Editor’s Choice: ‘Perfect Strangers’ For the Blackhawks Rebuild

I’m a child of the 80’s and 90’s and those of a certain age remember the ABC staple TGIF. Along with watching sports, and Saturday morning cartoons, TGIF was a must watch on my list. It was chock full of Chicago references–sometimes with Blackhawks, Bears, Bulls, White Sox or Cubs references.

For those outside the realm, it was family friendly fare on Friday nights that included hits like Family Matters, Full House, Step by Step, and Boy Meets World.

If TGIF came back and the #Blackhawks were featured, maybe this is how it would look?

A little bit of nostalgic fun courtesy of @chihockeynow on the eve of the Hawks' first preseason game: pic.twitter.com/wBtYhML7ui

— Nate Brown (@NBrownChiHN) September 27, 2023

Perfect Strangers, however, kicked it off. It introduces us to Larry and Balki, two distant cousins who end up in Chicago together. It led to the Family Matters spinoff and constantly referenced famous Chicago landmarks.

It introduced me to the city, and made my family’s move here a little easier to stomach, with my dad telling me that maybe we’d run into Balki somewhere.

We never did. But I was able to get to all the landmarks in the opener.

With the Chicago setting and a theme song invoking some nostalgia of generations past, I wondered if I could mash it up to the current day.

A couple Chicago Blackhawks serve as the ‘perfect strangers’ since general manager Kyle Davidson and rookie Connor Bedard are being looked at to bring the Blackhawks back to contention. Not knowing one another until the draft process, now they’re tasked with escaping the rebuild.

Blackhawks Looking to Davidson to Build and Bedard to Live Up to the Billing

The joy of winning the draft lottery never really did die down. It just morphed into higher levels of anticipation. For both Davidson and Bedard, the plan was to simply go ahead but now, fairly or not, the clock began ticking as to whether it would all work.

For Davidson, would the draft picks he acquired and then used work in the long run? After all, he dealt away Kirby Dach and Alex DeBrincat to grab first round pick in the 2022 Draft. He also dealt Patrick Kane away, and said goodbye to Jonathan Toews without extending a new contract.

For Bedard it’s very simple: will he be the generational player that he’s been billed to be?

After this summer, however, Blackhawks fans are encouraged. The prospect pool is deep and envied by many while Bedard has looked every bit of the word generational.

The early returns are indeed hopeful. Like the sitcom that inspired the creativity on my part, there will be some bumps along the way. It may be something that takes time and like was often a plot line in the show, can exasperate, especially if the rebuild into contention doesn’t immediately reap the benefits.

But there’s certainly a lot in the Blackhawks favor. And it could very well be that these one-time strangers are indeed perfect to make the rebuild a distant memory someday.