position at the trade deadline. So that’s something we need to address, especially with the schedule again probably being even more condensed next year. Our mindset right out of the gate has to be much better in that second game of back-to-backs,”
Francis suggested .500 is the norm, but the 2024-25 season league average was .472. A break-even target would actually be better than the league average, which is worth keeping in mind as we look for trends that explain the slide and where improvement could come.
Game-level team data was sourced from MoneyPuckand compared Seattle’s results to the rest of the league. Unless otherwise noted, data reflects the 2024-25 season and is split into buckets based on how much rest the team had between games: zero days of rest (second leg of a back-to-back), one day, and two or more days of rest.
What counts as a back-to-back game?
A back-to-back is simple: games on consecutive days. Most NHL games have at least one day of rest between them. Because goalies usually need a day’s rest between starts, teams often start the backup in one of the two legs. Less rest plus a backup frequently leads to lower league-wide performance in the second game.
If you remove those back-to-back games, Seattle would have finished the season 35-29-6. That’s a .543 points percentage — likely still short of the playoffs — but it shows how costly those nights became.
Days of rest
First, the obvious trend: as rest decreases, points percentage drops. The rest of the league follows this curve cleanly. The Kraken are different — they actually posted their best points percentage on one day of rest, with two-plus days still solid but slipping to second-best. The alarming part remains the zero points in the second leg of back-to-backs.
To get a wider view of how rest impacts success across the NHL, we expanded the scope back to 2008-09 and found that the pattern holds. More rest yields more regulation wins across the NHL. Since the Kraken have only been around for four years, their data below covers the lifetime of the franchise.
Kraken back-to-backs
Through four seasons, Seattle has struggled in the second leg of back-to-backs, going 11-29 overall. The lone bright spot came in 2022-23, when the Kraken went 5-3 in second legs. In the other three seasons they combined for six wins — three in 2021-22, three in 2023-24, and none in 2024-25. They track closer to the rest-of-league (ROL) point percentage averages with one or two days of rest, but the second leg remains a clear weakness.
Offense
So what is causing the Kraken to lose so much more frequently in the second of back-to-backs than the rest of the league? Well, if a team loses 12 straight in that situation, then offense is certainly part of it. Seattle averaged just 1.33 goals per game in those second legs.
In the first of two charts above, the Kraken’s expected goals gap is striking. Expected goals being almost double the actual goals scored in the second of back-to-backs suggests more offense was available, yet scoring lagged by 1.25 goals per game — nearly seven times the ROL delta. As with points percentage, goals track along with rest: more rest, more goals. However, Seattle’s drop is sharper than the rest of the league.
Shot quality is part of the puzzle too. In back-to-back games, low-danger shots go up, while medium- and high-danger shots go down. The Kraken got pucks on net, but from easy-to-save areas. Opposing goalies posted a .952 save percentage in those games.
Corsi adds nuance: it measures shot attempts as a percentage and can sometimes be viewed as an indicator of puck possession. Over 50 percent means your team out-attempted the opponent. Oddly, Seattle’s only above-50 Corsi split was back-to-back games at 51.2 percent. With one day of rest it was 47.1 percent, and with two-plus days, it was 49 percent. For the rest of the league, the metric improves with rest (back-to-back = 48.2 percent, one day = 50.1 percent, two-plus = 51.1 percent). So the Kraken pushed volume on tired legs, but the quality of their chances sagged.
Defense
Where do opponents’ chances and goals come from against Seattle in back-to-back games?
Low-danger attempts were down with less rest, but low-danger goals were up. The ROL averaged 1.15 low-danger goals against per game; Seattle allowed far more (1.83) on fewer low-danger shots.
Medium-danger attempts and goals both rose in back-to-backs. The jump in goals outpaced the jump in shots.
High-danger attempts and goals dipped, which hints at a defensive focus on the slot in that second leg. That’s good in theory, but it may open seams for medium-danger looks, which teams gladly take.
Goaltending likely plays into the low- and medium-danger spikes. We’ll get to that next. The high-danger dip suggests the structure isn’t broken, but the trade-offs are costly.
Goalies
Kraken goalies posted an .867 save percentage in second legs — a glaring weakness the team must address if they want those games to turn into wins. Philipp Grubauer started six of the games, Joey Daccord five, and Ales Stezka one. Grubauer’s numbers were still bad but slightly better than Daccord’s — with a higher save percentage, lower goals-against average, and fewer low-danger goals allowed per game, closer to the ROL average of 1.15. Daccord, meanwhile, gave up 2.6 low-danger goals per game. Stezka’s lone appearance produced better numbers across the board, but the sample size is too small to draw conclusions.
Allowing low‑danger goals can sap a team’s momentum, and when combined with rising medium‑danger chances against, it’s easy to see how a team with limited scoring punch ended up losing all 12 of its back‑to‑backs.
Travel
When starting this research, I expected travel to be a driver. The Kraken did travel more than league average, but not by much. A roughly 50-mile gap in average trip length isn’t decisive. They had nine road back-to-back games and three at home. The average trip was actually longer before the home back-to-back games (about 424.9 miles) than before the road back-to-back games (about 359.7), when NHL schedulers try to lump road games in cities that are close to each other.
Discipline, blocks, and hits
Penalties, blocked shots, and hits all climbed in back-to-back games. With rest days, Seattle typically stayed below the ROL average in penalties taken — a positive trend. In back-to-back games, though, they took nearly a full extra minor penalty. That puts opponents on the power play more often, giving them another edge on nights when 5‑on‑5 play is already a challenge.
Scoring first matters, too. Seattle allowed the first goal in 10 of 12 second legs (83.3 percent). The rest of the league gets scored on first in 52.6 percent of back-to-back games. That early hole forces chase mode and feeds more penalties.
The Kraken must improve in back-to-backs
Seattle did manage an 8-4 record in the first leg of back-to-backs, showing they can handle the front half of the challenge. The issue is carrying that level of play into the second leg, where cleanup is needed on both sides of the puck.
Overall, the keys to winning back-to-back games are no different than on any other game night; they need to get the puck into the high-danger scoring areas and generate chances while the defense limits the opposing team’s chances in those dangerous areas. Being more disciplined with the penalties could be an easily implemented improvement. Starting on time and getting a higher percentage of first goals will also help. The Kraken can’t ease into the game and hope it goes their way.
Goalies all took a step back in the second leg of back-to-back games, and the team will need to figure out if this is due to a strategy change or tired players. While the team has played on back-to-back nights, the goalie is coming off a rest day and should be good to go.
Back-to-backs won’t vanish — Seattle has 13 on the schedule this upcoming season. The focus now must be on turning that zero‑point bucket into a break‑even one. For a bubble team, that could be the difference between April tee times and playoff gates.
Blaiz Grubic
Blaiz Grubic is a contributor at Sound Of Hockey. A passionate hockey fan and player for over 30 years, Blaiz grew up in the Pacific Northwest and is an alumni of Washington State University (Go Cougs!). When he’s not playing, watching, or writing about hockey, he enjoys quality time with his wife and daughter or getting out on a golf course for a quick round. Follow @blaizg on BlueSky or X.
Welcome to a new recurring column here at Sound Of Hockey—Friday Film Room. In these posts we’ll pass along new gameplay video of three players in the Kraken organization and analyze recent trends or progress in their play. Our goal will be to cover as many players as possible as we proceed through the year. If you have questions or Film Room requests, don’t hesitate to reach out below or on social media @deepseahockey or @sound_hockey.
Blake Fiddler | Defense | 18 years old | 2025 second-round pick (unsigned)
Video: All Shifts | Edmonton Oil Kings vs. Prince Albert Raiders (OHL) | Apr. 1, 2025
Notes: Fiddler has rare mobility and creativity for a sturdy, 6-foot-4, young-for-his-draft, right-shot defenseman. From blue-line denials, breakouts, and transition rush patterns, to offensive-zone roving and net drives, he strives for plays that many junior defensemen would never consider, much less attempt. The results aren’t always there for Fiddler, but he’s attempting plays that should translate to the pro game rather than resting on junior hockey skills.
Fiddler is aggressive trying to deny space at the blue line and above the dots. He’s very active whenever he is able to diagnose and move forward in all three zones. The other side of the token is he needs to be more scheme sound and develop his four-way mobility because he won’t be able to succeed in attack mode 100 percent of the time at the next level. He needs to develop his more “conservative” defensive skillset and get a better overall feel for when to ratchet up and ratchet down the aggression.
Fiddler’s offensive play-driving ability is substantial even if it hasn’t shown up in points at the junior level. There’s no concern he’ll be unplayable offensively at the NHL level. (For more, check out our coverage of Fiddler’s play at the 2025 World Junior Summer Showcase.)
System rank: No. 5 (No. 1 defenseman)
Projection: Bottom-four NHL defenseman (ETA: 2028-29)
Zaccharya Wisdom | Forward | 21 years old | 2023 seventh-round pick (unsigned)
Video: All Shifts | Colorado College vs. Providence College (NCAA) | Dec. 6, 2024
Notes: Wisdom presents as a selfless, team-first player on tape—seemingly willing to plug into any role the team needs. He won’t put the team in a bad position with selfish plays or changes. He is an active forechecker who is willing to engage the physical game. His goals almost all come at the net front, where he is willing to do the dirty work to win positioning and connect on tips and rebounds, and he can win contested puck battles along the boards. He has solid-average speed in transition but does his best work off the puck, driving to a spot or creating space for a puck transporter.
Wisdom doesn’t generate much offense on his own. He won’t possess the puck for longer than a moment before cycling it on. He doesn’t shoot from outside the blue paint often, and he is relatively basic in his passing and playmaking. All of this amounts to an offensive profile that is probably too deferential for his skill level. His production trended up toward the end of his 2024-25 season with 11 points in his final 10 games.
He has skated in a bottom-six role in college and plays net-front on the power play. The role has limited his ability to tap into any latent offensive creativity. At this point, his most likely path into the professional ranks is in a grinding, forechecking, bottom-line role.
He is transferring to play at Western Michigan University this upcoming season, which is a step up from Colorado College. He won’t get more offensive opportunities there, so the hope is likely that his production and overall impact will rise with more talent around him.
System Rank: Outside top 20
Projection: AHL contract (ETA: 2027-28).
Semyon Vyazovoi | Goalie | 22 years old | 2021 sixth-round pick (unsigned)
Video: All Shots Against | Toros Neftekamsk vs. Molot Perm (VHL) | Feb. 3, 2025
Notes: Vyazovoi is a technically sound goaltender with solid size, physicality, and athleticism for the position. In the viewings I’ve had, he doesn’t present as the most dynamic goaltender in his reactions or post-to-post moves. His edgework may be a tick below average, and east-west ice reversals could give him problems.
Heads up on a shooter, Vyazovoi is not going to bite on fakes and is very solid covering as much of the net as possible. He is constantly scanning the defensive zone and has good overall awareness of puck and player positioning. He controls rebounds well.
His puckhandling and re-directions are solid but still in need of development. In my viewings, he was only adequate tracking the puck from the perimeter, conceding a couple goals on long-distance shots. He needs work on his deflection reactivity.
All that said, he has had some stellar statistics playing in Russia.
System Rank: No. 15 (No. 2 goaltender)
Projection: NHL entry-level contract & AHL tandem goalie (ETA: 2026-27) | Bubble NHL tandem or backup goalie (ETA: 2028-29)
Curtis Isacke
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.
A recent story from Dom Luszczyszyn of The Athletic gained traction locally when it cast doubt on the performance of the Seattle Kraken front office in free agency. Luszczyszyn analyzed unrestricted free agent contracts from the last five years against the player’s “expected value” as of the time of signing under his player performance model. While Luszczyszyn’s goal was to understand whether teams in states without state income tax had an advantage, he noted that Seattle ranked last (tied with Anaheim) in contract dollars relative to value in his sample.
As Luszczyszyn concedes, his model is “not the [sole] arbiter of truth,” but his analysis raises a number of questions. How do free agency decisions get made? And how have the Kraken measured up against expectations? Are there other ways we can or should be looking at the issue if our goal is to understand Seattle’s performance signing unrestricted free agents on the market?
That’s our topic for today. With contract data from PuckPediaand contract projections from Evolving Hockey, I can offer a few more data points to consider. Let’s get to it.
The most dangerous day on the calendar
July 1 is a chaotic day for NHL front offices. The restriction on contacting free agents from other teams is lifted at noon Eastern Time, and within hours, a large majority of the “best available” free agents have signed a contract.
It is a frenzied end to an arduous process. In the months leading up to free agency, teams spend countless hours valuing players and identifying targets, culminating in June pro scouting meetings where an offseason plan is set. All of that work is deployed on July 1.
“I’ve always said the two most dangerous days are trade deadline day and free agency day,” Seattle Kraken president of hockey ops Ron Francis has often refrained, because “it’s easy to overpay for players” at those times. This is a common sentiment around the league. Columbus Blue Jackets general manager Don Waddell has called July 1 a day where “you can get yourself in big trouble.”
Why is this? What actually happens during those fleeting hours on free agency day? Kraken general manager Jason Botterill gave a glimpse behind the curtain to Seattle Kraken season ticket holders during a July 3 breakfast before the final day of the 2025 Kraken Development Camp.
Shortly after noon, teams contact player agents with a fully realized offer, along with a pitch about why the team and market is a good fit for the player. In a competitive situation, the agent is compiling multiple offers and helping the player decide between them. It is relatively rare that a negotiation on core term or value elements happens on July 1 because there is not time to do it. The agent may come back with a minor counteroffer around the margins relating to signing bonuses, cash flow, or the like, but July 1 deals often resemble the team’s initial proposal.
This puts a lot of stress not only on the team’s internal player valuations—we think this forward is “worth” X—but also its market analysis—this player is one of the only top-six centers available, and we think he’ll get a competitive offer from team Y or Z. Teams are making big decisions, in a hard-cap environment, based on imperfect information—hence the danger.
Methods of analyzing performance in free agency
Through five free agency periods, how have the Seattle Kraken performed in their unrestricted free agent contracts? Has the team beaten or fallen behind its competitors? We could strive for answers a few ways.
Return on investment approach. One approach would be to consider the return on investment. With the benefit of hindsight, how have the players the Kraken signed performed relative to the contracts given to them? This could be judged by various standard or advanced metrics measuring player performance.
This is a worthy inquiry, but it is probably premature to reach any conclusions for the Kraken using this method given that the final analysis remains open on several deals the Kraken signed before the team ever took the ice, including Philipp Grubauer, Jamie Olekisak, and Jaden Schwartz. Perhaps we can return to this approach a few years down the road.
Projected performance approach. Another approach would be to compare the contracts the team handed out versus a projection of player value over the term of the contract at the time the contract was signed. This approach is unconcerned with actual performance and escapes any accusation of hindsight bias by using only the information that was available as of signing. This was Luszczyszyn’s approach, using his model. Again, Luszczyszyn’s model is not the only one. One could use other methods of projecting player value using standard or advanced metrics or alternative player valuation models.
Market approach. As we discussed above, though, player value is only half of the player acquisition story. What if we wanted to understand how the player contract measured up against market expectations at the time it was signed? One could do this by comparing the contracts the Kraken handed out against contemporaneous projections of player market value.
This is a complex task that involves developing an accurate understanding of how to predict market value. Fortunately for us, Evolving Hockey has developed such a contract projection system that has proven quite accurate over time.
I would recommend giving Evolving Hockey‘s contract projection explainer a read. In short, the model uses inputs including position, age, contract status, draft round, years since draft, time on ice, goals, primary assists, individual shot attempts, individual expected goals, giveaways, takeways, on-ice 5-on-5 goal differential, and on-ice 5-on-5 shot attempt differential, among others, to create value projections based on various potential term lengths. The model yields a “projected” contract by estimating the contract term first and then linking it to the AAV the model projects for that term.
For example, Evolving Hockey’s contract tool projected a four-year contract for defenseman Ryan Lindgren in free agency this offseason with a further projection of $4.841 million average annual value. Ultimately, Lindgren signed a four-year contract with a $4.5 million average annual value in Seattle. Regardless of what a specific projection system may predict Lindgren’s future value—whether Luszczyszyn’s or any other—we can say that Lindgren’s contract was roughly in line with what the expected market was for him.
Using Evolving Hockey’s projections plus contract information compiled by PuckPedia, we can generalize from this individual example to every unrestricted free agent signing during the summer free agency period over the last five years—i.e., since the Kraken have been in existence—to determine which contracts and teams have gone over or under market expectation. How does Seattle fare?
Kraken contracts versus market expectation
While Luszczyszyn’s projected-value approach disliked Seattle’s contracts, our market-oriented analysis tells a slightly different story. On a per-year basis—which is how Luszczyszyn reported his results—Seattle’s contracts came in better than expectation: approximately $160,000 lower than predicted by Evolving Hockey’s model.
(It’s worth noting that for reasons explained shortly, goalies are not included here. If Philipp Grubauer’s six-year, $35.4 million deal were part of it, the Kraken may have poorer contract performance metrics.)
In terms of total contract value paid, however, Seattle does come in above the predicted level. The contracts averaged $1.15 million total value above expectation. This is because three of the more overvalued contracts based on Evolving Hockey’s model (Brandon Montour, Chandler Stephenson, and Jaden Schwartz) were also significantly longer-term deals than projected.
Where does Seattle stack up versus the rest of the league? In terms of annual contract value surplus, the Kraken rank 14th in the NHL over the last five years. In terms of total contract value, Seattle ranks 27th.
Remarkably, Anaheim’s contracts, which were tied for last in Luszczyszyn’s projected annual value analysis, come out middle of the pack in this look on an annual basis and best in the league on a total surplus value basis.
Market analysis methodology
For this exercise, I compiled a list of all unrestricted free agent skater contracts signed between June and September over the last five summer signing periods valued at $1 million average annual value or greater. I believe this mostly replicates Luszczyszyn’s sample, though he didn’t specify whether he included unrestricted free agents re-signing with their own team before reaching free agency.
I included signings in June because by that point these players understand their market value (ahem) even if they are not technically a free agent. It was also necessary to capture many significant signings, including the Mitch Marner signing this offseason.
I excluded contract extensions—deals that would begin a full season out—since those are not true unrestricted free agent signings. Goalies weren’t included because Evolving Hockey does not create projections for them. (Luszczyszyn’s analysis didn’t include goalies either.) And, finally, I excluded low-value contracts below $1 million because the question of “value” disappears for marginal players whose contracts can be buried in the AHL without payroll or cap consequence. (Luszczyszyn also excluded these low-value deals.)
Conclusions, caveats, and context (plus taxes)
Looking at Seattle’s contracts chronologically (as displayed in Table 1 above), we see that the Kraken have generally met or out-performed market expectations, with just a few exceptions. While Seattle signed a few “above-market” contracts in its inaugural year, this makes sense when factoring in that the team likely needed to pay a premium to attract veteran talent to a new franchise. Beyond that, only the 2024 signings of Montour and Stephenson stand out negatively based on Evolving Hockey’s market value model. And there is plenty of context to put around those signings—Seattle had a surplus of cap space, a deficit of talent, and immense pressure to compete as a new franchise looking solidify its fanbase and season-ticket renewals under the specter of the NBA’s return to city.
Even omitting that important context, Seattle’s five-year market performance (as displayed in Table 2 above) is very similar to that of the well-regarded Tampa Bay Lightning, both on an annual and total-value basis. Returning to Luszczyszyn’s original prompt, this is particularly notable because the Lightning’s home state of Florida is income tax free, just like Washington State.
Any approach has its limitations, and this one is no different. Looking at Seattle’s deals with hindsight, it’s easy to say that the “best” market value contract (Andre Burakovsky) was a debacle, while the “worst” market value contract (Montour) had a strong first year. Again, this market study is not attempting to measure return on investment. That’s a different analysis—one we may undertake in a few years.
Finally, a few caveats before we close this out. First, Evolving Hockey missed about a dozen projections league-wide over the five-year stretch. I don’t think those contracts would have significantly influenced the results here because each of the contracts were relatively minor.
Second, the five-year sample is quite small. There’s no way around that; individual outlier contracts can easily skew a team’s standing in this study.
Finally, as mentioned above, this study does not account for goalie contracts. Philipp Grubauer’s contract remains one of the largest in Kraken franchise history, and it was met with mixed reception at the time it was signed. That contract is part of Seattle’s history of signing free agents, even if it doesn’t factor into the numbers here.
Curtis Isacke
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.
