I am a Sens fan but I have to say the way this Seattle team is built is very smart.

This team is filled with Good players not super stars but good players each have around $5m in value. which makes it so that every player is skilled, Dangerous and capable of Defence using not only hard work but skill which makes their depth is incredible.

Instead of having expensive super stars who can be stopped by being focused on by the other team and then having little cap for effective depth players.

Seattle have Good players with the ability to stop other teams super stars but also out perform the other teams depth.

A player with the value of an avv of $5m is skilled enough to stop top dollar opponents such as MacKinnon for example, but a player of around $1m AVV does not have the skill to out perform good players with a value of $5m AVV.



Therefore a team filled with players valued at $5m AVV > a team with expensive superstars and cheap depth.



AKA Communist Hockey teams are the best. ( this last line is a joke btw)

Do you agree with this take or opinion?

Definitiely agree, and (arguably) their best forward McCann hasn't even been in the lineup for most the playoffs. They will probably lose some quality in their bottom 6 when Beniers needs an extension, but I really like how the team was put together. Hopefully they don't blow it up to acquire stars like Vegas did.

It's all about the coach.

Minne, Vegas and Dallas are other teams I look at and wonder why are they still so elite when I look at their "meh" roster.

If only Hakstol was elite when he was on the Leafs bench

Seattle just has really nice depth who can score and most of their forwards play a two-way game.

Its funny though that some of that depth were guys that have have been on waivers like Sprong and Tolvanen.

Yeah I feel like Vegas started off the same way but transitioned to signing or trading for stars. Don't get me wrong Vegas is still very good tho. I feel like in the past the oilers and leafs suffered from having expensive star players but very cheap depth which cause them to have great regular seasons but lose in the playoffs. We saw this with Colorado this season, yes they had many injuries this season but their depth have not been as effective this year.

I agree the coach has a big impact but I find Dallas and Vegas have many super stars and some are underrated. Minne has lots of its cap invested in an underperforming Dcore imo which makes their depth cheap and ineffective imo.

If Seattle wins the cup, it could potentially change how GMs shape their roster, and could result in stars not getting the big dollar offers they might expect.

the way Nashville delt with the Tolvanen situation was horrible. I was praying for Ottawa to pick him up.

yep! that's exactly what im thinking! it could make things so interesting in the future imo. Right now my team has the choice to pay debrincat big dollars or spend that cash on 2 to 3 decent players improving our depth. Like I would prefer Dorion for example to sign Bertuzzi at $6m AVV (ish) and get a decent goalie around $4m - $5m AVV via trade instead of Debrincat for $9m AVV.

Best managed team: Seattle
Worst managed team: Toronto

Seattle area the hockey equivalent of the Borg.

They will take your scheme and add it to their own, resistance is futile. They have no top line to shut down, they have no weakness to exploit (at least not since Grubauer remembered how to play in net) all four lines operate the same way.

I agree but I do find Dubas did very well at the deadline this year adding O'Reilly and depth with that small amount of cap space.

Yep! I really thought they wouldn't do well because their Goaltending has been awful since the team was formed but Gru came out of nowhere and has been playing very well. My other worry all season was if Beniers could keep up the pace on the top line.

The Leafs just have the worse player core.

Matthews, Marner, J.T. , Nylander and Reilly have had 5 tries together.

I'm guessing either Matthews or Nylander will not be on the 2024-25 roster.

the Tavares contract is absolutely horrible. also I would trade Marner he does nothing in the playoffs imo.

Trading Marner will 99% offend Matthews and you'd not get him to resign.

So Nylander is the odd man out.

Nah you sit Matthews down and you tell him this trio of huge contracts is clearly not working so you tell him you find a replacement for Marner and go trade for another star for cheaper AVV.

Building a team by committee isn't as smart as you might think, just because it isn't the conventional way of doing things. Make not mistake, this Kraken roster is far from being intended as anything close to the finished product, striving for success by committee is extremely difficult to sustain(what team has one a stanley cup in the salary cap era without any superstars?). For me, the Kraken are probably my number one regression candidate for next season, as they look to have massively overachieved this past season. Their goaltending still isn't good, Vince Dunn and Adam Larsson will like regress to being a 2nd pair caliber defense pairing, Dunn might even end up getting overpaid for the season he just had. This team still has some inefficient contracts on the books like Grubauer, Alexander Wennberg, Jaden Schwarts, Jamie Oleksiak's deal isn't too bad, but not spectacular for a defender who can't play 20+ minutes consistently. Not to mention they still have a ton of work to do in bolstering their prospect pipeline. No stud defense prosects, and outside of Shane Wright at center, and Jagger Firkus on the wing, I don't really see any notable talent that boasts promising NHL upside. Might be a while before this team takes another significant step. Now I'm not saying that the Kraken will go back to being a lottery team next season, but it will not surprise me in the least if they miss the post-season next May.