The Convenient Cop-out of Character & Choking

History Lesson 1: The 1992 Chicago Blackhawks

Why cries of "No Character!" and "They choked!" are most often a fallacy

It's springtime, which means it is NHL playoff season. Which means it's time for an annual rite of spring: teams favored to win the Stanley Cup are eliminated, earlier than they were supposed to be. Teams that were built to win it all disappear in the first or second round of the playoffs. And then comes the alleged analysis—otherwise known as fans, journalists, and former players now making their living as analysts trying to figure out what went so wrong with teams favored by Vegas to win hockey's holy grail. And, almost automatically, attributions about a "lack of character" and/or "choking" arrive. For a team with so many All-Star players, with a team that won so many games so easily during the regular season, surely the only explanation for an early round playoff exit is the lack of character of said team's star players and, likewise, the inability of that team's star players to perform in the clutch.


Rather than deal with the logical fallacies of "lack of character" when it comes to players who have been proven their character many previous times in their careers and the blatant idiocy of stating that key contributors to previous championships are completely incapable of coming through in the clutch, I want to take a look at a team that broke an NHL record for most consecutive wins in one playoff season. I am not talking about the Stanley Cup champion 1992 Pittsburgh Penguins, who actually tied a playoff record first set by the team they would ultimately face in the 1992 Stanley Cup Finals, the Chicago Blackhawks.


Let's examine the highlights of the roster of the 1992 Chicago Blackhawks. (You can view the entire roster here).


Goalies: Ed Belfour, Dominik Hasek
Defensemen: Chris Chelios, Steve Smith, Igor Kravchuk
Forwards: Jeremy Roenick, Dirk Graham, Steve Larmer, Steve Thomas, Brent Sutter, Michel Goulet.

 
So, Chris Chelios won multiple Stanley Cups and Norris Trophies in his career. Did he "choke" as a member of a team that let a 3-0 lead in Game 1 slip away? Did those players who performed on championship teams all choke? And did those guys who were known for their character and grittiness for the duration of their careers lack character? Looking at other players, up and down the roster, it seems clear that the Blackhawks were an excellent hockey team, full of character players, guys who had won or would win Cups or medals, who were winners.


So what in the world happened to a team that was swept in the 1992 Stanley Cup Finals? 


The 1992 Blackhawks had to play against the 1992 Pittsburgh Penguins. The excellent Chicago team that broke the record for most consecutive wins in one playoff year earned the privilege of playing against three Hall-of-Fame centers, a Hall-of-Fame defenseman, and 4 wingers who would combine to score thousands of goals in their NHL careers. 


The Blackhawks had to play against Mario Lemieux, Ron Francis, Bryan Trottier, Jaromir Jagr, and Larry Murphy.  They had to play against Rick Tocchet and Kevin Stevens when they were in the prime of their careers as power forwards. They had to play against a hot goaltender, Tom Barrasso, in his prime. They had to play against defensive stalwarts named Samuelsson and bottom-line grinders who had come up through the system and gone through losing and learned how to win and it likely mentions reiterating: well—the offensive skill of that 1992 juggernaut Pittsburgh team speaks for itself.


Years later, Hockey Consultant still believes that 1992 Blackhawks team was the best team Jeremy Roenick ever played on. She still believes that 1992 Chicago team was the best chance Jeremy Roenick ever really had to win a Stanley Cup. (There's only one other team that's won 11 consecutive games in a single playoff year.)


Yet, what happens in hockey happens in hockey. Match-ups matter. And a team, full of character guys who had previously won Cups and many of whom would go on to win still more championships, was swept by the Pittsburgh Penguins after "choking" away a 3-0 lead in the first game of the 1992 Cup Finals.


But the Blackhawks didn't choke. Ed Belfour and Dominik Hasek didn't choke. Chris Chelios and Jeremy Roenick didn't choke. Dirk Graham, the captain of that Chicago team, cared as much as any player on the 1992 Penguins.


That Blackhawks team had the misfortune of encountering one of the best hockey teams assembled in the past quarter century, with half a roster full of players who could legitimately be considered for a place in the Hockey Hall of Fame. And the Blackhawks lost, and lost badly in close, tight games—they were swept.


Yet, if you look at the careers of the players on that Blackhawks team, you won't find players who lacked the "character" needed to win Cups or medals, and you won't find an entire team of guys with a record of "choking" (it's worth noting both those Blackhawks goalies eventually won Stanley Cups). You'll find great guys who comprised an excellent team and who played tremendously—and who just got beat by a better team— the only team, in fact, that has ever matched their record of winning 11 consecutive games in a single playoff year.


More often than not, a player who makes it to the NHL is not one with a track record of "bad" character, nor is that player one who "always chokes" during big games: most players with any of those issues simply simply don't get or manage to stay in the NHL if those are their issues. And crying "bad" character or "always chokes" of a player who's contributed to championships, well, clearly this is not a pattern of "bad" character or "choking" if that player has contributed to championship teams. More often than not, crying "no character!" and "they choked!" is a lazy, all-too-convenient cop-out for people too lazy to do actual analysis of why a team they presumed was so great ended up losing a playoff series.


Two decades later—when it's easy to analyze actual hockey because the raw emotions have dissipated and history tells us about the career trajectory of those Blackhawks and Penguins—it's simple merely to look at the video, rosters, and box scores, and come to the conclusion that the 1992 Chicago Blackhawks being swept by the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Stanley Cup final wasn't about choking or character at all.


That it was just about hockey, and one hockey team, full of character guys who had won, beating another team, also full of character guys who had won and would win still more.


So, a simple request: The next time you're prompted to scream "Character!" or "Choking!" to attribute the cause of an unexpected playoff loss, would you consider redirecting the conversation to something that's actually related to hockey, rather than—let's be honest—imaginary issues about players who—on the whole— care deeply about winning championships?