The Kraken have elevated Alexandra Mandrycky into an assistant general manager role with the club. The promotion comes after Mandrycky served as the team’s director of hockey strategy and research during the buildup to the 2021 Expansion Draft and Seattle’s inaugural 2021-22 season. Mandrycky joins Ricky Olczyk and Jason Botterill as a third AGM in the Kraken front office, and the trio will work together to support general manager Ron Francis.
Mandrycky built the team’s analytical infrastructure and research and development department from scratch. Last season, she hired and oversaw a team of four employees, but her role will now expand significantly.
“I’ll continue overseeing the research and development team; we have a group of four now, and we’ll be adding a few more over the course of this season,” Mandrycky said. “Last year I worked really closely with the amateur scouts on the amateur draft, and part of this new role is our director of amateur scouting, Robert Kron, will report into me. So I’ll continue working with all of [the amateur scouting department] very closely.”
What is interesting about Mandrycky taking such a large stake in the amateur side of the organization is that advanced stats are often hard to come by for evaluating players in the amateur ranks. Mandrycky credits senior quantitative analyst Namita Nandakumar for developing the metrics necessary to help Francis, Kron, and the rest of the staff get the whole picture on prospective Kraken players.
She also says the organization has done an exemplary job of balancing the information her department gives with the more traditional reports that the amateur and pro scouts provide. “I think a question that gets asked a lot is, ‘Is this [player] an analytics guy?’” Mandrycky said. “I don’t know what that means… We’re using analytics to have conversations about players, but I wouldn’t want [Francis] to go out and sign a player that analytics liked, but the scouts hated.”
Paving the way
The promotion is a notable move, as Mandrycky continues to prove herself as one of the fastest-rising executives in the evolving NHL landscape. She broke new ground in 2019 when the team, then called simply “NHL Seattle,” hired her to build its analytics program. The hiring made Mandrycky one of the highest-ranking females in the league at the time. She has since solidified herself as a central figure in Seattle’s front office.
“Alex has earned this promotion through her hard work and dedication to making the Kraken a better organization,” Francis said via press release. “Her knowledge and effort are assets that will continue to serve her well in this role.”
Mandrycky previously spent three years working for the Minnesota Wild as a hockey operations analyst. Before that, she made a name for herself in the analytics community by co-founding what was then a popular site for tracking player data, War On Ice.
Mandrycky is not the first female to hold the assistant general manager title in the NHL, but she joins a very select group of impressive women who are helping to change the sport. Angela Gorgone held the title for the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim back in 1996-97, but no woman held the title between then and when former player agent Emilie Castonguay was hired into the position by the Vancouver Canucks in Jan., 2022.
After Castonguay was hired, Hayley Wickenheiser joined Toronto, Meghan Hunter went to Chicago, and Kate Madigan went to New Jersey, all with AGM titles. Vancouver also hired former pro scout Cammi Granato away from the Kraken to serve alongside Castonguay.
Still, the cultural importance of Mandrycky’s rapid advancement through the hockey world is not lost on her. “Visibility is so key,” she says. “In some ways, it’s nice to not be the first. Other people have paved the way, even though the path is short over the last year or two.”
Camp is just around the corner
The Kraken will start training camp for their second season on Thursday, Sept. 22, at Kraken Community Iceplex. Seattle’s rookies, a group Mandrycky was instrumental in assembling, take the ice a few days earlier on Monday, Sept. 19. Practices are open to the public.
A few weeks ago, I spent some time digging into NHL playoff projections based on an adjusted goal differential. I forecasted a rough estimate of where the Seattle Kraken could land, based on that metric, in the 2022-23 season with their off-season moves. In this post, I am going to look at team points to determine how much the Kraken will need to improve to make it to the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 2023 and how often a team can rebound after a season like the Kraken had in 2021-22 to qualify for the playoffs.
What does it take to qualify for the playoffs?
The Kraken had just 60 points last year, while the last team into the playoffs, the Nashville Predators, had 97 points. When looking over the last 11 seasons, excluding the 2019-20 season that had a unique play-in format, the average minimum point total of the bottom playoff team was 92.4 points on the season.
If we assume the 92.4-point average to be the target to make the playoffs, Seattle will need to improve by 32.4 points next season. How common is it for a team to improve by 32+ points from one season to the next? Let’s look at the data.
Uh oh. That does not look good. Only two percent of NHL teams since 2010 have seen an increase of 32 points or more from one season to the next. However, that is not a fair comparison to expect all teams to possibly increase their point total by 30+ points. A team with 120 points in the previous season does not have the same likelihood to increase their point total by 30 points as compared to a team with 70 points in the previous year. To illustrate the point, here is a look at all the teams since the 2011-12 season by their previous year’s point total (x axis) and their change in points the following season (y axis).
As the slope of the average line indicates, the better you did in a given year, the less likely you will improve in the following year. Therefore, the previous statement about two percent of the time a team improves 32+ points is not a fair comparable.
Let’s isolate all the teams with 70 or fewer points in the previous season to see how frequently they improve by 32 points.
It is not a perfect calculation but a 15 percent chance of a 32-point improvement and theoretically qualifying for the playoffs is a believable number.
Here is the same scatter plot from above, filtering all the teams with 70-point seasons.
Climbing the standings
Another area I wanted to investigate was the frequency with which teams climb the standings to qualify for the playoffs. Last season the Seattle Kraken finished 30th in the league-wide standings. It seems a bit delusional to think a team that was that low in the standings one year could turn around to qualify for the playoffs the next year. To test our sanity, let us look at how other teams have done the following year after being one of the worst in the league. I have isolated all the teams that placed 28th in the league or below since the 2000-01 season and then looked at how often those teams qualified for the playoffs the following year.
A team that placed where the Kraken finished last season qualified for the playoffs the following year 17 percent of the time. Personally, that’s better than I expected and feel that is enough to say it is a possibility.
What are the chances?
This was a simple approach to evaluating the likelihood the Kraken improved enough to be a playoff team next season. Both the standings approach and points approach indicate that teams coming off a season like the Kraken have about a 15 percent chance to make the playoffs the following year. That seems believable, reasonable, and the right odds to have some hope going into the season.
Do you think they qualify for the playoffs next season? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
Last week we posted our video analysis of Seattle’s biggest free agent signing of the summer, Andre Burakovsky. This week, we return with a look at Seattle’s most significant veteran addition overall, trade acquisition Oliver Bjorkstrand. As was the case with the Burakovsky breakdown, this analysis is mostly built on watching tape from Bjorkstrand’s 2021-22 season, and I have compiled all of his shifts from three of his games for you to follow along:
Again, all of these videos are linked in a playlist on the DeepSeaHockey YouTube channel, so you can watch them all in a row there.
**Author’s Note: These are the first large video compilations I made, and, regrettably, the videos uploaded below HD quality, so the tape gets a little a grainy if you watch it on a large screen. I believe I can avoid this moving forward.
Overview
It is evident on tape that Oliver Bjorkstrand thinks the game at an elite level. He combines the ability to do many small things to help a line succeed with the ability to finish at the net and score 20-to-30 goals. While he is slight in frame and not the most dynamic athlete, his deep repertoire of skills indicates he will be a top-line, all-around forward for years to come.
Player profile
Oliver Bjorkstand is a 27-year-old, left-shot winger and veteran of seven seasons, all with the Columbus Blue Jackets. Oliver is the son of native Minnesotan Todd Bjorkstrand, a former professional hockey player and coach. Oliver was born in Denmark to his mother Janne, a native of Herning, and grew up in that country speaking Danish with his mother and English with his father at home.
Bjorkstrand played two years in Denmark before joining the Portland Winterhawks of the WHL for the 2012-13 season. After the Dane tallied 82 points across 86 regular- and post-season games for Portland, he was selected by the Columbus Blue Jackets in the third round, 89th overall, in the 2013 draft. Bjorkstrand played two more seasons with Portland, topping an impressive 140 regular- and post-season points each year, and then joined the Blue Jackets organization in 2015. The 6-foot-0, 177-pound forward split time between Columbus and the Cleveland Monsters of the AHL for two years before settling in as a full-time NHL regular in 2017-18 at 22 years old.
In Jan., 2021, Bjorkstrand signed a five-year, $27 million extension with Columbus. When the Blue Jackets faced a salary cap squeeze after the unexpected signing of Johnny Gaudreau, Columbus traded Bjorkstrand to Seattle on July 22, 2022. He has four years left on his contract, with a $5.4 million annual cap hit.
Previous production
Bjorkstrand established himself at the highest level a little later than most of his comparable players. To this day he remains a wiry player without blazing speed or physical attributes, so it took him some time to figure out how to deploy his game at the NHL level. In his age 22 and 23 seasons, Bjorktrand produced approximately half a point per game and topped 20 goals for the first time in 2018-19. In 2019-20, Bjorkstrand’s role in the Columbus offense expanded and his volume of offensive production grew with it. In his last year in Columbus he posted a career high 28 goals and matched his career best 29 assists.
Bjorkstrand’s strong all-around contributions are perhaps best captured by his Corsi (shot attempt differential) and Fenwick (unblocked shot attempt differential) percentages when he was on the ice in Columbus. Incredibly, he not only posted positive differentials in each of these categories every season, he also posted positive “relative” short attempt differentials (i.e., his team did relatively better in shot differential against the opposition with Bjorkstrand on ice rather than off the ice) in every season. This owes in some part to an offense-forward role (as indicated by his “Offensive Zone Start %”) but also to his remarkably deep skill set as a player.
In his first two full years in Columbus, Oliver Bjorkstrand filled a third-line role, but since the 2019-20 season, Columbus has deployed Bjorkstrand for top-line-equivalent even-strength minutes. He oscillated between first- and second-unit power play responsibilities throughout this time, but in 2021-22 he clearly established himself in the primary group and paid off that ice time with a career high nine power play goals.
Similar to Andre Burakovsky, Bjorkstrand has not been deployed on the penalty kill in normal situations. It is worth noting, however, that he was alert to a game situation and trusted by the coaching staff to jump over the boards and fill a penalty killing role when one of his teammates was injured and had to leave the ice in Columbus’s April 29, 2022, game. He did not look out of place at all in Columbus’s similar triangle-and-one scheme. But for the fact that his ice time is better used at even strength and on the power play, he looks like he would be a fine penalty killer.
At even strength, Bjorkstrand played on the right side in an offensive-forward role in the games I viewed from 2021-22.
On the power play, the Dane most frequently lined up in the slot (the “bumper” position) this past year, but also saw time in the left circle. In man advantage transitions Bjorkstrand commonly served as the second trailing forward with support responsibilities if the penalty killers shut down the advance of the primary trailing forward.
In four-on-four or three-on-three scenarios, Bjorkstrand was almost always in the primary unit.
Video analysis
Oliver Bjorkstrand, traded to SEA, is a play-driving two-way scorer who's one of those players who's good at pretty much everything. An excellent forechecker and especially good at creating shots. #SeaKrakenpic.twitter.com/NUVuR3RUBB
A scout might get tired writing out all of the good things Oliver Bjorkstrand does on the ice. I can’t claim to be a scout, but I know I found it is easier to list the few areas where he is not exemplary.
So let’s start there: Bjorkstrand is a wiry thin player. He plays much stronger than his size in critical respects, but will not bring physicality to a unit. He is also not an elite athlete by NHL standards; he is quick and slippery in short areas, which is more important in many ways, but he will not be the fastest or most dynamic Kraken forward.
Beyond that, I struggled to find any area of his game that fell below average. He constantly finds the puck offensively and defensively. He succeeds skating the puck in transition and drives play when in the offensive zone. Most impressive to me was his ability to maintain puck control through traffic and contact even at his size. His shot is very strong (if perhaps a fraction of a step below Andre Burakovsky’s elite level). On the defensive side he challenges on the forecheck and disrupts opposing breakouts and transition at a very high level.
Circling back to his gameplay analytics and micro-statistics, I was pleased to see my tape evaluation born out in those numbers. Bjorkstrand does a lot to drive success for his team. OK, let’s dive into the video.
High-end play driving and play involvement
When you watch Oliver Bjorkstrand’s shifts, it seems like he is always around the puck or in possession of it. He has very high-level instincts and intelligence on the ice. While he plays within the scheme, he is always active in space, closing out on opponents, blocking shots, or disrupting zone exits and frustrating opponent transition. He anticipates pressure points for the opposition and has a strong intuitive sense of where a pass may be attempted and is quick to disrupt or intercept.
On the offensive side, he anticipates offensive zone dump-in entries and commits to recoveries, and produces at a very high rate, even if he is not the biggest player.
On this play, Bjorkstrand is alone in transition, checked at the blue line by two Kraken defenders; but he is able to flip it to himself deep in the corner and set up play in the offensive zone. It is a simple play, but actually making it work requires a combination of vision, agility, and tenacity that relatively few players can deliver. Here, he executes a clever pass through traffic to free a teammate with controlled zone entry.
One 30-second stretch encapsulating his value came near the end of the second period of Columbus’s visit to Seattle on Dec. 11, 2021. Bjorkstrand begins by gathering a loose puck in the defensive zone and immediately keys transition with a short pass. After the Blue Jackets create a shot on goal, the Kraken recover and look to clear but Bjorkstrand pressures on the forecheck and then anticipates the passing lane, ultimately deflecting the saucer pass out of the air, causing a turnover to the Columbus blueliners. About ten seconds later he jumps on a loose puck in the neutral zone and skates in on a two-on-one break that ends with a tap-in goal off Bjorkstrand’s shot.
A similar shift came at the 11:10 mark of the third period against Tampa Bay on April 28, 2022. Bjorkstrand gathered a loose puck in the defensive zone and faced heavy forechecking pressure. Displaying elite ice vision, he made a clever indirect pass to the weak side, facilitating a zone exit where one seemed improbable. Even so, Tampa recovered the puck at their own blue line. But Bjorkstrand then jumped the passing lane on a stretch pass and took possession in the neutral zone. He beat a stick check in the neutral zone, skated into the offensive zone, and beat the goaltender for a goal.
In summary, Bjorkstrand’s greatest value is in these subtle areas. He drives positive play and sets his teammates up for success. Corey Sznajder’s visualization from his tremendous All Three Zones website shows how Bjorkstrand created shots for himself and his teammates at a rate far higher than anyone else in Columbus last year.
In this regard, his play contrasts markedly with that of Burakovsky, who does several discrete things very well but often times does his best work if others on his line are setting him up for success. For this reason, I’d be curious to see if Bjorkstrand and Burakovsky would work as compliments to each other on the same line.
Very strong shot and scoring touch
That said, not all of Bjorkstrand’s contributions are subtle; he can score goals at a high level. Three distinct skills make him a threatening all-around scorer. First, he has a very strong wrist shot. He is deceptive, often surprising the goaltender with the quick release or shot angle. Combine that with above-average velocity and accuracy and he is a threat to score anywhere from the circles down.
Bjorkstrand shot location data (2019-2022); Source: IcyData
Second, his hands are impressive. He can receive and release close-area passes or slightly off-target passes in an instant. This makes him dangerous in the bumper role on the power play.
Third, he goes to the difficult scoring areas. He takes a very high volume of his shots from the slot. And, when the situation dictates, he goes to the front of the net with abandon. Particularly for a smaller player, he is willing to take all manner of abuse at the top of the blue paint if it gives him a chance for a tip in, deflection, or screen on the goaltender.
He does not use the one-timer or slap shot much, but I like what I have seen from him when he does let those shots go. It is possible the Kraken could give Bjorkstrand a look in the left circle on the power play.
Very strong puck handling in transition and cycling in the offensive zone
The third aspect of Bjorkstrand’s game that really stands out is his puck possession skill. Early in his career, his offensive skill set was more shot-oriented (like Andre Burakovsky), but he honed his handling game later at the NHL level, largely from mimicking the play of Artemi Panarin.
He is very strong on the puck for a player his size, combining impressive hands with remarkable balance and resilience through body or stick checks. In this clip he defeats multiple stick checks in a contested puck situation to win control and generate a shot for Columbus. Here he skates around and through a heavy body check, somehow maintains puck control, and scores.
On the cycle, and in close quarters, Bjorkstrand is quick and skilled on his edges. In this clip he loses Jared McCann with some nifty footwork and a shoulder fake to create space for a pass to a teammate. Just seconds later, he holds possession for an extended period in the zone, stopping the Seattle defense in its tracks and generating a shot.
He frequently carried the puck in even-strength transition line rushes, with successful entry rates driven by his quickness, puck manipulation, and ability to diagnose the defense. In this clip, for example, he carries through most of the defense with pace and skill to apparently establish in the offensive zone before the play is whistled down on an offsides call. Per All Three Zones, last season, Bjorkstrand’s controlled zone entries leading to a scoring chance per sixty minutes (3.1) would have led the Kraken (who had nobody above 3.0).
On the power play, he was the second “trailing forward” in transition, who would be called on to navigate the puck into the offensive zone if the defense took away the first option.
Good defensive zone play
As a winger, Bjorkstrand is assigned to put puck pressure on opposing blueliners and win puck battles above the circles and along the boards. He performs this role well, nearly always displaying quality effort. But I often also saw him take on added defensive responsibility, dropping low in the defensive zone to clear the puck away from the net or support defensive-zone breakouts like a center would normally do. Here again, Bjorkstrand provides a relatively subtle contribution that drives down opponent scoring opportunities.
While Bjorkstrand’s possession and shooting skills are the strengths of his offensive profile, he also demonstrates above-average hands and vision to create plays for his teammates. In this clip, he connects a long-distance pass on the tape of his teammate across the power play formation. Here, from high in the formation, he spots a teammate for a would-be tip in and delivers a crisp pass that his teammate fails to finish.
In the clip below, he has the vision to keep a pressured play alive in the offensive zone and eventually spaces to a position to receive the puck back and score the goal himself.
Average-to-below-average straight-line speed and athleticism
Bjorkstrand does not win on high-end athletic traits. He is fast enough and won’t lose too many foot races out of sheer force of will. But he does not separate from defenders in space or win a cycle with his speed. While his overall athleticism is adequate, ideally he would deliver a little more given his smaller size. This is probably the only thing holding him back from true star-level performance, because the skills and smarts are there.
Average-to-below-average physicality
Bjorkstrand is a slender 6-foot-0 forward incapable of landing bone-crunching hits or separating opponents from the puck through brute force.
But he is remarkably strong for his size at the point of a puck battle. In the clip below he willingly engages two larger defenders behind the net and ultimately comes away with the puck. Plays like this recur in Bjorkstrand’s tape. So, while he’ll never be a “physical specimen” on the ice, I actually came away impressed with his ability to deal with and counteract physical play.
Below-average physical stature
Again, Bjorkstrand is not big. Combined with his average straight-line speed, a viewer might be tempted to question the plaudits thrown Bjorkstrand’s way, particularly in some of his quieter stretches. And his small frame could be risky in the long term given his heavy puck-touch-oriented game. He has already dealt with some injuries, including a major ankle injury in 2020. This is something to monitor. That said, he is skilled at avoiding contact from closing defenders, which often spares him from punishment that might otherwise not be sustainable at his size.
Projecting Bjorkstrand to the Kraken
Oliver Bjorkstrand is not an elite-level talent who can single-handedly dominate a game with speed, physicality, or skill. But he is among the very best NHL players in the next tier. He is cerebral and brings well-rounded strengths that will amplify the performance of just about any line you could put him on.
With Seattle, I’d expect Bjorkstrand to land on the right wing, likely in the top-line role, though I could also imagine him with the second grouping behind a first line that includes right-shot winger Jordan Eberle. He should also land on the top power play unit for the Kraken either in the bumper position or in the left circle in the Kraken’s 1-3-1 scheme. Assuming a healthy season, the 27-year-old should easily clear 50 points and find himself in the mix for team MVP honors.
Obtaining Bjorkstrand’s age 27-30 seasons for the cost of two middle-round picks is one of the finest moves this front office has made. It improves Seattle’s outlook into playoff contender territory in the coming years.
As promised on the previous show, Episode 203 is a unique one, which welcomes a big-time guest in Seattle Kraken forward Yanni Gourde. With Darren on vacation this week, the interview makes up essentially the entire episode.
It’s a fantastic interview that covers everything from Yanni getting selected by the Kraken to his first impressions of Seattle to what he would have done if he didn’t make it in to the NHL.
John, Andy, and Darren had a great time talking to Yanni, and they think you’re going to like this one.
As promised on the previous show, Episode 203 is a unique one, which welcomes a big-time guest in Seattle Kraken forward Yanni Gourde. With Darren on vacation this week, the interview makes up essentially the entire episode.
It’s a fantastic interview that covers everything from Yanni getting selected by the Kraken to his first impressions of Seattle to what he would have done if he didn’t make it in to the NHL.
John, Andy, and Darren had a great time talking to Yanni, and they think you’re going to like this one.
Hailing from Kelowna, BC, new Seattle Kraken defenseman Justin Schultz is glad to be back on the West Coast. He’s played the past seven years in Pittsburgh and Washington, which made it hard for family to travel to see him live. It was part of the attraction that Seattle had for the 32-year-old when he hit free agency this summer.
“I’m super excited, my wife is too. Ever since Seattle came in the league it was kind of one of those spots that we always wanted to play in, eventually,” Schultz said while addressing the local media on Thursday afternoon. “It’s close to home for us. We love the city and it’s a great opportunity for me to come in and earn a role and help this team win. We’ve got a lot of good young players, and it’s exciting being a part of this franchise.”
Schultz was signed to a two-year contract worth $3 million on the first day of July’s NHL Free Agency period. He brings with him a pair of Stanley Cup rings won with the Pittsburgh Penguins, as well as 602 NHL games under his belt.
He began his career with four seasons for the Edmonton Oilers starting in 2012, and would go on to spend five seasons with the Penguins, and the past two with the Washington Capitals.
“Looking at the back end, we needed a right-shot guy that can add to the power play,” Seattle general manager Ron Francis said. “Certainly, we think Schultz is a guy that can do that. He hasn’t had much of an opportunity, playing behind [John] Carlson and in Pittsburgh behind [Kris] Letang. So, we think that’ll be a good opportunity for him.”
Schultz has been playing second fiddle to a pair of great defensemen for a good part of his career, but he has scored 13 goals and 102 points on the power play.
Last season with the Capitals he potted a pair of goals on the man advantage along with three assists. He’ll be involved with the Kraken power play and could possibly quarterback one of the team’s two units, along with Vince Dunn.
“I kind of wanted a bigger role, and there’s definitely an opportunity,” Schultz said. “Gotta go out and earn it. But I learned a lot from those guys. They’re two of the best offensive defensemen, the best quarterbacks of a power play in the league. So, it was pretty cool to be behind them and working with them for all those years. Hopefully I can take what I learned and bring it to Seattle.”
The Kraken struggled on the power play last year and experienced multiple long droughts with the man advantage on the way to finishing 29th in the league with a 14.6 percent success rate. Seattle was even worse at home, where it scored just 15 power-play goals and had a 12.7 percent scoring rate.
If Schultz, along with the additions up front, can help to improve those numbers, then the Kraken will end up happy with his signing.
Schultz is no stranger to free agency and how to navigate the business side of pro hockey.
He was drafted in the second round of the 2008 NHL Draft by Anaheim and would head to the University of Wisconsin where he was a star for the Badgers. Schultz and the Ducks could not agree on a contract after the 2011-12 season, and the stalemate eventually led to Schultz becoming an unrestricted free agent before he had played one minute of NHL hockey.
In his final season at Wisconsin, he had a monster year, recording 44 points in 37 games, making him an attractive player to sign. A frenzy of sorts broke out as nearly every team was interested in Schultz.
The eventual winners of the Schultz sweepstakes were the Edmonton Oilers who signed the defenseman to an entry-level contract. He would spend his first three and a half seasons playing in Edmonton.
“I kind of went through it all at a young age and wasn’t really expecting it to go that way,” he said, referencing a relatively slow start to his pro career. “Kind of had to build my confidence back and got to play on some really good teams and learn from a lot of really good players. So hopefully I can bring that to this team. We’ve got a lot of young guys, it’s kind of weird to think that I’m one of the older guys now, but it’s going to be fun.”
Friendly confines
Schultz is not from Seattle but is familiar. He was with the Capitals and played against the Kraken in a 5-2 Seattle win at Climate Pledge Arena in November. Schultz was held off the scorecard that night, but the arena made an impression.
“We only got to go there once and it was on a back-to-back, so we didn’t really get to go to dinner or anything in the city,” Schultz said. “But the arena is amazing and it’s pretty cool to be able to call that place home now.”
When Schultz arrives in Seattle for training camp there will be familiar faces as well. In Pittsburgh he played with Jared McCann, Brandon Tanev, and Jamie Oleksiak. During his four seasons with Edmonton, he was a teammate and friends with Jordan Eberle.
“He was probably one of the first guys that reached out,” Schultz said. “I’ve talked to him every once in a while, and it’s pretty cool to get to play with him again. I played with a bunch of guys that are there now, so I feel pretty comfortable coming in.”
It was hard for Schultz to hide his excitement at the opportunity he has in front of him with the Kraken on Thursday. His signing wasn’t a big splash across the league, but he adds a veteran on the blue line who can chip in offensively and help jump start an ailing power play, and that just may be what the Kraken need.
This week’s episode of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast is a quick one but a fun one. With minimal Kraken news to discuss, John, Andy, and Darren focus on the hockey world as a whole.
They start with a brief World Junior Championship discussion, then move to a WHL Update, which focuses on Portland’s completion of its re-brand, which many folks have argued looks quite similar to Kraken colors.
Next, they move on to segments, which this week features Bad Boys, Goalie Gear Corner, Weekly One-Timers, and Tweets of the Week.
FYI, the next couple weeks will be a little different, with interviews being the focus, but there will still be content coming over that time.
If you can believe it, a new Kraken season is just about a month away now. So, it’s about time to start limbering up those hockey muscles again. Over the next few weeks, we’ll take a close look at some of the new comers (and one recent comer) and how they might project to contribute with Seattle this year. We’ll kick it off with Seattle’s biggest free agent signing of the summer, Andre Burakovksy.
In preparing this piece, I watched a number of Burakovsky’s 2021-22 games and cut up all of his shifts from three of those games into YouTube videos so that you could watch and follow along with my breakdown:
I encourage you to dive into the videos yourself and let me know if you disagree. You can find all of these “all shifts” videos on the DeepSeaHockey YouTube channel.
Player profile
Burakovsky, a 27-year-old, left-shot winger, signed a five-year, $5.5 million AAV contract with the Kraken as an unrestricted free agent this offseason. Born in Austria and raised in Sweden, Burakovsky was drafted in the first round of the 2013 draft, 23rd overall, by the Washington Capitals. The 6-foot-3, 200-pound forward debuted in Washington in the 2014-15 season at 19 years old and stuck with the team for the next five years, ultimately hoisting the Stanley Cup with Washington in 2018. Following the 2018-19 season, the Capitals dealt Burakovsky to the Avalanche, where he played for the last three years and won another Cup this year.
Previous production
As we will get into, Burakovsky is one of the league’s great shooters and has posted above-average shooting percentages every year of his career. While in Washington, his goal scoring production was relatively consistent at 0.8-1.0 goals per sixty minutes. After he was dealt to Colorado, that production ticked upward into the 1.0-1.4 goal-per-sixty range. On the Kraken, his 1.0 goals per sixty minutes in 2021-22 would have trailed only Jared McCann among forwards with at least 500 minutes of ice time.
But, perhaps even more notably, the big Swede’s play generation for his teammates ramped up in Colorado. Burakovsky posted his three highest assist totals (and assists per sixty minutes totals) in his three years in the Mile High City. His 39 assists in 2021-22 would have easily led last year’s Seattle team. Of course, the quality of Burakovsky’s Avalanche teammates was a big factor there.
In Washington, Burakovsky earned the equivalent of second-line minutes for his first four years with the team, before his ice time was downgraded to a third-line-type role in the 2018-19 season. He was a second-unit power play player, buried behind a talented group in Washington.
In Colorado, Burakovsky played anywhere from the “first” to “third” line, but overall logged second-line minutes. He remained stuck on the second power play unit behind an incredibly talented forward group, but he accrued significantly more man advantage time overall since Colorado’s high-powered offense generated power play opportunities at a prolific clip.
In video I watched from the 2021-22 season, Burakovsky lined up on the left wing at even strength. That said, he is flexible and has logged significant time on the right side (his “off wing”) in the past too. Burakovsky moved all around the formation in Colorado anyway.
When the Avalanche power play was set up in the offensive zone, Burakovsky was often assigned to the right circle (though the unit’s impressive movement and fluidity meant that he often ended up in other positions). When the power play was attempting zone entries, Colorado trusted Burakovsky as the single trailing forward. This role is entrusted to a player the coaching staff views as skilled in transition with space to scan the ice. Burakovsky was charged with skating the puck into the zone or finding a teammate to pass to if pressured at the blue line.
Burakovsky has never played any significant time on the penalty kill.
Except for 2018-19, when Burakovsky slipped to the bottom-six role with Washington, his coaches have consistently placed him in an offense-first role. When sent out onto the ice after a play stoppage, Burakovsky has started in the offensive zone more than 60 percent of the time and in the defensive zone less than 40 percent of the time. This role, combined with his offensive skill, has driven high-quality Corsi (shot attempt differential) and Fenwick (unblocked shot attempt differential) percentages when he is on the ice.
Of course, Burakovsky has played on talented teams, but looking a little closer, it is difficult to dismiss him as a “product of the system.” He has produced a positive Corsi relative to his teammatesin every year he has been in the league (see “Corsi For % rel”) in the chart below. This means his team’s shot attempt differential is better when he is on the ice than when he is not. The same is true for his relative Fenwick rates, except for the 2018-19 season.
Likewise, looking at shot quality, his on-ice expected goals +/- has been positive in six of eight NHL seasons, including each of his three seasons in Colorado. And this metric does not give Burakovsky any credit for his single best skill, his ability to finish scoring opportunities at an elite rate. Let’s get into that now.
Video review
Using video and a few statistics, here are some initial thoughts on attributes of Burakovsky’s play, starting with his strongest qualities.
Andre Burakovsky’s defining trait is his shot. Put simply, he has one of the best in the league. This skill is shrouded somewhat by his limited shot volume and opportunities. He has never had a season with consistent top line or top unit power play minutes. Furthermore, he doesn’t have elite complimentary skills to create space for himself to get a shot away. All of this means that he isn’t involved in a tremendous total number of scoring chances; but when he does get one, he is among the very best in the league at beating the goaltender.
We can get a sense of this, first, by looking at Burakovsky’s shooting data. Per statistics compiled at EvolvingHockey, over the last three years, Burakovsky is 17th in the NHL in shooting percentage on shots on goal among those with at least 1,000 minutes of ice time in that span, at 17.23 percent. Among all unblocked shots attempts, Burakovsky is 16th overall, at 12.63 percent. And the data shows these elite numbers are largely shot-skill related, rather than driven by the inherent danger of the shots he takes. Crunching the numbers, over the last three seasons, he ranks 24th in the league in difference between his actual shooting percentage and expected shooting percentage based on shot type and location on the ice.
Andre Burakovksy’s HockeyViz player card does a good job of representing this skill graphically; his “finishing impact” is at the far right tail of the curve.
Digging a little deeper with shot-by-shot tracking data over the last three seasons compiled by the tremendous site IcyData, we see that, relative to the league, Burakovsky generates an inordinant number of his shots and goals on wrist shots. While wrist shots are, unsurprisingly, the most common shot type in the league (56.69 percent of total shots in that span), Burakovsky uses wrist shots far more frequently (75.45 percent of his shots). By contrast he is far less reliant on backhand shots, slap shots, snap shots, or tip-in shots. And IcyData did not credit him with even a single deflection or wrap-around shot on goal in the last three years.
The wrist shots he generated came on average from 32.42 feet from the goal, which was 5.45 percent closer to the goal than league average; so, he is generating relatively good wrist shots. But, remarkably, the wrist shots that actually scored came at an average of 28.07 feet from the goal, which is 22.26 percent farther away from the goal than league average.
In other words, while the league takes a lot of long-distance wrist shots, those shots rarely go in. Only closer-distance wrist shots score. Burakovsky, by contrast, can finish those longer-distance opportunities. In fact, despite his scores coming from significantly farther away, Burakovsky’s shooting percentage is 51.58 percent higher than league average; Burakovsky’s wrist shots go in approximately 16 percent of the time versus approximately 10.5 percent of the time for the league. This is a big differential.
Visually, we can see that Burakovsky (on the left) generates more of his scoring from the high slot (19 percent) than league average (just 11 percent) in 2021-22. This seems to be where Burakovsky’s finishing skill most frequently manifests. If he can get free between the tops of the circles, he is a threat to score from distance in a way that very few in the league can.
Without further ado, let’s get to the video. His shooting skill shows up again and again.
Not only can Burakovsky pick a corner with velocity, he can also create a scoring opportunity more subtly, by dragging the puck ever so slightly before release, and changing the shot angle on the goalie. He doesn’t score on this shot (in fact, the shot is blocked), but the clip below is an example of this subtle and important shooting skill.
And, as the scoring percentage statistics above indicate, Burakovsky’s elite finishing skill is not limited to his wrist shot. He buries slap shots and backhand shots at elite rates too.
Very strong off-the-puck play in the offensive zone
The second thing that stood out to me in watching Andre Burakovsky was his skill in finding space for himself in the offensive zone without the puck. In this clip, off an offensive zone faceoff, he immediately flows to the slot in an area where his teammate has a passing lane to him for a one-timer.
In this video, Burakovsky moves right to the net front as he sees his teammate surprising the opponent with a corner board battle. His instincts almost generated a prime scoring chance out of a “nothing” play.
Here, he spaces to the low circle on the weak side off the rush, ready for a one-timer. He barely misses connecting on the shot, sending it wide.
In this video, after taking a giveaway, he hands off to a teammate and immediately moves to the slot for a one-timer.
While his puck handling skills are adequate, they are not high end. So, Burakovsky’s off-puck work is critical to how he generates the majority of his chances. It is a strong complimentary skill to his elite shot.
But his off-the-puck work is not limited to just shot generation for himself. Here, he skates off a defender in man coverage and creates a void in the slot for his teammate to skate into. While the scoring chance never materializes, this shows how Burakovsky can drive offensive production even without the puck on his stick.
Strong play speed and pace in transition
Burakovsky plays with very good straight-line speed, particularly for a player of his size, and he deploys that skating ability with above-average play pace in transition. This can stress a defense, putting opposing blue liners on their heels and winning space for himself and his teammates.
When pressured at the opponent blue line, he is only an average puck handler and will, at times, fail to control possession, as shown in the clip above. Other times he will bail out for the conservative play or lose possession entirely. Here is an example of the latter: Burakovsky takes the conservative play to maintain possession but gives up on what initially looked like a threatening rush.
But, more often than not, his pace gives him a strong chance in transition. And, when he is engaged, his straight-line speed also plays well on the back check. Here he is able to negate a Los Angeles forward from a rush with stride-for-stride close coverage.
Above average playmaking in space, including on the power play
When afforded an extra beat of time to scan the ice, he can make efficient, high end plays for his teammates. In this clip, Burakovsky connects on a long pass from the defensive zone, leading to a controlled transition and scoring chance back on his own stick.
But Burakovsky’s playmaking is perhaps best exemplified with two power play assists in Colorado’s April 16, 2022, game against Carolina. In this first video, he gets the puck in space off a board battle won by a teammate. He takes a moment to survey and draw the defender in before slipping a pass past to his teammate crashing the right circle. That teammate is then easily able to find another on the backdoor for backdoor one-timer. It all started with Burakovsky’s vision.
In this second video, Burakovsky gets the puck in space in the right circle. He shifts to a create a better angle and puts a pass right on the tape for his teammate on a backdoor tip in.
Burakovsky’s shot generation statistics on the power play are good. He produced average or better relative Corsi and Fenewick rates on the man advantage over the last three years. In other words, his team generated relatively more shots with him on the ice on the powerplay than when he was not on the ice.
However, the advanced analytics on his power play production are not good. JFresh Hockey puts Burakovsky’s power play value in the 14th percentile. This does not match the skill set I see, though. If the Kraken are prepared to build a first unit power play around Burakovsky on the right circle, and accentuate his strengths as a backside shooter and playmaker with space to operate, I think it would be a productive unit.
He is average on his edges, but he doesn’t have great short-area quickness to consistently lose defenders on the cycle in the offensive zone. Instead, he is best when using his size on the puck to shield it and block off defenders.
Similarly, here is another example where his size on the puck allows him to shield off a stick check and get a shot off:
Average to below-average playmaking under pressure
While I saw Burakovsky operating as a strong playmaker in space, when he is under pressure – as will often be the case at even strength – that playmaking and passing ability slips considerably. For example, following an impressive cycle highlighted above, he is pressured and sends a short pass to a teammate that needs to connect on the tape to allow continued offensive zone movement. Instead Burakovsky misfires, causing his teammate to reach and throwing off the timing.
At times it looks like his mind is racing, and he takes the first opportunity to fire a puck away rather than waiting a split second longer for the best opportunity. In this clip, a pressured and failed clearing chance leads to a prime scoring opportunity against. The time and opportunity was there to make a better play.
That said, his playmaking under pressure is not “all bad” by any stretch. To the contrary, there are times where his skill shows up despite immense pressure. Here, he is able to find a teammate in the slot from below the goal line despite close checking from an opponent. The play results in a goal. As Burakovksy moves out of his prime physical years, this is an area where he could still improve and better his game. The passing skill is certainly there, in flashes.
Below-average defensive zone involvement
Throughout these videos, you will see Burakovsky floating at the top of the defensive zone, most often getting engaged only to put puck pressure on an opposing blueliner or in support on high wall plays. To be certain, this is his role in the team defense as a winger, but the engagement and activity level is often substandard. His closeouts and physical engagement could be better.
In this clip, he loses a puck battle to Kole Lind leading to possession and transition for the Kraken, and then he never fully engages in the defensive end to clear the puck with urgency.
His transition defense also wanes at times, particularly when his feet are not engaged.
Below-average compete on the forecheck
Perhaps more troublingly, Burakovsky does not often bring a physical edge or tenacity that you would like to see on the forecheck. Instead, he often prefers to be the second player into the corner rather than the first. In this video he coasts into a potential puck battle, losing before it began. He certainly had the opportunity to at least stalemate this play in the corner.
Likewise, he defaults to playing with his stick rather than his body along the boards. In this clip he goes for the puck rather than cancelling the opposing player and easily concedes possession.
Generally speaking, Burakovsky is not very physical off the puck. He doesn’t use his size to separate players from the puck or win board battles. The “hits” statistic is fairly overrated, but he is not going to win any plaudits for physical play despite a 6-foot-3, 200-pound frame that many other more physically engaged players would envy.
We can't wait for the Kraken in the new season. They added some very good to great players during this off-season including Andre Burakovsky who signed there for a fair value. We don't expect he'll be good like he was in Denver, but we believe he'll score at least 65 points. pic.twitter.com/zUofebaviJ
Burakovsky, 27, was one of the youngest true unrestricted free agents available. Thus, he is still close enough to his prime years that we should not necessarily expect significant age-related regression until the latter years of his deal.
To leverage Andre Burakovsky’s elite traits, the Kraken will likely put him in an offense-forward role, paired with at least one other forward who can drive possession and create space in the offensive zone while Burakovsky looks for openings to receive a puck and fire it on the net. There are numerous Kraken players who could fill that role, including Matty Beniers, Alex Wennberg, and Yanni Gourde, so the team will probably search for chemistry in camp and early in the year.
The Kraken will also likely look to feature Burakovsky on the power play, probably in the right circle in the team’s 1-3-1 scheme, where he would be able to rip quick shots on goal from his forehand or survey the ice and make passes to his teammates. I do think the power play skill is there, even if it has not shown up in the advanced statistics yet.
To minimize Burakovksy’s weaker attributes, he is best paired with at least one strong puck retrieval forward, capable of winning puck battles behind the net and in the corners off uncontrolled zone entries, with only second-man-in support from Burakovsky. Brandon Tanev, Yanni Gourde, or Karson Kuhlman could fill this type of role, as could others. He is also ideally paired with a strong defensive center that allows him to be less active and float high in the defensive zone, ready to initiate transition going the other way. Gourde, and maybe Beniers and Wennberg, come to mind. He is not going to be a strong defensive forward in isolation, but there is no reason his line cannot succeed defensively if properly constructed.
While the overall talent of the Kraken roster does not compare with Colorado’s squad, it is possible that Burakovsky’s on-ice context does not change much from last year if he plays with Seattle’s other high-end players, rather than Colorado’s middle six. If so, and he is deployed (a) on the first unit power play, and (b) with an emphasis on offensive zone draws at even strength, I do not think it out of the question that Burakovsky maintains his even-strength goal scoring and improves his power play production, putting him in the 25-to-30-goal range this season.
What do you think of the Andre Burakovsky addition? Let us know in the comments below or on Twitter.
The new era of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast has arrived. Nothing has changed, really, but now the guys are beyond Episode 200 and into a new realm of numbers. On this episode, the guys start (as they typically do) with Kraken news, focused around the Eddie Olczyk announcement, the Firebirds’ full Seattle schedule, and the upcoming “SeaHac” conference.
John, Andy, and Darren then have a nice conversation to further break down this article on soundofhockey.com, which considered some possible line combinations the Kraken could deploy this season.
After Kraken talk, the show shifts to World Juniors, Women’s Worlds, and NHL talk, specifically Nazem Kadri landing in Calgary. Then it goes to segments, which features the triumphant return of Goalie Gear Corner, Weekly One-Timers, and Tweets of the Week.
The new era of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast has arrived. Nothing has changed, really, but now the guys are beyond Episode 200 and into a new realm of numbers. On this episode, the guys start (as they typically do) with Kraken news, focused around the Eddie Olczyk announcement, the Firebirds’ full Seattle schedule, and the upcoming “SeaHac” conference.
John, Andy, and Darren then have a nice conversation to further break down this article on soundofhockey.com, which considered some possible line combinations the Kraken could deploy this season.
After Kraken talk, the show shifts to World Juniors, Women’s Worlds, and NHL talk, specifically Nazem Kadri landing in Calgary. Then it goes to segments, which features the triumphant return of Goalie Gear Corner, Weekly One-Timers, and Tweets of the Week.
