A recent top-five draft pick doesn’t land on the trade market every day, and when one does, he usually isn’t lining up Vancouver as his first choice. But that’s the spot the Canucks may now have to consider with Seattle centre Shane Wright, a player whose name still carries plenty of shine even if his NHL path has been anything but straight.
For Vancouver, the appeal is obvious. The Canucks are in the early stages of a rebuild, and the idea of adding a young right-shot centre who was once viewed as a possible No. 1 overall pick is hard to ignore. The question is whether the upside is real enough to justify the gamble.
To get there, you have to sort through what Wright’s Seattle tenure actually looked like.
His first year after the draft was a carousel. Seattle had to decide whether to send him back to the OHL, where he had already dominated, or keep him with the big club.
The Kraken chose the NHL, or more precisely, chose to have him practice with the team. Wright played seven of Seattle’s first 13 games and averaged 8:07 of ice time.
After that, he went to the AHL on a conditioning stint because he was too young for a full assignment down there.
That’s where things briefly clicked. Wright scored four goals in five AHL games, then picked up his first NHL goal in his first game back.
That turned out to be the end of his NHL season. He left to captain Canada at the World Juniors and helped them win gold, then joined the Windsor Spitfires of the OHL before returning to the AHL for the playoffs.
In a few months, he had worn four different jerseys.
Former Kraken coach Dan Bylsma summed up the chaos this way to TheAHL.com: “There was a lot that happened to Shane, and a lot going on with his situation,” former Kraken coach Dan Bylsma told TheAHL.com when asked about Wright’s draft plus-one season.
“It didn’t feel like he had an opportunity to just play hockey and display how good of a player he is.”
Wright’s 2023-24 season brought more stability in the AHL, where he posted 22 goals and 47 points in 59 games. For one of the league’s youngest players, that was a strong year.
He also added four goals and five points in eight NHL games. Still, those numbers didn’t exactly scream future star, especially with Logan Cooley, picked one spot ahead of him, putting up 20 goals and 44 points in 82 NHL games in the same season.
Then came 2024-25, when Wright finally became a full-time NHL player under Bylsma, who had been promoted to Kraken head coach. The start was rough - one goal and two points in his first 18 games - but he finished strong, leading Seattle with 42 points over the final 61 games.
That momentum didn’t carry over into 2025-26.
Under new head coach Lane Lambert, Wright slipped backward. Lambert was the third head coach of Wright’s young NHL career, and the usage told the story.
Even though Wright had led the Kraken in scoring for much of the previous season, he was essentially treated like a fourth-line centre from opening night. Chandler Stephenson and Matty Beniers handled the top two centre spots, Frederick Gaudreau took most of the third-line work, and Wright was left on the outside of the main rotation.
At five-on-five, he ranked 12th among Kraken forwards in ice time. He didn’t kill penalties, and he was pushed to the second power-play unit. Lambert didn’t blast him publicly, but he did frame Wright’s situation in terms of sacrifice.
“Sometimes you have to sacrifice a little bit of your personal statistics in order to embrace the way to play, in order for the team to have success,” Lambert told the media back in January. “I think he’s done an amazing job with that, I really do.”
The problem is that the deployment said plenty. Wright went from building chemistry with players such as Eeli Tolvanen and Jared McCann to rotating through a long list of linemates while getting fourth-line minutes. His most common partners in 2025-26 were Berkley Catton, Kappo Kakko, Jani Nyman and Ryan Winterton.
That’s why a change of scenery makes sense. It also explains why the Canucks should be interested, even if caution is warranted.
Wright is not a sure thing to become a first-line centre. His 1.25 points per 60 last season points to fourth-line production, and his chance generation suggests that output wasn’t just bad luck.
He also did it against weaker competition. Even so, the bulk of his 2024-25 season points to a player who could still settle in as a useful NHL centre.
At his floor, with the right development, he looks more like a high-end third-line pivot.
For Vancouver, the real issue is price.
The Canucks can’t afford to start tossing around premium draft picks or top prospects while they’re still at the beginning of a rebuild. But Wright won’t come cheap either. Jonathan Lekkerimäki could be the cleanest trade piece, though Vancouver would likely need to add to make Seattle interested.
The Kraken were reportedly interested in Willander, too, which raises a tougher question for Vancouver: do you move a player who projects as a second-pairing, right-shot defenceman for a centre who currently looks more like a middle-six forward?
There’s also the possibility of a bigger swing, with some wondering whether Seattle could have interest in an Elias Pettersson-for-Wright deal. The Kraken have recently chased big names, going after Artemi Panarin and Jason Robertson before coming up empty. Still, that kind of swap feels unlikely, especially with Pettersson’s own decline and former Canucks GM Patrik Allvin now working in Seattle, where he has also subtly criticized Pettersson.
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