Bedard could headline NHL All-Star skills competition for $1 million prize originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago
The NHL announced a brand new All-Star skills competition set to debut at the 2024 All-Star Weekend in Toronto, in which 12 players will compete in multiple events for a $1 million prize.
Each player will choose to compete in four of the following six events to earn points based on where they finish in each event:
-
Fastest skater
-
Hardest shot
-
Stick handling
-
One-timers
-
Passing challenge
-
Accuracy shooting
The eight-highest point earners advance to the seventh event: The NHL shootout.
The shootout will feature all eight All-Star goaltenders, and each skater will choose which goalie they want to face.
Two players will be eliminated after the shootout, and the six remaining skaters will advance to the eighth and final event: The NHL obstacle course. Points in this round will be worth double.
The player with the most points after all eight events will be crowned champion and earn the $1 million prize.
“We wanted to do something that the players would have fun with and want to participate in,” NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman said on “ESPN” on Tuesday.
Only NHL All-Stars will be eligible to compete in the skills competition, with the first eight skaters determined by the NHL’s hockey operations department and NHLPA. Fans will vote in the remaining four players.
With $1 million on the table, the league should have no problem convincing its stars to participate. Especially a guy like, say, Connor Bedard.
The Blackhawks’ rookie superstar is the perfect candidate for the inaugural competition. Since the day the Vegas Golden Knights hoisted the Stanley Cup back in June, the NHL has had a singular focus:
Make Connor Bedard a household name.
The league has made extraordinary — and long overdue — efforts to better promote its stars, particularly though its rights agreements with ESPN and Warner Bros Discovery Sports (formerly known as Turner Sports). This revamped, all-around skills competition, set to air Feb. 2 at 6:00 p.m. CT on ESPN, is a brilliant way to showcase the sport.
Bedard has already been a ratings machine. The two most-watched games of the 2023-24 season so far both featured the Blackhawks, with Bedard’s NHL debut against the Penguins shattering ESPN’s viewership record for the most-watched NHL game in regular season history (excluding the Winter Classic).
Again, Bedard must be named an All-Star in order to be eligible for the skills competition. Luckily, the league’s policy is that all 32 teams must be represented at All-Star Weekend by at least one player. The league selects one player from each team, and the remaining 12 roster spots are voted in by fans.
One way or another, Bedard will be at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Feb. 2.
If the hockey operations department and NHLPA has half a brain, he’ll be on the ice with the sport’s most exciting players, performing the sport’s most exciting tricks on ESPN in primetime.
And for a chance to double his $950,000 entry-level guaranteed salary, he’ll surely make it one hell of a spectacle.
Click here to follow the Blackhawks Talk Podcast.
