Official Blackhawks 2024 Offseason Thread-Bedard owns Chicago

[LordKOTL]

Many valid points. But I still think it's a few years away from deciding who won the trades. But yes, Hagel and The Cat are very good players that could have helped. But to what end?

I've said this elsewhere, but the pieces we jettisoned would have been good enough to keep the team in the 16-20th place limbo: Not good enough to make the playoffs, not bad enough to get the good pieces. We would have had to pay for those players (at least eventually) and overall it would have drawn things out.

Case in point: It took us between 1995 and 2009 to get back to the Conference finals and 1992 to 2010 for the Stanley cup finals. Of the top scorers from the 1995 team, the longest tenured one was Amonte who left in 2002, and he retired in 2007. I think hanging onto some of those higher-end players for as long as we did actually drew out the rebuild longer, because those good players kept us good enough to not pick as high in the draft.

Between 1992 (Cup berth) and 2002 (Draft year that the 1st 2010-2015 core menber, Keith, was drafted), we only had 3 Top-10 picks: Bell (8), Yakubov (10), and Ruutu (9). It wasn't until 2004 that we got into the top 5 (Barker who was a bust), but after a failed pick in Skille we had 2 top-5 picks in Toews and Kane.

I think in keeping some of the better players from the 1992-era team, it prolonged the build. I think keeping guys like Debrincat, Hagel, Kane, etc. would have kept us from drafting in the top 10--missing out on not just Bedard, but all of the top prospects that we could have had in retrospect.

We had to jettison the bulk of them or prolong things in my opinion. Getting *to* the bottom was needed no matter who the GM was. Now the onus is on KfC to actually do the build. Some of his moves (or lack thereof) have been questionable, no doubt. But again, I doubt he'll be the GM when the team contends again even if this build works.

 

[LordKOTL]

Kyle Davidson.

A very young GM making rookie mistakes. Trading away a young, talented player named Hagel for draft picks and two players that barely qualified as NHL players. Now given the NHL fail rate on draft picks...why trade a very young, good player for picks that even if you struck gold would only turn into what you just traded away. Then you trade Debrincat for more picks. The Cat was a 30 goal guy, a finisher and if memory serves was all of 22 years old when they moved him. He was due for a payday but he did regularly what no else has been able to do since....score goals. I think they did get Korch for one of those picks but what they really needed than and now is some offense as they have very little.

How much better would the Hawks be with Hagen and the Cat still playing here? Along with CB, TT, Donato, Bertuzzi and Nazar upfront? Who knows how much better Reichel and Kurashev could be playing with better linemates?

Instead we get stiffs like Brodie, Martinez, Smith, Maroon and a fading Hall.

It was great garnering all the picks he got but people don't realize just how high the NHL Draft fail rate is.....it's been quite awhile since I last checked but I think the only sport with more failed picks is MLB.

As aforementioned. If we kept Debrincat and Hagel, we weren't getting CB or Nazar. The team would have been picking outside of the top-10 unless...we traded for a top-10 or better pick which would have meant Debrincat or Hagel are moved.