Seattle's ask for Shane Wright is so high it scared off Canadian team from making deal

Rick Dhaliwal reported on Oilers Now that Vancouver called Seattle about Wright, and the Kraken came back asking for Zeev Buium or Tom Willander.

Those are not two names pulled off a depth chart.

Patrik Allvin was fired as Canucks general manager in April after Vancouver finished 25-49-8, last in the league.

In June, Seattle hired him as vice president and assistant general manager under Jason Botterill, with Botterill saying publicly that Allvin would work closely with him on pro scouting.

Allvin drafted Willander 11th overall in 2023. Allvin acquired Buium in the Quinn Hughes trade last December.

Coverage of executive firings tracks contracts and severance. It almost never tracks the proprietary knowledge that leaves with the executive.

Allvin has Vancouver's internal grades, medicals, and development notes on both defencemen.

Botterill can now price a trade against Vancouver's own private file on itself.

That is why the ask lands so precisely. Seattle did not shoot high and hope; it named the two assets it can value better than the team that owns them.

Wright has almost no leverage. His agent Kurt Overhardt told Elliotte Friedman that Botterill agreed to move him this summer, and once a trade request is public, the price normally collapses toward the buyer.

Seattle asked for a top-four defenceman anyway. A club with no leverage does not anchor that high unless it believes it knows something.

Ryan Johnson said no, which is correct for a rebuild sitting on Buium and Willander.

The transferable lesson is bigger than one call.

Every fired GM who resurfaces as a pro scout somewhere else is a standing information asymmetry against his old club.

Seattle just showed the league what it looks like when a team decides to spend it.

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