Trading stories: Chicago Blackhawks have seen the emotional gamut with trades — from excitement to heartache

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The NHL trade season comes around every year, but it doesn’t always blunt the shock when a teammate is shipped off.

It came twice for MacKenzie Entwistle last season.

Brandon Hagel, his 2019-20 Rockford IceHogs teammate, was dealt to the Tampa Bay Lightning three days before the 2022 trade deadline.

In another stunner, Hawks general manager Kyle Davidson swung a draft-day deal with the Ottawa Senators for Alex DeBrincat, the 5-foot-7 winger who would playfully “bully” the 6-3 Entwistle at most practices and morning skates.

“Me and Brinksy were pretty close, and even Hags,” Entwistle told the Tribune. “So for those two guys to get traded last year was obviously tough. But that’s part of the game.”

Entwistle has developed a thick skin for such an eventuality, as have most Hawks if you ask around.

Hawks icons Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews dominate this season’s rumor mill. Max Domi and Andreas Athanasiou were candidates for a trade-deadline flip before they ever donned a Hawks sweater. And others such as Sam Lafferty and Jake McCabe have emerged as surprise targets for the March 3 deadline.

No one is off limits.

The trade deadline has no regard for locker-room bonds, but if any group is equipped to handle it, it’s this one.

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“We’ve built some pretty good relationships with some of the guys, and at the end of the day, most of it’s talk until it happens,” Entwistle said. “That’s when it can come to the realization that it’s real.”

From players to their coach, the Hawks have experienced all sides of trades and shared their perspectives with the Tribune.

“Twisty” had become a captain in his fourth season with the Hamilton Bulldogs when he got the surprise twist of his junior career — a trade to the Guelph Storm on Jan. 5, 2019.

“It’s a weird situation, having to just get up and pack when you’re living with a billet family,” Entwistle said of his host family, Dave and Christa Copeland.

“I was with them for four years of my life. So every single day, sitting down at dinner with their family and you’re like their fourth kid. They had their three little boys. Now I go back and they’re almost taller than me.”

Fast-forward four years and Entwistle is bracing for the potential departure of teammates who are like older brothers to him.

“It’s a little bit different because everyone has their own family here,” he said. “You’re still getting traded, you’re still moving places. And so it is a little bit different but the same.”

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Entwistle is soaking up knowledge from Hawks veterans while he can.

“There’s countless guys,” he said. “I sit beside Jack Johnson, a guy that won a Stanley Cup last year (who’s) been around the league for a long time.”

And then there are Kane and Toews, two future Hall of Famers with expiring contracts who’ve had more influence on Entwistle than he’s willing to let on.

“Being able to learn from them and taking little things from their everyday habits is something that — I don’t know if I’d ever tell them that — but that is definitely what I do on a daily basis for sure,” Entwistle said.

“They’re in the gym every single day, they’re always studying games, they’re watching film, their nutrition is good. They do all the little things that some people in the hockey world or not around the hockey world don’t get to see every single day.

“Those are just little things that I get to see and fortunate enough to see.”

The former NHL defenseman, now the first-year coach of the Hawks, was traded twice in his 21-year career.

The first time, on Sept. 19, 1991, Richardson was part of package that sent Craig Berube, Glenn Anderson and Grant Fuhr to the Toronto Maple Leafs and Richardson to the Edmonton Oilers in his fifth season in the league.

“I got traded in training camp, so I had a little bit of time to settle things and rent my house and move and all that,” Richardson said. “Then I got traded at the deadline once, and that was at the end of my career and I asked for it, so I was prepared and it was a good thing.”

On March 8, 2006, the Columbus Blue Jackets traded him to Toronto for a conditional midround pick. It was Richardson’s second, albeit brief, stint with the Leafs.

“When you actually get over the shock of hearing that you’re moving, there’s an excitement that someone really wanted you and that they’re bringing you in for a purpose,” he said. “And then there’s an excitement of going to a new place and that brings up energy in your game, going to the rink. Even your routine is going to be different. So it brings a little tingling to the body and probably adds to your game a little bit.”

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But Richardson has seen the other side of a trade when it wasn’t exciting.

It was the 1990-91 season, and Richardson was playing out his first stint with the Leafs, though he didn’t know it at the time. Defenseman Brad Marsh had become a fan favorite in Toronto.

“He was an all-heart player and really well-liked in the dressing room,” Richardson said.

But the Leafs traded Marsh to the Detroit Red Wings for an eighth-round pick on Feb. 4, 1991.

“I remember he was crushed,” Richardson said. “He was crying in the dressing room. To see a guy (32) years old, bawling like a baby and hugging the trainers and not wanting to leave a place he thought he fit in well.”

The trade, — which netted the Leafs winger Robb McIntyre, who topped out at one season with the AHL St. John’s Maple Leafs in 1994-95 — was a “head-scratcher,” Richardson recalled.

“For us, it didn’t make sense,” he said. “(Marsh) was a glue in the dressing room. He fixed things and he went to a team in our division. We didn’t really benefit from it, it didn’t help out the player and it might have disrupted our room more than anything.”

When Davidson acquired Lafferty on Jan. 5, 2022, from the Pittsburgh Penguins, it seemed as if the trade was more about getting rid of Alex Nylander, a bust in Chicago, than getting a difference-maker.

“High-energy hockey,” Lafferty said. “That was (Davidson’s) expectation for me when I came to Chicago.”

Lafferty has been a surprise find, posting seven goals and five assists in 19 games since Jan. 1. He’s one of the Hawks penalty killers (three short-handed goals and an assist) and is a career-high 53.3% at the dot.

A contender this season could do worse for a bottom-sixer. So when his name started getting mentioned in trade rumors, probably few were more surprised than Lafferty.

“It’s hard to wrap your head around, it’s just so out of (your) control,” Lafferty said, adding a big part of his emergence has been opportunity.

“Everyone here has trusted me and put me in a lot of situations. So I think that builds your confidence.”

Lafferty could become one of the Hawks leaders by default should some veterans depart at the deadline.

“Maybe come March 3, this could all be broken up,” Lafferty said. “I don’t think we think about it like that, but you know going into a season it’s going to have to end at some point.

“We recognize nothing’s forever and we want to enjoy it while we have it.”