Auston Matthews has more goals and a higher gpg than Ovechkin age for age. And the gap is about to grow. Can he also make a run at 894?

[jigglysquishy]

If you're using the HockeyReference number, you might as well expect to be mocked.

 

[daver]

You don’t see merit to era adjusting? If not, then this discussion is over.

You don't have to adjust. Compare relative domination vs. their peers; and adjust for league size.

Adjusting using league GPG is very faulty.

While the intersection of peak/longevity is always up for debate, in Ovechkin’s case the overall picture based on rockets won and total goals across a difficult to score era seems pretty clear. The only case I can see against is just flat out ignoring both longevity and era, which requires a lot of mental gymnastics.

Greatest and Best are two different things. Who was the best player at getting the puck into the net? Lots would argue that is Mario.

But Wayne and Hull have the two most dominant seasons.

Anyways, nothing to do with the OP except acknowledging that Matthews' numbers, like OV, need context.

 

[MadLuke]

I don't think he has a Top 3, maybe even Top 5 goalscoring season of all time.

This will be impossible to really say (because no one like Gretzky did for assists or Orr for the best season by a defenseman, etc...) it is a bunch of quite close people.

But Ovechkin 65 goals season and that 2007 to the 2010 olympcis stretch in general is up there in the conversation for the top 5 best of all time for sure imo, with the Richard-Hull-Hull-Howe-Espo-Gretzky-Lemieux-Bure and now possibly Matthews (Cam Neely per games being an other impressive peak)

From the start of the 2007 season to the Olympics break in february 2010

Ovechkin scored 163 goals in 215 games

Ovechkin: 163
Kovalchuck: 127
Heatley: 112
Iginla: 112
Nash: 106
Parise: 105
Malkin: 103
Carter: 102
Crosby: 99

65% more than Crosby


Gretzky ridiculous 81 to 84 season (234 games) it looked like

Gretzky: 250
Bossy: 175
Vaive: 157
Goulet: 155
Middleton: 147
Dionne: 145

72% more than Dionne,

I do not think this is a situation where Ovechkin peak goal scoring is not high enough to not give him a title if we consider him the best otherwise.

 

[daver]

This will be impossible to really say (because no one like Gretzky did for assists or Orr for the best season by a defenseman, etc...) it is a bunch of quite close people.

But Ovechkin 65 goals season and that 2007 to the 2010 olympcis stretch in general is up there in the conversation for the top 5 best of all time for sure imo, with the Hull-Hull-Howe-Espo-Gretzky-Lemieux-Bure and now possibly Matthews (Cam Neely per games being an other impressive peak)

From the start of the 2007 season to the Olympics break in february 2010

Ovechkin scored 163 goals in 215 games

Ovechkin: 163
Kovalchuck: 127
Heatley: 112
Iginla: 112
Nash: 106
Parise: 105
Malkin: 103
Carter: 102
Crosby: 99

65% more than Crosby


Gretzky ridiculous 81 to 84 season (234 games) it looked like

Gretzky: 250
Bossy: 175
Vaive: 157
Goulet: 155
Middleton: 147
Dionne: 145

72% more than Dionne,

I do not think this is a situation where Ovechkin peak goal scoring is not high enough to give him a title if we consider him the best otherwise.

The original comment was "clearly the best and greatest". I agree is there with Wayne and Hull as the greatest even though Mario is still arguably the best.

 

[TheStatican]

Absolutely 100% he could do it. Will he? Probably not. There's too many things that could go wrong. Several players should have had more than 894 goals, the highest of which should have been Lemieux who was tracking for 900 to 1100 goals, especially since we saw that he clearly aged much better as a goals scorer than Gretzky did - having nearly as many goals as Gretzky did age 30 and above despite playing in less than half the number of games!

30+	gms	goals
Gretzky	640	217
Lemieux	316	196

But of course significant and repeated injuries derailed his chances.

Ovechkin also would probably already be at 900 if not for situations beyond his control - missing out on nearly 2 seasons worth of games because of two lockouts and covid.

Furthermore the original (pre-Gretzky) recorded holder; Howe would easily have finished in somewhere in the mid 900's had he simply continued to play in the NHL instead of choosing to play in the WHL.

Then there's also Jagr and Bossy. Much less of a sure bet for both compared to the 3 above since their lost time would was in declining goal scoring seasons, but it's possible they could have been in range of the mark had A) Jagr not missed 4 NHL seasons and B) Bossy's career not ended early due to serious injury.


In any case it'll be interesting to see what circumstances come up that might imped Matthews progress towards the record but for now he's tracking pretty well to challenge it;

 

[BraveCanadian]

Several players should have had more than 894 goals, the highest of which should have been Lemieux who was tracking for 900 to 1100 goals, especially since we saw that he clearly aged much better as a goals scorer than Gretzky did - having nearly as many goals as Gretzky did age 30 and above despite playing in less than half the number of games!

 

[TheStatican]

Relax, I'm well aware that should have doesn't hold close to the same value as actually did.

 

[The Panther]

As others have said, it's certainly possible he could do it, but it's also possible some other current players could do it, and it's ALWAYS extremely unlikely when a player is barely 26 that he will establish any all-time scoring marks (except for Wayne Gretzky, who was barely 27 when he became the all-time assist leader).

Wait six or seven years, see how Matthews' career has gone, and then we'll take up this conversation.

 

[bobholly39]

Will need to carry his goal scoring dominance into his 30s. 7 out of 8 rockets from age 27-34 is what gets you to 800. Matthews hasn’t turned 27 yet. Look at Crosby, won an Art Ross at 26 and has stayed pretty healthy but never won another.

What's put Ovechkin in the case for Gretzky's record is not his goal-scoring performance through age 26. It's that his goal-scoring ability has persisted with age at a rate beyond (nearly) every great goal scorer in the league.

I stipulate in the OP that Matthews will be ahead of Ovechkin by 50 goals age to age by end of next year. That's not a guarantee of course, but I think it's a reasonable possibility. Assuming that happens and he is close to ~421 goals by end of next season...

Matthews doesn't need to age as well as Ovechkin. He doesn't even need to come close to ageing as well as Ovechkin, to surpass 800. If he does end up near ~421 career goals by end of next year - and assuming he plays till age 38 - he has 11 more years to hit 379 goals to top 800. That's an average of 34 goals per year.

For comparison:

From ages 28 to 38 - Sakic averages 32 goals per year. And this includes the heavy DPE years. Matthews is a much better goal scorer than Sakic, and scoring is much higher today than DPE.

From ages 28 to 36 Mats Sundin averaged 32 goals per year also in the DPE.Matthews is a much better goal scorer than Sundin, and scoring is much higher today than DPE.

I think 34 goal average from ages 28 to 38 is quite conservative for Matthews, especially if scoring remains higher.

Ovechkin averaged 45 goals per year between ages 28 and 37 (excluding this year). If you exclude the short 2021 season, that goes up to 47 goals. And a lot of those years were pretty low scoring years.

I think Matthews averaging ~38-40 goals per year between ages 28 to 38 is a reasonable pace for him. Thats puts him in the ~840-860 goal range by age 38. That's also not "7 of 8 rocket" territory, just regular strong consistency for a top goal-scorer.

 

[bobholly39]

For starters, I need to preface this by saying I am only talking about compiled raw career goal totals, and not an actual comparison of the two of them as players. Because I don't really think Matthews has a case vs. Ovechkin in a peak-vs-peak comparison. But yes, Matthews has a chance to score more goals. Obviously he does, considering he's the top goalscorer right now, and in his prime, and is currently ahead of the pace. But, higher scoring in the NHL is what has made that possible (in addition to being able to play his D+1, age 19 season). OV's had his share of Cy Young type seasons, but those were after he sharply declined as an overall player and changed his game to allow the goals totals to stay high at the expense of everything else. Matthews is having Cy Young seasons in his prime!

It's crazy how, at this exact age, they have essentially the same number of career GPs, because how they got there is completely different. Matthews has missed only 38 games due to factors outside of his control (covid-shortened seasons), and already 56 more due to injury/suspension. Ovechkin had missed 82 due to the 04-05 lockout, and just 21 for other reasons. OV only missed about 38 more games in the 12 years between then and now - it's really hard to envision Matthews becoming that durable, as he's always been suceptible to the odd minor injury.

It's going to take better than expected durability, and also, league scoring level is going to have to remain where it is, or continue to rise. It's also really difficult to get inside their heads and predict how Matthews is going to deal with aging. Some players become "better" while scoring fewer goals. Others become worse but score just as many. It has a lot to do with their mental makeup, career aspirations, coaching strategy, and the overall vision of the franchise. Will Matthews make chasing career goal totals a priority? I can't say at this time whether he's the type or not.

Connor McDavid is also just 200 days older, with only 16 fewer goals, and has demonstrated he can be a Matthews level goal scorer if he wants. The conversation may one day be whether he can do it, not Matthews.

I don't doubt McDavid's overall abilities in the least, but I just don't see this for him.

McDavid has only once in his career paced for 49 goals or more over an 82 game season.
In comparison - Matthews has done this 4x. Not only that, but he's paced for 65 goals or more in a season 3x now (I'm counting this year). You need those strong peak spikes to help inflate your totals.

McDavid will certainly hit 600 career goals, and possibly 700, but 800 seems extremely unlikely, and 894 almost impossible.

 

[The Panther]

I mean, he needs 461 more goals to get to 800, right? That's a lot of goals.

If he's not an Ovechkin-like super beast who doesn't age in performance from mid-20s to mid-30s, then, yes, there's a fair chance. (If he stays healthy and if this and that, etc.)

But the most likely scenario for ANY hockey player is that their offense (esp. goals) starts to decline around the late 20s. I realize injuries and Covid have slowed Matthews' raw numbers down, but he's only scored more than 47 goals once. He'll do it again this year (barring injury), which will be twice by 26. The issue is whether he will follow a normal pattern and start to decline as a goal-scorer at 28 (in two years) or 29, OR if he'll be an Ovechkin super-beast (or an Esposito / Selanne minor-super beast).

 

[Midnight Judges]

If you're using the HockeyReference number, you might as well expect to be mocked.

You are in denial.

 

[MadLuke]

You are in denial.

Do you strongly believe that Weiland 43 goals narrow win :
Goals

1.	Cooney Weiland* • BOS	43
2.	Dit Clapper* • BOS	41
3.	Howie Morenz* • MTL	40
4.	Nels Stewart* • MTM	39

Outscoring the average elite pack by 7.5%

Should Adjust higher than Gretzky getting close to 90 when no one hit 60 like this ?
Goals

1.	Wayne Gretzky* • EDM	87
2.	Michel Goulet* • QUE	56
3.	Glenn Anderson* • EDM	54
	Tim Kerr • PHI	54

Outscoring the average elite pack by 59%


If so fair enough, but it should be obvious that it does not require one to be in denial to find it a bit funny.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Do you strongly believe that Weiland 43 goals narrow win :
Goals

You are making a reductio ad absurdum argument here.

Cooney Weiland played in an era where many of the players were amateurs. It isn't comparable to a modern NHL that has several professional leagues below it.

hockeyreference's adjustments are useless if you go back too far in history. This is also true for raw per game stats.

Otherwise their adjustments are generally fine.

People in this forum have a problem with them because they desire to be untethered to any sort of frame of reference across eras. And so they are free to make unreasonable claims - such as 1950s Canada, with a talent pool 1/3 or 1/4 the size of today's, creating 2-3 times as many top 100 players as the Crosby/Ovechkin generation.

Personally, I find that to be extremely unlikely.

 

[FrozenJagrt]

How well can we expect a guy who has had shoulder and wrist issues to age as a goal scorer versus a guy whose durability and longevity has entered "freak" status?

 

[MadLuke]

People in this forum have a problem with them because they desire to be untethered to any sort of frame of reference across eras.

This is a bit unfair, the issues with hockey-reference method (going far back make them just more obvious, they are all the same between the 06 and now, just milder) have detailed in quite precise ways and this forum has giant thread dedicated to have some frame of reference across eras and habits that pop-up (Vx, Vx7, looking at Top 10 result instead of raw points totals and so on).

Otherwise their adjustments are generally fine.

The very same issue that make the 20s-30s pop-up as strange are still fully there, just massed down.

How well can we expect a guy who has had shoulder and wrist issues to age as a goal scorer versus a guy whose durability and longevity has entered "freak" status?

Faith in medical recovry-science-surgery getting better and better and a league that protect stars better and better over time.

 

[Michael Farkas]

I guess that H-R adjusted goals has already given Ovechkin the goals record and that's why there's a pedestal for it...?

Can I ask a stupid question? As if I have any other kind...

Is adjusting for era just a shortcut for doing, in part, a proper talent evaluation? Like...we know that the 80's was easy to score and the 60's were hard to score (generally). So, the only reason why we'd try to maneuver those totals around is because we don't like output of the stat. We're disappointed that Jean Beliveau is down there, but Joe Nieuwendyk is up there. And I am too. But...with this method...you get Bobby Hull at 13th, behind Sidney Crosby. Marleau above Lemieux.

So...how much "better" did the output get?

Again, I'm sorry to keep it saying it, at some point we're going to have to do work to get a good/better result...

I see now that the answer to my first question is yes. Well, at least, that H-R has him first. Thanks to the 15 (!) that he's gotten for this year...woof...

 

[jigglysquishy]

I've written multiple essays on why HRef adjusted stats are junk. They don't work at all for the 20s or 30s. Or 40s and 50s. Or 60s. They look better in the 70s and 80s. And look ever better in the 90s .They generally look good post 2005.

But when your method is worthless for Hull and Howe and Richard it's not good. Especially with the structural problems that stem from an unfamiliarity with the sport.

 

[Vilica]

With regards to Matthews and Ovechkin, any gap between them is entirely due to Toronto's more goals scored. At this point in their respective careers (8 seasons in), Toronto has scored 1981 goals in Matthews' career, whereas Washington only scored 1720 with Ovechkin. [For the sake of making my numbers easier, I'm going to include all of Ovechkin's 11-12 instead of truncating it 30 games short. Thus, the concrete numbers I'm using are 339 goals in 553 games played for Ovechkin, compared to 339 goals in 527 games played for Matthews.] That means Ovechkin scored 19.71% of Washington's goals, while Matthews has scored 17.11% of Toronto's goals (I checked Gretzky's first 8 years and he was at 17.43%, 543 goals of 3115 scored). That seems so remarkable, we're talking about Matthews playing in a higher-scoring era, and he'll still be 1000 goals short of Gretzky's Oilers.

That 1981 number of goals has been achieved in 583 games, while Washington played 574 games, so Toronto has already scored 261 more goals than Washington, with 35 games left this year. If you delete the last 9 games played, to equalize the team games played exactly, you need to subtract 9 goals from Matthews, and 26 goals from Toronto, so 330 goals of 1955, or 16.88% (You can see how volatile a hot streak is, as Matthews 9 goals of Toronto's last 26 has increased his percentage by 0.23). If you want to do a season to season comparison instead of an age to age one, the lockout year of 12-13 and the final 35 games this year lead to team games played of 622 to 618, again with Toronto scoring around 250 more goals than Washington.

In terms of adjusting goals, I re-purposed my VsX spreadsheet into a Goals VsX one, but didn't update the players, so any top goal scorer that didn't make it into the top 20 of points has been excluded for the moment (until I update the players). These are the top 25 top goalscoring seasons by Average GVsX, going strictly off 2nd place goals in every year. The cutoff where this breaks down is an interesting one. I chose 1933-34, when goals by strength started getting tracked, because the goal/assist balance issue means that if you included before then, those player-seasons would occupy 42 of the top 50 slots (Brett Hull's season would be 26th). It really only applies to Charlie Conacher though, because his career spanned that period, as 2 of his seasons qualify and 2 do not.

Rank	Name	Year	Team	Games	Goals	GVsX	GVsX Season		Avg GVsX
1	Brett Hull	90-91	STL	78	86	51	168.63		150.85
2	Charlie Conacher	34-35	TOR	47	36	25	144.00		144.04
3	Gordie Howe	52-53	DET	70	49	32	153.13		141.20
4	Alex Ovechkin	07-08	WAS	82	65	52	125.00		141.11
5	Wayne Gretzky	81-82	EDM	80	92	64	143.75		138.75
6	Mario Lemieux	88-89	PIT	76	85	70	121.43		137.63
7	Charlie Conacher	33-34	TOR	42	32	27	118.52		133.55
8	Wayne Gretzky	83-84	EDM	74	87	56	155.36		133.29
9	Steven Stamkos	11-12	TBL	82	60	50	120.00		133.25
10	Maurice Richard	44-45	MTL	50	50	32	156.25		131.56
11	Phil Esposito	70-71	BOS	78	76	51	149.02		130.94
12	Jean Beliveau	55-56	MTL	70	47	38	123.68		128.55
13	Pavel Bure	00-01	FLA	82	59	54	109.26		126.39
14	Gordie Howe	51-52	DET	70	47	31	151.61		125.02
15	Pavel Bure	99-00	FLA	74	58	44	131.82		124.80
16	Bobby Hull	68-69	CHI	74	58	49	118.37		123.70
17	Bobby Hull	65-66	CHI	65	54	32	168.75		122.74
18	Alex Ovechkin	12-13	WAS	48	32	29	110.34		121.99
19	Brett Hull	91-92	STL	73	70	54	129.63		121.90
20	Teemu Selanne	92-93	WIN	84	76	69	110.14		120.64
21	Alexander Mogilny	92-93	BUF	77	76	69	110.14		120.64
22	Bobby Hull	66-67	CHI	66	52	35	148.57		120.45
23	Auston Matthews	20-21	TOR	52	41	33	124.24		120.30
24	Mario Lemieux	95-96	PIT	70	69	62	111.29		120.16
25	Connor McDavid	22-23	EDM	82	64	61	104.92		120.09

If we break down the top 25 by count, here they are:

Brett Hull 2; Charlie Conacher 2; Gordie Howe 2; Alex Ovechkin 2; Wayne Gretzky 2; Mario Lemieux 2; Steven Stamkos 1; Maurice Richard 1; Phil Esposito 1; Jean Beliveau 1; Pavel Bure 2; Bobby Hull 3; Teemu Selanne 1; Alexander Mogilny 1; Auston Matthews 1; Connor McDavid 1

There are 129 player-seasons above 100, though obviously that's an artificial barrier. The number is also subject to even more volatility than points. Ovechkin's 17-18 season, where he scored 49 goals, comes in at 98.84, whereas if he had scored 50 it would be 100.86, a 2 point jump. That's not even the biggest gap due to 1 goal - the difference between Ovechkin scoring 33, 32, or 31 goals in 12-13 is 125.8, 121.99 and 118.17 (3.81/3.82 gap). Shorter seasons and low-scoring is much more volatile than long seasons and high scoring - Gretzky's 92 goal season has a 1.5 spread with a 1 goal difference (140.26, 138.75, 137.25). That volatility is why the top 25 should be more tiered than ranked - 1 through 6 is a tier, 7 through 12 a tier, then 13 through 25 the 3rd tier.

If we breakdown player-seasons for that 129, Ovechkin has 10, Maurice Richard and Bobby Hull have 7, while Gordie Howe, Wayne Gretzky, and Mario Lemieux all have 5. Nobody else I counted has more than four, though that is subject to change, when the players are updated.

[As a final aside, Pavel Bure's 99-00 and 00-01 seasons show the benefits of using Average GVsX instead of GVsX. Scoring levels were essentially the same each year, but because 2nd place scored 54 goals in one year and 44 in the other, his 99 season is rated 22 points better than his 00 season, when the stats, and common sense, show they're basically the same year.]

 

[Stephen]

As others have said, it's certainly possible he could do it, but it's also possible some other current players could do it, and it's ALWAYS extremely unlikely when a player is barely 26 that he will establish any all-time scoring marks (except for Wayne Gretzky, who was barely 27 when he became the all-time assist leader).

Wait six or seven years, see how Matthews' career has gone, and then we'll take up this conversation.

Yeah that’s my thinking as well. If Matthews scored 50x over the next 7 years, that puts him in the low 700s club at age 34. Then you’re talking about a 200 goal sprint to age 40 or so.

So much has to go right before we even ask this question.

 

[Midnight Judges]

I've written multiple essays on why HRef adjusted stats are junk.

Your essays are junk.

VsX ignores important context for no good reason. There is no rationale for ignoring massive amounts of data from surrounding seasons or the general era in favor of the highly volatile top 10 players or top 5 players or worse, top 2 players from a given season.

And that is to say nothing about the massive changes in the size of the talent pool - [mod].

[mod]

 

[Midnight Judges]

[As a final aside, Pavel Bure's 99-00 and 00-01 seasons show the benefits of using Average GVsX instead of GVsX. Scoring levels were essentially the same each year, but because 2nd place scored 54 goals in one year and 44 in the other, his 99 season is rated 22 points better than his 00 season, when the stats, and common sense, show they're basically the same year.]

This is one of the main criticisms of the VsX methodology. Those sorts of nonsensical outcomes are common and also easily avoidable. Why have a method where people spot check and fix, or not, based on whatever agenda is being served in the moment (not saying you have one here), as opposed to a repeatable standard? What is the advantage of that?

For examples, there are many periods where league scoring really didn't change much over a 4 or 5 year period. Why limit the comparison to 1 season in instances where there are 5 comparable seasons?

 

[MadLuke]

There is no rationale for ignoring massive amounts of data from surrounding seasons or the general era

Like HReference ignoring surrounding season is just easier, same goes for Top 2-Top5 type I would imagine, simpler-easier-faster to do specially by hands would be the big reason (otherwise I too feel comparing to the 2, 7, 10th instead of an average seem just inferior)

 

[BraveCanadian]

Like HReference ignoring surrounding season is just easier, same goes for Top 2-Top5 type I would imagine, simpler-easier-faster to do specially by hands would be the big reason (otherwise I too feel comparing to the 2, 7, 10th instead of an average seem just inferior)

Yeah, that was a very strange argument to make considering average scoring ignores much more than what VsX captures automatically by being based on peers under the same conditions.

 

[MadLuke]

Yeah, that was a very strange argument to make considering average scoring ignores much more than what VsX captures automatically by being based on peers under the same conditions.

I meant instead of looking at scoring versus 10th in scoring, the average of the 10 scorer will tend to be way less noisy.

Bure 58 goals VsX being what 25% higher in Vx2 type of model than the following season 59 goals season show how noisy it can be, second best scorer from year to year are quite different beast, it can be prime Mario-Gretzky or Jamie Benn. Yzerman 155 pts season is even a minus something in some Vx way to look at it.