In any typical year, this would be a bad time for Chicago sports media. It’s the winter. It’s cold. Trudging to work every day sucks. But more than that, once you get to work, you only have one professional team to cover — the Bears are done, the Cubs and White Sox are remaining relatively quiet in the offseason. You have the Bulls, a team that hasn’t been all too good as of late, and that’s about it, right? In any typical year, yes.

This is no typical year. This year is the Year of the Blackhawk, in which a long-downtrodden franchise is making its push for not only respectability but for local dominance. If it seems unlikely, it is. It will take the Blackhawks more than one year to be more popular than the Bulls in Chicago … but the ball is rolling, and the media is taking notice. Ready to hop on a bandwagon? ESPN.com’s resident Chicagoan, the always-reductive Gene Wojciechowski, takes you there:

If you’re the 0-for-’08 Detroit Lions, there’s hope. The galactically dysfunctional New York Knicks and Dallas Cowboys? There’s hope. The penny-pinched Pittsburgh Pirates, once-proud U-Dub Huskies, orphaned Oklahoma City Thunder … there’s hope. Even a Donald Sterling-owned team or a roster managed by absentee exec Michael Jordan can walk a little taller today.

That’s because the perennially worst franchise in sports has performed reconstructive cosmetic surgery on itself — and it worked! Any prettier and the Chicago Blackhawks would have their own modeling deal.

Ah, yes, who would have ever thought that a perennially successful franchise like the Dallas Cowboys, managed by a billionaire owner, who had one of the great football dynasties of the last decade and whose team is as talented as any in the NFL would have — gasp — hope? If the Blackhawks can do it, so can the Cowboys! In a billion-dollar stadium, no less! Know hope, ‘Boys fans! Know hope!

Anyway, the rest of Wojo’s piece is the story of the Blackhawks’ marketing makeover, spearheaded by none other than John McDonough, who has struck a brilliant balance of tradition — old veterans, “legacy,” all that — and the excitement of the Blackhawks’ youth to build a resurgent level of local interest. He’s a master surgeon, that guy. It’s very impressive.

That said, the story is familiar to anyone in hockey, or anyone who has taken even a passing interest in the Hawks this season. But that doesn’t stop the running jumps aboard the Blackhawkwagon. Count ESPN the Mag among the offending parties, though Chris Sprow can make just about any subject interesting, so that’s cool with me. Steve Rosenbloom also joined the fray, and now this just getting annoying:

Point is, the Bears’ choke in Houston came at such a perfect time for the Blackhawks that you’d think that McDonough orchestrated it, and here’s why:

It turned the sports city over to the local pond hockey team.

Even more perfect, it comes the week that that the Hawks face off against the dreaded Red Wings in a nationally broadcast game of shinny in the local baseball cathedral on New Year’s Day.

Perfect timing, I’m telling you. The Bears are dead, the Bulls are bad, the Hawks are playing the best hockey in the league right now.

First of all, brah, ease up on the single-sentence paragraphs. For Kane’s sake, what is it with some sportswriters?

Did I miss the class in journalism school that said you had to punctuate every thing you say as if it’s your last sentence?

Why is this so popular?

I thought Mike Downey was done at the Tribune.

Do we see how annoying this is, Steve?

Good.

Anyway, there’s truth to Rosenbloom’s thought, but there’s also a fair batch of kneejerkery involved here. It’s going to take time. One Winter Classic doesn’t a franchise make. Not to mention the Bulls’ own young talent — the best rookie in the game, Derrick Rose — will have something to say about whether Bulls fans find their way back to the United Center in the coming years.

The Blackhawks have a great short-term opportunity. It’s worth getting excited about. But let’s not drop all perspective at the first sight of outdoor hockey, hmm? The Hawks have a long climb yet.