Connor Bedard Signs Five-Year, $75 Million Extension With Blackhawks

The Chicago Blackhawks announced Saturday, July 18, that they signed restricted free agent center Connor Bedard to a five-year contract extension worth $75 million, an average annual value of $15 million, according to NHL.com.

Bedard, who turned 21 on Friday, led Chicago in scoring for the third straight season in 2025-26, putting up 75 points on 30 goals and 45 assists in 69 games. He finished 17 points ahead of Tyler Bertuzzi, the team's next-highest scorer, despite missing 13 games, according to Russian Machine Never Breaks.

The deal runs through the 2030-31 season. Bedard will hit unrestricted free agency at 25, according to Russian Machine Never Breaks.

The Money Breakdown

Per PuckPedia, the contract structure looks like this: $7.2 million salary plus a $9.8 million signing bonus in year one, $6.2 million salary in year two, $5.2 million in year three, $4.2 million in year four, and $3.2 million in year five, with the $9.8 million signing bonus repeating every year. A full no-move clause only kicks in during the fifth and final year, according to Fox News and Pro Hockey Rumors.

That structure matters. It means Chicago can trade Bedard without his consent for the first four years of the deal if things go sideways. Most teams don't get that kind of flexibility with a franchise player, but it's also a sign both sides negotiated in good faith rather than Chicago simply caving to lock him up.

Where Bedard Ranks Now

The $15 million AAV makes Bedard the third-highest-paid player in the NHL for next season, trailing only Anaheim Ducks center Leo Carlsson at $18 million and Minnesota Wild winger Kirill Kaprizov at $17 million, according to both Pro Hockey Rumors and NHL.com.

The Carlsson comparison isn't incidental. The Philadelphia Flyers threw an $18 million-a-year offer sheet at Carlsson earlier this offseason, forcing Anaheim to match it just to keep him, according to Fox News. That deal reset the market and put pressure on Chicago to get ahead of any similar move on Bedard, since as a restricted free agent he was technically available for another team to sign to an offer sheet Chicago would then have to match or lose him for draft pick compensation.

General manager Kyle Davidson made clear this wasn't a reluctant paycheck. "Connor has continuously defied our expectations since being drafted, and has quickly established himself as an elite player in the NHL," Davidson said in a team statement. "He utilizes all aspects of his game to not only be a constant threat, but to make the players around him better every time he steps on the ice."

The Injury Question

Bedard won't be on the ice when next season starts. The Blackhawks announced on July 8 that he underwent surgery on his left shoulder after suffering an injury during offseason training, according to NHL.com. Recovery is expected to take about four months, putting his return sometime in November, according to Russian Machine Never Breaks.

This isn't Bedard's first brush with injury trouble. He missed 14 games as a rookie in 2023-24 with a fractured jaw after a hit in a loss to the New Jersey Devils. Last season he missed 12 games with an upper-body injury after St. Louis Blues center Brayden Schenn knocked into him during a faceoff, an injury to the same shoulder that required this summer's surgery, according to NHL.com.

A reasonable skeptic could look at that pattern and ask whether Chicago is overpaying for a player who has yet to play a full, uninterrupted 82-game season without a major injury derailing it. Bedard has played all 82 games only once, in 2024-25. The Blackhawks are betting $75 million that the shoulder issue is behind him and that his offensive trajectory keeps climbing rather than flattening out.

Bedard was the first overall pick in the 2023 NHL Draft after a dominant junior season with the WHL's Regina Pats, where he posted 143 points in 57 games. He won the 2024 Calder Trophy as the NHL's top rookie and has 203 career points in 219 regular-season games, according to NHL.com.

With Bedard locked up, the Blackhawks avoid the kind of offseason drama that hit Anaheim with Carlsson. The next question for Chicago is roster-building around him. Whether the front office can surround its $15 million centerpiece with enough talent to turn a rebuilding franchise into a playoff team before Bedard's prime years tick away on the deal's back end remains to be seen.