Previously on Lost…I mean, Last time on Adventures in Odyssey… I mean, last time you found yourself on this beautiful site you read about “The Architect” and how important the brilliant Dale Tallon was in building an exceptional team in Chicago that has won two Cups and is poised for more. But one of my most loyal readers wanted to know if Tallon is such a brilliant Architect, why did Chicago let him go? If you have followed the NHL for some time you’ve probably heard of the Wirtz family. Bill Wirtz owned the Hawks for several years before passing away leaving Rocky Wirtz to look after the ownership of the team. During this transition in Chicago there was plenty of animosity in the Blackhawk front office circles. Despite this, Dale Tallon went about his business building a championship team. One of the biggest scraps in the front office involved current Blackhawk executive John Mcdonough and his apparent animosity toward Dale Tallon’s smarts in putting a team together. And when John Mcdonough is a best friend of the owner...well then you knew that Dale’s days were numbered in Chicago. Just ask Martin Havlat. But Chicago still needed a reason to fire Tallon. And conveniently enough, when it came time for Chicago to submit qualifying offers to several restricted free agents, the faxes went to the wrong people and other qualifying offers were simply lost in the mail like an errant birthday party invitation. Tallon was then demoted from his GM post but just a few months later he was leading the charge in Sunrise. I can still see Dale Tallon shaking his head and saying to himself “PC load letter?”
(Apologies for all the hyperlinks, I won't let it happen again.)
