A letter to lifelong Blackhawks fans

Dear Blackhawks diehards,

Congratulations, you deserve the Stanley Cup that is heading towards Chicago. I know, I know, the series isn’t technically over, but who amongst us believes the Flyers can win four of the next five games? I didn’t think so.

And before you go off and claim that I am putting a voodoo hex on Chicago’s hockey team, I will let you know that if the Hawks do lose in the Finals it will not be because of me. If I had the ability to change the fate of the Blackhawks with my words, the team would have won Stanley Cup long before 2010. And if that was the case, I wouldn’t be writing this letter.

I type away because for Blackhawks fans who have been to the depths of sports hell, sitting at the precipice of glory can be a bit bittersweet. I’ve been struggling with the concept of losing “my” Blackhawks to every suburban kid with an ebay jersey — the off-colored Chinese strips that look nothing like the beautiful jerseys the Hawks actually wear.

I’ve struggled with this because there was a beauty to having an NHL team in the city that no one cared about. We were in at the base level. We saw terrible hockey, but were also there for the Toews’ goal against Colorado and sang Rudy Can’t Fail for Tuommo Ruutu. We applauded the move for Adrian Aucoin and then booed everyone of his overpaid strides. We celebrated Petr Bondra’s 500th goal despite the fact that we weren’t Capitals fans. Ultimately, we cared about the team that an owner didn’t care about.

It is an interesting dynamic sharing a team with 100,000 (at most) Chicagoans. I am sure that if we were better organized, we could have bought the team from Old Man Wirtz and run the team our way. I suppose his passing and the Rocky Wirtz administration is the next best thing.

But being there when the days are lean can create a sense of entitlement. Those of us who were there for the bad should have first dibs on the good. All the bandwagoners can hop in the back of the wagon— we were the trailblazers.

Sadly the world doesn’t work that way. So we, the trailblazers, will fork over the cash.

If the simple dynamics of supply and demand were the reason of my angst, I would be on the first boat to Cuba. The fact is, while it sucks that three years ago we could have sat anywhere we wanted for $8, that was a mirage. We never wanted the ticket deals to last because that meant that the Blackhawks would still be in last place. There have always been enough Blackhawks fans to fill the United Center — they just needed a reason to come out. As the saying goes: hockey never left Chicago, but it has most certainly returned.

But now us trailblazers have to share the team, the rink and the city with millions upon millions of novice fans. And we blend right in.

The celebration should be on soon, and I urge all old-time Blackhawks fans to not hold anything back. If you have a grudge, let it go. High five the guy with the green Kane jersey and let the emotions flow when Toews lifts the Stanley Cup. The Blackhawks are still “our” team, no matter how many times the guy at the bar asks why the game was stopped.

The fact of the matter is, we deserve the glory and we should let no one damper our spirits. The guy who didn’t care about hockey three weeks ago? Well, he’s wearing a Hossa jersey now. When the Hawks win the Stanley Cup, that guy won’t have any emotions. He’ll cheer and get drunk in Wrigleyville. The bandwagoners will never understand what this Stanley Cup means to the trailblazers, and that is a good thing. The emotions, the unbridled joy that will poor into every nook and cranny in Chicago, will be an equal an opposite reaction to the years surrounding the lock-out. It will be the trailblazers job to lead that celebration.

Perhaps there will always be a twinge of regret that as a trailblazer, you were not front and center for the rebirth of the Blackhawks, pushed aside by a guy in corporate seats or the yuppie couple at the bar.  But for those who still feel that limitation in celebration, imagine if the scenario went a different way.

The best parallel I can draw is to music. Hopefully, everyone has a band or an artist that is underground. They make great music, but they just aren’t big — yet. You see them in concert, or listen to their debut album, and you sense something great about them. “They’re going to be the next big thing,” you say. For me, there are two bands that fit that mold, and each went a different direction.

The band that represents the current Blackhawks is Kings of Leon. A few years ago they were raw, edgy, and showed promise. I was a big fan, and when their fourth album, Only By the Night, came out, it was so good that it vindicated all the times I had pimped the band. I had a few months with the album before the rest of America caught on—now they are the biggest rock band of this generation.

Another band I was into, a band I just knew was going to be huge, was We Are Scientists. Their poppy-indie rock was different and I like different. I thought America would like different too. If the music world was a stock market, I wouldn’t have needed to diversify my portfolio, Kings of Leon and We Are Scientists were slam-dunk moneymakers. It hasn’t worked out that way. I was right about one band, but the greatest accomplishments of We Are Scientists are a couple of movie soundtracks and a few commercials.

The Blackhawks could have easily become the We Are Scientists of hockey: a good team, but nothing the masses are getting excited about. Wouldn’t you rather see the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup?

Now, there is a joy to being proven correct. For years we have been saying that the Blackhawks could turn it around, that these Toews and Kane guys would bring hockey back to the city. We were right.

I have loved every minute of Antti Niemi’s season, not just because he’s playing great hockey, but because I said he could do it when no one else did. I’m not trying to toot my own horn here, because we all have these accomplishments, each a little different than the other guy’s.

As trailblazers, we now know, but would never say, “I told you so,” to the city of Chicago. We were right, they were wrong. Let’s be cool about how much more awesome we are than them. There’s no need to rub it in, because deep down, in places they don’t talk about at parties, they know they were wrong.

This is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity: two generations of Blackhawks fans coming together to celebrate the first Stanley Cup Championship in 49 years. The newbies might not stick around and follow the team in the future, but those who are just getting into hockey and will stay with hockey for the rest of their lives, well, they’re no different than us. They just needed the push. For us, that push might have been playing hockey or going to your first game, a father or a brother dragging you to the rink to see a last-place team. For them, it’s a great team that is exciting the city. In the end, a love of hockey is a love of hockey, no matter how you got there.

So, let the yuppies and the corporates fade away, they always do. It is not our responsibility as trailblazers to be bitter and judgmental, we should be teachers of the next generation of Blackhawks fans, no matter how young or old they might be. What Pat Foley represents to us trailblazers, we should represent to the newbies. Regale them with stories of Roenick and Chelios, Thibault and Amonte, Gilmour and Wilson, Belfour and Secord. With all the ignorance out there, it is our job to impart some knowledge. Thankfully, we are never going back to hockey purgatory, which means some of the bandwagoners are going to stick around. These new Blackhawks fans are moldable, let’s impart passion, tradition and blue-collar attitudes onto them. Let’s make the next generation of die-hard Blackhawks fans a better version of us.

But most of all, let’s let the emotions of the moments that lie ahead carry our actions. Let’s savor every second of the games and celebrations that follow. Don’t let anyone or anything damper our spirits. After all, we deserve this. The glory days are back for another round in Chicago, let’s enjoy every minute of it.