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

[Golden_Jet]

Maybe it's only clear and unequivocal because you want to see it.

To me, the injuries still happening are the mostly unavoidable injuries that aren't related to the massive rules changes that came in during the lockout. So, we still see guys with ankle injuries due to catching an edge, or knee injuries from an awkward collision, or shoulder injuries from guys crashing into the boards. What we don't see anymore are guys having their hands slashed with impunity. A broken finger can easily mess up your shot, even if it doesn't cause you to miss a game. We also don't see guys getting brutalized by defensemen during the net front battles, so there's fewer broken/bruised ribs that guys are playing with and no one has ruptured their spleen lately. Nor do we see nearly as many predatory head shots that take talent out of the game. And when we do see these things today, there's usually a PP as a result, and sometimes even a suspension, to enforce the idea that it's not allowed.

It was also a totally different era in medical care. Injuries today are identified better, treated more seriously, and players are much more apt to miss a game or 3 than playing through something and never properly recovering.



It's not just a handful of players.

In 1990-91, 10 guys scored more than 100 points. Gretzky had 163 points. The top 10 players scored a combined 1157 points. 26 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 2566 points. There were 5796 goals scored in the league that year. Those top 26 players had points on 44% of the league goals that year. That's a huge impact on league scoring.

In 2010-11, there was only 1 guy over 100 (Sedin 104). In 2010, the top 10 scorers combined for only 894. Only 9 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 1983 points. There were 6720 goals scored that year, with 9 additional teams joining the league. The top 26 players only scored points on 29.5% of those goals.

Once you get to about the 75th highest scorer, the numbers are all about the same. In other words, despite it allegedly being easier to score, only about 75 guys out of the 500+ in the NHL scored more in 1990 than a similarly ranked scorer in 2010. If was truly easier to score back then, why is it only 15% of the players scoring more? Why is there such a huge difference between the top 10s, but not the 75-150th best guys? If it's goaltending, why is so much of the difference in scoring concentrated among just the top 25-50 players, and not throughout the league? Wouldn't improved goaltending make it harder for the 2nd tier guys to score too? Seems to me like the only logical explanation is that there's something different about the top 25-50 guys.



The top 26 scorers in 1990-91 combined for 600 more points than the top 26 scorers in 2010-11. Remove them, and you're losing a lot more than just the goals they scored themselves.

lol, you’re seeing what you want to see,
Stone had a ruptured spleen a year ago.
Yes players are getting broken fingers during OV’s career. Bobby Ryan had about 6 of them, as well as other players, we had Crosby basically lop off the end of the finger of Méthot with a slash.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

lol, you’re seeing what you want to see,
Stone had a ruptured spleen a year ago.
Yes players are getting broken fingers during OV’s career. Bobby Ryan had about 6 of them, as well as other players, we had Crosby basically lop off the end of the finger of Méthot with a slash.

It being safer doesn't mean these things can't still happen. It just means they happen less frequently as a direct result of the rules changes trying to reduce the number of avoidable injuries. Stone ran into Trenin and randomly lacerated his spleen. It was a freak accident on a nothing play, not something any of the rules changes tried to prevent. Maybe he was just due for his annual pre-TDL injury to let Vegas stock up for the playoffs, and the universe obliged. Bobby Ryan having 6 broken fingers, or Crosby having 1 doesn't mean there were the same number of hand injuries around the league.

I wish I could say I can't believe I have to explain things that are this simple to people who want to insist I'm wrong, but I've been here too long to be that naive anymore.

 

[Dallas Winston]

It took ovechkin 528 shots to score 56 goals... that is the most shots ever taken. Id reckon he has at least 1000 more shots than any of the top 10 goal scorers. 447 shots to score 65. Matthews has scored 60 on 348 shots and 69 on 369 shots. So lemieux for me

 

[WarriorofTime]

Highest Adjusted Goals Seasons between the two:

Ovechkin - 72
Lemieux - 71
Lemieux - 67
Ovechkin - 62
Ovechkin - 60
Lemieux - 59
Ovechkin - 59
Ovechkin - 58
Ovechkin - 58
Ovechkin - 57
Lemieux - 56
Ovechkin - 55
Lemieux - 52
Ovechkin - 52
Ovechkin - 52
Ovechkin - 50
Ovechkin - 49
Ovechkin - 48

While Lemieux's 3 highest totals come out slightly ahead, Ovechkin's volume of work is just too great to make up for a small difference there.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Maybe it's only clear and unequivocal because you want to see it.

To me, the injuries still happening are the mostly unavoidable injuries that aren't related to the massive rules changes that came in during the lockout. So, we still see guys with ankle injuries due to catching an edge, or knee injuries from an awkward collision, or shoulder injuries from guys crashing into the boards. What we don't see anymore are guys having their hands slashed with impunity. A broken finger can easily mess up your shot, even if it doesn't cause you to miss a game. We also don't see guys getting brutalized by defensemen during the net front battles, so there's fewer broken/bruised ribs that guys are playing with and no one has ruptured their spleen lately. Nor do we see nearly as many predatory head shots that take talent out of the game. And when we do see these things today, there's usually a PP as a result, and sometimes even a suspension, to enforce the idea that it's not allowed.

It was also a totally different era in medical care. Injuries today are identified better, treated more seriously, and players are much more apt to miss a game or 3 than playing through something and never properly recovering.



It's not just a handful of players.

In 1990-91, 10 guys scored more than 100 points. Gretzky had 163 points. The top 10 players scored a combined 1157 points. 26 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 2566 points. There were 5796 goals scored in the league that year. Those top 26 players had points on 44% of the league goals that year. That's a huge impact on league scoring.

In 2010-11, there was only 1 guy over 100 (Sedin 104). In 2010, the top 10 scorers combined for only 894. Only 9 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 1983 points. There were 6720 goals scored that year, with 9 additional teams joining the league. The top 26 players only scored points on 29.5% of those goals.

Once you get to about the 75th highest scorer, the numbers are all about the same. In other words, despite it allegedly being easier to score, only about 75 guys out of the 500+ in the NHL scored more in 1990 than a similarly ranked scorer in 2010. If was truly easier to score back then, why is it only 15% of the players scoring more? Why is there such a huge difference between the top 10s, but not the 75-150th best guys? If it's goaltending, why is so much of the difference in scoring concentrated among just the top 25-50 players, and not throughout the league? Wouldn't improved goaltending make it harder for the 2nd tier guys to score too? Seems to me like the only logical explanation is that there's something different about the top 25-50 guys.



The top 26 scorers in 1990-91 combined for 600 more points than the top 26 scorers in 2010-11. Remove them, and you're losing a lot more than just the goals they scored themselves.

You're not doing an apples-to-apples comparison here. There were 21 teams in 1991 and 30 teams in 2011, so focusing on a static number isn't going to give you a meaningful result. The 26th highest scorer is much lower in the scoring race (on a relative basis) in 1991, so of course the percentage is higher.

Why not look at the Nth highest scorer (where N is the number of teams in the league)? That gives you a snapshot of how the average highest scorer on a team is doing. (It's not a perfect metric because some teams won't have any players in the top N in scoring, and others will have two or more, but it's a decent snapshot).

In 1991, there were 21 teams. The top 21 scorers recorded 2,151 points. There were 5,805 goals scored that season, so the typical #1 scorer contributed to 37.1% of the goals leaguewide.

In 2011, there were 30 teams. The top 30 scorers recorded 2,324 points. There were 6,721 goals scored that season, so the typical #1 scorer contributed to 34.6% of the goals leaguewide.

The percentage is higher in 1991, but not by a huge amount (not anywhere close to the 44%-29.5% you had before). And if you back out Gretzky (he was an outlier and 1991 was his last truly great year), both years are within 1% of each other.

 

[authentic]

Statistically, league wide scoring simply can’t be that greatly affected by the elite scorers. If you removed the top 30 goalscorers from 88-89, the league would still average slightly more GPG than 07-08. And that’s assuming no one would score in the minutes they were replaced by.

Lol that’s actually wild. Case closed.

 

[PainForShane]

It being safer doesn't mean these things can't still happen. It just means they happen less frequently as a direct result of the rules changes trying to reduce the number of avoidable injuries. Stone ran into Trenin and randomly lacerated his spleen. It was a freak accident on a nothing play, not something any of the rules changes tried to prevent. Maybe he was just due for his annual pre-TDL injury to let Vegas stock up for the playoffs, and the universe obliged. Bobby Ryan having 6 broken fingers, or Crosby having 1 doesn't mean there were the same number of hand injuries around the league.

I wish I could say I can't believe I have to explain things that are this simple to people who want to insist I'm wrong, but I've been here too long to be that naive anymore.

You have to explain things that are this simple because you literally said a few posts up

I'm also not creating injuries that never existing,

But here you are repeatedly defending your idea to factor in the potential of imaginary injuries, which is close enough to what you denied doing. All this while also saying

If you can't test it for accuracy and repeatability, then there's zero reason to trust it.

***

It follows from your advice that there's 'zero reason to trust' your claim / assumption about Ovi's potential injuries in a different generation.

Lmk if I have to explain this 'simple' argument any further

 

[paracord]

It took ovechkin 528 shots to score 56 goals... that is the most shots ever taken. Id reckon he has at least 1000 more shots than any of the top 10 goal scorers. 447 shots to score 65. Matthews has scored 60 on 348 shots and 69 on 369 shots. So lemieux for me

Career Shots, Regular Season:

Ovechkin - 6813 (most all time)
Gretzky - 5083
Lemieux - 3633

Shots per game, Regular Season:

Ovechkin - 4.62
Lemieux - 3.97
Gretzky - 3.42

Shooting Percentage, Regular Season:

Lemieux - 19.0%
Gretzky - 17.6%
Ovechkin - 13.0%

Shooting Percentage, Playoffs:

Lemieux - 18.9%
Gretzky - 17.5%
Ovechkin - 11.2%

And yes, the closest in the top 10 goal scorers of all time in shots to Ovechkin is Jaromir Jagr, and he is almost 1200 shots shy of him. Jagr is 3rd all time. Ray Bourque has the second most shots all time, and he is more than 600 behind Ovechkin, with more than 130 extra games played than Ovi.

 

[Lshap]

Maybe it's only clear and unequivocal because you want to see it.

To me, the injuries still happening are the mostly unavoidable injuries that aren't related to the massive rules changes that came in during the lockout. So, we still see guys with ankle injuries due to catching an edge, or knee injuries from an awkward collision, or shoulder injuries from guys crashing into the boards. What we don't see anymore are guys having their hands slashed with impunity. A broken finger can easily mess up your shot, even if it doesn't cause you to miss a game. We also don't see guys getting brutalized by defensemen during the net front battles, so there's fewer broken/bruised ribs that guys are playing with and no one has ruptured their spleen lately. Nor do we see nearly as many predatory head shots that take talent out of the game. And when we do see these things today, there's usually a PP as a result, and sometimes even a suspension, to enforce the idea that it's not allowed.

It was also a totally different era in medical care. Injuries today are identified better, treated more seriously, and players are much more apt to miss a game or 3 than playing through something and never properly recovering.

Ovechkin's durability isn't something to interpret. It's a straightforward fact. You can't extrapolate his injury history... because he doesn't have an injury history. It's like claiming Lemieux's scoring would've suffered if he played today, because he'd be addicted to online gambling. I mean... it's possible, right? Imagine someone doubling down on that claim, insisting that Lemieux wouldn't be as good a player because he'd acquire a problem he never had before. That's what you're doing with Ovechkin and these imaginary injuries you claim he'd suffer in the 1990's.

By the way, Ovi remained un-injured playing against guys like Pronger, Chara, Weber, Cooke, Kadri, Lucic, etc. in their prime, and he did it before the DPS cracked down on headshots about a dozen years ago. Nothing soft about the league Ovi played in.

It's not just a handful of players.

In 1990-91, 10 guys scored more than 100 points. Gretzky had 163 points. The top 10 players scored a combined 1157 points. 26 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 2566 points. There were 5796 goals scored in the league that year. Those top 26 players had points on 44% of the league goals that year. That's a huge impact on league scoring.

In 2010-11, there was only 1 guy over 100 (Sedin 104). In 2010, the top 10 scorers combined for only 894. Only 9 guys scored more than 80 points. The top 26 players combined for 1983 points. There were 6720 goals scored that year, with 9 additional teams joining the league. The top 26 players only scored points on 29.5% of those goals.

Once you get to about the 75th highest scorer, the numbers are all about the same. In other words, despite it allegedly being easier to score, only about 75 guys out of the 500+ in the NHL scored more in 1990 than a similarly ranked scorer in 2010. If was truly easier to score back then, why is it only 15% of the players scoring more? Why is there such a huge difference between the top 10s, but not the 75-150th best guys? If it's goaltending, why is so much of the difference in scoring concentrated among just the top 25-50 players, and not throughout the league? Wouldn't improved goaltending make it harder for the 2nd tier guys to score too? Seems to me like the only logical explanation is that there's something different about the top 25-50 guys.

The top 26 scorers in 1990-91 combined for 600 more points than the top 26 scorers in 2010-11. Remove them, and you're losing a lot more than just the goals they scored themselves.

We're talking specifically about goals, not total points. I'd be legit curious about the same top-26 from both eras, and the difference between 1991 and 2011 in goals. No problem if you don't have time... I can figure it out later tonight.

 

[Dallas Winston]

Career Shots, Regular Season:

Ovechkin - 6813 (most all time)
Gretzky - 5083
Lemieux - 3633

Shots per game, Regular Season:

Ovechkin - 4.62
Lemieux - 3.97
Gretzky - 3.42

Shooting Percentage, Regular Season:

Lemieux - 19.0%
Gretzky - 17.6%
Ovechkin - 13.0%

And yes, the closest in the top 10 goal scorers of all time in shots to Ovechkin is Jaromir Jagr, and he is almost 1200 shots shy of him. Jagr is 3rd all time. Ray Bourque has the second most shots all time, and he is more than 600 behind Ovechkin, with more than 130 extra games played than Ovi.

So for the poll lemieux has 200 less goals with 3000 less shots. Come on now... i know eras n such but lemieux had no problems scoring on prime roy joseph hasek with pads same size or bigger than today with a wooden stick

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

Mario all the way.

As usual the only thing that stops him is health.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

So for the poll lemieux has 200 less goals with 3000 less shots. Come on now... i know eras n such but lemieux had no problems scoring on prime roy joseph hasek with pads same size or bigger than today with a wooden stick

Lemieux would be unstoppable in this league and likey much healthier. People used to be allowed to tackle him.

Credit where it's due though, Ovechkin's incredible and he's stayed healthy. Beating Gretzky's record was unthinkable. I have zero problem with people calling him the greatest goal scorer ever. But when healthy, I would take Lemieux over anyone.

 

[EXTRAS]

Lemiuex. If he had remained healthy he would have skunked gretzkys career goal record.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

You have to explain things that are this simple because you literally said a few posts up


But here you are repeatedly defending your idea to factor in the potential of imaginary injuries, which is close enough to what you denied doing. All this while also saying


***

It follows from your advice that there's 'zero reason to trust' your claim / assumption about Ovi's potential injuries in a different generation.

Lmk if I have to explain this 'simple' argument any further

I'm saying that the eras are so different that it's impossible to separate OVs health from the era he played in. In other words, I can't test that he would stay healthy in literally any other era, so why should I trust that he definitely would? That doesn't mean that he definitely would, but giving OV credit for staying healthy in one era while punishing Mario for getting hurt in a completely different era is total bullshit.

 

[WarriorofTime]

I'm saying that the eras are so different that it's impossible to separate OVs health from the era he played in. In other words, I can't test that he would stay healthy in literally any other era, so why should I trust that he definitely would? That doesn't mean that he definitely would, but giving OV credit for staying healthy in one era while punishing Mario for getting hurt in a completely different era is total bullshit.

The notion that nobody stayed healthy in Lemieux's day is false. Francis, Stevens, Andreychuk, Gilmour, Chelios, Messier, Damphousse, Yzerman, Robitaille, MacInnis, Muller, Housley, Verbeek, etc.

Ovechkin's not even top 20 in career games played, largely due to lockouts, covid and such.

 

[TheLegend27]

I'm saying that the eras are so different that it's impossible to separate OVs health from the era he played in. In other words, I can't test that he would stay healthy in literally any other era, so why should I trust that he definitely would? That doesn't mean that he definitely would, but giving OV credit for staying healthy in one era while punishing Mario for getting hurt in a completely different era is total bullshit.

Except plenty of superstars did have injuries in Ovi’s era (such as Crosby and Stamkos) despite playing a far less physical game. Ovi being the most durable of an era that spans 20 years should be enough evidence to consider him historically durable. The mileage players have nowadays actually should make them more injury prone. Playing constant hockey from 6 years old in order to separate yourself from the average kids and make the NHL is taxing on the body. What about Mario’s era would make you question Ovi health?. He’s too fast for players his size, and walks away from heavy hits like nothing. There is no basis that Ovi would be more injury prone in Mario’s era, so why try to make what if arguments questioning Ovi’s durability?.

 

[WarriorofTime]

93 skaters have accrued 1,000 games played between 2005-06 and 2024-25. One more (Ryan McDonagh) probably gets there by season end.

96 skaters accrued 1,000 games played between 1984-85 and 2003-04.

You'd expect a higher number to accrue more games in a larger NHL.

 

[DitchMarner]

It took ovechkin 528 shots to score 56 goals... that is the most shots ever taken. Id reckon he has at least 1000 more shots than any of the top 10 goal scorers. 447 shots to score 65. Matthews has scored 60 on 348 shots and 69 on 369 shots. So lemieux for me

Better/greater goal scorer and most accurate shooter aren't necessarily the same thing.

There are better shooters than Zach Hyman and Chris Kreider, but both of those players have scored 50+ goals in a season. Goals are goals.


Also, is scoring on fewer shots even really a positive? If a guy scores 50 goals on 200 shots, people are bound to bring up his abnormally high shooting percentage and say he got lucky. Also, shots taken can enhance a player's underlying numbers (corsi, scoring chances for etc).

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Ovechkin's durability isn't something to interpret. It's a straightforward fact. You can't extrapolate his injury history... because he doesn't have an injury history. It's like claiming Lemieux's scoring would've suffered if he played today, because he'd be addicted to online gambling. I mean... it's possible, right? Imagine someone doubling down on that claim, insisting that Lemieux wouldn't be as good a player because he'd acquire a problem he never had before. That's what you're doing with Ovechkin and these imaginary injuries you claim he'd suffer in the 1990's.

By the way, Ovi remained un-injured playing against guys like Pronger, Chara, Weber, Cooke, Kadri, Lucic, etc. in their prime, and he did it before the DPS cracked down on headshots about a dozen years ago. Nothing soft about the league Ovi played in.


We're talking specifically about goals, not total points. I'd be legit curious about the same top-26 from both eras, and the difference between 1991 and 2011 in goals. No problem if you don't have time... I can figure it out later tonight.

Maybe Lemieux's scoring would have suffered for some random off-ice reason that you want to make up. But OV pretty clearly benefited from the on-ice rules changes that the league implemented right before he joined the league, and since. Just something as simple as no touch icing made the game a lot safer. As a result, it's impossible to separate his health from the era he played in and questioning whether he could have done the same in literally any other era is a totally valid and reasonable question. Questioning whether Mario would have gotten into online gambling if he came into the league in 2005 like OV probably isn't valid or reasonable.

And, sure, OV did play against a handful of guys who were pretty tough. Of course, they weren't allowed to slash and crosscheck with impunity anymore, but I'm sure the few dozen minutes a season he spent on the ice against them was just as risky as spending almost every shift getting abused.


I thought we're talking about league averages and what causes them to change. And most elite players contribute to goals being scored in more ways than just putting the puck in the net, so their total points are much better measure of their contribution to overall league scoring. Gretzky's 163 points in 90-91 means 163 goals were scored that season as a direct result of something he did. It doesn't matter if he personally scored every goal or not, he still contributed a lot to them being scored, and probably a few more that didn't result in him getting a point. If you replace him with literally anyone other than Mario, a lot of those goals 163 goals probably aren't getting scored that year.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

The notion that nobody stayed healthy in Lemieux's day is false. Francis, Stevens, Andreychuk, Gilmour, Chelios, Messier, Damphousse, Yzerman, Robitaille, MacInnis, Muller, Housley, Verbeek, etc.

Ovechkin's not even top 20 in career games played, largely due to lockouts, covid and such.

Where did I say nobody stayed healthy? I'm saying that a lot of guys didn't, and a even a lot of the guys who did had nagging issues and injuries that impacted their play over the years, so I don't think it's safe to assume OV would definitely be part of the list of guys who was totally healthy during that era. It's a total unknown how he would fare in Lemieux's era, so giving him bonus points for something that could simply be a result of the safer era he played in is illogical.

 

[Rorschach]

Comparing Lemieux to Ovechkin is like comparing a SUV to a motorcycle.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Better/greater goal scorer and most accurate shooter aren't necessarily the same thing.

There are better shooters than Zach Hyman and Chris Kreider, but both of those players have scored 50+ goals in a season. Goals are goals.


Also, is scoring on fewer shots even really a positive? If a guy scores 50 goals on 200 shots, people are bound to bring up his abnormally high shooting percentage and say he got lucky. Also, shots taken can enhance a player's underlying numbers (corsi, scoring chances for etc).

If a guy scores 60 goals on 300 shots one time in his career, never to repeat it, then maybe he got lucky. When a guy scores 613 goals on 3054 shots over 745 games, it becomes a lot harder to call his career 20% shooting percentage "abnormally high" or "lucky".

 

[WarriorofTime]

Where did I say nobody stayed healthy? I'm saying that a lot of guys didn't, and a even a lot of the guys who did had nagging issues and injuries that impacted their play over the years, so I don't think it's safe to assume OV would definitely be part of the list of guys who was totally healthy during that era. It's a total unknown how he would fare in Lemieux's era, so giving him bonus points for something that could simply be a result of the safer era he played in is illogical.

This doesn't make sense. It's very illogical. Ovechkin's durability is a plus for his career value. You don't just subtract that value and say hypothetically perhaps the durability doesn't translate, it just doesn't work. Ovechkin's amongst the healthy group in his era, so he could be presumed part of the healthy group in a different era. Similar to how Lemieux would be presumed to be part of the offensively potent group in any era and it'd be rather silly to suggest maybe he wouldn't and it's a total unknown for something that could simply be a result of inefficient goaltending styles and less defensemen that skated well.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

93 skaters have accrued 1,000 games played between 2005-06 and 2024-25. One more (Ryan McDonagh) probably gets there by season end.

96 skaters accrued 1,000 games played between 1984-85 and 2003-04.

You'd expect a higher number to accrue more games in a larger NHL.

Sure, but I'd also expect fewer B tier guys to be good enough to continue being a top tier player well into their 30s. Without an advantage in skill level, the decline in skating and reaction time can push a lot of those guys out of the league earlier than elite guys who can still contribute due to their superior skills.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

This doesn't make sense. It's very illogical. Ovechkin's durability is a plus for his career value. You don't just subtract that value and say hypothetically perhaps the durability doesn't translate, it just doesn't work. Ovechkin's amongst the healthy group in his era, so he could be presumed part of the healthy group in a different era. Similar to how Lemieux would be presumed to be part of the offensively potent group in any era and it'd be rather silly to suggest maybe he wouldn't and it's a total unknown for something that could simply be a result of inefficient goaltending styles and less defensemen that skated well.

Sure, he could be presumed to be healthy during that era, but I'd much rather admit that I don't know than put much faith in things that I can only presume and not actually see. If you want to argue that Lemieux might not score 0.82 goals per game during OV's era, go for it. Predicting what will definitely happen is far from an exact science, so you could very well be right, despite everyone presuming otherwise. Lay out the reasons why you think he'd struggle in the modern era and let's dig into it.