Jacob Melanson has given the Kraken something a lot of teams chase and few can truly bottle: a player who can tilt a game by sheer force. And in doing that, the 23-year-old forward has put himself in a strange little Seattle conversation alongside Ichiro Suzuki - not with a bat, but with hits.
Ichiro’s 262-hit season for the Mariners in 2004 remains one of the cleanest contact seasons in baseball history, topping George Sisler’s 257 and standing as a record for 84 years. The NHL’s version of hits, meanwhile, has only been officially tracked since 2007-08, so the comparison lives in a very different universe. Still, the league’s current single-season standard is a monster one: Kiefer Sherwood’s 462 hits for the Vancouver Canucks in 2024-25.
Melanson just signed a three-year, $4.35 million extension after a 36-game run with Seattle that made his case loud and clear. Working on the fourth line, he piled up 188 hits - 5.2 per game - while averaging only 9:22 of ice time. That rate tops even some of the NHL’s heaviest recent hitters.
“I’m feeling awesome. My fiancé and I are over the moon to have the deal done and be back in Seattle for another three years. It’s an amazing fan base.”
Coachella Valley Firebirds vice president Troy Bodie watched the hit count climb and wasn’t exactly shocked.
“It’s a bit outrageous, but not surprising to those who know his game,” Bodie told The Desert Sun. “There’s different ways to impact the game and its not always with your stick.”
That kind of physical edge has become Melanson’s calling card, even if the box score doesn’t always sparkle. He scored two goals and five points in those 36 games with the Kraken, but offense has never been the only lane for him. In 28 games with Coachella Valley last year, he put up nine goals and 19 points, and he once had a three-goal, three-assist game in the QMJHL.
The bigger picture is familiar if you look at the NHL’s top hit men. Sherwood has 134 points in 337 NHL games, Trenin has 120 points in 457 games, and Lauzon has 58 points in 384 games.
None of them were brought in to light up scoreboards. They stuck around because they could wear down opponents, make space, and give their teams a different kind of value.
Melanson has already started preaching that message to younger players with the Firebirds.
“I was trying to teach those guys you can still make it up to the NHL even if the points aren’t coming. It’s about hard work, using your physicality as a strength.”
There’s no mystery about the cost, either. Melanson’s 188 hits led the Kraken despite him playing fewer than half the season in Seattle, and that total ranked 31st in the entire NHL. Bodie put it plainly.
“I don’t know how sustainable it is, because it puts such a toll on your body,” observes Bodie. “But he’s doing what he has to do to earn a spot, and it’s working.”
The wear-and-tear part is real. The Kraken’s 2021 fifth-round pick has already broken his collarbone twice in juniors and broke his leg with the Firebirds during 2024-25.
Even so, there’s a clear sign he’s learning the right lessons from the league’s bruisers: he’s doing it without crossing the line too often. Sherwood had 35 penalty minutes in his record-hits season, Trenin had 38, and Lauzon had 98.
Melanson had 32 penalty minutes in his 36 Kraken games, a pace that works out to about 72 over a full season.
That fits the player he said he wanted to be when Seattle drafted him. Back then, as a teenager, Melanson said he modeled himself after Tom Wilson and Brad Marchand.
“I am the kind of player you don’t see very often any more,” he said to The Northern Light in 2022. “I’m kind of old school. I like to play physical.”
In Other News...
Kraken Prospects Enter Camp With Real Pressure To Stand Out
The Krakens rookie camp opens Sept. 11 with 23 players headed into a setting that can matter just as much for perception as development. Seattle has a mix of forwards, defensemen and goaltenders in the group, with prospects at different stages of the climb and a two-game showcase against the Canucks set for Sept. 12 and 13 to give the organization an immediate look at who can handle game pace right away.
For players such as Jagger Firkus, Jani Nyman and Oscar Fisker Mlgaard, the week is less about being present than about separating from the pack. The Kraken have plenty of young talent trying to turn a camp invite into a real step forward, and while some of these names already carry NHL experience, the challenge now is to show they belong in the conversation before the focus shifts from rookie camp to the bigger decisions that follow. [Read more 🡒]