NEWSLETTER
Last night the Chicago Blackhawks’ plan to rebuild took a strong, hard turn in a significantly more positive direction. In case you missed it, they won the No. 1 pick in the 2023 NHL Draft Lottery, and will undoubtedly select Connor Bedard when they’re on the clock on June 28 in Nashville.
(LOL it’s in Nashville, too… that’s great! Hopefully they allow people in Illinois to buy tickets to the draft.)
Bedard will become the second player in the 98-year history of the Blackhawks to be drafted first overall, joining Patrick Kane in 2007.
When general manager Kyle Davidson spoke with the media shortly after the announcement on ESPN, he tried to keep a strong poker face. He couldn’t come out and say “I can’t wait to see Connor Bedard in a Blackhawks’ sweater!” because he hadn’t officially drafted him — yet. But I think we confidently know where this is going.
And Davidson acknowledged how important Bedard can be to his rebuild plan.
“I just said, ‘Wow,’” Davidson said Monday night. “You understand the impact that a first overall pick can have — and having the first overall pick in the right year. Hopefully that’s what we’ve got here. It can change a franchise, it can change a city and it can change an era in a team’s history. So there’s a lot of weight to that.”
Bedard may be the LeBron James of the NHL. With the growth of media in the past decade, no NHL prospect has had as much of his development broken down, poured over and raved about — ever. There was no Twitter when Sidney Crosby was playing junior. The number of outlets diving into juniors was growing when Connor McDavid was playing for Erie in the OHL 9-10 years ago, but it wasn’t nearly as deep as it is now.
Like LeBron, Bedard’s legend has been growing since he was 13 years old; he was labeled “The Future of Hockey” by Ken Campbell at The Hockey News before his 14th birthday. He’s been the centerpiece of Canadian national teams full of players older than him for years. He’s been in front of microphones for almost a half decade and is incredible well spoken. Back in early March, Bedard was in full veteran mode answering questions about potentially being the top pick.
Still needs to prove himself? Puts on reading glasses…
Yeah. He’s special. And he’s unique. Here’s how Harman Dayal at The Athletic described his game at the end of March:
Bedard is extremely gifted beyond his otherworldly shot. The biggest threat of a player like McDavid or MacKinnon is that they’ll blow by you and get behind your defense. With Bedard, the threat is he has an endless array of weapons — a tremendous shot, puck skills, hockey sense, creativity and deception — that leaves defensemen with almost no idea what he’s going to do next.
The Chicago Blackhawks are going to select a player who could change everything. Davidson had every right to be comfortable selecting Adam Fantilli or Leo Carlsson or even Matvei Michkov — they’re probably going to be stars for years.
But Bedard is the one.
And, at No. 1, he’ll be coming to Chicago.
