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C Connor Bedard - Regina Pats, WHL (2023 Draft) Part 2

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EichelFan15 said:
The post reeks of someone trying desperately to appear impartial while giving completely backhanded/incorrect assessments. Starts with the first sentence about SOG and continues through your whole blurb.
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I disagree as he has brought up size concerns before with centers and it's a valid point to consider although he is only 2 inches shorter than Crosby and 1 inch shorter than Point and obviously skilled enough in other areas to compensate for his lack of size.

Heck he might even grow 2 inches and then its a moot point.
 
WhiskeyYourTheDevils said:
Tyler Johnson was a top 6C in his prime at 5'8
Yanni Gourde is a top 6C
Marchessault has played as a top 6C in the past
Brayden Point is a legit 1C at "5'10"

I don't think height prevents guys with Bedard's talent from being centers in this league. And he's likely to be at least 5'10 by the time he's done growing (he already looks close to that height).
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But Johnson and Marchessault are not top six centers now. Gourde, I guess may be one. On an expansion team and he barely has reached 200 career points at age 30, but it’s not a terrible example.

Does it prevent Bedard? Probably not, but it’s not something that can be ignored. There are almost never top 6 centers below 5’10. At any given time, there are 0 or 1. And people have been saying Rossi will also be a top six center. I’ll take Bedard over Rossi as more likely to be a top six center, but the point is that these guys aren’t common for a reason.
 
surixon said:
Not sure how you can say he's not an elite skater with straight face. If he's not an elite skater then extremely few are.

He has everything you want in a skater. Highly explosive acceleration, terrific edge work and elite top speed that allows him to blow by people.
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So then what does elite mean to you?
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
But Johnson and Marchessault are not top six centers now. Gourde, I guess may be one. On an expansion team and he barely has reached 200 career points at age 30, but it’s not a terrible example.

Does it prevent Bedard? Probably not, but it’s not something that can be ignored. There are almost never top 6 centers below 5’10. At any given time, there are 0 or 1. And people have been saying Rossi will also be top six. I’ll take Bedard over Rossi, but the point is that these guys aren’t common for a reason.
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It can absolutely be ignored. The Lightning just won back to back cups with Point (generously listed at 5'10, he was 5'9 when he was 18), Gourde (5'9), and Johnson (5'8) as 3 of their centers.
 
EichelFan15 said:
You form (blatantly incorrect) opinions about players with limited viewings and then you are biased toward defending your initial assessment, going against common sense and obvious evidence to the contrary.
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In other words, a bunch of word salad.

If anyone has a bias here, it seems to be you that admonishes people for not viewing certain players like you do before you explain how you’ve watched them play more than anyone on the website.
 
I mean I still believe he's got potential to be the next Crosby-esque player(production not style) but a 4 goal game against Austria really isn't anything crazy. It does excite me to watch what he can do against some of the better teams. It felt like most of the Canadians were on autopilot after the quick lead.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
In other words, a bunch of word salad.

If anyone has a bias here, it seems to be you that admonishes people for not viewing certain players like you do before you explain how you’ve watched them play more than anyone on the website.
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I probably have watched a few of these guys play more than anyone on here and dissected their games so I feel pretty strongly about my opinions. But unlike you, I am willing to change my mind as new info is presented. I also haven't been wrong yet, at least with anything I've said about Bedard.

I do agree that my only concern is the height factor. The pace he plays at is is his strongest attribute tho.
 
EichelFan15 said:
I probably have watched a few of these guys play more than anyone on here and dissected their games so I feel pretty strongly about my opinions. But unlike you, I am willing to change my mind as new info is presented. I also haven't been wrong yet, at least with anything I've said about Bedard.

I do agree that my only concern is the height factor. The pace he plays at is is his strongest attribute tho.
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I don’t even know what you are criticizing from my post. I believe he looks like a very good prospect, but has some flaws I explained, that will keep him from being generational. Do you think he’ll be generational?
 
How good will this kid be when he actually physically matures. He looks like he’s 12. He’s playing super smart to make up for his lack of (relative to his competition) strength. I’m see another Marcel Dionne level talent here.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
The SOG number is exaggerated. Once he got two, they were trying to get him the puck to break records instead of making the best hockey play. It was that type of game where it was over after the first period because Austria was never going to come from behind from more than one or two.

I think Bedard has shown very obvious elite offensive potential. He maybe can’t carry a WHL at age 16, and his 15 year old season numbers were a fluky start, but I think it’d be stupid to say he doesn’t have obvious star scorer potential for the NHL. He has an elite shot, attacks the middle, dangles well, is a good passer, and an above average skater.

Where I worry though is his physical and positional projection. I know people are going to go crazy with the usual comments, but any prospect that is shorter than 5’10 in their D-2 is someone that you have to mention their size as a potential limiting factor. There simply aren’t top six centers in the NHL that are shorter than 5’10. If Bedard doesn’t grow, which can’t be a given, he’d have to be an outlier to play center. Maybe he can be due to his scoring talent, but that point has to be acknowledged.

I don’t find his skating to be as good as I initially thought either. It’s good, but I wouldn’t say it’s elite. It’s probably good enough for an undersized forward, potentially for center where you generally need to be a better skater, but I wouldn’t call him a blazing skater. And I don’t know that I’d hold it against him that he’s pretty average physically and with his two way game at his age, but at some point it will need to improve to project as any more than a pure scoring guy at the NHL level.

This is all to say that I think he will be really good, but it’d be stupid to ignore that his game and current projection has clear flaws. If you have decided he’ll be generational, logic probably isn’t what you are looking for. The kid is an exciting prospect, but if anyone is expecting this guy to replace Crosby and McDavid eventually as the face of the league, I think you are mistaken or the next generation of players isn’t as good as the current one.
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Not that it really matters but the SOG number isn’t exaggerated. He had 7 shots in the first period when the record wasn’t thought of. And 2 of the last 5 shots were goals. I didn’t see anyone go out of their way to get him the puck in a situation where it wasn’t the best play.
 
prongertheman9 said:
Not that it really matters but the SOG number isn’t exaggerated. He had 7 shots in the first period when the record wasn’t thought of. And 2 of the last 5 shots were goals. I didn’t see anyone go out of their way to get him the puck in a situation where it wasn’t the best play.
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The last few minutes they threw him over the boards for extra shifts without his normal line-mates.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
So then what does elite mean to you?
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I mean I described in the second paragraph what I like about his skating. Different players use their skating differently.

He has elite acceleration and great top speed. He can switch gears quickly. He also has very good edgework and can change directions very quickly.

Different players use their skating differently. Take Michknov for instance, he lacks the top speed and explosiveness of Bedard but is amazing on his edges. As such He plays a very different game then Conner.

Both players are elite skaters but they are elite in different ways.

I see Bedard as an explosive skater that uses his strengths ala Mackinnon and Michknov to use more in terms of edgework ala Kane.
 
No they didn’t. He got one shift out of order at the end of his game, with his normal line mates and it didn’t result in a shot. He walked the other team and then passed it to Desnoyers who hit the post and then his stick broke in half trying to take a shot with second left.
 
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prongertheman9 said:
No they didn’t. He got one shift out of order at the end of his game, with his normal line mates and it didn’t result in a shot. He walked the other team and then passed it to Desnoyers who hit the post and then his stick broke in half trying to take a shot with second left.
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I’m pretty sure they counted a SOG that last shift. The shot went on net, even if his stock broke.

The point stands either way. You acknowledged he got a shift out of turn. Trying to make it seem like they weren’t trying late on to get him more goals is a little disingenuous. I’m sure there were plenty of good chances for any player because the Austrian players can’t defend. It doesn’t mean they would’ve made all those same plays if Bedard had 0 goals at the time. There was a concerted effort to try to get him more goals.
 
surixon said:
I mean I described in the second paragraph what I like about his skating. Different players use their skating differently.

He has elite acceleration and great top speed. He can switch gears quickly. He also has very good edgework and can change directions very quickly.

Different players use their skating differently. Take Michknov for instance, he lacks the top speed and explosiveness of Bedard but is amazing on his edges. As such He plays a very different game then Conner.

Both players are elite skaters but they are elite in different ways.

I see Bedard as an explosive skater that uses his strengths ala Mackinnon and Michknov to use more in terms of edgework ala Kane.
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I think you vastly overrate Bedard’s speed. His speed for a 5’9 forward is nowhere near elite, in my opinion. He’d easily lose a foot race over a short distance to MacKinnon.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
I think you vastly overrate Bedard’s speed. His speed for a 5’9 forward is nowhere near elite, in my opinion. He’d easily lose a foot race over a short distance to MacKinnon.
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Your looking at him as a 16 year old vs Mackinnon in his mid 20's. It's relative, I fully expect that as Bedard adds strength as he gets older he will become more explosive.

Mackinnon didn't look near as explosive as he is now when he was Bedard's age as well.
 
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