Last night, my beloved Chicago Blackhawks, who only sport the best uniform in all of professional sports:
What many people outside Chicago don't understand is just how foreign this is to us. For years, the owner, Bill Wirtz, nicknamed Dollar Bill for his penny-pinching ways, did everything he could to stymie the growth of the club at the expense of his wallet. The stories defy belief: Home games couldn't be seen in Chicago because he wouldn't sign a television contract, first claiming that he didn't want to disrespect the season-ticket holders, then claiming that he wasn't going to just give them away for nothing. The problem with his argument is that Michael Jordan torpedoed it with his run of six NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls: The Stadium was sold out for virtually every one of his games, yet they were also broadcast on local television, and Jerry Reinsdorf, the chairman of the board for the Bulls, is no fool when it comes to money, so he wasn't just giving them away for nothing, either. The truth laid in the fact that Dollar Bill's son, Peter, owned the concessions for the United Center, and with Dollar Bill's underperforming teams, people stayed away from the United Center in droves. Every paying customer who didn't go to the UC was one less buying customer for Peter's concession stands.
One would think that the Bulls' example would lead a savvy businessman like Dollar Bill to put money into the team to maximize his profit. The problem with that theory is that he already had his financial empire. The team was his plaything. Dollar Bill had a liquor distributorship called Judge & Dolph that allegedly sold two out of every three drinks in Vegas. Whether that's accurate or not I can't say, but that's what I heard. What he did have was a virtual monopoly given to him by the Illinois legislature that guaranteed him almost ninety percent of all sales of liquor and beer in the state of Illinois. That law was later struck down by a federal court as being violative of the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.
Then there was Dollar Bill's attempt to quash free speech. A frustrated fan, tired of the shenanigans with which the team was being run, published and distribued a flier outside the UC that was critical of Wirtz and his ownership. Wirtz had the Chicago police confiscate the fliers and banish the dissident. Again, a federal court ruled that was violative of the First Amendment.
During his ownership, the club was run for all intents and purposes by Bob Pulford, a member of the last Stanley Cup winning teams in Toronto in the 1960's. This gave Wirtz the appearance of propriety, since Pulford had the bona fides as a Hockey Hall of Famer. The truth of the matter was that Pully, as he was known, was Dollar Bill's drinking buddy and lackey. He did next to nothing to improve the team.
Wirtz ran off Bobby Hull, the face of the franchise for so many years, when he flirted with the WHL. Consequently, when Bobby's son Brett was a free agent, he wouldn't come to Chicago. Other free agents by-passed Chicago because of Wirtz. He ran off Jeremy Roenick and Ed Belfour, two of the team's top players in the 90's. He was a cancer in the organization, but he was also the owner.
Sometime within the last ten years of Wirtz's reign ESPN rated the Blackhawks the worst professional organization in all of professional sports. Yes, they were rated as even worse than the Chicago Cubs, who haven't won a World Series since 1908 or even been in one since 1945. That's saying something.
When he died, the local Comcast outlet tried to broadcast as many games as it could despite the fact that Wirtz died just before the start of the season. Since his death, we've won two Cups, compared to no Cups for forty-nine years before his death. It's amazing how much influence, good or bad, one person can have.
After they won the Cup in 2010, each member of the team, as is tradition, got the Cup for one day. There are various and sundry stories of what players have done with their days with the Cup. Two pictures emerged from the day Andrew Ladd -- who had to be traded after the season due to salary cap considerations -- had with the Cup. They are, to date, my favorite pictures with the Cup. I think they are evocative of so much more than simply winning the Cup. I can only imagine how Ladd felt with that Cup in that place. Here they are:
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the 2013 Stanley Cup champions, the Chicago Blackhawks:
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