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

[Midnight Judges]

Honestly at best they are roughly equal at peaks, Lemieux scored at that peak level more often though. Ovechkin is undeniably greater by leaps and bounds, Lemieux’s had equal if not arguably better goal scoring at his peak while dishing out assists like Gretzky… It’s not like there’s no debate about it here. I’m sure you saw Lemieux at his peak, is it really that crazy of an opinion?

I think their peaks are comparable.

But from there Ovie has a big advantage in prime and a gargantuan advantage in longevity. Those things mean very little or nothing to many fans, but to a team they are the difference between winning and losing tons of games (which should be, but apparently isn't, part of the "better" criteria for Lemieux fans). Like seriously, we are not in agreement that contributing to more wins is "better." It's that dumb.

Here are their best adjusted seasons: Lemieux has a 3 goal advantage for the top 3. Ovechkin has a 6 goal advantage for the top 5. Then after the 5th season it becomes a total ass kicking.

So basically the only way Lemieux is better is if everything after the 3rd season means absolutely nothing.

	Ovie	Lemieux
1	72	71
2	62	67
3	60	59
4	59	56
5	58	52
6	58	46
7	57	39
8	55	38
9	52	38
10	52	37
11	50	34
12	49	32
13	48	17
14	43	15
15	42	7
16	40	7
17	35	1

 

[Midnight Judges]

Lemieux was competing with all time great goal scorers like Hull, Neely, Selanne, Bure, Robitaille, etc.

OV was mostly competing with 2nd/3rd tier guys like Jeff Carter, Jamie Benn or Tarasenko. Are we supposed to be impressed that he beat his lesser peers more often?

The talent pool has grown significantly and continues to grow.

The hockey gods of our childhood are not inherently better than the hockey idols of subsequent children.

there are indeed fewer and smaller outliers as the talent pool expands. This is natural. It’s certainly not evidence that everyone sucks nowadays.

 

[Spektre]

Lots of stats, facts, context, and data from the Ovechkin side.

Lots of falsehoods, baseless assertions, style points, imagination, personal attacks, woulda coulda shoulda, and history revisions from the Lemieux side.

Strawman much? lol

Anyone wanting to banter back and forth should get a grip on reality. The OP's question states Who's the better goal scorer, Lemieux or Ovi? The word "better" makes this an opinionated thread.

You're more than welcome to have a different opinion. It's allowed

You can come up with stats, which are factual, but it's in support of your "opinion".

I don't care what the era is, was, or will be. If I had to pick who I would want to score a goal, in any situation between the two, I'm taking Lemieux every time over Ovie or anyone else.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

Lemieux was competing with all time great goal scorers like Hull, Neely, Selanne, Bure, Robitaille, etc.

OV was mostly competing with 2nd/3rd tier guys like Jeff Carter, Jamie Benn or Tarasenko. Are we supposed to be impressed that he beat his lesser peers more often?

Hull and to a lesser extent Neely, yes. Selanne and Robitaille aren't in the all time great category as goal scorers and Bure was after Mario's peak.

Ironic that you left out Ovechkin's biggest competition for Rockets...Stamkos, Kovalchuk, Malkin and Crosby, you know that slight step up from the names you chose?

 

[Regal]

Lemieux was the slightly better per game goalscorer at their peaks imo, mainly because he was at that level for more years. The Ovechkin argument mixes health into every factor which is two different things. Ovechkin has the better adjusted peak season (by 1 goal), but Lemieux has the 3 best adjusted goal per game seasons (‘89, ‘92 and ‘96). Ovechkin has the better overall prime outside of peak though, even per game, and by far the better goal scoring career. I think Lemieux’s goal scoring gets overrated outside of his peak years. It was still great, but he wasn’t blowing everyone away either.

 

[SkinsFan09]

Lemieux was competing with all time great goal scorers like Hull, Neely, Selanne, Bure, Robitaille, etc.

OV was mostly competing with 2nd/3rd tier guys like Jeff Carter, Jamie Benn or Tarasenko. Are we supposed to be impressed that he beat his lesser peers more often?

Neely had one amazing stretch in 1993-94 but he is absolutely not an all-time goal scorer. In fact of the guys you listed really only Hull and Bure are all-time scorers who didn't just consistently pot home 20-30 for a long time to accumulate.

Kovalchuk, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin are all in the same tier as the guys you listed and Ovechkin also beat out Auston Matthews and Leon Draisatl in his 30s for Richards.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Lemieux was competing with all time great goal scorers like Hull, Neely, Selanne, Bure, Robitaille, etc.

OV was mostly competing with 2nd/3rd tier guys like Jeff Carter, Jamie Benn or Tarasenko. Are we supposed to be impressed that he beat his lesser peers more often?

lol, what a disengeniius post, picking guys like Tarasenko and Carter as OV’s top competition.
Appreciate the satire.

 

[Regal]

Neely had one amazing stretch in 1993-94 but he is absolutely not an all-time goal scorer. In fact of the guys you listed really only Hull and Bure are all-time scorers who didn't just consistently pot home 20-30 for a long time to accumulate.

Kovalchuk, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin are all in the same tier as the guys you listed and Ovechkin also beat out Auston Matthews and Leon Draisatl in his 30s for Richards.

Throwing out names for competition has never been very useful imo because most guys only have a handful of elite years, and some players have one-offs that are better than players who are better in an all time sense. I don’t think competition is massively different for either other than I’d say Brett Hull’s 86 goal year is arguably the best ever in terms of dominance over peers and relative to league scoring, so arguing that Lemieux not having the best year of his generation isn’t relevant since it was also better than Ovechkin’s best year. And I’d argue that Ovechkin faced a pretty big void in competition for a couple years from Stamkos’ broken leg until the rise of Matthews, Draisaitl and Pastrnak.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Lemieux for me. A little bit more versatile in terms of goal-scoring for me, more varied. Lemieux can literally score every imaginable way better than virtually anybody else that he could possibly be on the ice with at any given time. Wrist shot off the rush - Check. One-timer on the power play? Check. Breakaway or penalty shot? Check.

Ovechkin is a weapon for all time, but he has a weakness even in this area. He's not very good on his backhand and he's not very good in tight relative to his skill set. And we're talking about the absolute best ever. So, this is where you nitpick.

Lemieux on a breakaway or penalty shot = basically automatic goal. Those are the moments we remember most about Lemieux. First shift -> works over Bourque, beats a strong goalie in Pete Peeters (?). Last* home shift -> Playoff game versus Philadelphia. The "oh baby" goal vs. Minnesota in the Final. The 5 goals 5 different ways. and on and on and on...it's Lemieux being able to score that goal and he did it a bunch of different ways even in that process. Min. 5 attempts, Lemieux has the highest percentage of PS conversions in history (75%, next guy is 66.7). He's one behind Pavel Bure for all time penalty shot goals (6 of 8; Bure went 7 for 11)

Ovechkin doesn't have that. He's 2 for 12 all time in penalty shots. In the shootout, min. 10 attempts, he's not top 200 in shootout conversions. One of his most famous moments. The showdown with Crosby. Game 7 2009 ECSF. Gets a breakaway early in the 1st. Save by Fleury. Pens win the game, the series, the Cup.

So assuming we're not talking about "sort by descending" and we're talking about the qualities of these players. Lemieux is the most well-rounded, versatile, and prolific goal scorer I've ever seen.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Hull and to a lesser extent Neely, yes. Selanne and Robitaille aren't in the all time great category as goal scorers and Bure was after Mario's peak.

Ironic that you left out Ovechkin's biggest competition for Rockets...Stamkos, Kovalchuk, Malkin and Crosby, you know that slight step up from the names you chose?

Stamkos had a couple of impressive seasons early in his career, but quickly fell off.

Kovalchuck had 2 career seasons with 50+ goals.

Crosby and Malkin each have 3 career seasons with more than 40 goals.

Where is the step up from Brett Hull that you think is there?

 

[Midnight Judges]

I don’t think competition is massively different for either other than I’d say Brett Hull’s 86 goal year is arguably the best ever in terms of dominance over peers and relative to league scoring, so arguing that Lemieux not having the best year of his generation isn’t relevant since it was also better than Ovechkin’s best year.

It's one of many supporting facts. And Ovechkin's case doesn't rely entirely on a short pointy peak like Lemieux's does. So to be bested in the same era on the one thing the entire case relies on - that isn't great for the argument.

 

[Toby91ca]

If Lemieux was the better goal scorer, he would have led the nhl in gpg more than Ovie. Ovie did it 9 times to Lemieux’s 6.

OV didn't lead the league in GPG 9 times, you'd have to apply a certain filter for games played for that to be true. But GPG is a per game stat, so filter for games played is strange. That said, it does totally make sense, you can't look at a guy that plays 1 game and scores 2 goals and suggests he's the best of all time, 2 goals per game....

Anyway, using a filter of 15 games, OV led 6 times. What filter did you use? I'm assuming you would say OV led in GPG in 12/13, even though Lupul did. Though, Lupul only played 16 games (but it was a 48 game season as well). I'm not fussed with that though. Also not fussed with saying OV led in 08/09 because the statistical leader only played 16 games. I'm more curious about 13/14, I think Stamkos playing 37 games is enough to suggest he was GPG leader....otherwise we start getting into just going with raw goal leader than GPG since we are ignoring guys that played less games

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Neely had one amazing stretch in 1993-94 but he is absolutely not an all-time goal scorer. In fact of the guys you listed really only Hull and Bure are all-time scorers who didn't just consistently pot home 20-30 for a long time to accumulate.

Kovalchuk, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin are all in the same tier as the guys you listed and Ovechkin also beat out Auston Matthews and Leon Draisatl in his 30s for Richards.

Neely had three 50+ goal seasons, which is more than Kovalchuk, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin, or Matthews.

Selanne put up a 76 goals as a rookie, and had 2 other 50+ goal seasons. Again, that's more 50+ goal seasons than Kovalchuk, Stamkos, Crosby, Malkin or Matthews.

OV's last Richard was in 2019-20, Matthews' 4th season in the NHL. Drai had 1 season with more than 30 goals coming into that season. Do you really want to pretend that's the same as beating a prime Brett Hull?

 

[Midnight Judges]

OV didn't lead the league in GPG 9 times, you'd have to apply a certain filter for games played for that to be true. But GPG is a per game stat, so filter for games played is strange. That said, it does totally make sense, you can't look at a guy that plays 1 game and scores 2 goals and suggests he's the best of all time, 2 goals per game....

Anyway, using a filter of 15 games, OV led 6 times. What filter did you use? I'm assuming you would say OV led in GPG in 12/13, even though Lupul did. Though, Lupul only played 16 games (but it was a 48 game season as well). I'm not fussed with that though. Also not fussed with saying OV led in 08/09 because the statistical leader only played 16 games. I'm more curious about 13/14, I think Stamkos playing 37 games is enough to suggest he was GPG leader....otherwise we start getting into just going with raw goal leader than GPG since we are ignoring guys that played less games

I can't recall which filter I used. Maybe half the games or something. So no, Stamkos and Lupul would not qualify, and nor would Noah Clarke in 2008, or Gord Walker (who beat Lemieux in GPG in 1987), or Dean Morton in 1990, or Cam Neely in '92, or the 5 players who beat Bondra in '95 etc.

But yeah, I definitely hold the opinion that if someone wants to qualify for having led the league in a per game stat for a season, there is a necessary minimum games played. Otherwise a meaningful statistic devolves into meaningless happenstance gibberish.

MLB uses 550 at bats for a batting title. That's roughly 70% of the at-bats for an every day player. It strikes me as reasonable.

 

[wasup]

To me OV is the better goal scorer but the better player and by a mile it Lemieux .

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

lol, what a disengeniius post, picking guys like Tarasenko and Carter as OV’s top competition.
Appreciate the satire.

Jeff Carter finished 2nd in the Richard race in 2008-09. He was 4th in goals in 2012-13. OV won the Richard both of those years.

Tarasenko was top 5 in goals in 2014-15 and 2015-16, both years that OV won the Richard.

To me, they are great examples of the caliber of guys that OV was beating for his Richards. Would you prefer I use guys like Pavelski or Tavares instead? Maybe Seguin or Benn? Which great goal scorers were in that era, other than OV and a couple of years of Stamkos?

 

[Golden_Jet]

Jeff Carter finished 2nd in the Richard race in 2008-09. He was 4th in goals in 2012-13. OV won the Richard both of those years.

Tarasenko was top 5 in goals in 2014-15 and 2015-16, both years that OV won the Richard.

To me, they are great examples of the caliber of guys that OV was beating for his Richards. Would you prefer I use guys like Pavelski or Tavares instead? Maybe Seguin or Benn? Which great goal scorers were in that era, other than OV and a couple of years of Stamkos?

lol, maybe use the better scorers that played, it was a satire post you used nothing more.

 

[Toby91ca]

I can't recall which filter I used. Maybe half the games or something. So no, Stamkos and Lupul would not qualify, and nor would Noah Clarke in 2008, or Gord Walker (who beat Lemieux in GPG in 1987), or Dean Morton in 1990, or Cam Neely in '92, or the 5 players who beat Bondra in '95 etc.

But yeah, I definitely hold the opinion that if someone wants to qualify for having led the league in a per game stat for a season, there is a necessary minimum games played. Otherwise a meaningful statistic devolves into meaningless happenstance gibberish.

MLB uses 550 at bats for a batting title. That's roughly 70% of the at-bats for an every day player. It strikes me as reasonable.

Ignoring the fact that baseball and hockey are two completely different sports, you are talking about a major award being handed out. GPG stat is simply a stat, no awards being discussed here. That said, I do agree there needs to be some reason to it.

I'd say this though......massive difference between Walker and his 1 goal in 1 game played for a GPG stat of 1.00 and Stamkos and his 25 goals in 37 games or 0.68 goals per game.

Like I said, I'm find simply going to raw goals scored ,that would actually better the argument in OV's favour as it's 9 to 3 I think, instead of 9 to 6. If we are using a GPG stat though, I think we need to go a lot lower than 70% of games played.

 

[Toby91ca]

Jeff Carter finished 2nd in the Richard race in 2008-09. He was 4th in goals in 2012-13. OV won the Richard both of those years.

Tarasenko was top 5 in goals in 2014-15 and 2015-16, both years that OV won the Richard.

To me, they are great examples of the caliber of guys that OV was beating for his Richards. Would you prefer I use guys like Pavelski or Tavares instead? Maybe Seguin or Benn? Which great goal scorers were in that era, other than OV and a couple of years of Stamkos?

Carter only finished top 3 in goals once in the year OV won the Richard. In his 9 victories, there is only 2 players that finished top 3 twice.....no one was there 3 times. Carter wasn't of those 2, but Stamkos was and other, surprisingly enough, was Tavares.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Ignoring the fact that baseball and hockey are two completely different sports, you are talking about a major award being handed out. GPG stat is simply a stat, no awards being discussed here. That said, I do agree there needs to be some reason to it.

I'd say this though......massive difference between Walker and his 1 goal in 1 game played for a GPG stat of 1.00 and Stamkos and his 25 goals in 37 games or 0.68 goals per game.

Like I said, I'm find simply going to raw goals scored ,that would actually better the argument in OV's favour as it's 9 to 3 I think, instead of 9 to 6. If we are using a GPG stat though, I think we need to go a lot lower than 70% of games played.

Agree, 9 to 3 is about as clear cut as it gets and you could definitively end the argument right there.

I advanced both arguments and many others as well. Because why not.

The more ways we look at things, the stronger Ovechkin's case becomes.

 

[Toby91ca]

Agree, 9 to 3 is about as clear cut as it gets and you could definitively end the argument right there.

I advanced both arguments and many others as well. Because why not.

The more ways we look at things, the stronger Ovechkin's case becomes.

Yeah, I don't know, my answer is Ovechkin but it's probably because of recency and his approach to all-time record, when that really shouldn't be the answer....though, it's an easy tiebreaker.

The other tiebreaker for me, as dumb as it might be, is simply that I see OV as a pure goal scorer and I've never seen Mario as that. This isn't fair to Mario of course, but that's the way I've seen it. Same as Bure, Hull, etc. Kovalchuk, for example, no business lumping him in with other all-time goal scorers, but I see him as a goal scorer and not so much Lemieux....but then there are the stats for guys like Gretzky and Lemieux, I see them as having scored a ton of goals because they are so good, not because they are pure goal scorers. And yes, both played in a high scoring era, but their stats dwarfed others that played in that era as well.

I already pointed out as well though, Mario never really scored more goals to a great degree more than his competitors, neither has OV. Gretzky did a fews as did a few other guys.

 

[Video Nasty]

Ovechkin has always been given extra credit for winning Rockets against weak, inconsistent competition. Very fortunate his one true threat, Stamkos, had his career trajectory nuked.

 

[GirardSpinorama]

8 is the greatest goal scorer of all time full stop

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

lol, maybe use the better scorers that played, it was a satire post you used nothing more.

Like who, exactly? Which "better scorers" were there in the Richard races that OV won? Or do you think pretending my post is "satire" proves me wrong?

 

[Video Nasty]

Like who, exactly? Which "better scorers" were there in the Richard races that OV won? Or do you think pretending my post is "satire" proves me wrong?

Max Pacioretty