This is where I am on Bedard.
I don’t think anyone can honestly say that this season has been anything but a disappointment overall. I think we all hoped and expected he would take a significant step forward, production-wise, from last season and it just hasn’t happened. Where I get frustrated is people who are just constantly complaining and worrying about him without any kind of appreciation of how lucky we are to have a guy who is almost certain to be an All Star player for a long time on this team. I get that with the hype pre-draft that his current level may be underwhelming, but that doesn’t change the fact that we have an awesome young player who has stepped into the league and produced at a rate that only few have.
Now there are many reasons for his underwhelming production. Some of them on him, some of them situational. He needs to get stronger and improve his skating/endurance. He needs to trust his teammates more and not try to do as much himself. He needs to diversify his zone entries. He needs to harness his emotion and the pressure better to perform at the highest level when it is most important. The caveat with all those things is that he is not yet 20 years old. There are very very few players that have walked into this league and handled all those things well.
Situationally, obviously he is on a bad team. He spends many shifts hemmed in his zone, he rarely has anyone else make plays to get him good chances, he rarely has time and space, and it seems like the entire team just doesn’t get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to penalties and generating power plays. Now, before I hear about how Donato or TT are producing, it’s simply not comparable. The level of attention that Bedard receives and the way opposing teams game plan around him is on a completely different level. If anything, they have benefitted significantly from that, Donato many times as a linemate and TT on the power play where he has so much more time because opponents flood Bedard’s side.
While we can all agree that his production has not taken a step, I do think people are overlooking the small steps he has made in other parts of his game. In-zone on the PP he has gotten even better. He is already among the best players in the league on the PP. The fact that the Hawks have been top 10 on the PP ,despite the personnel, is a testament to that fact. Defensively, while he still has a ways to go, he has made some subtle strides. His positioning is much better, and is no longer flying the zone nearly the way he was last season (I actually think this is one of the reasons his production is down). His faceoffs have also improved significantly as the season has gone on.
