Murray Wood: Of Easter bunny bells and Juicy Fruit gum
For Murray Wood, Easter brings to mind grandma's practical advice about repurposing, and some of life's little lessons.
Connor Bedard’s young hockey life has been and will largely be dictated by bingo balls.
They are the things that brought him to Regina in the first place when — thanks to a pair of trades between the Swift Current Broncos and Lethbridge Hurricanes and then Lethbridge and the Regina Pats — the 2020 WHL prospects lottery turned into the first rendition of “Bad for Bedard.”
Swift Current, after going all in to win the Ed Chynoweth Cup in 2018, was in the cellar of the Western Hockey League standings with just 11 wins in 2019 and then just 10 in 2020, though the latter season was shortened because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Part of that all-in strategy was trading its first-round pick in 2020 to Lethbridge for goaltender Stuart Skinner. The following year, Lethbridge, interested in making a run of its own, flipped that pick to Regina for Jake Leschyshyn and Nick Henry.
So on May 25, 2020, while most of the world was still in lockdown and with Bedard just a few days removed from being granted the first exceptional player status in the WHL, he and his family waited to see for the first time in his life how the bingo balls fell.
In fact, the Broncos didn’t win the draft lottery that day; the Prince George Cougars did. However, the Cougars could only move two spots ahead, so they moved from fourth to second while the Pats, through a series of trades, landed the first pick — and quite the exceptional player indeed.
Now, on Monday, Bedard will have the bingo balls again dictate his hockey future.
And just writing that out all seems quite silly, doesn’t it?
A young man, who has all the potential, ability and talent to be the next superstar of the NHL like he made himself in the WHL, has to rely on four bingo balls to decide his entire life.
Of course, he could pull an Eric Lindros and demand a trade, but I don’t think that happens after seeing how loyal he was to the Pats through his career even though it was clear his best chances to win were likely somewhere else.
What if he ends up in Columbus? Or worse, Arizona?
Yes, maybe that’s exactly what those markets need, like Saskatchewan needed Bedard to get the buzz back in arenas and sell out buildings throughout the province whenever he arrived to play.
However, if you’re looking at the best landing spot for Bedard, it’s the team that would draft him first overall if the NHL rid itself of the bingo balls and just gave the first pick to the worst team from the year before.
Anaheim is an up-and-coming team with young stars like Troy Terry, Trevor Zegras and Bedard’s former world junior teammate, Mason McTavish.
And though I’m not a great fan of either market, the next best locations for Bedard to land would be Columbus or Arizona.
Both teams have pieces in place that would complement the young sniper, with Johnny Gaudreau in Columbus and another one of his former gold-medal teammates, Dylan Guenther, in Arizona. The Coyotes also have former first-round pick Clayton Keller coming off a career year.
So on Monday night, the 11 teams eligible will sit by and watch if they win the lottery.
As most of us dream of winning a few million dollars playing the 6/49 or Lotto Max to get to retirement a lot quicker, these NHL teams are hoping for their big dream of landing a talent to hit fast forward on their climb to contender status.
As for Bedard, he’ll again rely on four bingo balls to tell him where he’s moving to next.
Silly.
