1979-80 Season

[Johnny Engine]

someone on here will know better than me, perhaps you, i thought the biggest skate change came in the 70s?

I wonder if there was an observable lag between the introduction of better skates, and players that grew up skating in them. It's blatant to me that not only do the late 90s births all have an identifiable way of shooting and stick handling, but also that the most significant advance in stick technology happened when these guys were toddlers.

If you apply the same sort of logic to the introduction of Tuuks, then yes, the generation that includes Bure, Fedorov, Sellanne, Leetch and Niedermayer were all very young. But as you mentioned, a hundred other things were changing and half of those players were trained in a very different culture, so it's hard to isolate.

 

[Dingo]

I wonder if there was an observable lag between the introduction of better skates, and players that grew up skating in them. It's blatant to me that not only do the late 90s births all have an identifiable way of shooting and stick handling, but also that the most significant advance in stick technology happened when these guys were toddlers.

If you apply the same sort of logic to the introduction of Tuuks, then yes, the generation that includes Bure, Fedorov, Sellanne, Leetch and Niedermayer were all very young. But as you mentioned, a hundred other things were changing and half of those players were trained in a very different culture, so it's hard to isolate.

ya, it probably is a part of it

i think this, for better or worse - we played this game one way for generations - north south, down the wing, half clapper, crash the net.

1972 happened, and all of a sudden Canadian kids came out next generation playing east west, drop passes, saucers, better skaters, in shape, and Euros came over waybigger, able to slap it and crash the net, able to hit and be hit.

And then Gretzky went to the States and real money came into the game - all of a sudden there are hundreds of guys, from multiple countries, training like Rocky Balboa to take your job.

The guys from the 70s 80s didnt stay well, whereas the guys before them actually did. and so has everyone, uninjured, who started in about 1990 an on.

The game changed in there

i think.

 

[The Panther]

i think this, for better or worse - we played this game one way for generations - north south, down the wing, half clapper, crash the net.

1972 happened, and all of a sudden Canadian kids came out next generation playing east west, drop passes, saucers, better skaters, in shape, and Euros came over waybigger, able to slap it and crash the net, able to hit and be hit.

Some truth there, but not really. When I've watched NHL games from the 1950s or 1960s (admittedly I don't do this often), I often see creative offensive plays that are still standard today such as a forward circling the net, going back to the point, hitting the late man, etc. These aren't things the Soviets invented. Bobby Orr's presence had already started a big change in the N.A. game long before 1972. And the WHA's existence from that same year started the era of players pursuing big money as professionals (which you refer to later).

And then Gretzky went to the States and real money came into the game - all of a sudden there are hundreds of guys, from multiple countries, training like Rocky Balboa to take your job.

Yes, and this factor is always unrepresented in these discussions. When the average salary of a position goes from $80,000 a year to $2,000,000 a year in about 15 years, there's going to be A LOT more competition for the high-end positions.

The guys from the 70s 80s didnt stay well, whereas the guys before them actually did. and so has everyone, uninjured, who started in about 1990 an on.

As has been shown on here in several posts before, the guys who were born in about 1960 or later aged extremely well. It's the guys who were born in the early 1950s to mid-1950s who aged extremely poorly.

Think of some players who started (at young ages, say 18-20) between 1979-80 and 1982-83: Bourque, Messier, Gretzky, Ciccarelli, Stevens, Moog, Coffey, Murphy, N. Broten, Carbonneau, Brent Sutter, Francis, Hawerchuk, MacInnis, Vernon, Nicholls, Vanbiesbrouck, Andreychuk, Housley, Verbeek. All of these guys were still big-impact players well into the 1990s, some until the end of the 1990s, and a few (Messier, MacInnis, Bourque, Stevens) well into the 2000s.

That's going forward, say, 13 to 22 years from their debut. But go back and look at players born from around 1950 to 1958 and see how many were still big-impact players from 1983 to 1992. If they weren't already gone by the early 1980s, most of them flamed out quickly by 1985 or so. Basically nobody was a high-impact player anymore by the mid-1980s... or even the early 1980s (maybe Brad Park and a couple others).

 

[Dingo]

Some truth there, but not really. When I've watched NHL games from the 1950s or 1960s (admittedly I don't do this often), I often see creative offensive plays that are still standard today such as a forward circling the net, going back to the point, hitting the late man, etc. These aren't things the Soviets invented. Bobby Orr's presence had already started a big change in the N.A. game long before 1972. And the WHA's existence from that same year started the era of players pursuing big money as professionals (which you refer to later).

Yes, and this factor is always unrepresented in these discussions. When the average salary of a position goes from $80,000 a year to $2,000,000 a year in about 15 years, there's going to be A LOT more competition for the high-end positions.

As has been shown on here in several posts before, the guys who were born in about 1960 or later aged extremely well. It's the guys who were born in the early 1950s to mid-1950s who aged extremely poorly.

Think of some players who started (at young ages, say 18-20) between 1979-80 and 1982-83: Bourque, Messier, Gretzky, Ciccarelli, Stevens, Moog, Coffey, Murphy, N. Broten, Carbonneau, Brent Sutter, Francis, Hawerchuk, MacInnis, Vernon, Nicholls, Vanbiesbrouck, Andreychuk, Housley, Verbeek. All of these guys were still big-impact players well into the 1990s, some until the end of the 1990s, and a few (Messier, MacInnis, Bourque, Stevens) well into the 2000s.

That's going forward, say, 13 to 22 years from their debut. But go back and look at players born from around 1950 to 1958 and see how many were still big-impact players from 1983 to 1992. If they weren't already gone by the early 1980s, most of them flamed out quickly by 1985 or so. Basically nobody was a high-impact player anymore by the mid-1980s... or even the early 1980s (maybe Brad Park and a couple others).

i think we are saying the same thing as far as era/birthdates

and, Bobby Clarke said, and i AM paraphrasing, "The Soviets did things we had never seen. .... well, Orr did them, but we just thought he was an anomaly..."

Orr was a freak precursor. Gretzky was the first modern player

imo, of course.