That is a big contract for essentially 1 season. Let him prove it before you give it to him.

$7 x 5

Literally every GM in the NHL: We don’t do that here

So…let him walk to UFA?

Lots of options.
A.) Agree to a more reasonable deal.
B.) accept the Arbitration Value and kick the can to the TDL or next year where we've even seen Severson as a pending UFA get something.
C.) trade him to another team that IS willing to overpay for his services.

I'm not a Kraken fan per say, but it was fun watching them last year...I don't dislike them at all! I'd rather trade someone that's getting greedy and get value back than agree to $8M a year and have them become one of the worst contracts in the NHL. It's just too risky. He's had 1 good season and wouldn't have been exposed for Seattle to take if STL thought he was going to be worth $8M per year. Jeff Skinner comes to mind. Can't argue that he scored 82 points last year. He's still not worth $9M.

Sorry to say it but Dunn's next contract is going to cause a bit of discomfort. A couple of quick comparables would be Sergachev and Nurse. I'm not a fan of either of those deals either, and the cap will be going up quite a bit in the next couple of years.

Add to it that Seattle can't afford to walk away from Dunn right now. There's no one even close to being able to play his role in the lineup.

Worth it or not, it's what the market affords for a player of his talent. Arbitration will solidify that.