The Need to Knows
- The Time: 6pm PT (note the time!)
- The Place: Beautiful Climate Pledge Arena, Seattle, WA
- Place to Watch: ROOT Sports Northwest, ESPN+
- Place to Listen: KJR 93.3-FM
- An Opposing Viewpoint: Eyes on the Prize
Let’s enjoy the novelty of the Kraken still being mathematically alive for the postseason as of this writing. Barely. If they lose tomorrow to Montreal, that will extinguish their playoff hopes officially.
But as of right now, they sit at 0.1% per Moneypuck. Shuffle a deck of cards and draw a card. If it’s the ace of spades, draw another card. If it’s a black king, the Kraken are in the playoffs. Any other outcome (or in the other order) and they’re out.
More relevant is the #1 overall pick, which the Kraken are now in contention for. Macklin Celebrini is the prize and by far the best prospect in the draft.
Losing feels awful even when you know it’s the best thing for the franchise. I don’t know what to tell you. This is the worst part of sports. The NHL really should move to the Gold drafting system as adopted by the PWHL (which by the way, if you want to watch meaningful hockey with the Kraken out of the playoffs, the women’s game is fantastic and the PWHL is a very good product).
So what can we look forward to?
If you’re going to the game, the experience is great
The PA, the game operations, the national anthem singers, the house band, the organist, the DJ, the mascot, on and on is A+. Everything independent of the game result is fantastic.
If you’re watching the game on TV or listening on the radio, the experience is great
John Forslund or Everett Fitzhugh: (pick your poison) * -1
John, JT, Edzo, Piper, Alison, Nick or Everett/Al — there are no wrong answers. What I like to do since I attend every home game is listen to the radio broadcast on the Kraken app. The play-by-play is about a second behind and I don’t find that delay to be distracting. Then for road games, I watch on TV. That way I get half of the best of both worlds.
The Kraken are wearing their Winter Classic jerseys for the last time this season
One of the absolute best uniforms in NHL history will be worn one final time. Look at these beauties:
The Juraj Slafkovský/Shane Wright “drama”
The presumptive #1 overall pick for the 2022 draft was Shane Wright for years, but when Montreal had the #1 overall pick, they selected Juraj Slafkovský instead, which had their own fans booing them. Some people think Shane Wright gave the Montreal table a death stare during the draft.
Shane Wright hasn’t played in the NHL much, but he did score his first career goal against the team that passed on him.
None of this is actual drama, but it’s drama-adjacent. Or maybe if you squint really hard there’s something there. But it feels like something’s there, and isn’t that what matters? Of course, Slafkovský didn’t have anything to do with any of this and it feels weird to root against a kid.
In the spirit of a team that’s down and is looking for resilience in the face of setbacks, please enjoy this French version of Chumbawama’s “Tubthumbping.”
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