Clown Man Bowman: How the Blackhawks dynasty was derailed

Stan Bowman inherited a Stanley Cup when he took over as general manager of the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2009 offseason. Dale Tallon set up a wonderful team that managed to win it all in 2010. In my opinion, Bowman deserves credit for 2013 and 2015. Deciding to draft Brandon Saad and Andrew Shaw was huge. How he deciphered which players to bring in and which to trade away after the Cups was also big. So Stan Bowman does deserve some credit.

Having said that, there were many questionable decisions that set the franchise on a downward spiral, starting with signing Bryan Bickell to a 4-year, 4 million per year deal in July of 2013. I love what Bickell brought to the table, a real tenaciousness, but it was a definite overpay for a career bottom six forward who had an unbelievable postseason run with 17 points in 23 games.

Two years later, Bowman threw an 8 year, $55 million contract at 30-year-old Brent Seabrook. Seabs was already showing signs of age and a lack of speed, but sure let's lock him up for the next eight seasons. He did manage 49 points in the 2015-16 season, a career-high, but it was all downhill from there as he managed just 15 goals combined over the next three seasons after scoring a career-high 14 in 15-16 and we all know how the story ended unfortunately with all his injuries.

As bad as the signings were, the trades are what really set the Hawks back. Bowman did a great job figuring out he needed to trade players away, however, bringing in talent in return was not his forte.


One of the worst trades has to be receiving Tomas Fleischmann and Dale Weise from Montreal for Phillip Danault and a 2018 second rounder in Feb of 2016. Danault has scored 26 goals for the Kings this season, double his previous season high. He is also one of the better defensive forwards and is good in the faceoff dot sound like something the Blackhawks have been searching for?

Later that year, the Hawks gave away Teuvo Teravainen and Bickell to Carolina for a '16 2nd and a '17 3rd in an obvious salary dump. Teuvo has gone on to score 322 points in those six seasons. He should still be in Chicago. Could you imagine a top 6 of Teuvo Toews Kane Debrincat Strome and Panarin? That would be amazing.

Ok, the 2015-16 season might have killed the Blackhawks. When you look at the moves Bowman made you can begin to see how a team that won 3 cups and had a great postseason streak going would go on to lose it just a few seasons later.


June 23, 2017 was a dark day for Blackhawks fans. Fresh off a surprising sweep by eighth-seeded Nashville, the Hawks traded both Artemi Panarin and Niklas Hjalmarsson. In return they reacquired Brandon Saad and got goaltender Anton Forsberg and d-man Connor Murphy. The thought process was that if Chicago brought back Saad, Toews's play would improve, while Kane would continue to thrive with anyone you put him with. To me, you just can't trade away a player like Panarin no matter the reason. All he's done since is put up 418 points, including a career-high 96 this season. If Bowman didn't offer the big contract to Seabs, maybe the Hawks could have kept Hjalmarsson, a player with arguably more skill.

Bowman was just never able to get the correct value out of any significant asset. His emotions would get the best of him in a plethora of ways, from panic trading after playoff losses to bringing back old faces. It's not easy to keep teams together with the way the salary cap is constructed, but there were better ways to approach the situation. Unfortunately, the Hawks are stuck in a rebuild now and at a crossroads with their franchise players in Toews and Kane. Who knows what the future holds? Here's hoping general manager Kyle Davidson isn't the next Bowman...