The Seattle Kraken’s three best non-selections in the 2021 NHL Expansion Draft
By Nick Herrera
1. P.K. Subban
Avoiding taking the “Subbanator” should be almost a no-brainer, but an ownership group might be touching base with the front office on the possibility of drafting some personality that can be a fan favorite. In that light, one could see the validity of that point of view. P.K. Subban has already made some appearances on ESPN and could be a decent early ambassador to new fans who come to hockey through ESPN and its new NHL TV deal.
From a hockey perspective, it is a good thing Seattle reportedly did not select Subban. The veteran blueliner has shown signs of aging in each of the past three seasons, falling quite far from his Norris Trophy-winning season in 2012-2013. Subban is still a serviceable NHL player at the age of 32, and Seattle would only need to pay him his $9 million dollar salary for one more season.
The biggest reason that Seattle has done a good thing in not selecting Subban, however is the absolute excessive amount of quality defensemen available for them to choose from. If you look over the exposed player lists from around the NHL, there is no shortage of blueliners that play as a top-four defenseman for their current team. Nearly all of those are without being paid as much as Subban is paid, Vince Dunn being a prime example.
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Avoiding Subban will enable Seattle to potentially build a defensive core that is made up entirely of second-pairing defensemen – something the Vegas Golden Knights did with great success in 2017. Obviously, there are no top-tier players there, but if you look at the current cellar dwellers of the NHL, they would love a chance at having the caliber of defense the Seattle Kraken reportedly will assemble tonight.