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"2022-23 NHL team previews: Projections and ranking of every NHL team"
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crash davis
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(#23) Seattle Kraken 2022-23 season preview: Playoff chances, projected points, roster rankings
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Welcome to The Athletic’s 2022-23 edition of the team season previews. Check out all the previews as they’re released right here.
There was no more humbling moment for the analytics movement than the Seattle Kraken being unequivocally bad in their inaugural season.
Every model under the sun – including and especially this one – forecasted a playoff team in Year 1, a thought that would’ve seemed outlandish at first blush if not for Vegas pulling off a similar miracle a few years prior. The Kraken were expected to be a deep defensive team with their trump card being goaltending.
Ah, goaltending. You fickle mistress.
Instead of being Seattle’s biggest strength, it was the team’s mightiest weakness with the Kraken finishing 31st in save percentage. And just like that, the team sunk out of the gate.
Of course, goaltending isn’t the only thing to blame for Seattle’s lack of success. The Kraken were a bad team through and through – the preseason call for the playoffs is as big a miss as you’ll see.
The hope is not to repeat, and yet, here they are once again – inexplicably projected to be in the playoff race. Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us twice…
The projection
Shame on us.
The Kraken begin the next tier of teams, the ones with a legitimate shot at the playoffs. Somehow. That is not a typo, you are reading that correctly: 27 percent.
At the very least, it’s thankfully a lot lower than last year’s overzealous projection – but it still feels astronomically high for one of the league’s worst teams last season. It’s a team with one of the league’s worst core groups, not a single top pairing defender, and a bottom-five starting goalie. It makes no damn sense… compels us though.
What the Kraken do have is a very strong supporting cast, especially up front. What the team lacks in elite talent, it makes up for with its depth. That was bolstered this summer by the signing of Andre Burakovsky and the acquisition of Oliver Bjorkstrand. Add potential young studs Matty Beniers and Shane Wright to the mix, plus a healthy season from Brandon Tanev, and the Kraken are a nice 6.9 wins better than last year’s full-season group.
That’s a 14-point swing, pushing Seattle up all the way from 73 projected points. That would’ve ranked second last. It’s worth noting that based on goal differential, Seattle should’ve been closer to a 68-point team last year.
Aside from the new faces, the other thing to remember is that these projections are based on more than just one season. Almost every Kraken player saw their value drop in their first season in Seattle. While that data is weighed the heaviest, the model is expecting some positive regression for a majority of the roster – though it’s possible the new environment means it shouldn’t. Either way, that manifests most between the pipes, where Philipp Grubauer can’t possibly be as bad as he was last year. That alone is a big plus.
There’s still a chance the Kraken end up near the league’s basement, but it’s a better bet – according to the model – that Seattle lands outside the league’s bottom 10. Somewhere in the mushy middle. In 50 percent of simulations, the team ends up somewhere between 83 and 93 points. It’s not quite a playoff team, but it’s one that’s at the very least in the conversation. That’s a big step up from last season.
Seattle still has a lot of question marks surrounding its roster and there are still plenty of reasons to doubt some of the projected values for its players. But at the very least this should be a much-improved team. There’s no chance it can get any worse than last year.
The big question
Can Matty Beniers be the star player the Kraken need to become a playoff team?
Turns out it’s tough to build a franchise out of nothing. Some of us might have forgotten — thank you, Vegas — but Ron Francis certainly did no such thing.
The expansion draft process got most of the attention. That’s understandable; it features players from every team who, in some capacity, are known commodities. Just as important — maybe even more so — is hitting on your first draft pick.
Early as it may be, it seems like Francis nailed it with Matty Beniers.
The second overall pick in 2021, Beniers put up 43 points (20 goals, 23 assists) in 37 games as a Michigan sophomore, then made a late-season NHL cameo. It couldn’t have gone much better; Beniers, in 10 games with the Kraken, had three goals and nine assists.
On some level, it shouldn’t have been much of a surprise. Players, generally speaking, don’t get taken at No. 2 by accident, and Beniers’ reputation as an 18-year-old draft prospect was outstanding. In a different year, maybe one without the presence of a 6-foot-6, do-everything defenseman like Owen Power, he’d have gone first overall.
Still, some of Beniers’ scouting reports were dotted with backhanded compliments, at least in discussions about elite NHL draft prospects. He was mature. He was defensively responsible. He was a two-way player. Imagine that you hold the second overall pick, and be honest: Wouldn’t you rather see “elite offensive talent” mixed in somewhere? “Top-end skating ability”? What if you were trying to conjure a prospect pipeline out of thin air?
If that was the book on Beniers when Seattle drafted him — that he was the safe pick — he spent almost a calendar year showing that he has a different gear. The production at Michigan was one thing. His stint as a go-to guy on the U.S. Olympic team was another. Then, his time in Seattle was the icing on the cake. A complete player? A well-rounded one? Not yet – his production masked a lot of deficiencies at five-on-five. Either way, don’t call him boring when his offensive ability was the first thing to shine through at the NHL level. “Defensively responsible” is not code for “offensively dull.” The vision and puck sense Beniers showed with the Kraken is your proof.
It’s not a coincidence that, in his offseason rankings of the prospect pools, Corey Pronman specifically noted that Beniers has star potential. That’d be good news for any franchise, let alone one that, just a bit more than a year ago, didn’t have any players. Then came the expansion draft, when Seattle largely passed on dynamic offensive talents and, to varying degrees, paid the price. Beniers showing off his creativity, vision and shot with more consistency last season can only be a good thing, especially for a team that had exactly one 50-point player (Jared McCann) in 2021-22.
Is any of this a surprise? Of course Seattle needs Beniers to reach the tippy-top of his potential. Of course they need Shane Wright — another two-way center whose lack of dynamism cost him at the draft — to do the same. Franchises are built down the middle. It’s a cliche because it’s true. It also applies to Seattle a bit more literally, and “The Big Question” is whether it can pay off in Year 2.
Beniers comes in with a much loftier projection than most rookies usually start with: 2.1 wins. The production he flashed during his 10-game stint is a big part of that and was already enough to expect top-line scoring. Too soon? Almost definitely. Ten games is not much of anything to go on, but the model can handle that – to the best of its ability anyway. There are large error bars attached to a projection based on 10 games, but it regresses heavily based on just how small the sample size is. Someone with 10 games under their belt gets a heavier dose of regression compared to someone with 200 games. But when age is factored into the equation, some of that regression evaporates.
That’s also the reason Beniers’s weak five-on-five impacts – a sub-40 percent expected goals rate last season – don’t harm his projected value too much. Given his pedigree and scouting report, that’s probably for the best as he should be a much stronger driver than he showed last year.
A lot of Seattle’s hopes going forward ride on Beniers being the real deal. His first 10 games suggest he can be just that from the get-go. The next 82 will be significantly more telling.
The wildcard
Can Philipp Grubauer bounce back?
Philipp Grubauer finished dead last in the league in goals saved above expected, allowing 31.5. It was far from ideal in his first year as a bonafide starter for the Kraken. Seattle may have struggled offensively in its inaugural season, but the Kraken were actually a strong defensive team that did well to protect the slot at even strength. This was not the worst defensive team that Grubauer ever played for in terms of shot volume or quality against. But if the team allowed a quality chance to get past them, they often weren’t getting the save to cancel it out. Grubauer actually stopped more tips and deflections above expected, along with backhands. But wrist and snap shots beat him from all over the ice.
Goaltending is the most volatile position, and others around the league have shown that a disastrous season doesn’t have to be defining. An excellent one doesn’t have to, either. Grubauer has never had a season that’s come close to his levels from 2021-22, when accounting for both minutes played and workload. So maybe there is hope that he can get back to the level that’s expected of him. Management addressed a need in more goal support to help bail him out if he falters. But ultimately, the Kraken need him to not be a liability on every scoring chance against.
Given how bad last season was, it makes sense why the team can’t bank on a rebound, alone. But there’s still pressure on him to be the starter this team needs, especially with Chris Driedger’s injury status in mind — Seattle probably doesn’t want to have to lean on Joey Daccord or Martin Jones any more than necessary.
The core
Andre Burakovsky, Yanni Gourde, Jordan Eberle, Jaden Schwartz, Vince Dunn, Adam Larsson, Philipp Grubauer
This year, all the depth charts feature grades for every part of the roster imaginable. The most interesting grade grouping is generally between each team’s “core” players and “support” players – it’s why we broke the roster sections into two parts, focusing on each. The methodology for choosing the “core” was rather simple: the four most-used forwards, the two most-used defenders and the starting goalie.
For most teams, it’s a pretty foolproof way to capture their best players. For a Seattle team where depth is king, it doesn’t quite do the trick. According to GSVA, the Kraken don’t give the most minutes to their best players. Maybe that’s part of the problem.
In any sense, it leads to the wildest difference for core and support grades. A sparkling “A” for the supporting cast ranked second in the league, and a big fat “D” for the core which ranks 31st. That’s Seattle hockey, baby.
Newly acquired Andre Burakovsky certainly works as a core piece as he immediately becomes Seattle’s best winger. It’ll be interesting to see what he does in a lead role with heavier usage (and more power play time) as he’s been one of the league’s most efficient scorers for years. He’s scored over 2.5 points-per-60 in each of the last three seasons, something that only seven other players can also say: Artemi Panarin, Brad Marchand, Connor McDavid, David Pastrnak, Jonathan Huberdeau, Leon Draisaitl, and Nathan MacKinnon. Those are superstar talents and while Burakovsky is obviously not on the level, his production is very underrated. He gives Seattle much-needed scoring punch.
Burakovsky isn’t going to offer a lot in terms of play-driving, but offensively he’s very gifted. Last year he ranked third on Colorado in shot contributions and was among the very best in the league in that regard. He’s great at moving the puck up ice too.
As the team’s best two-way center, Yanni Gourde is also a definite core piece for Seattle. He was the team’s best playmaker last season and had a strong 1.92 points-per-60, the second-best mark on the team behind Ryan Donato. Gourde, despite his size, is a menace on the forecheck and was among the league leaders in creating chances off of it.
Gourde took on the toughest minutes and still managed to maintain the same relative expected goals impact he had in Tampa Bay: 0.19 per 60. The only difference was the supporting cast around him, dropping his expected goals percentage from 56 percent to 50 percent. He should have much more help this year on the wings to create a decent shutdown line for the Kraken.
Vince Dunn and Philipp Grubauer also qualify, but mostly due to the weakness of their respective positions relative to the rest of the Kraken. Neither are great options, but there aren’t many better ones. Dunn showed his decline in 2020-21 was no fluke and his placement on the top pair looks very dicey. He’s not well suited for the role. Grubauer’s collapse has been well documented and Seattle needs to hope last season was a mirage.
The rest? They belong with the supporting cast and are part of the reason there’s such a dichotomy between Seattle’s core ranking and its support ranking.
Jordan Eberle and Jaden Schwartz were two of the team’s most important pieces going into last season, but there are now three wingers and two centers in the lineup who provide more value. Both players looked like decent play-drivers coming into last season but struggled in Seattle. On offense, their scoring naturally dropped and at five-on-five they ranked fifth and seventh on the team in terms of scoring efficiency.
Neither player’s placement in the core is as offensive as Adam Larsson’s however, one of the lowest rated “core” pieces of any team with a GSVA of minus-0.6 wins. Larsson offers next to nothing on offense – that much has been true for a long time – and unfortunately didn’t add much defensively last year either. Only Dunn was on the ice for more expected goals against. Combine that with Larsson’s offensive ineptitude and the Kraken defender ranked dead last in expected goals percentage and wasn’t far off the bottom in actual goals percentage either.
Larsson is not a top pairing defender and the team’s heavy reliance on him is part of the problem when it comes to generating offense with its best players on the ice. If he’s not limiting chances either, he’s a massive liability.
The support
Since the Kraken don’t have an elite star player just yet, they’re probably going to be a team that produces by committee.
That committee does include quite a few good supporting players. There’s Jared McCann who probably slots on the wing, but can shift to center if needed (especially if one of their young budding stars struggles). Over the last few years, most public models have generally overrated his contributions while hockey men have underappreciated him.
In McCann’s first year with the Kraken, he played a career-high in minutes. Roster strength in Pittsburgh versus Seattle obviously played into that, but he showed that he McCann handle more ice time as he responded with highs in scoring with 27 goals and 50 points in 74 games. At five-on-five, his impacts below the surface all slipped below his impressive 2020-21 season. Maybe it’s because he was more exposed in Seattle, and didn’t have players ahead of him on the depth chart as he did in Pittsburgh with both Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. This year, at least, there’s more help around McCann on the Kraken. It pales to what he had on the Penguins, but more support while maintaining the opportunity to be a top-six player may be the balance he needs.
Some of that support comes in the form of players with more opportunity to make an impact, like Beniers. Others are newcomers, including Oliver Bjorkstrand, who the Kraken essentially stole from Columbus in a cap clearing move.
Bjorkstrand fits what Seattle needs as an offensive generator. The winger creates a high volume of shots and scoring chances, both off the rush and the cycle. Bjorkstrand’s release and finishing ability make him a goal scorer to watch. How he’s worked on his puck possession skills and jam have only added to his value. He’s generally able to produce over two points-per-60, but a below-average on-ice shooting percentage last year stifled his production. That likely played a role in why he was available.
Depending on how the lineup shakes out, Bjorkstrand could find himself higher than the third line — whether it’s a loaded top line with Burakovsky, or alongside his former Blue Jackets teammate Alex Wennberg. The latter is a playmaker, which can bite him when he literally passes up shots. But when paired with a shooter, can be effective as long as it’s not predictable. Still, Wennberg comes in just a shade above replacement level for a reason and that’s because his scoring efficiency is generally low and his on-ice impacts aren’t special. He depends too much on who he plays with.
A healthy Brandon Tanev adds some two-way play to the Kraken’s depth and fits well next to Gourde and Bjorkstrand for now. That has the makings of a solid shutdown line. Plus with a healthier forward group, players like Ryan Donato and Joonas Donskoi will be slotted more appropriately on the fourth line.
One of the most exciting players on this roster, Shane Wright, likely starts out in a depth role – if he makes the team. The forward infamously fell to fourth in the draft after being touted as the top prospect for years, which was the Kraken’s gain. As long as it’s best for his development, he’ll get every opportunity to make the lineup. Based on his scoring in junior, Wright projects to provide third-line value as a rookie.
While there are a few new names on offense, most of the defense is in place from last season. That includes Jamie Oleksiak, who had to show what he could do without Miro Heiskanen on his side. The offensive side of this game still isn’t exactly there, but he’s still strong in his own zone. He doesn’t allow many entries against, but the few that slip past can turn into a scoring chance.
Behind him on the left will likely be Carson Soucy. Last year, he was pretty average in his puck-moving efforts, but there’s more upside for him to reach. Time on the second power play unit would help him get there on the surface, but he may have to battle Justin Schultz for that. If the former Capital is matched with a more defensive skater, it would allow the Kraken to deploy three fairly balanced, albeit unspectacular pairs. Lastly, there’s William Borgen who had one of the easier workloads of the Kraken’s defense last year; still, in that sheltered role, he showed that he could defend entries against and help move the puck out of his own end with possession.
All of the Kraken’s supporting defensemen are fine from a value standpoint, it’s just that there isn’t a standout top pair by the numbers that would elevate the group as a whole. The forward group at least has some difference-makers, but the defense corps is definitely lacking in that department.
The best case
The opposite of their inaugural season, basically. Grubauer remembers he was a Vezina candidate just two seasons ago and Seattle’s strong stable of depth leads the Kraken to a surprise playoff berth. Matty Beniers and Shane Wright become immediate difference-makers, giving the franchise two key cornerstone pieces.
The worst case
For a second straight season, value by committee fails and the Kraken are undone by their extremely weak top end. Grubauer continues to sink behind a weak team and Seattle once again languishes in the league’s basement.
The bottom line
No question tempts fate more strongly than “How much worse can it get?”
In the Kraken’s case, though, it’s fair to wonder. Competent play from Grubauer, even if nothing else changes, will be enough to prevent a repeat of their first-season horror show. Adding some offensive talent — even it’s just a full season’s worth of Beniers and 60 points from Burakovsky — will go a long way, too.
The ceiling is still low, though, and no team seems better suited to split the difference between their best- and worst-case scenario than Seattle. Not every player positively regresses, and Grubauer’s play was bad enough to make you wonder just how much of a Colorado creation he may be. If he’s in the same neighborhood as last season, or if he gets hurt and forces, say, Jones into action — or if the Kraken take a step back defensively — things could get ugly in a hurry, and another projection could be wrong.
References
How these projections work
How these projections performed last season
Understanding projection uncertainty
Resources
Evolving Hockey
Natural Stat Trick
Hockey Reference
NHL
All Three Zones Tracking by Corey Sznajder
Read the other 2022-23 season previews here.
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