Better luck next year: Blackhawks are on the long road back from the tank

Welcome back to Better Luck Next Year, a series that will focus on each team as they get eliminated from Stanley Cup Playoff contention and the Stanley Cup Playoffs. What went wrong, why it went wrong, what (if anything) went right, and what is next. We continue today with the first team to officially be eliminated from Stanley Cup Playoff contention: The Chicago Blackhawks.

So, you want your team to tank for the next can’t-miss prospect that could change the course of your franchise? Just be prepared for the reality that even if you do get that player, and even if that player is what you expect them to be (or even close it), it is going to take a long time and a lot of luck to completely recover from everything you had to do to get into that draft position.

The Chicago Blackhawks are finding that out right now.

Prior to — and during — the 2022-23 season, the Blackhawks did everything in their power to gut their roster down to the studs. And it was not just older players at the end of their career or the end of their contracts that were sent away. They dumped young players that were already in their prime, or had still not yet entered their prime, and could have theoretically been long-term players in Chicago.

Alex DeBrincat was traded for draft picks even though he was only 24 years old, still under contract for another year, a couple of years from unrestricted free agency, and eventually re-signed a long-term deal after leaving Chicago for less than $8 million per season.

Dylan Strome and Dominik Kubalik were not given qualifying offers as restricted free agents and allowed to leave for nothing. In Strome’s case, he was still only 24 years old and one of the team’s most productive players. There was some concern over what his next contract would look like as an RFA based on his qualifying offer, and given that he only signed a one-year deal for $3.5 million there is argument to be made that maybe his value around the league wasn’t that high at the time. But Strome’s game has taken off in Washington where he is now a top player on the league’s best team this season.

Brandon Hagel was traded at the end of the 2021-22 season for multiple first-round draft picks even though he was still only 23 years old and in the middle of a breakout season. He has become a standout player in Tampa Bay and is still only 26 years old.

Kirby Dach, just a few years removed from being the No. 3 overall pick in the draft, was traded away for a future first-round pick.

This wasn’t just a team looking to jettison older players and big contracts.

This was a team getting rid of everything that was not tied down and looking well into the future with the returns.

In exchange for that group of players the Blackhawks received four first-round picks (one for DeBrincat, one for Dach and two for Hagel), a second-round pick and a fourth-round pick (as part of the DeBrincat return), a third-round pick (as part of the Dach return), and fringe NHL players Taylor Raddysh and Boris Katchouk.

Obviously that is a lot of draft capital, and the Blackhawks eventually ended up with eight first-round picks between the 2022 and 2024 classes.

Getting as many draft picks as possible was clearly a big part of the plan.

But the biggest part of the plan was getting positioned for a chance to nab Connor Bedard at the top of the 2023 NHL Draft class.

Even though they did not finish with the league’s worst record, they still had lottery luck on their side and ended up getting the top pick.

They got their guy.

But now what?

Now two years into Bedard’s career they are actually on pace to win fewer games and finish with a worse record than they did the year before he arrived, when the team was actively tanking. They still seem to be YEARS away from serious contention, and perhaps even years away from even getting back into the playoffs..

They have a great prospect pool after all of those picks, and there are some potential high-end players in that group, but not all of them are going to pan out as expected.

The players selected in the back-half of the first-round are always going to be 50-50 bets to be NHL regulars, and only about a 15-20 percent bet to be a high-end player.

They are also not all going to develop at the same pace and may not be immediate stars.

Even if it works, it is still going to be a long way off. Especially given how devoid of NHL talent the rest of the roster is.

Overall this season they rank 32nd (out of 32 teams) in every major underlying 5-on-5 category including shot attempt share, expected goal share, scoring chance share and high-danger scoring chance share, just as they did a year ago. And the year before. It is honestly staggering how little progress they have made from the full-on tanking season.

They are, again, just as bad now as they were in the year they gutted the roster and tried for Bedard.

That is not supposed to be happening.

It should not be happening.

There should be at least SOME progress at this point. Maybe not all the way back to the playoffs, but you should at least be in a position where maybe you are a somewhat competitive and legitimate NHL roster.

They are not. Or even close to it.

What went right this season

Honestly …. not much.

This is a bad team. A very bad team. And there are not many positives to take away from this season.

So let’s try to find some if we can….