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Troubled Waters in ‘The Deep?’ Wavering Fan Interest Catalyst for Kraken’s Offseason Shakeup

Mandatory Credit: Stephen Brashear-USA TODAY Sports

Not since the summer prior to the team’s genesis have the Seattle Kraken seen an offseason as bustling as this one. 

Seattle relieved head coach Dave Hakstol of his duties mere weeks after their 6th-place finish in the Pacific Division to name his successor, Dan Bylsma, before June. Earlier this month, the team announced Jessica Campbell and Bob Woods as replacements for assistant coaches Paul McFarland and Jay Leach, whose exits leave Dave Lowry the only member of the coaching staff to have witnessed the team’s singular playoff run. 

Made possible through partnerships with local TEGNA stations, the Kraken officially cut ties with regional sports network ROOT to broadcast all non-nationally televised games for free going forward. While long rumored, the move predates the official end to Seattle’s original five-year contract with ROOT, inked before the inaugural season. 

General manager Ron Francis wasted no time jumping on forward Chandler Stephenson and defenseman Brandon Montour at the crack of free agency, signing each to seven-year deals worth around $50 million. Never in his eight-year executive career has Francis signed contracts as long despite “always” having at least Kraken ownership’s permission to do so. Contractual commitments of such magnitude– for the Kraken and Francis– are unexplored territory. 

Change is occurring on all fronts of the franchise. Even the team itself is calling the upcoming season a “new Kraken era” in press releases and marketing. 

Of course, adjustments of strategy and personnel are needed to compete in an increasingly cutthroat division, forget vying for a championship. Kraken co-owner Samantha Holloway promised season ticket holders in an email from May that the organization would be “aggressive” in improving the team at present. If playoff qualification is the aim every season from here on out as Holloway says, scoring the fewest five-on-five goals in franchise history as Seattle did last season won’t cut it. 

Screenshots by @NicoleCutmore on X/Twitter.

But the upheaval may also represent a shift in what the Kraken perceive the pathway to postseason success to be and how fast they believe they should achieve it. This isn’t to say Seattle’s commitment to winning ever wavered. Rather, the roster’s core, the team’s systems, and Francis’ conservative approach to selecting and acquiring talent– a style nearing a decade without a championship– may be further from contending caliber than previously assumed. 

Urgency to change that fact is high. Success is needed to fill the trophy case as badly as it’s needed to continually fill the stands at Climate Pledge Arena. 

Excitement is high for the first few years following a league’s expansion because fan expectations are low, a phenomenon called a honeymoon. Hence the name, this natural, no-strings-attached elation doesn’t last forever. Fans must be given other reasons to invest their time and money into a team once the novelty wears off. For teams serving nontraditional hockey markets like the Kraken, this is an especially tough task– there is no culturally ingrained passion for the sport to tap into.

That said, stealing fans’ hearts isn’t impossible, according to Stan Emert, director of the Sports Enterprise Management program at the University of Washington Tacoma.

“Anytime you [bring a franchise] into a new place, they’re going to have a honeymoon,” Emert says. “But then you’ve got to take the next steps. What does the average fan want? The average fan of a major league sport wants wins.” 

Seattle holds a 107-112–27 all-time record after plummeting back to the bottom of the standings last season, and ranks 24th in total goals scored (716), 28th in power play conversion (18.4%), and 25th in penalty-killing (76.8%) from 2021 to 2024. Wins haven’t been overwhelmingly common throughout the honeymoon and the team’s enduring weaknesses show little indication of improvement. 

Even with two rounds of the playoffs under their belt, little about a .490 points percentage over three seasons is appealing, either to potential new fans or those already following the team. With the taste of the postseason lingering on their tongues, the latter are unlikely to be convinced anything but contention is productive. Worse, Seattle’s few successes have been hidden behind staggering paywalls which have driven away interest reflected in poor TV ratings. 

Over the last three seasons, the Kraken averaged a 0.17 rating across 21 nationally-broadcast regular season games including the 2024 Winter Classic, which earned the lowest ratings in the event’s 15-year history. Ratings for ROOT broadcasts at home struggled similarly. As reported by The Seattle Times, the Kraken earned the same 0.7 rating for their first eight games of the 2023-24 season as they did their first nine of the 2022-23 season, failing to capitalize on the momentum of a miraculous postseason run in between. 

Jon Lewis, founder of Sports Media Watch and a reporter covering the sports media industry for two decades, believes there is “intrigue in the market” for Seattle’s success. Based in a vibrant professional sports landscape home to the 11th-largest American NHL TV market, potential exists for the Kraken to foster as devoted a fan base as their larger regional counterparts have done. That is, if they give fans a reason to watch now that broadcasts are more accessible.

“If you have a good team, you’ll break through anywhere,” Lewis says. “If Seattle can put together a top quality team and regular playoff appearances, maybe even a title, the Mariners, the Seahawks– that won’t matter. They’ll still be a big deal there.” 

“It all comes back to the main reason why we’re all here, is to watch our teams win.” 

Considering the murky state of the team’s season ticket demand, Lewis believes the issues of viewership and ticket sales may be connected. 

“It’s not necessarily even clear yet that the Kraken will be the kind of hit that everybody in the NHL wants them to be,” Lewis says. “In a situation like this one, it would seem to be more the case that the lack of interest on TV is also just a lack of interest in going to the games.”

When the NHL’s Board of Governors voted unanimously to approve expansion to Seattle in 2018, they did so with confidence in the region’s interest provided by a lucrative season ticket deposit drive eight months prior. Thirty-five thousand deposits were collected within a matter of hours of the sale’s opening. Ten thousand additional season ticket hopefuls were waitlisted, a number that grew to 53,000 by August 2020. 

The Kraken unveiled the High Tide Waitlist in June 2021, charging a maximum of 10,000 additional fans $250 annually for the chance to purchase season tickets should any sold-out seats open up. Although it is unclear why the High Tide Waitlist replaced a previous unpaid Ticketmaster waitlist, it became the only one funneling surplus season ticket demand prior to and entering the inaugural season. 

Waitlists are customary for professional teams that have sold out season tickets. Most NHL teams don’t have a waitlist, but the nine teams that do– including original six teams the Toronto Maple Leafs and Boston Bruins, as well as the 2017 expansion Vegas Golden Knights– are open about the fact. 

Screenshot from Toronto Maple Leafs’ team site.

Davy Jones’ Locker Room learned in February of rumors that the High Tide Waitlist shuttered, leaving the team theoretically without a reservoir of season ticket demand. The only mention of the Waitlist still on the team’s website is an article announcing its opening. Several requests to confirm whether the High Tide Waitlist still exists went unanswered, and a source within the organization did not receive a response in their inquiry about the waitlist, either. 

At request for comment, the Seattle Kraken provided the following statement to Davy Jones’ Locker Room: 

“The High Tide Waitlist was created leading up to our inaugural season. Over the first two seasons, we were able to offer everyone previously on the High Tide Waitlist multiple opportunities to purchase 44-and 22-game plans. We have pivoted from a waitlist to offering limited half & full season plans.” 

Season ticket demand necessitated a waitlist at one point and apparently no longer. Reasons as to why demand has declined are unknown, yet raises concerns regarding Seattle’s ability to retain initial honeymoon demand– and demand at all– long-term.

While expansion isn’t finalized, the imminent resurrection of the SuperSonics means the Kraken may soon face more competition for fans than ever before. Immediate success may not find the Sonics in their hypothetical first season back in Seattle, but lasting fervor for the team exists beyond their honeymoon because their popularity has sustained itself for the 16 years since their relocation. 

“Seattle probably wanted an NBA team more than it wanted an NHL team– to get the Sonics back,” Lewis says. “It’s a lot of money to go [Kraken] games, especially in a city like Seattle. It’s not cheap. It’s not necessarily convenient. And if the team is not contending, then people have other ways to spend their time.” 

When it comes to sports, Seattle is loyal to a fault. The Mariners are the only active MLB franchise still waiting for their World Series debut, and the Seahawks boast one championship to show for almost fifty years as a team. But with the NBA’s return on the horizon– whose regular and postseason overlap entirely with the NHL’s– the Kraken don’t have decades to convince fans they should spend their time at the rink, not courtside.

Two lucrative free agency signings and a wealth of organizational changes are a good start to demonstrating Seattle can make the necessary moves to build a winning team. Until the right results roll in, their work isn’t done. 

National broadcast ratings sourced from Showbuzz Daily, Sports Media Watch. Advertisement and link for alternative ticket packages removed from team’s statement for relevancy.

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