Where's Danny Wirtz? Does It Even Matter?

Coming out of the Winter Classic feeling worse than ever.

Apologies on the late delivery. I'm sure you get it, being New Year's Day and all. Also, I'm guessing you probably aren't all that eager to get even more media about the Hawks, given their current state.

As mentioned in the preview, really trying to analyze an outdoor game can be futile. The conditions are just so wildly different. What would normally work might not on a rain-soaked ice surface or a windy day or the different lighting or whatever else.

Not that there wasn't a lot to complain about. Seth Jones continues to hang up the I'm Not Interested sign ever since coming back from injury. If this game was important, and perhaps the only important one the Hawks will have this season, why did they start their second best goalie? Nick Foligno continues to act like a captain in front of the cameras but doesn't actually do anything to make the team better or more structured. It's all eyewash. Tyler Bertuzzi has gone back to being a turd. The Hawks have spent the last three games getting utterly crushed trying to exit their zone only along the boards. It's not even the other team has their d-men pinching down to keep zone time going. They're just standing there. They don't even have to move. Louis Crevier gets ice-time while Wyatt Kaiser and Kevin Korchinski don't.

So there's all that, but it hurts a little more given the stage. We knew this season would be ugly at times, but it stings more when it doesn't feel like there's any progress being made. Fans know what that looks like. They can accept losses, and a lot of them, if they feel even just a little forward momentum. It's the Dan Bernstein corollary: Are you closer to a championship than you were yesterday? Actual wins and losses aren't always the barometer of that.

But are the Hawks closer? Are they any closer to being a contender and winning things than they were the day after they drafted Connor Bedard? It doesn't feel that way. It doesn't feel like the Hawks have a plan for Frank Nazar or Kevin Korchinski, the only pieces they have in house right now that could really matter down the line. Wyatt Kaiser was the second-best d-man all season. He can't get on the ice now for reasons no one can seem to identify. It goes on, but we've done that show.

What's really strange is with the Hawks on the biggest stage they'll have all season, essentially hosting the NHL world for a couple days, did we hear anything from Danny Wirtz? He's the one who picked Kyle Davidson over candidates from Carolina and Tampa, two teams that have a distinguished track record of not just winning, but of developing and producing from their own system consistently. And they did that without top picks. Wirtz is the one who has backed this plan, this rebuild, and asked for patience. He's the one who decided to put the Hawks on a channel were so few fans can see them, without reading the room on how things were going for RSNs and Comcast these days. At the end of the day, he's responsible. And when the Hawks are front and center of league business, possibly the only time for years they will be, where was the beaming host? And if he doesn't want to be out front, what does that say?

We haven't heard from him since the fall. We didn't hear from him after Luke Richardson was fired, to this point the biggest admission that Davidson's hand wasn't exactly steady on the wheel. Does Danny still believe in where this team is going? Is he going to say anything reassure fans that he will do everything possible to bring even watchable hockey back to the United Center? Or as long as attendance remains reasonably good, which it has, does he assume everything is ok among the fanbase?

But...but, there's always a "but," there's a nagging fear that maybe none of that matters. The Hawks are so entrenched in Davidson's rebuild that there isn't much of a way out of it now. They can't "sign" their way out of it in the summer. They don't have much to trade even if they did want to veer and make a big splash. What would Korchinski's value even be? Vlasic? It's hard to see where any kind of pivot is even possible now, two and a half seasons into whatever this is.

As well as the Hawks do treat their players, Chicago almost certainly isn't a destination anymore. Who's signing up to get their ass kicked for another season or two? Other than players like Foligno who have nowhere else to go? Or second-rate scorers like Bertuzzi who have washed out of the contenders' tier?

The only way out of this is for either Kyle's plan to come to fruition, which he keeps pushing farther down the line to buy himself time, or for Danny to decide someone else needs to either finish the job or start it again. The fans aren't going to stomach the latter. Davidson will argue he hasn't had enough time to prove that he can develop the talent he has drafted the last three years. That's probably true. But the initial signs...they aren't good. This was the season where the Hawks were supposed to take a first step instead of falling or regrouping. That first step is looking a lot like Wile E. Coyote's.

But we have no idea if Wirtz senses that. Or if he believes in this direction. He's in hiding. Which doesn't help to alleviate the feeling that there's no one on any level with the Hawks who truly knows what they're doing. They fired the coach and have a stand-in. The GM said this squad was going to be more competitive, and they're open lengths the worst team in the league. The owner backed all this and is nowhere to be found. Their business operations put them on a channel in the dark.

Where exactly are Hawks fans supposed to plan their flag?

Please share and re-skeet (are we really going with that term?) and all that stuff. Happy New Year!