NHL Trade Deadline Primer: Contenders should be calling about Jared McCann

Seattle does not have to trade him, but it only takes one call and one offer.

The NHL Trade Deadline is on March 7, so it is time to start taking a look at some players that could be on the move and some bigger picture trade deadline subjects. Today we focus on Seattle Kraken forward Jared McCann who could be one of the more interesting players available.

---

When it comes to building their NHL roster the Seattle Kraken have not done much right over their first four years in the league. The immediate success of the NHL’s previous expansion team, the Vegas Golden Knights, set an outrageously high bar for Seattle, and it simply has not been able to come close to duplicating that path.

Part of it is the NHL’s other general managers learned from a lot of the mistakes they made with Vegas.

Another part of it is Seattle has just made some really head-scratching decisions along the way, and still has as recently as this past offseason (Chandler Stephenson? Really?).

One of the few things they did get right is getting forward Jared McCann in the expansion draft process, and then signing him to what has turned out to be a solid value contract under the cap.

Since joining the Kraken in their debut season, his 110 goals are 46 more than any other player that has played for the Kraken, while his 224 points are 54 more than any other Kraken player. He has been, by far, the most productive player on the roster and has really put all of his talents together to become a legitimate top-line player. That included a 40-goal season two years ago.

With Seattle on its way to a third non-playoff season in four years, and with the team not really having a lot of obvious trade candidates to sell, McCann’s name has started to surface in trade speculation.

There is no guarantee the Kraken will move him, nor are they under any pressure to do so given that he still has a couple of years of term remaining on his contract, but if they are listening he is a player contenders should be making calls about.

Hell, they should be calling even if Seattle is not actively listening.

Let’s talk about it.