In the next entry of our series of Seattle Kraken Grades, we look at a player who could catapult this franchise into the contender category. Matty Beniers, who has already secured some hardware in his short career, is highly-anticipated to acquire a lot more before he hangs up his skates.
In his rookie campaign two seasons ago, Beniers won the Calder Memorial Trophy as the National Hockey League's best rookie. He edged out Edmonton goaltender Stuart Skinner and Buffalo defenseman Owen Power with 160 first-place votes.
But, last season showed a bit of a downslide for the young gun. Even after winning a highly coveted award, and gaining a full year of experience with a playoff series to boot, Beniers back-tracked drastically last season.
Let's take a look.
Season Recap
To sum it up, the entirety of the Seattle Kraken failed to generate offense. Up and down the roster, there was just not enough production in that category to give them any bit of a chance at winning hockey games. Beiners, who is highly gifted in creating offense, was dissapointing to say the least last season.
In 77 games, he only lit the lamp 15 times. This was par for the course with the Kraken, as the team as a whole was the 29th-worst team in the league in scoring goals. To add to his staggering low goal total, he also deflated in assists with 22. Those stats are extremely low for a player getting first-line minutes.
The drop-off in production and overall absence from having any kind of an impact on the game gives him a generous "C". There is a ton of room for improvement, and he is gonna have to pull out all of the stops in 2024-25 to retain his position as the next big thing for the Kraken's future.
To add insult to injury, Beniers and the Kraken have been in contract talks recently, and it has blown up all over the internet. As his rookie contract ended after last season, there has been a lot of intense conversations on what his next deal should be. We have a long summer to go, and I'm sure both sides will come to some sort of agreement before long.
What would you grade Matty Beniers 2023-24 season?