Chicago Blackhawks general manager Kyle Davidson constantly has a foot in the present and another in the future. If he’s going to pull of the rebuild he started in 2022, he will need to work through a lot of phases in the coming years.

Drafting Connor Bedard was a major piece to the future puzzle, but Davidson understands there’s so much more to it. From Bedard’s development to adding stars to whether to trade his first 2025 first-round draft pick, Davidson spoke recently to The Athletic about where the Blackhawks’ rebuild is and where it needs to get to.

How would you assess Connor Bedard’s development midway through his second NHL season?

I’m very pleased with the added elements to his game. His ability to survive and in some cases thrive against the best players in our game is very impressive for the second-youngest player in the league. Of course, he has some areas to grow in, but I have zero concern that he will do just that. I love his mentality of wanting to play against great players and challenge himself in that way early in his career. I love that mentality. He’s going to learn from those situations and use the knowledge to further grow his game.

There were some questions surrounding him when he was drafted, because of his size and being so offensive, whether he’d figure it out defensively and whether his future would remain at center. He seems more defensive-minded this season. It doesn’t appear the organization has wavered from him being a long-term center, either. How have you seen his development at that position?

I think he’s made some really nice strides. And he mentioned the other day, he’s worked on over the summer on kind of having that strong stick and stripping pucks and that kind of thing. Just his defensive awareness and reliability and 200-foot game, that’s not something you just figure out overnight in the NHL. Especially for someone that’s leaned on offense and been relied upon offensively for so long, that’s something that will take time, and playing against men is difficult. He’s not the biggest guy, so he’s got to figure out different ways to find pucks and win pucks and defend. Again he’s the second-youngest player in the league. That’s something that we’ve already seen progress in. He’s made big strides. We’ll continue to see those moving forward. It’s not something we’re all really concerned about.

There is a lot of talk about his faceoffs. (He’s at 35.3 percent for the season). You probably want him to improve in that area. The coaches have taken some of that pressure off of him and allowed his wingers to take more faceoffs. How do you envision him in that area in the future?

Again, you look at some of the top faceoff men in the league and a lot of them are veteran players. It’s a skill that’s learned especially over time and and experience. Do people come in and take faceoffs here and there? Yeah, but I don’t think that’s necessarily out of the norm for a lot of other teams with either younger players or players that are still working on their craft. It’s something that I know he’s put work into after practice and he will continue to do so. As he gains experience in the league, I think we’ll see that improve.

A lot of fans think Bedard eventually needs a running mate, whether it’s someone for his line or someone to balance the offense in the lineup — a “Patrick Kane had Jonathan Toews” sort of thing. Do you think in those terms? As you’re building this team, do you think of multiple superstars or does he need a winger to complement him?

I think from our perspective and my thought process is that we need to continue to build talent around him, right? If that comes in the form of one player that’s inserted or a number of players, then, you know, I think it can come in different forms and it comes to you from an availability standpoint in different ways. And so, it’s certainly something we think about, but more so because we just want to build a really strong team. It’s not necessarily (that) we just need one other guy and then we we downshift because we’ve got a running mate for Connor and now we’re done. No, we want to build a great team. That’s more the focus than anything.

If that manifests itself in finding a running mate or an additional threat, one additional threat on another line, OK, we’ll look at that. But I think our aspirations are higher that we’re going to have a number of great options throughout the lineup up front, on the back end.

Having said that, stars are hard to come by. So, do we want more? Of course we do. But I think there’s also more than one way to build a really strong team. You can be top-heavy with your talent or you can be deep with your talent. And so, we’ll sort of see how our players develop, our young players develop and then evaluate whatever opportunities come our way, whether it’s down the road in free agency, trade or the draft and we’ll go from there.

I think it’s something you’re always considering is finding that star power. But that’s so much easier said than done — we’ll just go get a great player to play with him. It’s like, all right, yeah, ideally, it’s that easy. It just isn’t, because this is something that every other team is looking for as well.

Do we think about it and do we consider it in our long-term build? Of course. But we’re also trying to consider what’s realistic, as well, in terms of building a successful team structure and making sure that we’re not putting our eggs in one team-construction basket, so to speak.

I’ve always thought these next few years might be your most challenging. You may have those stars in your system considering where you’ve drafted and how many high picks you’ve had and you do have players showing signs they have real potential. You have all these guys potentially down the line, but I think we’ve also seen from the past year that a lot of prospects need time. Even someone like Frank Nazar is showing signs now, but it may be a year or two before he really produces in the NHL. Fans want prospects like Bedard to come in and have such an impact, but most need time. Over these next few years, how do you balance the cap, where getting to the floor might even be challenging, but also investing in those young players and giving them time to develop and trying to have a roster that you probably want to be more competitive than the last couple years?

It’s certainly a balancing act. I think a lot of the factors that go into your NHL team are unforeseen moving forward in our situation, mostly just because we don’t know what is available to us, right? And we don’t necessarily know what the development of our young players looks like. Now, having said that, I feel like a lot of the young players that we’ve seen this year have shown they’re closer and closer to stepping in and being contributors at the NHL level. And so, that’s really exciting.

The question being additions to the NHL roster, I think it’s always something we’re exploring and something we’re considering. But at this point in the season, looking at future years, it’s just so hard to understand what’s actually there. But, yeah, you’re also right with some of the really talented players in our prospect pool, some of them just need time and some of them need to develop. The development that we’ve seen from a lot of them is really, really exciting, but it’s just not at the point where we can reasonably think that we’re going to put them into the NHL and they’re ready to impact the game or impact a team or season just quite yet. We have aspirations and high hopes that they will. And I think a lot of those expectations are realistic, but it’s not necessarily tomorrow or next week. You know, you got to give it some time to build.

The other thing, too, with what we’re building is that in terms of drafting and developing is that we’re potentially earlier on just because the players aren’t here yet, right?  In the grand scheme of things with a player like Connor, people wanted to accelerate things. They wanted to jump-start things. Well, it does to some extent because you check a big box. There’s still a whole other team that you have to build around that player. And so, it takes time. And so, that’s kind of what we’re going through right now, is we’re developing, we’re letting some of these players find their feet in pro hockey and in their development curve. And then, hopefully, over the next season or couple of seasons, we can really see them step into the NHL when they’re ready and start impacting the team. We’re always evaluating where they’re at. We’re always evaluating what gaps they need to fill to make sure that that transition to pro and the NHL is is smooth.

But we’re also evaluating what additions and opportunities are available to us to augment the NHL roster and take a step forward in that area because we do want to continue to push the envelope and push forward. We’re not going to do anything that is detrimental to our medium- and long-term outlook, but maybe there’s something that is beneficial to both. And so, we’re always looking into that. We’re always looking for situations that can help us in those horizons. But, you know, they’re they’re just hard to come by at the NHL level.

To have likely another top-five pick in this year’s draft, do you look at that as a possible asset you can move or do you need to make that pick to add another young player of that potential caliber? How do you look at that?

I don’t think it’s necessarily that we’re married to making the pick. Again, it would be a very hard needle to thread in all likelihood, but if there’s an opportunity to use a pick like that to find a player that’s either in the NHL or closer to the NHL that we feel very confident is going to provide us some significant value to the NHL roster moving forward, then certainly we’re going to explore that. We’re not dead set on, “Well, we got this pick, we got to make it.” If there’s an opportunity that makes sense to use that pick on the market, then we’ll absolutely explore that.

The salary cap numbers hadn’t been released the last time you spoke to the media. Danny Wirtz has always made it clear that he’s going to allow you to spend what you need to spend. There has been some speculation that not all teams are going to be willing or able to be near the cap ceiling. Could that become an advantage for teams like yours?

That’s not exactly clear to me how that’s all going to play out. I think that’s something that we’ll have a better handle on in the next few years around the league. So, yeah, I just don’t know. I don’t fear that it’ll be a disadvantage for us, but I just don’t know if other teams won’t. I don’t have that insight yet.

Bringing in Chris O’Hearn as vice president of hockey operations, do you see him helping you navigate the cap in the coming years?

Yeah, for sure. I think having someone with Chris’ experience, both in negotiations and cap management and cap strategy, I think that’s something that’s really exciting for us — and obviously, with the salary cap going up, is going to be something that we’ll certainly have to navigate. And so, we’re really excited to add Chris and his viewpoint into our group to help move that whole area forward.

How important will Bedard’s next deal be to build that whole picture?

I think any of our better young players in their contracts are going to paint a pretty big picture on how much is obviously spent on them but then what you’ve got to fill in around. And so, I think that goes for any team, right? You kind of see what your top players earn and then you piece things around them, and hopefully it’s a situation where you’ve got enough that you can afford depth throughout the lineup and you can build a really strong team unit with your salary cap. So we’ll see how everything shakes out with a bunch of our young players. A lot of them take some time to develop and then they’ll hopefully have lots of success and we’ll have some healthy dialog with their agents and representatives over the next number of years and we can figure out where we’re at when we get there.

You haven’t had the type of players so far to play a very specific style of hockey. You’ve drafted a lot of speedy and skilled forwards and big and skilled defensemen. When the rebuild takes shape, what playing style do you envision for this team? What do you hope the Blackhawks are known for?

I hope we’re known for a relentless style of play with pace and compete. When we lose the puck, I’d like us to be aggressive in pursuit of gaining it back. I believe we’ve drafted players that, once they’ve developed and reached their potential, will be able to play the game in multiple ways and bring versatility to the type of style we need to play from night to night and situation to situation in order to put us in the best situation to succeed.

Do you have an idea of what college prospect might sign or burn years? Are you preparing to implement some players into the NHL lineup late in the season?

I think we’re prepared, yeah. I think we’re prepared for anything. It’s more so just we’ll kind of have those conversations with their player reps or the players themselves, depending on the case. But I think we’re prepared for it. I think it’s something that would be exciting to see. But I don’t think you really know until you get down to towards the end of these seasons before you figure out who’s thinking what.

Do you see Oliver Moore as someone who is potentially ready for that next step?

I think he’s definitely potentially ready. I think that’s something that a player like Oliver’s got to take stock of and figure out where he feels his game is at and what he needs. But those are conversations we’ll have when they’re wrapped up. They’re a pretty good team (at the University of Minnesota) and hopefully they can make a long run for some great experience for Oliver. But we’ve seen some nice strides, and I think he plays a really projectable game to pro hockey. But we’ll let him finish out the season and then figure out where the chips fall off after that.