A playoff appearance doesn’t change long-term confidence in Kraken

The Seattle Kraken have shaken off a slow start to the season to rally toward legitimate contention for a spot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

With a record of 20-14-8, the Kraken find themselves in the third-place spot in the Pacific Division, which would get them into the postseason for the second time in their brief history as an NHL franchise.

While Seattle has gone 8-0-2 in their past 10 contests to work into this situation, the overall body of work for the team halfway through the season remains underwhelming, as they have a negative goal differential and the Pacific has been down all the way around.

On Friday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, host Tyler Yaremchuk and co-host and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton discussed why even if the Kraken are able to make the playoffs, it won’t change how they feel about the team moving forward.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Points percentage-wise, they’re actually ahead of the Edmonton Oilers. We gave them a B-grade, but the reason I’m hesitant is almost the same reason I was hesitant to heap praise on the Preds and Blues yesterday… It’s great, Seattle that you’re looking good and that you’re in the playoff conversation… But big picture-wise, are you good enough to beat both the Oilers and Golden Knights in playoff series and go on a run? Not a shot, so what are we doing here? Why are we praising the mediocrity? They’re going to slow down at some point… They might be a wild card team, and they’re probably just going to lose in the first round.

Carter Hutton: Seattle doesn’t have a single player over 30 points… It is concerning in that sense, and then where does the future lie? I think this is a topic that happens a lot with Seattle… Matty Beniers, Shane Wright, where’s that super star? Where’s the guy? They don’t really have it.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…