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A Rocky Start
Fan Commentary, by Mr. Miller
October 23, 2007
In less than a month's time after taking over for his father, Rocky Wirtz has done what every fan, reporter and hockey insider knew should've been done years ago: he "reassigned" Bob Pulford away from hockey operations and is now in the process of negotiating with Comcast to put home games on television.
 Both moves might seem trivial to many outsiders. After all, to 99% of all sports fans in America, the idea of refusing to broadcast home games is as foreign as former Blackhawk GM Mike Smith's draft picks. But they amount to nothing less than a step from out of the darkness in terms of how the Blackhawks are going to run their organization from here on out.
Rocky deserves a lot of credit for going against his father's long time policy of protecting the season ticket holders. Yet this reversal of a decades-long policy of former owner Bill Wirtz has every Blackhawk fan wondering "What's next?"
Several fans have suggested that it's time to bring long time announcer Pat Foley back into the mix. Foley left for the AHL's Chicago Wolves last season after both sides failed to come to a contract agreement. The move left Wolves' fans ecstatic as they gained an incredible voice in which knowledge and passion for the sport of hockey can be heard in every word.
Blackhawk fans got Dan Kelly. The worst hockey announcer since, well, the beginning of broadcasting. (And by several accounts, a jerk to boot.)
A radio combination of John Wiedeman and Troy Murray and a TV duo of Pat Foley and Eddie Olczyk could match up well with any broadcast booth in the country.
The question no one seems to be asking though is whether or not Foley would even want to come back to the Blackhawks. After all, one would think his opinion would matter the most in this situation. His loyalty now is with the Wolves and changing that might not be a simple task.
One can only hope that good things continue to happen to the Blackhawks. It's good for the team, the fans, the city and the league. They've got an exciting young team and if Rocky's early moves are any indication, perhaps respectability is closer than we think.
The Blackhawks won.
Some fans have joked over the years what would happen first: the Cubs in the World Series or Blackhawk home games on TV. Come on. Was there really ever any doubt on that one?
The Koci countdown.
Barry Rozner of the Daily Herald reports that the first home game to be broadcast as part of this new policy change will be on November 11th vs. Detroit (sucks). That will be game #17 of the season. Any bets on if David Koci will score a point by then?
As heard on the boards.
Jim C, a very opinionated and often controversial poster on the WirtzSucks.com message boards, simply had this to say: ...the 21st century is coming to Chicago.
Too bad it's already stopped by and visited every other NHL city several times over in the past, oh, 20 years.
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