Seattle Kraken

The Seattle Kraken are an expansion franchise in the National Hockey League (NHL) playing in the Pacific Division of the Western Conference. The city was awarded the NHL franchise in December 2018, and the Kraken became the thirty-second franchise in the NHL and played their debut season in 2021. The team is owned by a consortium of owners led by David Bonderman, Jerry Bruckheimer, and Tod Leiweke and plays out of the Climate Pledge Arena. Seattle owners paid an expansion fee of $650 million to become the thirty-second franchise of the NHL.

The Climate Pledge Arena was set to reimagine an arena constructed under a historic landmarked roof originally built for the 1962 Seattle World's Fair. The development sought to make a state-of-the-art arena in Seattle's Uptown neighborhood that would not alter Seattle's skyline. The project renovated the building beneath the iconic roof and included the development of access tunnels, landscape improvements, and a parking garage.

View from high inside the Climate Pledge Arena, which sits below street level.

Once constructed, the arena was envisioned as being a net-zero, carbon-certified arena. This was partially led by Amazon, which purchased the naming rights of the arena and named it Climate Pledge after the company's net-zero carbon point. This includes using no fossil fuel consumption for daily arena use and solar panels to power the arena. Also, it was the first NHL arena to announce the intent to eliminate single-use plastics and utilize compostable packaging instead. And the rink uses a "Rain to Rink" system, which harvests rainwater from the roof to be used to surface the rink.

Climate Pledge Arena achieved a net-zero carbon certification from the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), which hands out certifications based on its standards globally to recognize energy-efficient buildings intended to operate at net-zero carbon emissions.

Brand and color reveal for the Seattle Kraken.

The new Seattle NHL expansion unveiled their name and branding shortly in 2020, and their jerseys were shown in 2021 ahead of the NHL Expansion Draft, in which the Seattle team selected players from other teams in the same format enjoyed by the Vegas Golden Knights during their expansion. The name chosen for the team, Kraken, was the result of a secretive process that included over 1,200 names, with a real exploration on more than 100, before settling on 5 finalists and then a winner. Kraken was intended to evoke both the creature from Scandinavian mythology and the mystery and danger of the sea.

Seattle Kraken's home sweater.

Then came the development of the logo and color scheme. The development team wanted to build a logo and sweater that players and the community could be proud of. This led to an intensive process, which included league jersey partner Adidas and resulted in a color scheme of a primary color called deep sea blue. The complementary colors were chosen to reflect the Seattle area and included three shades of blue named ice blue, shadow blue, and boundless blue, with a red slash in the color red alert. With a color scheme, the team needed a logo, and they wanted to avoid a caricature but wanted some mystery to the logo. This led to the "S" as the primary mark, in part an homage to the original Seattle Metropolitans uniform, with a tentacle hiding in the negative space with a red eye in the center.

Team photo of the Seattle Metropolitans.

Previous to the modern franchise, hockey has a long history in Seattle. The city was home to the first American-based hockey team to win the Stanley Cup, won by the Seattle Metropolitans in 1917. The Seattle Metropolitans competed for the Stanley Cup twice more before the team ultimately disbanded in 1924 after their home arena was converted into a parking garage.

In 1928, with the opening of the new Civic Ice Arena, also known as the Seattle Center, professional hockey returned to Seattle. The new arena would be home to professional teams that operated under different monikers through the years, including the Eskimos from 1928 to 1931, the Sea Hawks from 1933 to 1941, the Ironmen from 1944 to 1952, the Bombers from 1952 to 1954, the Americans from 1955 to 1958, and the Totems from 1958 to 1975.

In 1977, the Kamloops Chiefs, a junior ice hockey team from British Columbia, moved to Seattle, where the team was renamed the Seattle Breakers. The Breakers were sold in 1984 and renamed the Seattle Thunderbirds, a junior hockey team that competes in the Western Hockey League.

In 1974, a group led by Seattle lawyer Vince Abbey was awarded an NHL expansion team, but the deal fell through when the group failed to pay the $180,000 deposit for the $6 million franchise fee.

In 1990, during the NHL expansion that added the Tampa Bay Lightning and Ottawa Senators, an ownership group from Seattle submitted an application for an NHL expansion team but eventually fell short when part of the ownership group rescinded the bid without the knowledge of the other group members.

Expectations for the Seattle Kraken's expansion draft were set by the Vegas Golden Knights, who were able to deal with teams to get additional players and picks through their expansion draft in 2017. Unfortunately for the Seattle Kraken, 2021 was not a long enough time for the collected general managers to forget the lessons they learned in the Vegas Expansion Draft. This left general manager Ron Francis with a different challenge and a different approach to the draft, one that included a focus on defense and taking a chance as, according to Francis, the more darts thrown, the better chance for success.

The event stage for Seattle's expansion draft.

Instead of general managers working deals to keep roster players that could not be protected through the draft rules, those general managers gritted their teeth and accepted their loss. This led to a draft experience much different from Vegas, in which Seattle put together a fun event for local fans and for the fans of other teams, who watched to see which player would be claimed from their clubs. For those looking for fireworks, there was disappointment.

Seattle picked a roster of players focused on value forwards, goalies with promise (if not established records of success), and an impressive group of defensemen. The club left itself with a good deal of financial flexibility under the salary cap, which could help them pursue free agents. And with a glut of defensemen, the expectation was that Seattle would trade some players to pursue other players they were interested in but had been otherwise protected. And the club avoided several high-profile players with big contracts.

Kraken players celebrate a goal in their first home game.

In their inaugural season, the Seattle Kraken disappointed both the expectations they inherited from Vegas's previous, unprecedented success and also the various analytical models that, based on the team's roster, had expected the team to put together, which many had considered capable of achieving an 80 point or more season. That 80 points would have put the Kraken near the playoffs. Instead, the roster underachieved. They failed to make the playoffs, and they ended their first season with 60 points and last place in their division.

Ahead of the season, the Kraken announced the hiring of coach Dave Hakstol, who was expected to coach the team in line with a philosophy of hard work and a team-first attitude, coaching a team to play as a whole rather than as individual players, creating a style of play in which the sum is greater than the parts. Throughout the season, although not living up to the lofty expectations placed upon them, the team showed increased play but found themselves let down by their goaltending, led by Philipp Grubauer, who was signed by the Kraken before the season after a few strong seasons with the Colorado Avalanche.

Following a disappointing inaugural season, the Seattle Kraken drafted fourth in the 2022 NHL Entry Draft, where previous-consensus-first-overall draft pick Shane Wright fell to fourth, where Seattle selected him. They started their second season with Shane Wright in their lineup, along with their second-overall 2021 draft pick Matthew "Matty" Beniers. The team had worked to overhaul their roster, trading out some players, and worked to define and bolster a core of young players, which included Matty Beniers, Jared McCann, and Vince Dunn, while finding a goaltender that could back up and challenge Phillip Grubauer for the starting position.

Kraken players' celebrating a goal during the first round of the 2023 playoffs.

The team entered their sophomore season with measured expectations, based partially on an underwhelming inaugural season and a general consensus understanding that the roster had largely underperformed during that season. Instead, the season saw the Kraken explode in their offense, scoring goals in waves, matching their inaugural season in wins and points in the first three months of the season, posting an NHL record for winning all games of a road trip of at least seven games during an eight-game winning streak, and posting a second winning streak, which spanned from November 17 to December 1.

The team also exhibited the coaching philosophy of Dave Hakstol and proved to be greater than the sum of its parts, all working hard throughout games, whether winning or losing, and never taking a team for granted. This included a playing style that was defensively sound with high speed and an aggressive forecheck supported by better, if still below league-average, goaltending. The team was rewarded with forty-six wins in the season and 100 points, launching them into the playoffs.

Seattle and Dallas players compete for a puck during their second round series in the 2023 playoffs.

In the playoffs, the Seattle Kraken shocked many with a win over the Stanley Cup-defending Colorado Avalanche in seven games. Through these games, the speed and physicality of the Seattle Kraken were on display, as well as the team's scoring depth, and the team saw scoring and goals coming from the entirety of their lineup. Further, the Seattle Kraken received solid goaltending from Grubauer, who had many questions about his potential performance and proved many people wrong. In the second round of the playoffs, the Kraken continued to outperform expectations, taking the Dallas Stars to seven games. However, unlike against the Avalanche, the Kraken team game was unable to overcome the game-breaking talent on the Dallas Stars roster.