Seattle Kraken postgame salmon toss, explained

The Seattle Kraken salmon toss is one of the best new traditions in the NHL and in sports but what exactly are they doing and why?

For the 2021-22 NHL season, the Seattle Kraken are finally here with their inaugural campaign and, with it, we’re starting to get a look into some of the new traditions that the expansion franchise is trying to adopt.

One that hockey fans are loving is the Kraken postgame salmon toss.

If you haven’t seen it yet, the Seattle players toss salmon (ones that are rubber or stuffed, not real fish) over the glass and into the fans after the game.

Besides being wonderfully weird, though, what is this new NHL tradition all about?

Seattle Kraken salmon toss postgame tradition, explained

Essentially, we’re looking at the Kraken trying to adopt a famous part of Seattle culture into their traditions and rituals.

Pike Place Market is one of the biggest attractions in Seattle where you can see vendors and fishermen tossing fish to one another as they’re being packaged and sold. It’s truly a sight to behold.

This is clearly an homage to that as the Kraken try to endear themselves to the city as an expansion NHL franchise.

On top of that, a cool wrinkle to it is that it appears that the Kraken award the honor of the postgame salmon toss to the team’s three stars of the night. Thus, it’s a way to give the standout performers at a home game a distinction in a cool way beyond just putting them on the video board.

So there you have it. It might be a bit zany and some might call it contrived but, in the NHL world, it’s often the weirder the better when it comes to traditions, so this certainly fits the bill.