Is This Adulthood?

Wrapping up the Hawks weekend north of the 49th Parallel, and some Bears thoughts that are probably overly-excited but fuck it.

Sector 1901 - Is this Adulthood?

Three of four points wouldn't be what anyone would have expected out of Winnipeg and Edmonton. Should the Hawks get anything from a decidedly uninteresting Flames team (though one that's now 3-0 so maybe we should find them more interesting), and they'd have what the normies would call a successful roadtrip. It's happened before. It probably already is.

Before we get any further into a sum-up of the Hawks' weekend activities, I have to utter an apology. Thanks to CHSN's limited reach and capabilities, and my preset plans, and my obliviousness to how CHSN works at the moment, there wasn't a replay available for me to watch of the Hawks' win in Edmonton. I'll piece together what I can from summaries, stats, and highlights. It won't happen again, though it would be nice if CHSN was an actual big-boy channel and made things easier on everyone. I won't hold my breath, and will adjust accordingly in the future.

Anyway, let's get in up to the wrist as best we can...

• We'll start with what's most important, at least for now, to the Hawks. No matter who is dressed and who is playing with whom and how they're playing and what the record is, the season remains mostly about Connor Bedard's ascension to the penthouse of NHL stars, or at least moving him up the elevator to that.

In that sense, there was some good, some the same from the opening three games. While it would be nice if Bedard was also an analytic wonder in addition to being a scoresheet phenomenon, it's probably going to be a while before that happens. Partly due to his utter helplessness on faceoffs, partly due to work still needing to be done on his defensive game, we're just miles from that.

Which is fine, because Bedard should be able to outscore even a moderate possession-deficit consistently, and it'll matter even less if he can pile up power play points in a way he couldn't last year playing with a unit of wayward clowns. On that front, we're good. He already has two power play assists, and he's 3-0 on even-strength goals vs. against so far on the campaign.

The warning light is he's still not generating enough shots for himself. He's got seven through three games, which wouldn't be enough on its own and looks a shade worse when five of them came against Utah. The MacKinnons and Matthewses of the world get up to four or five shots per game. Bedard's shot being his best weapon, he needs to live in that hood if not beyond it.

On the plus-side, his individual xG is up a shade from last year, and so is the team's xG up so far when he's on the ice, though three games is nowhere near enough to get a good reading. He may need more shots but at least he is getting and generating slightly better chances for his teammates than last season. Baby steps to the elevator and such.

It's also been intriguing to see how other teams counter him, especially on the road. Both the Utah Johnnies and the Oilers just put their top-scoring line against his line, and Bedard mostly got run over possession-wise. The Jets put their best defensive line, anchored by Adam Lowry, out against him for most of Friday night, and Bedard had his best possession game. We'll see how teams treat him away from the UC from here, whether they think just making him play defense is the way to go. And how Luke Richardson slots him when he gets the choice during home games.

• The other main story for the Hawks is that Taylor Hall and Tyler Bertuzzi were both brought to Chicago to make a young center better. It's just that in these three games, it's been Philipp Kurashev and not Bedard. Kurashev's line was dominant in Winnipeg (80 percent xG%), which is not a sentence I'd ever thought I'd write. They seem to create something every shift,

As said before, we really have no idea where Kurashev fits on this team in the years to come. But what Kyle Davidson and Luke Richardson want going forward are options, and Kurashev being a capable center presents them.

• A lot was made about the more structured play the Hawks had in Winnipeg, especially in the 3rd when protecting a lead that they were unfortunate to surrender. Though not that unfortunate. Even protecting a lead, giving up 16 shots is still excessive, but they kept the quality of chances down. We wouldn't want to see the Hawks going into a 1-2-2 shell for a whole period when they're playing games that really matter again, but also given the paucity of go-go on the blue line, there might not be much choice right now.
• Speaking of which, it only took two games for Richardson to get back to pairing Aelx Vlasic and Seth Jones, who took some serious dungeon shifts against the Oilers (both under 20 percent in offensive zone starts). The results weren't great, but they were never going to be in Edmonton, and Vlasic needs to be out there for all the big moments anyway. It was also utterly pointless in having Vlasic carry around Brodie while Alec Martinez and Seth Jones took the most minutes. Martinez needs to either be tutoring a young player or his existence here is pointless.
• Shame for Arvid Soderblom to not only lose the shutout but not even get a win when he clearly deserved one. I was first drawn to Soderblom two seasons ago watching how calm he was in net. As Darren Pang (who is completely reborn next to Rick Ball on the broadcast) pointed out, last season's troubles for Soderblom were based in his insistence on being too calm and too focused on his technique. Sometimes as a goalie, you gotta Hasek a couple saves and scrambles during a game. That ease looked confident again with Soderblom on Friday, and though he'll be splitting starts in Rockford soon enough, an assured Mrazek injury somewhere down the road means he'll get more looks.
• Given the way the Oilers and their goalies have started the season, Mrazek maybe should have kept the real estate listings with him when the Hawks left on Saturday night.
• How long do you think after the creation of CHSN did Howard Ankin come bursting through the door to be the first advertiser? Seven seconds? And would anyone trust Ankin if he told you tomorrow was Tuesday?
• Kyle Connor is definitely a go-for-the-green-in-two guy, as he always seems to choose the hardest option with the puck. He's talented enough to get away with most of the time, but no one in the league attempts more reverses while stickhandling than Connor.
• So this is exciting and all...

...and Korch can do that in the AHL pretty much whenever he likes. The problem is that the Hawks wouldn't want him coming up to the NHL thinking he can do that whenever he likes. It's nice to build confidence and all, but the ease with which Korchinski can skate through and around AHL talent isn't exactly going to help him build good habits. It's hard to learn how to pick your spots in a league when every spot is one worthy of being picked.

Sons Of Lemuel - Take Me To The Other Side

It has been a while since the bye week has made Bears fans feel as though they're being robbed of something instead of pure relief. Or basking in a glow for a while instead of just gasping to the shore of not having to watch the Bears for a Sunday, whichever route you want to go. But the Beloved hit the break 4-2, off two moonings of really bad teams.

It would be easy to dismiss the recent Bears streak as taking advantage of the schedule. But even just decent teams dispatch the bad ones, which in the NFL is basically how a team becomes decent. And quite frankly just not being the team that good ones should beat is enough for me.

Because it certainly was a different feeling watching the Jaguars do the things we had become so accustomed to the Bears doing to cost themselves games. Specifically the three straight defensive penalties on the Jags that gave the Bears two first downs in the 3rd quarter and kept a game-clinching drive going, robbing Jacksonville of any chance of a comeback.

I've seen that movie before, it's just usually the lead actor is decked out in blue and orange. Too many times we'd see what we thought could be a momentum-changing stop, only to see that piss-yellow graphic flash on the scorebug and know what was coming next. A defensive holding or roughing the passer, and not just that call but the knowing dread that an opposing, knife-wound of a touchdown was sure to follow and yet another game going on the ever-growing loss pile.

I like this view better, where the Bears benefit and we're all reasonably confident that they will make it hurt, not just hope to continue to bumble down the field simply on defensive penalties. Good teams will find a way to stymie these Bears at times, for sure. But few if any teams will stop them if they're given second and third chances. In this league that is mostly a collection of the meh, that's more than enough to be decent.

Please share and rewteet and all that other stuff. Everyone's welcome and it's free for a while yet!