Since coming into the NHL as an Original Six franchise in 1926, the Blackhawks have hardly been trend-setters. In recent years, in fact, they've generally been considered to operate well behind the times.

The arrival of president John McDonough 10 months ago is changing all that, however. McDonough's latest project is a fan convention -- the first in the NHL. It will run July 18-20 at the Hilton Chicago Hotel and representatives of many of the other league teams are expected to attend to see how well it works.

It was during McDonough's 24-year run in the front office of baseball's Chicago Cubs that he devised a fan convention. The first was held in 1986 because McDonough "simply wanted to expand the market-sales cycle to 12 months. ...We wanted to bridge one season to another and humanize the players. We had no idea if it'd be successful."

It turned out to be a huge success, and other teams in baseball as well as those in football and hockey have created their own offseason special events. The Hawks' convention was announced during the season and the club announced that it had sold out in two weeks. The Hawks were putting a few more tickets on sale in the last week before the convention, however. McDonough estimated attendance for the three days at 8,000. The first Cubs' convention drew only 2,300.

Since taking over McDonough has worked to get all games televised, negotiated a radio contract with powerful WGN, brought back popular play-by-play broadcaster Pat Foley, hired former stars Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita and Tony Esposito as ambassadors and approved the signing of the top free agent on the market, defenseman Brian Campbell. He received an eight-year $56.8 million contract, a signing that made a big, powerful statement with the club's fan base.

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