Breaking down this year's NHL draft: What will Hawks do after taking Bedard?

After the Blackhawks select Connor Bedard with the No. 1 pick in Wednesday's NHL draft, general manager Kyle Davidson's night will be far from over.

As Davidson ponders what to do with the Hawks' No. 19 selection, he'll likely watch Anaheim grab future top center Adam Fantilli at No. 2, Columbus snare Swede Leo Carlsson at No. 3, and — just like the rest of the world — see who has the guts to add Matvei Michkov, who's under contract for three more seasons in Russia.

Will it be San Jose at No. 4, Montreal at No. 5, Arizona at No. 6 or Philadelphia at No. 7?

Or — as some are predicting — will Washington trade up from No. 8 to take the player many believe is the second-most talented player in an already deep and impressive draft?

The hype surrounding Michkov is well deserved and — as long as a team is willing to wait at least three years for his arrival — the risk seems like one worth taking.

“Michkov is one of the very best first-year draft eligibles I've ever seen from inside the offensive blue line,” writes the Athletic's Corey Pronman. “He has truly special offensive skill and hockey sense. ... His mind is special, but he's freakishly skilled with the puck too, and can make elite stickhandling plays seem routine.”

So is there any way the Hawks could trade up 14 or 15 spots and add a second generational talent? That possibility was raised by a couple of reporters at a baseball game I was covering about a month ago.

Davidson's answer: Fat chance.

“I'm not even sure what that looks like, to be honest,” Davidson said. “That's a pretty big jump. I always put myself in the other team's position: Like, what would it take for me to move from 4 to 19?

“I don't even if know if I can put that price up there. So it's probably tough.”

Still, it wouldn't be surprising to see the Hawks move up several spots by trading one of their four second-round picks. Watch for them to choose from a large pool of wildly talented wingers that they could pair with Bedard for the next 10 years.

Some names to keep an eye on include Gabriel Perreault (son of former NHL center Yanic Perreault); 6-foot-3, 195-pound power forward Samuel Honzek; high-scoring winger Colby Barlow (46 goals in the OHL last season); the undersized Zach Benson (36G, 62A in WHL); 6-1 winger Quentin Musty (26G, 52A in the OHL) and — if the Hawks want to stick with responsible, two-way centers — Brayden Yager (28G, 50A in WHL).

Difference-making draft?

The NHL draft is perhaps the most difficult in pro sports because GMs are trying to project how 18-20 year-old kids will develop over time.

There are always big misses at the top and glorious finds in Rounds 3, 4 and even 5.

Take 2013 as an example. The Flyers, Blue Jackets, Flames, Canucks and Flames again took players in the first round who played in a total of just 96 NHL games.

Yet in the third round we saw Pavel Buchnevich (135 goals to date) taken at No. 75 by the Rangers, Jake Guentzel (197 goals) taken at No. 77 by the Penguins, Mattias Janmark (76 goals) taken at No. 79 by the Red Wings, Anthony Duclair (122 goals) taken at No. 80 by the Rangers, and Carter Verhaeghe (66 goals the last two seasons) taken at No. 82 by Toronto.

This draft is supposedly one of the deepest in history, which bodes well for the Hawks as they own seven of the first 67 picks. Imagine if they could add guys like Guentzel, Duclair and Verhaeghe in Rounds 2 and 3.

“I can't remember the last time a GM or someone walked into a draft and said, 'Wow, this is a really shallow draft,'” said Kyle Davidson. “But in this draft, there's two things going for it.

“The talent at the top ... does extend further than it has in quite a few years — or certainly in recent memory. There's just a lot of really, really high-end talent.

“And then the depth. You're getting into the second, third round (where there are) guys that have legitimate chances to be very good players in the NHL. ... You're justified in that optimism for being bullish on those players.

“It's fantastic for us, given how many picks we have in the top three rounds.”

Don't deviate:

Every staff spends countless hours scouting and ranking hundreds of players. All of that hard work results in a board that GMs must trust when their team is on the clock.

With this being Kyle Davidson's second draft, I asked for his philosophy. Does he always take the best available player? Or, in later rounds, does he look to fill the organizational depth chart?

“To me it's best player available,” he said. “You've got two days to collect players through the draft. You've got every other day of the year to manipulate your reserve list.

“So, to me, it's about finding the best players because there's only a finite number that will play in the NHL. Let's find those guys first ... and then manipulate from there because it does us no good to say, 'We've got a lot of defensemen, so we're going to avoid defensemen.'

“But what if those defensemen you're going to avoid are going to play, and the forwards are never going to play? That doesn't do you any good.”

Davidson used last year's draft as an example. Even though many pundits believed the Hawks had already stockpiled some nice, young D-men, that didn't stop them from trading up and taking Kevin Korchinski at No. 7.

The Hawks didn't stop there, either, and took another blue liner in Sam Rinzel at No. 25.

“If we're in a position that is advantageous enough that we have more NHL players than roster spots,” Davidson said, “then that's great for us. “That's a position of strength and that's the goal.”

Sign here, please:

Don't expect the Hawks to make any splashy additions when free agency opens Saturday. Kyle Davidson made it clear in April that he wants to give an opportunity to prospects who have cut their teeth in the Hawks' system.

That's great news for defensemen like Alex Vlasic and Isaak Phillips.

“We don't want to block any of our young prospects out, should they show us that they're ready to play full-time NHL minutes,” Davidson said. “The flexibility of going with shorter-term deals is something we're going to look at because of the need to keep options open for our younger players.”