The Kraken Are Stuck in the Middle, and That's Worse Than Tanking

Look, we all saw what spring 2023 felt like. That magical playoff run when the Kraken upset the defending champion Avalanche in the first round and pushed Dallas to seven games? Seattle ate it up. Kraken stories dominated the most-read lists day after day. For a second, this franchise mattered.

Now? The Kraken have played 246 straight games without making the playoffs. They just got eliminated for the third straight season and fourth time in five years. And here's the brutal part: they're getting muscled out of the spotlight by a Super Bowl-winning NFL team, a division-winning MLB team, and a yet-to-return NBA team that hasn't even touched the court.

This isn't just bad hockey. It's irrelevant hockey.

The Collapse Nobody Saw Coming

Before the Olympic break, things looked different. The Kraken looked like they might actually play for something more than pride down the stretch. Then came a 5-14-2 skid that has them sitting 28th in the NHL in points heading into Saturday's game with the Flames. That's not just a slump. That's a free fall.

The real problem? This team doesn't score. The Kraken are 27th in points scored while sitting 12th in points allowed. They're playing defensive hockey that probably kept their playoff hopes alive through three-quarters of the season, but it's also making ice hockey about as entertaining as ice melting. Fans want to see the puck find the back of the net. That doesn't happen much at Kraken games.

Time for the Hard Reset

CEO Tod Leiweke called for an organization-wide audit to figure out what's broken. That's a start. Ron Francis, who stepped into the president of hockey operations role after starting as general manager, will step down at season's end. But honest assessment? A rebuild is probably the only way forward.

Yeah, the Kraken came into the league as an expansion team four years after Vegas, and league executives learned from that to prevent a similar strata-level talent haul. But staying stuck in the middle for 30 years is worse than spending a year or two at the bottom actually building something real. A short painful rebuild beats permanent mediocrity.

Seattle's got too much going on in sports right now to settle for watching the Kraken tread water. It's time to fix this the right way.

This article was created with AI assistance and reviewed by Seattle On Tap editorial staff. Always verify information with official team sources.