Dark Days Ahead in the Windy City
2022-02-11It's tough to be in the Blackhawks organization right now as the team takes blow after blow on and off the ice. The latest is the firing of their old GM after the directionless path the front office with questionable trades and even more questionable drafting as they burned a 1st round pick on *checks notes* 22-year old free agent Brady Lyle.
Taking over at the helm is GM Doogan-Smith. He has 4 years of leading a successful franchise in another SIM league so can grasp what is needed of a franchise. At the introductory press conference GM Doogan-Smith had these initial remarks about his outlook of the current state of the franchise.
"This is a massive challenge, but I'm excited to step in to help right this ship. There's some pretty glaring holes here. The core is quite old, only $4M in cap space this year and the prospect pipeline is pretty unimpressive. It's almost as if the old GM took a page out of the Jim Benning book of how to build an NHL team."
When asked what his plan was for the Blackhawks, he replied with two words and dead-eyes that would scare the grim reaper:
"Scorched Earth."
After an awkward 10 second pause where time seemingly stood still, GM Doogan-Smith snapped out of his catatonic state to continue:
"It's going to be a long road to relevency here. Sure we could try to make the playoffs this year, but what assets and cap room do we have to improve our depth in a meaningful way without performing a money-for-money trade? How far do we make it in the playoffs? Then after this year, what does this team look like. Looking through the transactions from last year I see we lost a lot of quality pieces either through lost trades or just due to players walking in free agency. We need to be smart and recoup as many assets for the next two drafts and start building a team with a clear path to being a contender and not to continue in the mushy middle. This timeline is realistically a 3-4 year project."
GM Doogan-Smith took a pause and then proclaimed:
"We are open for business, other GMs are free to inquire about any player on the rosters. I will be sure to respond in a timely manner regardless of the initial offer/converstion."
The season is still young for Chicago and the team even sits in 6th place in the Gretzky conference through 19 games this season. However, a new GM with a clear plan is in town and to realize sustained success over the next decade, it sounds like a new direction is needed which means some dark days are ahead.
Not gonna lie. Two sentences into this and I was already rolling over laughing!
Dark Days Ahead in the Windy City
Intro article from the new Blackhawks GM
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Glad you’re with us Adam. Great article, looking forward to seeing what’s in store in Chi-town.
Dark Days Ahead in the Windy City
Intro article from the new Blackhawks GM
Fantastic intro and great article!
Dark Days Ahead in the Windy City
Intro article from the new Blackhawks GM