Blackhawks Fire Dale Tallon: Because Bowman Said So

Ok, I’ve looked at this move by the Blackhawks for a few hours—I’m honestly trying to find a legitimate reason for making this move right now. Every team has a right to fire any of their employees at any time. I’m sure there will be plenty of people talking about the firing, should it have happened, blah blah blah. I’ll leave that to them. I don’t think he should have been fired—but what do I know? They only made it to the Western Conference Finals, picked up one of the best free agents on the market, resigned their young players and are a favorite to make it to the Stanley Cup Finals next year. Yeah, he sucked—he should be moved immediately. It’s never that easy, but let’s mix in some fuckin’ perspective please. If you want more than that as a Blackhawks fan, your concept of reality is severely skewed.

My question is simple: Why now? The general manager has two HUGE things to deal with in the offseason—the draft and free agency. With both of these duties completed, the rest of the offseason is when a GM fine-tunes his vision for the team. The point is that all of the heavy lifting is done. August isn’t going to make or break your team. The two weeks at the end of June and beginning of July will.

So that brings us back to the original question: Why did the Blackhawks fire Dale Tallon in the middle of July? He just signed the biggest free-agent on the market to a 12 year deal (Marian Hossa), signed his most important restricted free-agent to a 3 year deal (Kris Versteeg), and headed up the draft in Montreal. If the team wanted to go in a different direction, then why would they let Tallon spearhead the decision-making process that will dictate the next 12 months?

I thought about this over and over since last night and I could only come up with two possibilities. First, the Blackhawks organization might still be pissed about the Qualifying Offer fiasco involving Cam Barker, Kris Versteeg, et al. Those thoughts were confirmed early in the press conference the Blackhawks held today. Blackhawks President John McDonough was asked if Dale Tallon would have been fired if it were not for the RFA paperwork incident—his answer was concise and to the point: “Probably not.” Yet immediately after saying that, he continually stated that the paperwork problem wasn’t solely Tallon’s fault. He instead chose to emphasize that it was an ORGANIZATIONAL mistake.

If that were true, then why was Tallon set up to be the scapegoat? Better yet, why would he be offered another job within the organization? That’s right—Dale Tallon was not technically fired, he was replaced by Stan Bowman and is now the new Senior Advisor of Hockey Operations. Do you know who is also a Senior Advisor of Hockey Operations for the Blackhawks? Scotty Bowman. Make no mistake about it; Tallon was fired.

If you don’t believe me, ask Dave Taylor with the Kings if he was fired when Dean Lombardi was named General Manager. You can call it whatever you want—but I saw Dave Taylor over the weekend. He was watching the Development Camp, sitting with all the fans in the stands (alongside the Kings Radio analyst Darryl Evans), while the rest of the front office guys were up in an area where they could watch the scrimmage without being bothered by fans. Such is life for an “advisor.”

I’m not saying that Tallon is above criticism. In fact, there have been a few moves that are going to hamstring this organization for a few years. Cristobal Huet’s contract looks like it was WAY too much considering it was Nikolai Khabibulin that led the Hawks in the playoffs last season. Brian Campbell is probably the 3rd or 4th best defenseman on the team, yet his contract says he should be one of the 3 or 4 best defenseman in the league. Marian Hossa’s contract is so long, it’s possible that the Los Angeles Kings, New York Islanders and the Hamilton/Winnipeg/Medicine Hat Coyotes could all be GOOD by the time his contract is up. That’s a LONG time.

If you want to know what the definition of “Cap Hell” is, take a look at the problems that Chicago is going to have to endure next off-season. The Blackhawks are going to have to figure out a way to sign their two offensive superstars (Kane and Toews), while also figuring out a way to lock up their cornerstone defenseman (Duncan Keith). That’s going to be a HUGE problem! But that was something for “Future Tallon” to figure out. Now, it will be someone else’s problem.

The second scenario I was considering in regards to Tallon’s removal is much messier and wouldn’t be cleared up in an off-season press conference. It’s no secret that the addition of Scotty Bowman was looked at as a move that would put ANY current GM in the crosshairs. You can say there were no ulterior motives when the older Bowman was brought in as advisor, but let me break down some objective facts.

- Scotty Bowman was brought in because he has been so successful throughout his career. Fact.

- Scotty turned down front office offers with the Maple Leafs and with the Red Wings before he joined Chicago’s staff. Fact.

- Scotty publically stated that he took the job because of family concerns. Fact.

- Stan is an ambitious figure (like his father) who has been the Assistant GM of Hockey Operations for Chicago for the last 2 years. Fact.

- There’s only one job left for Stan to aspire to: General Manager. Fact.

Here’s my question: if McDonough was convinced that this was an organization error, then how could the assistant GM of OPERATIONS be promoted when there was an operational fuck-up? Per the Blackhawks website, here is a rundown of Stan Bowman’s responsibilities over the last 2 years:

“In his most recent role, Bowman attended to the day-to-day administration of the Blackhawks’ hockey operations department with his primary responsibilities including all CBA-related matters such as contract negotiations, free agency, salary arbitration, player movement and player assignment.”

I could be wrong, but the whole “qualifying offers” problem sounds like it was both “administrative” as well as something that would be related to the Collective Bargaining Agreement. So why is Tallon the figure losing his job over this again? Why is Bowman the one getting promoted again? And most of all, why NOW?

Maybe I’m missing something?

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