TRAIKOS: Why the Coyotes — and several other NHL teams — are tanking for Connor Bedard

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TORONTO — In Connor Bedard’s first 10 games this year, the No. 1 prospect in next year’s NHL draft scored nine goals and 10 assists, while providing a full season’s worth of jaw-dropping highlights.

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In related news, the Arizona Coyotes headed into Monday night’s game against the Toronto Maple Leafs having allowed half a dozen goals in each of their first two games this year.

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Can you say #TankHardForBedard?

That certainly seems to be the objective. Not only for Arizona, but also Chicago, Anaheim, San Jose, Montreal and a bunch of other bottom-feeders who are hoping to improve their draft lottery odds for the chance at selecting a generational talent who is already drawing comparisons to Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid. 

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That means losing hockey games. A lot of them.

And then some more.

“People can say that we’re lower than whale s***, but we don’t think that way,” Coyotes GM Bill Armstrong told Postmedia on the morning of Monday’s game against Toronto. “We play a hard brand of hockey. We’re going to compete for every inch every night. We’re not always going to dominate or be successful. But we’re coming to play.”

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Indeed, one week into the season, there might be even worse teams than the Coyotes. But give it time. You ain’t seen nothing yet.

With a college-sized home rink and a regular-season schedule that seems designed to give Arizona the best odds at finishing last, this could get ugly. Even uglier than Buffalo’s 54-point tank job in 2014-15 when McDavid was up for grabs.

Just look at how the Coyotes are spending their first 24 games.

After starting the year on the road for six straight games, the Coyotes head home, where they will play four games in a 4,000-seat rink that they are sharing with Arizona State University, before heading back on the road again for 14 more games. That’s a full month spent living in a hotel on the road. 

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By then, the team is expected to have moved on from top-pairing defenceman Jakob Chychrun, who has already asked for a trade. It’s also expected that the Coyotes could be mathematically eliminated from the playoffs by then.

“It’s going to be a grind,” said Armstrong, who feels for the players and what lies ahead this season. “Listen, they’re competitive guys. When they get pushed out by their organization and end up here, they want to show that they can compete.”

Compete is a subjective word. Last year, the Coyotes competed and still finished with the second-worst record in the NHL. Clayton Keller, who led the team in scoring, tied for 70th overall. No one on the team had 30 goals or 70 points. 

On paper, this year’s roster looks worse. Travis Boyd, who was playing on the Leafs’ fourth line a couple of years ago, is centring the Coyotes’ top line. Nick Ritchie, who couldn’t produce on a line with Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner last season, is Arizona’s leading scorer.

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It’s the hockey equivalent of the team from the movie Major League, a sort of island for misfit toys and bloated contracts. Andrew Ladd was traded here two years ago as a salary dump. So was Bryan Little, who hasn’t played a game since November 2019. Only Keller and Lawson Crouse have contracts that stretch past the next four years. Everyone else is on borrowed time while a new rink is built and all those draft picks grow into impact players. 

And yet, despite missing out on the playoffs for nine of the past 10 years, this is not a team overflowing with prospects or potential. Part of that has to do with Armstrong’s predecessor, John Chayka, who wasted top picks on players who have not panned out (Barrett Hayton and Dylan Strome) or had them taken away for breaking the draft rules.

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Maybe that is why Armstrong, who made his name as a top scout with the St. Louis Blues, is trying and get as many picks as possible. He had nine in his first draft with the Coyotes in 2021. This year, he had 10, including No. 3 overall Logan Cooley, who was wisely sent back to college while the team continues along the ugly road of rebuilding. 

“You’ve got to draft an impact player every three to five years if you want to win a championship,” said Armstrong. “The really successful teams that win Cups, when you’re picking at the top you’ve got to get really good players. You’ve got to hit on the money-makers. You’ve got to find your Matthews’ and Pietrangelos’ and those guys.”

Can Bedard be that guy? Maybe. But keep in mind that at this time last year, scouts thought that Shane Wright was that guy. And then the draft arrived and Wright fell to fourth overall, with Montreal, Arizona and New Jersey all passing on him.

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“At this time last year who were we talking about?” said Armstrong. “Just because you get picked No. 1 overall doesn’t mean you’re at that Crosby or McDavid level.”

Still, Armstrong likes what he sees in the 5-foot-9 Bedard, who led Canada to a gold medal at the world juniors after scoring 51 goals and 100 points in 62 games with the Regina Pats in the Western Hockey League last season.

“We’ve been watching him since the U-18s three years ago,” said Armstrong. “It’s still not certain what player he is, but I think everyone is excited by what they see. How good is he? That’s still to be defined. There’s a lot of hockey to be played.”

And a lot of hockey to be lost.

mtraikos@postmedia.com

twitter.com/Michael_Traikos

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