Each Wednesday this month we’re wondering What If from different times in Blackhawks history. Today’s gets us in the way back machine a little longer than last’s week’s edition. We’re traveling all the way back to 1967.
Phil Esposito was only 24 years old, but had already played four seasons wi🧸th the Blackhawks. He scored 74 goals win an even 100 assists in 235 games for Chicago. Why trade a productive young player when the team around him is really good already?
According to Espo, it was because… well, he had a big mouth. In his memoire, Esposito recounts that he was moderately inebriated at a team function following the 1966-67 season and approached then coach Billy Reay and GM Tommy Ivan and told them bluntly: “We’ve got a great team here, you could almost have a dynasty, but you two are gonna screw it up.”
Soon after, he was packing his bags for Boston.
On May 15, 1ꦺ967, the Blackhawks traded Esposito with Ken Hodge and Fred Stanfield to the B🔥oston Bruins for Gilles Marotte, Pit Martin and Jack Norris.
Ouch!
Esposito 🥂became a fixture at the top of a loaded Boston lineup. He scored 459 goals with 553 assists in only 625 games over the following nine years🌱. He led the in goals six times, points five times and assists three times in those nine seasons.
Hodge was only 22 when he was part of the package. Like Esposito, he came into his own in Bo🉐ston and became a terrific player. He, too, was a point-pe♑r-game player for the Bruins, posting 289 goals and 385 assists in 652 games over the next nine seasons.
Stanfield spent only the next six years with the Bruins, but he gave them 409 points 💝in 4𓆉48 games.
For those keeping track at home, the three players 🅰the Blackhawks gave up scored 883 goals with 1,212 assists (2,095 total points) in 1,725 ga🎐mes.
Nothing against Martin — whose 627 points in 740 games is nothing to be ashamed of — but the deal was a massive blunder by Chicago.
Oh, what could have been!
So, let’s ask the question: What if the Blackhawks hadn’t made this blockbuster mistake?
The 1966-67 Blackhawks were 41-17-12 and finished in first place. They were led by Bobby Hull’s 52 goals and Stan Mikita’s 90 points. In the season that followed the trade, the Blackhawks were 32-26-16 and fell to fourth place. The Blackhawks still had Mikita, both Bobby and Dennis Hull, Kenny Wharram and a blue line that included Pierre Pilote, Ken Stapleton and Doug Jarrett. The core was still there to compete.
Chicago got to the Stanley Cup Final in 1971 and 1973, where they lost to the Montreal Canadiens both times. But had Chicago kept Esposito, Hodge and Stanfield, the history books might remember those two p🐠layoff runs differently. And there may have been other postseason☂ successes in between.
The bigger trickle-down what question for me is whether or not Bobby Hull would have left for the Winnipeg Jets in 1972 if ꦯthe team still had a younger, dynamic roster and had won t🏅he 1971 Stanley Cup. Yes, the money was there from the WHA, but another championship might have made staying in Chicago a more thoughtful conversation for both sides.
