Biggest Preseason Question: Chicago Blackhawks

      The Hawks are the perfect team for channel flippers (except for opening night when ESPN has them in a standalone time slot). Whenever your competitive game of choice breaks for commercial, head on over to check in on the Hawks game in hopes that Bedard and Taylor Hall are jumping on the ice. You'll get 40-60 seconds of high-flying, flashy fun where the Calder favorite carves through opponents and unleashes his missile of a shot. As soon as they head to the bench, you can tune back out because I promise you won’t be missing anything. 

      Let’s get one thing straight: the Blackhawks are in the midst of a complete rebuild and are possibly going to be even worse than they were last season, and that’s saying a lot. Outside of Bedard, Hall, top D-man Seth Jones, and *maybe* Lucas Rychel, they are going to be borderline unwatchable. They added well respected veterans in Nick Foligno and Corey Perry to meet the salary floor and provide Bedard with some leadership, and they added Taylor Hall to give him a linemate who can feed his offensive game and hopefully help him feel less alone in this barren wasteland of a roster. 

      While that sounds like criticism, it’s really an indication that GM Kyle Davidson is doing everything right. He’s effectively stripped this team down to the floorboards and increased his chances of drafting another elite talent to grow with the phenom he just drafted 1st overall. He’s made smart additions that will teach his prospects how to handle themselves like pros without improving the team enough to hurt their draft position. I particularly like the addition of Hall, who can relate to the pressure placed on Bedard to be the savior of the franchise after experiencing a similar situation early in his career with Edmonton.