In their inaugural season, the Seattle Kraken believed they had found their franchise goalie for the foreseeable future by signing Philipp Grubauer to a six-year, $35.4MM contract. Grubauer was coming off an impressive season with the Colorado Avalanche, managing a 30-9-1 record in 40 games with a .922 SV%, finishing third place in Vezina Trophy voting.
Unfortunately, the Kraken have not seen a positive return on their significant investment in goaltending. In his first season with the team, Grubauer’s play dropped dramatically, finishing with an 18-31-5 record, a .889 SV%, 3.16 GAA, and -26.4 Goals Saved Above Average (GSAA), the latter being the lowest in the league by a considerable margin.
In large part due to the surprising top-level play from Martin Jones a year later, the Kraken qualified for the postseason in 2022-23. Although Grubauer had another disappointing regular season, he looked inspired throughout the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs, especially against his former team. Grubauer finished the postseason with a 7-7-0 record with a .903 SV%, eliminating his former employer and the defending Stanley Cup champions in a hotly contested opening round matchup.
Despite having a resurgence in the 2023 postseason, Grubauer has fallen back to his old ways in the meantime, ultimately ceding the starting netminder position in Seattle to Joey Daccord. Since losing to the Dallas Stars in the second round of that playoff run, Grubauer has earned a 22-33-3 record in 60 starts with a .889 SV%. His play over the last two seasons has brought his overall record with the Kraken to a 57-78-12 record (36.5% winning percentage) in 156 games with a .890 SV%, 3.07 GAA, and -56.2 GSAA.
Quite obviously, that wasn’t what Seattle was expecting when they made such a large investment in Grubauer’s services, and he has little chance of recouping the starting position from Daccord anytime soon. The talent gap was so significant between the two netminders that Grubauer had been mentioned as a likely buyout candidate heading into the current offseason.
Ultimately, the Kraken decided against buying out Grubauer during their initial opportunity at the start of the offseason and reiterated this choice after their conditional buy-out window, following the signing of Kaapo Kakko to a three-year contract in late July. Seattle did sign veteran Matt Murray to a one-year, $1MM contract on the opening day of free agency, though he’s likely penciled in for AHL duty with Grubauer still in the system.
Since it’s well known he’s a sunk cost for the remaining term on his contract, the Kraken are effectively left with two choices. They could buy him out next offseason, which would spread out 66.6% of his remaining one-year and $5.9MM over the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons, or seek a trade partner. It’s important to note that Grubauer has a 10-team no-trade list in his contract.
Depending on how desperate each team becomes next season, the Philadelphia Flyers, Edmonton Oilers, Pittsburgh Penguins, and Columbus Blue Jackets all make sense to some degree for Grubauer’s services. Even if he has a slight increase in his production, Seattle could be positioned to swap overvalued goaltending deals with the Oilers (Stuart Skinner), Penguins (Tristan Jarry), and Blue Jackets (Elvis Merzlikins).
At this point, the Kraken must provide additional value in a potential deal for the previously mentioned goaltenders. There is no doubt that Grubauer has negative value for the team, and the Kraken may be better off waiting another year to buy out the remaining year of his contract next summer when it is more financially advantageous.
“Release the Grubauer!!”
Can he type?
No the oilers don’t make sense. They have neither the cap space nor do they want another question mark (more like liability at this point) in net. He is not going to Edmonton. Skinner is better than grubauer.
Arguably better but less consistent. I could see Columbus doing a swap. Elvis has needed a change of scenery ever since his friend died saving Merz’s family.
Agreed. Edmonton could use a net minder more consistent than Skinner. But Skinner is better than Grubauer. And is also more affordable at current contracts. If Skinner was consistently more at his top than bottom, he is a top 10-15 goalie in the league. Possibly higher. Unfortunately his inconsistencies drop him to the 22 – 25ish instead. He’s still a starter, but a lower end one. Grubauer is a #2 at best at this stage of his career. Plus this is a contract year for Skinner. Expect the unexpected for him. May be a top 10 G this year.
Swapping Gruby for Merz in Columbus makes sense IMO. Similar contracts. Both can use a fresh start. If Columbus can find a way to get Seattle to include McCann and they can flip Chinakhov it solves problems for both clubs.
Elvis, Chinakhov, and Isaac Lundestrom for Grubauer and McCann
Elvis and Grubbey could use a geographic relocation and 2 younger good NHL players for McCann.
But Merzlikins threw a hissy fit when he got demoted to backup. The rumors are that the entire team is sick of him, that’s why they all threw him under the bus after the Wilson incident. Elvis is toxic
As Friedman said, it’s better to solve your problem than to trade it for someone else’s. I would assume they’ll hang on to Gru and put the screws to him by making him compete with Matt Murray for the No.2 spot. Maybe he’ll finally realize he has to stay in his crease and off his belly. He seemed to like Coachella last season… maybe he spends the year in the desert.
There’s no way Pittsburgh is interested.
This is Dubas we’re talking about. I have no clue what he looks for in a player anymore.
Truculance?
It’s very clear they are looking for young players that are NHL ready. They are rebuilding without saying it outwardly. They have murashov coming and they have 3 place fillers at least in goal. Zero need for another under performing veteran goalie even if he was cheap. The only scenario that makes sense for Pittsburgh is swapping jarry for grubauer, but I don’t Seattle is interested.
They should accept that they overpaid for an average 1b starter/backup goalie.
Not a playoff team so why does it matter?
I’ll always associate this guy with talking smack on the Blues in the playoffs (while with Colorado) before completely crapping the bed in the next round.