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Kraken Draft Pick Kyle Jackson Signs AHL Deal

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The AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds have signed one of their parent club’s prospects, forward Kyle Jackson, to an AHL contract for the 2023-24 season, according to a team announcement. Jackson will begin his pro career in the Seattle Kraken organization without burning a year of his NHL entry-level contract and suit up for the AHL’s defending Western Conference champions next season.

Jackson was passed over in the 2021 draft after COVID cost him the 2020-21 season but went off the board to the Kraken a year later, who selected him in the seventh round with the 196th overall pick. He built on some already strong production, finishing second on the OHL’s North Bay Battalion in scoring with 31 goals, 52 assists and 83 points in 67 games. He wraps up his junior career and turns pro with 71 goals, 99 assists and 170 points in 186 appearances with North Bay across four seasons.

Projecting NHL futures is always more difficult with overage picks, but Jackson’s back-to-back point-per-game seasons after his initially eligible draft year is a good sign – especially after losing a full season to COVID. Standing at 6-foot-2 and 192 pounds, the 20-year-old’s hallmark is his puck skills. He’s a solid playmaker and is skilled at making plays in tight while maintaining possession.

Seattle must sign Jackson by June 1 of next year to retain his exclusive signing rights, meaning Jackson’s rookie year in the pros carries some added pressure. He’ll need to show some signs that his game can translate to the pro level to earn an entry-level contract from Seattle at some time over the next ten months.

A Case For Joey Daccord To Win The Backup Goalie Battle

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  • Seattle is one of the teams where the backup goalie is not yet set in stone for next season with veteran Chris Driedger set to battle the recently re-signed Joey Daccord for the spot. Geoff Baker of The Seattle Times suggests that the Kraken would be better off with Daccord in the second-string position from an organizational depth perspective since there’s much less of a risk of Driedger and his $3.5MM AAV being claimed than it is for Daccord and his $1.2MM price tag.  Daccord was the better of the two goalies with AHL Coachella Valley last season but Driedger’s NHL career numbers (2.45 GAA, .917 SV% in 65 games) are certainly better than Daccord’s (3.64 GAA, .884 SV% in 19 appearances).

Seattle To Bid For 2026 World Juniors

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  • Seattle will be entering a bid to host the 2026 World Juniors, reports NHL Network’s Jon Morosi (Twitter link). If their proposal is accepted, Climate Pledge Arena – the home of the Kraken – would be one of the host facilities which means the Kraken would be eyeing a long road trip during the event.  A decision on the host city for the event is expected later this year.

Dunn: Chance To Land One More Big Contract Later Played Role In Four-Year Term

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  • Kraken defenseman Vince Dunn met with the media today including Geoff Baker of The Seattle Times following his four-year, $29.4MM contract from last week. The medium-term agreement raised some eyebrows and Dunn acknowledged that a factor was the possibility to try to land another sizable deal when he’s 30 in what should be a bigger salary cap environment.  Dunn did make it clear that he has no desire to leave Seattle when his contract expires in the 2027 offseason.

Kraken Re-Assign Jani Nyman To Finland

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The Seattle Kraken re-assigned forward prospect Jani Nyman to Ilves in the Finnish Liiga today, according to a team announcement. The move solidifies Nyman’s home for next season and returns him to the organization where he’s spent the past six seasons developing.

Seattle selected the 18-year-old right winger with the 49th overall pick in the 2022 NHL Draft. After a strong rookie season in the Liiga, registering ten goals in 29 games for Ilves, Seattle signed the bulky sniper to a three-year, entry-level contract in June. He also appeared for the Finnish national junior team at the 2023 IIHF World Juniors, notching two goals and an assist for three points in five games.

While 2022-23 was his rookie season in Finland’s top men’s league, it wasn’t his first full professional season. Nyman spent his draft year on loan with KOOVEE in the Mestis, the country’s second-tier league behind the Liiga. While not a standard league for draft-eligible prospects to suit up in, Nyman excelled there, leading the team (by far) with 18 goals and 35 points in 34 games.

Standing at 6-foot-3 and 217 pounds, he possesses a pro-ready frame despite being more than a year away from his 20th birthday. He does bring an intriguing blend of shooting ability and size, and while he’s far from a sure thing at the NHL level, he is one of the Kraken’s more intriguing forward prospects.

Nyman now looks to build on his skills in a familiar environment before likely coming stateside in 2024. Given his age, he’s an entry-level slide candidate, meaning his ELC will toll to 2024-25 unless he plays ten or more NHL games in the coming season, an unlikely event given today’s news.

Kraken Unable To Buy Out Chris Driedger In Post-Arbitration Window

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One of the oft-overlooked benefits of heading to arbitration with a player is some potential additional salary cap flexibility in the form of a second buyout. It’s a window granted to teams for a 48-hour period beginning three days after they settle their last arbitration case. The Seattle Kraken did so with defenseman Vince Dunn today, inking him to a rather significant four-year, $29.4MM pact.

A rather obvious candidate for a buyout on the Kraken is netminder Chris Driedger, who the team was aggressively trying to shop earlier this summer. He missed most of the season with injury and couldn’t work his way back into the Kraken lineup when healthy, instead playing 14 games for the AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds and slipping to fourth on the team’s goalie depth chart. He didn’t see a single second of action in the Firebirds’ run to Game 7 of the Calder Cup Final in their first season.

He’s third now with the departure of Martin Jones in free agency, but his $3.5MM cap hit is incredibly steep for a third-string netminder. However, Seattle will not be able to use a buyout on Driedger – players bought out during the conditional second window must have a cap hit of at least $4MM (and have been on the team’s reserve list at the prior season’s trade deadline).

It leaves Seattle with no other likely buyout options in the second window, so don’t expect them to take advantage of that early next week. The Kraken are now within $2MM of the salary cap’s $83.5MM Upper Limit after signing Dunn, a testament to the team’s quick rise to relevance with a payroll that reflects it.

The team will likely continue its attempts to move Driedger as the season draws nigh, as even getting rid of him at 50% salary retention is preferable to burying him in the minors, which would only bring his cap hit down to $2.35MM.

Philadelphia is the only team to utilize its post-arbitration buyout window this offseason, parting ways with defenseman Tony DeAngelo and the final season of a two-year, $10MM contract last week.

Seattle Kraken Extend Vince Dunn

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6:17 p.m.: Per Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, Dunn’s new contract will come in at a four-year deal worth $29.4MM, or $7.35MM per season. It’s top-pairing money for the Kraken’s number-one defender, who could very well exceed that contract’s value if he continues on his current path. CapFriendly reports the breakdown of the deal is as follows:

2023-24: $9MM salary
2024-25: $8MM salary (full no-trade clause)
2025-26: $7MM salary (16-team no-trade list)
2026-27: $5.4MM salary (16-team no-trade list)

Seattle promptly confirmed the contract. Dunn will be an unrestricted free agent at the end of his deal, when he’ll be 30 in the offseason of 2027.

3:58 p.m.: By far the team’s most important restricted free agent heading into this summer, Kevin Weekes of ESPN reports the Seattle Kraken are closing in on an extension for defenseman Vince Dunn. After almost doubling his career-high in points this past season, Dunn was due for a healthy raise from the Kraken front office.

Dunn, who was originally the 56th overall pick of the St.Louis Blues back in the 2015 NHL Draft, never got a huge shot with the Blues. Seemingly capable of playing top-four minutes in his last year with St.Louis back during the 2020-21 season, Dunn was behind the likes of Justin Faulk, Torey Krug, Colton Parayko, and Marco Scandella on the team’s depth chart.

Nevertheless, he was always a capable contributor during his time with the Blues, scoring anywhere from 20-35 points a season, averaging a tad over 17 minutes a night in four seasons. Thankfully for Dunn, an opportunity came knocking during the 2021 NHL Expansion Draft, as St.Louis opted to protect Faulk, Krug, and Parayko, leaving Dunn exposed for the Kraken to select him at no cost.

As expected, most of the upstart Seattle roster struggled during their inaugural season in 2021-22, but Dunn managed to match a career-high in points, scoring seven goals and 28 assists in 73 games played. He was given ample opportunity on the team’s powerplay, a situation that was previously rare to him during his time with the Blues. The Kraken powerplay struggled overall in the team’s first year, only producing at a 14.55% clip, good for 29th in the league.

As the team grew closer, added more talent last offseason, and absorbed head coach Dave Hakstol’s tactics, Dunn and the Kraken put up an exceptional 2022-23 season. Early on, Dunn immediately earned the spot as the team’s top defenseman, quarterbacking a powerplay that took a 5.2% jump in one season. Overall, Dunn would score 14 goals and 50 assists in 81 games played, while 15 of those points would come on the Kraken powerplay.

Not only would Dunn lead all Seattle defensemen in points, but he also finished second on the team overall, only sitting behind forward Jared McCann by six points for the team lead. In 14 playoff games, Dunn would score one goal and six assists, helping the team eliminate the defending Stanley Cup champions, the Colorado Avalanche, in the first round of the postseason.

Still only 26 years old, Dunn picked a fantastic time to have a breakout campaign, as the Kraken currently have a decent cap situation to retain him for as long as they’d like. Proving to be the most offensively gifted defenseman on the roster, Dunn could become a staple on Seattle’s blue line for quite some time.

Seattle Kraken Extend Head Coach Dave Hakstol

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The Seattle Kraken have announced that they’ve signed head coach Dave Hakstol to a contract extension that will keep him with the club through the 2025-26 season. No financial details have been released at this time but the two-year contract gives the 54-year-old some security coming on the heels of the first 100-point season in franchise history.

Hakstol led the franchise to a series of firsts in just their second season of existence. The Kraken made the playoffs for the first time and even knocked off the defending Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche in the opening round for their first playoff series win.

Hakstol oversaw one of the most dramatic turnarounds in recent history as he took the Kraken from a 30th overall finish in 2021-22 to the second round of the playoffs. Seattle went from just 60 points in 2021-22 to 100 points this past season. The team’s point percentage nearly doubled going from .366 to .610. It was by far Hakstol’s most successful season as a head coach in the NHL with his previous best coming while he was overseeing the Philadelphia Flyers in 2017-18. That year he led the Flyers to a 98-point regular season before they were dumped in six games by the Pittsburgh Penguins in the first round of the playoffs.

Hakstol might not have big-name recognition, but he fits with what Seattle has built throughout their lineup. They don’t have many big names in their lineup, but the club showed incredible resiliency and grit throughout this past season. Something Hakstol himself showed after an initially disappointing first season in Seattle.

Seattle Kraken Sign Eduard Sale

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07/16/23: The Kraken have now officially announced their signing of Sale, confirming the $950k AAV that was reported earlier.

07/15/23: The Seattle Kraken are reportedly close to signing their first-round pick of the 2023 NHL Draft, Eduard Sale, to a three-year entry-level contract. The contract will reportedly have an AAV of $950K each season, and pay Sale a base salary of $855K (Tweet Link).

At the time of the 2022 NHL Draft, Sale had already made some noise as a potential top-10 selection this year. During that year, Sale primarily played with HC Kometa Brno of the Czechia U20 league, and flat-out dominated, scoring 42 goals and 47 assists in only 39 games.

This past season, finally moving up to the professional leagues for HC Kometa Brno, Sale could only manage seven goals and seven assists in 43 games. Although the transition to professional hockey did not go as smoothly as desired for Sale, he still played well in international tournaments for Czechia, scoring 11 goals and eight assists in 18 games played for their U18 team, as well as three goals and seven assists in 11 games for their U20 team.

Sale is primarily an offensive talent at this point, still needing a bit of development on the defensive side of the puck. Next season, Sale is set to join the Barrie Colts of the OHL. The Colts originally drafted Sale with the 29th overall selection at the OHL’s Import Draft last summer.

Seattle Kraken Re-Sign Cale Fleury

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1:36 PM: The team has formally announced the signing via a press release.

11:44 AM: The Seattle Kraken and blueliner Cale Fleury have reached a deal on a contract extension prior to their arbitration hearing, according to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman. Per CapFriendly, the deal is a two-year, one-way $800k AAV contract that will see Fleury make $775k in 2023-24 and $825k in 2024-25.

The 24-year-old right-shot blueliner was set to press his case in arbitration after a 2022-23 campaign spent mostly as a healthy scratch. Fleury was a press-box regular for Seattle last season, at one point going a stretch of 31 straight games outside the lineup.

He didn’t play at all in the AHL as the Coachella Valley Firebirds made a run to Game Seven of the Calder Cup Finals. The Kraken were likely unwilling to expose the player to the waiver wire mid-season and potentially see him claimed by a team in need of a right-shot blueliner.

Fleury was an original Kraken expansion draft selection, acquired from the Montreal Canadiens. The 2017 third-round pick already had some success on his resume as a former WHL captain who racked up 102 hits in just 41 games as an NHL rookie.

He played most of his first season with the Kraken in the AHL, serving as an alternate captain for the Charlotte Checkers. He scored a healthy 33 points in 58 games, a career-high by a wide margin.

Fleury’s success in the AHL and his time spent with Seattle as mostly a healthy scratch last season have earned him a one-way contract extension spanning the next two seasons.

While the Kraken already have Adam Larsson, Will Borgen, Justin Schultz entrenched on the right side of their defense, Fleury could be first in line to take one of their spots in case of an injury. Or, he could end up on the waiver wire and claimed by a club willing to give him a more regular opportunity to play NHL games.

Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

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