Currently in their 4th season, the Seattle Kraken have had ups and downs. After a lackluster inaugural season the Kraken stormed back the following year securing a spot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and not only eliminating the previous champions but coming within 1 game of the Western Conference Finals, losing to the Dallas Stars in an electrifying seven game series. That season the first ever draft pick for the Kraken, Matty Beniers, was a key contributor and was awarded the Calder Trophy for rookie of the year. With 57 points in 80 games the University of Michigan product looked off to a great start but fell back down to earth in his sophomore year with only 37 points in 77 games.

Enter Shane Wright, the top pick in the 2022 NHL entry draft by the Kraken in the first round going 4th overall after dropping all the way down to the Kraken. Wright was projected as the top pick in the draft and was an easy choice for the young franchise. What a steal, wright? While he didn’t play much in his first 2 seasons, clocking 8 games each year (drawing many questions towards ex head coach Dave Hakstol)even if it does make sense as his rookie season the Kraken were cooking, rolling 3 scoring lines and rocketing them into the playoffs. This year though, Wright has been a staple in the lineup playing 45 games and scoring 21 points at this point while mostly playing a third line center role with star Jared McCann and newcomer Eeli Tolvanen. Those 21 points are good for 8th on the team and only 4 points behind franchise center Matty. 4 points behind while obviously seeing less ice time at 12:36 versus Matty’s primo deployment of 17:33. Another promising stat for Wright.

So who is the star?

Now this isn’t a who is good and who is bad. It’s not a should we not have drafted this guy and drafted this other guy? It’s just a look into the future, and with a debate like this, it’s looking like one the Kraken are perfectly fine with having on their hands.

If we project these 2 guys out this season, Matty comes in at 43 points over the year while Shane is at 38 points. Let’s look at some numbers here. Matty boasts a 11.1% shooting percentage which is just under his career average of 13.4% Shane has a high 19.0% shooting percentage this year which is also under his average of 22.4% The problem here is the sample size is much smaller for Shane than Matty, but that 19.0% sure is nice to look at. Shane is also clicking on the power play with 9 power play points to Matty’s 3. This for Shane is also promising, as he is playing on the second unit and getting much less power play time than Matty.

I see a solid future for Matty as he continues to work on his face off game and defensive play while generating a better corsi for percentage presently. But I am intrigued with what I’ve seen from Shane Wright in his first full season. This is a player like I said before that was the number one overall projected draft pick and dropped all the way to fourth. Wright has also won 2 gold medals playing for Team Canada and was the sixth player to be granted exceptional status for his 2019-20 OHL season (Yes, that list includes McDavid). I think Shane will blow past his projected 38 points and give the Kraken good questions to have this offseason on how to deploy these guys.

One day we could see a deployment that we’ve seen elsewhere, where we put these 2 guys on the top line and power play together to really get the scoring going. And one day when Jordan Eberle hangs up his skates, one of these promising young stars could be pinning that ‘C’ on their jersey.