Janvonpobben
Registered User
- Sep 15, 2021
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This needs to be emphasized.That was peak Daniel Alfredsson. He shaved his head before the 2007 playoffs and suddenly looked like the best player in hockey at age 34-35.
14 goals in 20 playoff games in 2007. And after this 7 point game, he led the 2007-08 scoring race with 67 points in 47 games.
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And yet the seeds were already sown for his decline. Just a week before this game, Alfredsson missed two and a half games with a hip injury. A week later, he missed four more games with the same nagging hip injury. He had a five point night when he returned to put him a tie for the league lead in scoring once again. And then he played only 21 of the last 26 games, scoring only 16 points.
The Ottawa Senators organization has never been the same.
No - he's a first line RW ideally, or at worst a 1A/1B, as with Hossa.1. A hard worker with skill.
2. A career 2/3 rd liner ideally.
3. A 4th line winger in all-time competition.
4. A HHOFer for a lesser team,
5. An all-time worthy (A) alternate captain.
1. A hard worker with skill.
2. A career 2/3 rd liner ideally.
3. In fact, a HHOFer for a lesser team.
4. A 4th-line winger in all-time competition.
5. An all-time worthy (A) alternate captain.
This needs to be emphasized.
Alfredsson, following this 7 point outburst, was in the Art Ross lead heading into the 2008 All-Star break. He would be injured shortly thereafter, miss time, and fall back in the scoring race. But he was outpacing Crosby, Ovechkin, Thornton, his own Pizza Line-mates, etc when healthy.
It was at the tail end of a 2.5 year stretch beginning in 2005 where he was legitimately a contender for best player in the world, although many would dismiss that notion before hearing why. The 2005-06 season saw him put up 103 points, and lead team Sweden in goals and points when they won gold at the Olympics. The 06-07 season saw him lead Ottawa to a finals berth, and lead the playoffs in goals and points. And in 07-08, the outright Art Ross lead at the all star break, after which his hip injury got in the way.
And hey, in 03-04, he finished 7th in scoring (no Pizza Line), and in 02-03, he led Ottawa to a President's Trophy and within a game of the SCF. So really, an exceptional 5 year stretch of hockey, with a lockout right in the middle where Ottawa had as great of a chance as any to win the Stanley Cup (roster with Chara, Hasek, Hossa, etc).
This 7 point game to overtake the Art Ross lead deep into the season was definitely the exclamation point of his prime.
I never agreed with the Alfredsson = Sundin-claim that pops up among Sens fans at times, but this is very harsh and Alfie has grown on me in hindsight/since the lockout. He has a Smythe worthy run in a losing cause and remarkable longevity as a productive winger. I don’t know how many teams would have had prime Alfredsson on their third line. Some Habs powerhouses for sure.
I guess it would be interesting to hear where people would place Alfredsson on the early 90s Pens depth charts with Recchi/Tocchet, old Joe Mullen and Jaromir Jagr. I don’t think Alfie was worse than Glenn Anderson and should have enamored Messier more than Kent Nilsson did for the Oilers dynasty.
I always wondered how people considered Sundin a better player. Alfredsson has always been underrated and doesn’t get mentioned much anymore.
Sundin and Alfredsson are not 2 years apart (22 months), yet they felt almost of different hockey generation if you were a young kid in 1990, different timeline to arrive in the nhl and after that different timeline to become a big star (despite the Calder win).Alfredsson has one of the weirder career-arcs of major forwards that I can think of. I didn't even know he was almost 23 when his NHL career began
Sundin and Alfredsson are not 2 years apart (22 months), yet they felt almost of different hockey generation if you were a young kid in 1990, different timeline to arrive in the nhl and after that different timeline to become a big star (despite the Calder win).
One start 1st overall draft pick, the other goes undrafted until 21 when he get a 6th round pick from the Sens, yet they end up over time pretty much at the same place.
Alfie was a defenceman until he was 14 years old.
Numbers tell the story of Daniel Alfredsson's career - The Globe and Mail
The 133rd overall pick in 1994 draft was considered a long shot to make itwww.theglobeandmail.com
Sundin had the better career for sure. You just can't buy that kind of consistency year after year. Alfredsson had maybe a decade of point per game seasons while Sundin basically did this his entire career for two decades.
Yeah Sundin was better, but more so in terms of achievements rather than peak. At peak, they're pretty close.
Alfredsson has one of the weirder career-arcs of major forwards that I can think of. I didn't even know he was almost 23 when his NHL career began. So, he started with two very solid, productive seasons on the Sens, 1995-1997. They were still a trainwreck in his first year (he led them in scoring as a rookie) but then they started getting better quickly.
However, he kind of didn't. His years three and four are a bit 'meh'. The team is getting quite good in this period, but he's injured for long stretches of both seasons, and it's the arrival of the DPE which means his stats look sort of unimpressive (but aren't too bad, all things considered -- still, not the big jump up you might expect of him here).
Then, from 1999-00 to 2003-04, he has five remarkably consistent seasons in a row. He's around a point-per-game in all five of these seasons, so they're easily his five best seasons to date.
Then, the Lock-Out, during which he turns 32. One might expect him to start slowing down when he came back....
...and instead he then has the three most productive seasons of his career from around age 33 to 35. He scores 103 points in 2006 (despite missing five games) and would have scored way over 100 in 2008 (now aged 35!) if not for 12 missed games (still gets the second-highest point total of his career).
Then, he's still very productive at ages 36 and 37, leading the Sens in scoring both seasons.
Finally, slows down for his final four seasons. (But he still led the Red Wings in scoring at age 41... albeit with only 49 points.).
If you go by the Hockey-Ref. "adjusted scoring" metric, the five most productive seasons of Alfredsson's career were all from aged 30 to 35. His big playoffs was at age 34.
Yeah peak/prime is what I’m referring to here. I don’t see how Sundin was just as good at his peak, 4th in points and 4th in Selke voting with decent competition at the top and his 2007 playoff run were all better than Sundin ever was. Alfredsson from 2005-08 was flat out a better player than Sundin was for any single season of his career.