Seattle Starts Building Their Roster
2021-08-16Part 1 of 2
TAMPA, Flor. – From his satellite office in Tampa, Florida (traveling sucks these days), the Seattle Kraken GM, Brandyn Errickson, was tasked with selecting one player from every other EHE franchise to start building the first Seattle NHL/AHL rosters.
In an almost 90-minute conference call with league commissioner Kevin Lacy, GM Errickson, decked out in the all new and VERY official EHE Seattle Kraken merchandise, made his 31 selections which had to include at least 14 forwards, 9 defensemen, 3 goalies, 20 active contracts and $48.4M in salary.
Going in reverse order of the 2020-2021 season standings, Seattle started the draft by selecting their first defenseman Victor Mete from the Montreal Canadiens. An original 3rd round pick of the Washington Capitals in the 2016 EHE entry draft, Mete played 104 games for the Canadiens over the past 2 seasons and netted 36 points. Depending on how things play out Mete will probably start the season in the yet to be named AHL affiliate.
Next on the board were the Edmonton Oilers, from which Seattle chose their first forward, and what seemed to be a running theme, a solid bottom 6 guy in Nick Cousins. Vancouver followed by losing Vinnie Hinostroza, San Jose had defenseman Troy Stecher selected and Calgary saw Riley Stillman leave to join the new Seattle franchise. Through the first 5 picks Seattle had 3 of their 9 required defenseman and 2 of their 14 required forwards.
A string of four forwards followed with the Kraken selecting winger, Ryan Hartman, from Winnipeg, center, Nic Roy, from Washington, Brandon Hagel from St. Louis and Lias Andersson from Detroit. While most mock drafts had Winnipeg losing Jordan Eberle, GM Errickson decided to go a cheaper route with Hartman. GM Errickson had to be elated to land Roy, Hagel and Andersson with a combined average age of just 22.6 years old.
After the string of forwards commenced, the Pittsburgh Penguins were on the board from which Seattle chose Dennis Gilbert. Not a flashy name by any means, but he should be able to help out Seattle’s AHL affiliate’s backend. A team near and dear to the commissioner’s heart, Carolina Hurricanes, were up next and Seattle laid the hammer down by taking their first goaltender, Cal Petersen. Kevin at this point had to take a break to recollect himself, but he was able to soldier on even after losing Peterson.
Up next were the New Jersey Devils of which the Kraken selected their youngest player of the draft in Isac Lundestrom. Lundestrom was the 17th overall selected in the 2018 EHE draft and should be a solid contributor in the AHL this upcoming season. The 13th selection was from the Toronto Maple Leafs and from them the Kraken went a bit off the board by taking Nicolas Meloche. Meloche filled the 5th defenseman of the required 9 and that probably had a fair bit to do with this pick.
Zach Aston-Reese was then selected from the Columbus Blue Jackets followed by goaltender Jake Allen being selected from the he Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. It’s almost fitting that these two were chosen back-to-back as they were packaged together after the draft and shipped to Calgary with Seattle getting two 3rd round picks and AHL goalie Evan Fitzpatrick.
Halfway through the draft, the new Seattle franchise has fulfilled 5 of the required 9 defensemen, 7 of the required 14 forwards and 2 of the required 3 goaltenders. The active contract count is currently at 9 of 20 and the total active salary is a paltry $12,892,500. With some of the biggest EHE franchises still left on the board and over $35M left to acquire, it should make for an exciting and interesting part 2. Be sure to follow up later this week when our Seattle Kraken Expansion draft recap concludes.
You drafted five players named Nic or Nick!
Seattle Starts Building Their Roster
The EHE's newest franchise begins selecting players from the other EHE franchises.
Good read, Brandyn. Looking forward to Part 2
Seattle Starts Building Their Roster
The EHE's newest franchise begins selecting players from the other EHE franchises.