The expansion draft is less than a week away, and while we’ve all spent months trying to figure out who, exactly, Seattle will pick—if they wanted to take Zach Hyman and then pay him eleventy million dollars, I’d support this!—the Kraken front office has apparently decided to challenge Rick Steves for market share.

The resource guide is 70 pages long. It encompasses just about everything someone new to Seattle could want to know about: child care and Chinese food, realtors and Rainier — the ins and outs and how-tos for new members of the Seattle Kraken.

This is the sort of very practical detail that I find fascinating. A bunch of people in the Kraken’s front office have put together a seventy-page book that covers everything from where to hire a nanny to the best hikes in the Seattle area. This NHL.com article talks about the guide and, more generally, the logistics required to suddenly take on thirty new players, most of whom will be grown-up men with families and not teenage draft picks, and help them quickly set up lives in a brand-new city.

They set up meetings over Zoom, asking for the moving companies used by the other professional athletes in the city, inquiring about the florists they liked, the car services they called, the nannies who cared for their kids. They asked about negative experiences too, wanting to smooth the path to Seattle from their disparate home cities.

Seriously, I think that the Kraken could develop an alternative revenue stream. The attention to detail here—florists!—is impressive.

ICYMI

2021 NHL Draft Profile: Aleksi Heimosalmi - Pension Plan Puppets
He’s a smooth, offensive defenseman from Finland that dazzled at the World U18s

Maple Leafs winger Zach Hyman has permission to talk to other teams - Pension Plan Puppets
The obvious is now explicit: Zach Hyman will leave in free agency.

Darcy Kuemper to solve Toronto’s goalie needs? - Pension Plan Puppets
He leads a long list of goalies the Maple Leafs are said to be interested in.

Stuff We Didn’t Write

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Insider Trading: What is the long-term outlook for Shea Weber? - Video - TSN
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Less than a week until we know which Leaf will be Kraken Seattle's roster
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A lack of consistency kept them from seeing more playoff action, but both have bright futures, assistant coach Luke Richardson says.

From The Branches