Davidson states why he wants to move on from Toews.

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Austin Sabourin
April 23, 2023 (4:02 PM)

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The end of an era has happened in Chicago with management stating that they aren't gonna to offer him an extension at the end of the regular season.

Chicagos GM has finally stated the reason on why they have wanted to move on from their captain.

»I don't know if it's necessarily putting the past behind us... It's moreso clearing the deck to some extent to allow the organic growth for young players into leadership roles and offer this new era of Blackhawks players the same opportunity that Toews, (Patrick) Kane, [Duncan] Keith, [Brent] Seabrook were all offered when they came into the league.»

Going off of that, Davidson also went on to say that as long as the vets like Toews and Kane were still around it was stunting the growth of younger players who weren't getting their chance to shine and take on leadership roles.

»When there's a player like Jonathan or Patrick in your locker room, you defer to them. You just let them handle the leadership and there's not a lot of development opportunity there. So now we believe that it was something that is beneficial for this next group to allow leaders to emerge, and form that relationship with Luke [Richardson], form that relationship with myself. In the locker room, be the voice rather than deferring to someone who's been here for so long. It gives them an opportunity to step up and be the new leadership group of the franchise.»

Davidson is understanding that the fans have been spoiled getting to watch their team win multiple cups in such a short time, and the fact that the rebuild has painful. He gets that the fans aren't happy with it.

"It's just one of those things that, in the situation we're in, these tough decisions have to be made. And this is just another one of those. I get the potential disappointment because they're legends. They've done so much for the city, so much for the organization and brought so much success that's only natural. But we've got to do what we think is best for the growth of the team and this was something that we thought was best for them."