Better Goal Scorer.....66 or 8?

[Golden_Jet]

When Matthews started winning Rockets, OV was over 35. OV wasn't really competing with Matthews for Rockets.

50 goals is pretty good.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Not including Draisaitl/Pastrnak/Matthews is pretty disingenuous. Even without them though, that's a list full of bona-fide HoF guys, a whole lot of borderline cases, and one or two "seasons of their lives" guys. Is Corey Perry all that different from say Peter Bondra? By adjusted goals, Stamkos is a pretty exact comparison to Robitaille.


"The numbers can't tell you why so I'm going to completely guess as to why in a way that supports my previous point"

The sample size of total goals scored in a season is so large that it is extremely difficult for any one player or even group of players to have an outsized impact on averages. Take last year for example, where there were 8,086 total goals scored (I'm using goals as it's both the main question of this thread and easier to get league totals for than points) or 6.16 goals per game. Matthews scored a ridiculous 69 goals -- only .8% of the league total. The top five combined had 280 or 3.5%. Take out Matthews' goals and league goals/game only drops to 6.11, take out the top five scorers and it only drops to 5.94.

Sure, there were probably fewer truly elite offensive guys. Even taking out the five best goal scorers though doesn't change overall league scoring by as much as you think. Defenseman also became much, much better skaters. Goalies became significantly better, aided by the butterfly and cartoonishly big pads. Coaching and tactics evolved too with teams creating better defensive environments than ever seen before. Rapid expansion helped scoring in some ways (more players = theoretically easier competition) but it also hurt scoring as well (more teams = less good players per team). The salary cap was a big deal too, and I'm sure a ton of other things I'm forgetting.

It's precisely because they can't really give you the "why" that you have to just take adjusted numbers and scoring rates at face value.

To me, pretending he beat prime Drai/Pasta/Matthews is what is disingenuous. Those guys were all 23 or 24 and just barely reaching their primes when OV beat them. And I fully agree that there's a lot of really good players on that list. But how many would you call an elite goal scorer? For me, that list starts at Stamkos and ends at his 6th season in the NHL.

I've been making the same argument about why scoring averages dropped for years, and drag it out every time someone makes the utterly laughable claim that scoring averages go down solely because it's "harder to score" in a given year. And, people clearly not understanding my theory doesn't make it wrong.

Gretzky scored 212 points in 1981-82. With 840 total games played that season, he personally contributed to 0.252 goals per game for the season. And that's not counting the goals he helped create that he didn't get a point for. What would you expect to happen to the league averages when he's not putting up 200 points anymore? If he's "just" a 100 point player, and nothing else changes, that's at least a 0.13 drop in league average scoring for the season. But, it wasn't just him scoring 100 fewer points. It was also a lot of the consistent 100+ point scorers like Yzerman and Sakic retiring and being replaced by guys that could only regularly score 60 or 70, like Shane Doan or Matt Duchene.

As for your other claims, sure, defensemen generally became better skaters as the league has evolved, but so did most of the forwards. And defensemen are no longer allowed to slash/hold/obstruct/whatever, nor could they lay guys out with a shoulder to the head like Scott Stevens used to do, giving forwards a lot more space to get chances. Goalies and their pads got bigger and technique improved, but so did stick technology, making it much easier to get off a good shot or pick the top corner. And coaching has improved at both ends of the ice, not just the defensive zone, so teams are creating better offensive environments too. But, even with the evolution of the game, you still need elite players to score a lot of points in the NHL, and we didn't have many elite players for most of OV's prime.

And you can take the adjusted numbers at face value if you want. I think they're based on a flawed premise, and will continue to treat them as being utterly meaningless.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

50 goals is pretty good.

Only 2 behind the great Chris Kreider that year.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Only 2 behind the great Chris Kreider that year.

Ahh so another Jeff Carter, Benn, or the other terrible option Tarasenko that was listed.

 

[Midnight Judges]

I have never seen them successfully make a defense against this. It’s either crickets or weak attempts at diversions like we’re seeing in the comments after this.

Everyone is competing with everyone in the NHL.

To reduce it to a lesser list of players based only on who was top 3 or top 5 in the years where Ovie led the NHL is arbitrary.

Regardless, Matthews is clearly in that category anyway, but was improperly left off for no logical reason.

To me, pretending he beat prime Drai/Pasta/Matthews is what is disingenuous. Those guys were all 23 or 24 and just barely reaching their primes when OV beat them.

Age 23 and 24 are the absolute peak seasons for most great players. Sometimes 21 or 22.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Everyone is competing with everyone in the NHL.

To reduce it to a lesser list of players based only on the years where Ovie led the NHL is arbitrary.



Age 23 and 24 are the absolute peak seasons for most great players. Sometimes 21 or 22.

Exactly, Crosby best season was at 21.

 

[qc14]

Gretzky scored 212 points in 1981-82. With 840 total games played that season, he personally contributed to 0.252 goals per game for the season. And that's not counting the goals he helped create that he didn't get a point for. What would you expect to happen to the league averages when he's not putting up 200 points anymore? If he's "just" a 100 point player, and nothing else changes, that's at least a 0.13 drop in league average scoring for the season. But, it wasn't just him scoring 100 fewer points. It was also a lot of the consistent 100+ point scorers like Yzerman and Sakic retiring and being replaced by guys that could only regularly score 60 or 70, like Shane Doan or Matt Duchene.

Your math is just straight up wrong here.

With 212 points in 840 games played he personally contributed to .252 points per season, not goals. He was responsible for a ridiculous .109 goals per game that year.

This graph is pretty outdated by now, but there were on average 8 goals per game in 81-82 and only 5.7 in 09-10(what I'll take as Ovi's prime). You could pretend that not only Gretzky but the entire Edmonton Oilers team got shut out every single game they played and that would only account for .5 goals per game, leaving scoring in 81-82 still 1.8 goals per game or 31% (!!!!) higher than in 09-10.

That's a whole lot of scoring that is not just explained by "the better players were better"

 

[Video Nasty]

Everyone is competing with everyone in the NHL.

To reduce it to a lesser list of players based only on the years where Ovie led the NHL is arbitrary.

Add this to the list. We both know that if Ovechkin went up against lethal, consistent goal scorers as competition, you would use that as a positive bullet point. We already saw the damage Stamkos could do. The neutering of Ovechkin's one true threat allowed him to win a minimum of 2 Rockets more than he likely would have had otherwise. You're so obsessed with adjusted stats and the difference in the number of goals, yet not a peep about quality of top end competition in a specific area of the game. Why could that be?

 

[Hippasus]

I'm assuming we are just talking about goals here? If not, there is really no discussion at all, Lemieux had better seasons than OV's 07/08.....but in terms of goals? That's more arguable....I could make a strong case by considering goals per game for a few years for Mario, but he missed games, so couldn't have been as good of a year....so then you're basically left with his 85 goal season. I think there is a decent argument that's better, especially if you also consider Mario's goal per game stat was 26% better than #2 that year....OV's was only 20% better than #2. Not a slam dunk of course, you can argue both ways, but either argument is subjective.

Now, when it comes to playoffs....I'm not sure what Hockey Reference is saying, but I'm not sure how OV's 15 goals and 27pts in 24 games (his teammate had 12 goals and 32pts and Crosby had 9 goals and 21 pts in 12 games) is better than 1992 Lemieux, 16 goals and 34pts in 15 games.

Sorry, for regular season, I was wrong, but it's close:

Lemieux 2.2973
Ovechkin 2.2854

Ratio versus average first-liner for given season is above.

For playoffs, I was probably wrong too.

Peak, overall, is probably Lemieux over Ovechkin, but I can't look into it further at the moment.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Add this to the list. We both know that if Ovechkin went up against lethal, consistent goal scorers as competition, you would use that as a positive bullet point. We already saw the damage Stamkos could do. The neutering of Ovechkin's one true threat allowed him to win a minimum of 2 Rockets more than he likely would have had otherwise. You're so obsessed with adjusted stats and the difference in the number of goals, yet not a peep about quality of top end competition in a specific area of the game. Why could that be?

There is no lack of top end competition. There is merely the perception of it because it was a low scoring era (and many hockey fans are apparently not capable of doing ratios).

McDavid and Matthews and MacKinnon weren't putting up bigger numbers until the NHL league wide averages increased despite having been in their prime years previously.

Conversely, old Crosby and old Ovechkin (and many other players like Joe Pavelski) are not seeing their point totals drop as one would expect for aging players - because (again) scoring has gotten substantially easier.

At age 39 Ovechkin is 5th in goals this season despite missing 16 games. So does that mean McDavid's entire generation and McDavid's competition are pathetic? Or maybe, just maybe, this Ovechkin guy knows a thing or two about scoring goals?

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Everyone is competing with everyone in the NHL.

To reduce it to a lesser list of players based only on who was top 3 or top 5 in the years where Ovie led the NHL is arbitrary.

Regardless, Matthews is clearly in that category anyway, but was left off for no logical reason.



Age 23 and 24 are the absolute peak seasons for most great players. Sometimes 21 or 22.

Matthews was left off the list of guys who finished top 3 in OV's first 7 Rocket winning seasons because he didn't finish top 3 during any of those seasons. What is the logical reason to include him on that list?

Matthews was 22 when he scored 47 goals in 70 games, to finish 3rd, 1 goal behind Pasta/OV. The next year, he scored 41 in 52 games, and followed it up with 60 in 73. Do you really want to pretend that that 47 goal season was his peak, and not the beginning of his prime, like I said?

 

[Midnight Judges]

Matthews was left off the list of guys who finished top 3 in OV's first 7 Rocket winning seasons because he didn't finish top 3 during any of those seasons. What is the logical reason to include him on that list?

There is no logic to limiting it to Ovechkin's first 7 wins.

Matthews was 22 when he scored 47 goals in 70 games, to finish 3rd, 1 goal behind Pasta/OV. The next year, he scored 41 in 52 games, and followed it up with 60 in 73. Do you really want to pretend that that 47 goal season was his peak, and not the beginning of his prime, like I said?

There is no logic to limiting it to only peak.

 

[Golden_Jet]

There is no logic to limiting it to Ovechkin's first 7 wins, aside from your agenda.



There is no logic to limiting it to only peak, aside form your agenda.

Ya lol @ the cherry picking. Poster is definitely a good at cherry picking though.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Your math is just straight up wrong here.

With 212 points in 840 games played he personally contributed to .252 points per season, not goals. He was responsible for a ridiculous .109 goals per game that year.

This graph is pretty outdated by now, but there were on average 8 goals per game in 81-82 and only 5.7 in 09-10(what I'll take as Ovi's prime). You could pretend that not only Gretzky but the entire Edmonton Oilers team got shut out every single game they played and that would only account for .5 goals per game, leaving scoring in 81-82 still 1.8 goals per game or 31% (!!!!) higher than in 09-10.

View attachment 987090

That's a whole lot of scoring that is not just explained by "the better players were better"

Did you know that all points come from a goal being scored? Well, they do, which means that the guy with 212 points must have contributed to 212 goals being scored, just like I said. Otherwise, why did he get an assist?

Out of curiosity, do you think it's just a coincidence that scoring jumped so much right around 1980? I can't help but wonder if that has anything to do with the single highest scoring player in NHL history's rookie season. The plateau between 1980 and 85-86 also seems to be the years when Gretzky was putting up 200+ points. The big drop at 92-93 seems to coincide with Lemieux missing considerable time with injuries and Gretzky "only" being a 130 point guy. Lemieux returns to put up 161 in 95-96, and there's a bump in league scoring. He retires in 97 and it drops again. Who was drafted after 1991 that was going to score 160+ points to replace the massive loss in scoring talent? Or any of the other 100+ point scorers who retired before the lockout? Who replaced Sakic? Or Yzerman? Or Hull? Or Federov? Or Forsberg? To me, it seems like were replaced with 2nd tier guys like Getzlaf and Benn and Duchene, not like for like replacements.

The chart also ends at 2014-15, the year before McDavid was drafted, right before the massive influx of young offensive talent enters the league and starts driving the scoring averages back up.

 

[Video Nasty]

There is no lack of top end competition. There is merely the perception of it because it was a low scoring era (and many hockey fans are apparently not capable of doing ratios).

McDavid and Matthews and MacKinnon weren't putting up bigger numbers until the NHL league wide averages increased despite having been in their prime years previously.

Conversely, old Crosby and old Ovechkin (and many other players like Joe Pavelski) are not seeing their point totals drop as one would expect for aging players - because (again) scoring has gotten substantially easier.

At age 39 Ovechkin is 5th in goals this season despite missing 16 games. So does that mean McDavid's entire generation and McDavid's competition are pathetic? Or maybe, just maybe, this Ovechkin guy knows a thing or two about scoring goals?

I’m not talking about numbers. I’m talking about the individual talent level competing year in and year out, and being fortunate enough to play in a league where your rival at what you do best is alternating trophies with you until their untimely demise, and there being no viable replacement.

Ovechkin is the greatest goal scorer ever. You can’t seem to consider that there have been better goal scorers and you certainly hand wave away his lack of competition and how that’s going to factor into how many trophies someone wins.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

There is no logic to limiting it to Ovechkin's first 7 wins.



There is no logic to limiting it to only peak.

You not understanding something doesn't mean there's no logic in it, nor does it prove me wrong.

Ya lol @ the cherry picking. Poster is definitely a good at cherry picking though.

If I'm cherry picking, why can't you name the elite goal scorers from that era that OV beat for his Rockets?

 

[qc14]

Did you know that all points come from a goal being scored? Well, they do, which means that the guy with 212 points must have contributed to 212 goals being scored, just like I said. Otherwise, why did he get an assist?

Points and goals are different. If you are looking at Gretzky's total points, then you need to be comparing that to the number of points in the entire league and not the number of goals. By choosing points for Gretzky but only goals for the entire league you're basically double-counting Gretzky's impact.

Out of curiosity, do you think it's just a coincidence that scoring jumped so much right around 1980? I can't help but wonder if that has anything to do with the single highest scoring player in NHL history's rookie season. The plateau between 1980 and 85-86 also seems to be the years when Gretzky was putting up 200+ points. The big drop at 92-93 seems to coincide with Lemieux missing considerable time with injuries and Gretzky "only" being a 130 point guy. Lemieux returns to put up 161 in 95-96, and there's a bump in league scoring. He retires in 97 and it drops again. Who was drafted after 1991 that was going to score 160+ points to replace the massive loss in scoring talent? Or any of the other 100+ point scorers who retired before the lockout?

You are correct that individual players can contribute to relatively small year-over-year changes in league wide goals/game. As I pointed out in my math in the prior post even Gretzky in 81-82 -- the best player in the history of the league in his best ever season -- only could account for .1 goals per league game. The difference in goals per league game between the 80s and early 90s (Gretzky, Lemieux's prime) and the late 2000s and 2010s (Ovechkin's prime) is somewhere between 2 and 2.5 goals per game. That is the equivalent of 20 to 25 Gretzkys. For the difference to all be related to the lack Gretzky/Lemieux/Hull/Yzerman/Selanne they'd need to have scored a combined 1680 goals a season. That is 336 goals each or just over 4 goals per individual game played.

I think it is pretty unreasonable to suggest that the NHL had 20 Gretzkys worth of talent less in 2010 than it did in 1985. Clearly there must also be other factors at play.

Who replaced Sakic? Or Yzerman? Or Hull? Or Federov? Or Forsberg? To me, it seems like were replaced with 2nd tier guys like Getzlaf and Benn and Duchene, not like for like replacements.

Absolutely hilarious to pick out Duchene as a key offensive superstar of the 2010s

 

[Toby91ca]

Ovechkin won 2 rockets after Matthews placed 3rd in 2017.

Matthews was 3rd when Ovie won in 2020.

Ovie was 4th when Matthews won in 2022.

Ovie looks like he'll end up top 5 this season. Matthews is still in his prime.

'16-17 to '24-25 - That's a 9 year stretch where they are competing.

Suggesting OV and Matthews have been competing for the Rocket for 9 years is extremely misleading. Matthews was still early in his career in some of those years and not in serious contention at the same time as OV. You mention Matthews finishing 3rd in his rookie year, but OV was nowhere close to being in contention that year. Other years Matthews missed too many games to be in contention.

This year, you can't look at OV competing with Matthews for the Rocket....neither have any reasonable chance at competing for it.

 

[Toby91ca]

50 goals is pretty good.

Yup....but not in Rocket contention.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Yup....but not in Rocket contention.

He’d even be in rocket contention at 39 if doesn’t break his leg.

 

[Toby91ca]

He’d even be in rocket contention at 39 if doesn’t break his leg.

Maybe, maybe not.....we've all been taught to ignore games that players didn't play.

 

[Regal]

There is no lack of top end competition. There is merely the perception of it because it was a low scoring era (and many hockey fans are apparently not capable of doing ratios).

McDavid and Matthews and MacKinnon weren't putting up bigger numbers until the NHL league wide averages increased despite having been in their prime years previously.

Conversely, old Crosby and old Ovechkin (and many other players like Joe Pavelski) are not seeing their point totals drop as one would expect for aging players - because (again) scoring has gotten substantially easier.

At age 39 Ovechkin is 5th in goals this season despite missing 16 games. So does that mean McDavid's entire generation and McDavid's competition are pathetic? Or maybe, just maybe, this Ovechkin guy knows a thing or two about scoring goals?

Except, taking into account league scoring shows that the players outside of Ovechkin weren’t having good seasons in the mid 2010s. In terms of adjusted seasons, here’s all the 50 goal seasons from 05-06 to 12-13:

07-08 Ovechkin 72
11-12 Stamkos 68
12-13 Ovechkin 62
08-09 Ovechkin 59
07-08 Kovalchuk 58
11-12 Malkin 57
12-13 Stamkos 56
09-10 Crosby 56
09-10 Stamkos 56
07-08 Iginla 56
05-06 Cheechoo 56
10-11 Perry 55
09-10 Ovechkin 55
06-07 LeCavalier 55
05-06 Jagr 54
12-13 Tavares 54
07-08 Malkin 52
06-07 Heatley 52
05-06 Ovechkin 52
05-06 Kovalchuk 52
12-13 Carter 51
10-11 Stamkos 50
06-07 Selanne 50
05-06 Heatley 50

24 in an 8 year stretch or 3 per year.

Here’s all the 50 goal or more seasons from 19-20 to 23-24:

23-24 Matthews 68
22-23 McDavid 63
20-21 Matthews 63
22-23 Pastrnak 59
21-22 Matthews 58
19-20 Ovechkin 58
19-20 Pastrnak 57
23-24 Reinhart 56
19-20 Matthews 56
23-24 Hyman 54
22-23 Rantanen 53
21-22 Drasiaitl 53
23-24 MacKinnon 51
21-22 Kreider 51
20-21 McDavid 50
19-20 Draisaitl 50

That’s 16 in a 5 year stretch, or just over 3 per year.


Here’s all the 50 or more adjusted goal seasons from 13-14 to 18-19:

14-15 Ovechkin 60
13-14 Ovechkin 58
14-15 Ovechkin 57
18-19 Ovechkin 52
15-16 Kane 52
18-19 Draisaitl 51
17-18 Ovechkin 50

7 in 6 years or just over 1 per year.

Now, adjusted goals aren’t perfect and I do think there’s a bit more to that time period than just weak years, but it’s pretty obvious Ovechkin didn’t have any real competition for a pretty long stretch. That’s not to say he wouldn’t have still won the Richards because his seasons were still strong for the most part, but 17-18 and 18-19 were certainly vulnerable if they had happened in another era, and he didn’t have any random spike years to compete with like the best of Stamkos, Matthews, McDavid or Pastrnak.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Except, taking into account league scoring shows that the players outside of Ovechkin weren’t having good seasons in the mid 2010s. In terms of adjusted seasons, here’s all the 50 goal seasons from 05-06 to 12-13:

07-08 Ovechkin 72
11-12 Stamkos 68
12-13 Ovechkin 62
08-09 Ovechkin 59
07-08 Kovalchuk 58
11-12 Malkin 57
12-13 Stamkos 56
09-10 Crosby 56
09-10 Stamkos 56
07-08 Iginla 56
05-06 Cheechoo 56
10-11 Perry 55
09-10 Ovechkin 55
06-07 LeCavalier 55
05-06 Jagr 54
12-13 Tavares 54
07-08 Malkin 52
06-07 Heatley 52
05-06 Ovechkin 52
05-06 Kovalchuk 52
12-13 Carter 51
10-11 Stamkos 50
06-07 Selanne 50
05-06 Heatley 50

Here’s all the 50 goal or more seasons from 19-20 to 23-24:

23-24 Matthews 68
22-23 McDavid 63
20-21 Matthews 63
22-23 Pastrnak 59
21-22 Matthews 58
19-20 Ovechkin 58
19-20 Pastrnak 57
23-24 Reinhart 56
19-20 Matthews 56
23-24 Hyman 54
22-23 Rantanen 53
21-22 Drasiaitl 53
23-24 MacKinnon 51
21-22 Kreider 51
20-21 McDavid 50
19-20 Draisaitl 50


Here’s all the 50 or more adjusted goal seasons from 13-14 to 18-19:

14-15 Ovechkin 60
13-14 Ovechkin 58
14-15 Ovechkin 57
18-19 Ovechkin 52
15-16 Kane 52
18-19 Draisaitl 51
17-18 Ovechkin 50

Yes, and that's a fair point that is certainly supported by the data.

I think if you look at what has happened to the top end scorers relative to 8 years ago, there is something going on in addition to what the adjusted stats show. I'm not sure exactly what that is.

Out of the players you listed for this most recent span - several of them had plenty of opportunity in the drought span as well. But they couldn't do it. At some point the pattern becomes more than coincidence.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Points and goals are different. If you are looking at Gretzky's total points, then you need to be comparing that to the number of points in the entire league and not the number of goals. By choosing points for Gretzky but only goals for the entire league you're basically double-counting Gretzky's impact.

Not when it comes to contributing to the overall goal scoring averages for the league. A person with 212 points contributed to 212 goals being scored that year, even if he didn't score them all himself. Or do you want to pretend all of his assists didn't contribute anything to those goals being scored?

You are correct that individual players can contribute to relatively small year-over-year changes in league wide goals/game. As I pointed out in my math in the prior post even Gretzky in 81-82 -- the best player in the history of the league in his best ever season -- only could account for .1 goals per league game. The difference in goals per league game between the 80s and early 90s (Gretzky, Lemieux's prime) and the late 2000s and 2010s (Ovechkin's prime) is somewhere between 2 and 2.5 goals per game. That is the equivalent of 20 to 25 Gretzkys.

I think it is pretty unreasonable to suggest that the NHL had 20 Gretzkys worth of talent less in 2010 than it did in 1985. Clearly there must also be other factors at play.

Absolutely hilarious to pick out Duchene as a key offensive superstar of the 2010s

Again, there's no reason to ignore assists when talking about a players contribution to league scoring averages.

And the drop in overall league production doesn't need to all be from one player. What happens if the top 200 players all score 2 fewer goals than their predecessors, but nothing else changes? Seems to me like 400 fewer goals being scored around the league over the season would hurt the goal scoring averages quite a bit. How many players need to be about 5 points worse than the guy they replaced to account for a 2 or 2.5 goal per game differences overall? Maybe 300? 400? Do you think taking the top 10-20 guys out and comparing everyone to guys 20 spots above them might do the trick? I do.

I also used Duchene as an example of the caliber of 2nd tier guys you'd usually get in the draft to replace those superstars, because he was literally the guy who replaced Sakic as the 1C for the Avs. They went from 98 points per 82 average to 60 points from Duchene. The only person calling him an offensive superstar seems to be the strawman you built.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Yes, and that's a fair point that is certainly supported by the data.

I think if you look at what has happened to the top end scorers relative to 8 years ago, there is something going on in addition to what the adjusted stats show. I'm not sure exactly what that is.

Out of the players you listed for this most recent span - several of them had plenty of opportunity in the drought span as well. But they couldn't do it. At some point the pattern becomes more than coincidence.

I know you think I'm crazy, but I think there might be at least one or two guys in the league today who could possibly be a better scorer than Jamie Benn, the Ross winner in 2014-15.