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

[Randyne]

The table is saying that 85 goals in 1989 is "71"

And 86 goals in 1991 is "78"

And I'm saying that's nonsense. That's all.

It's math.
In different seasons, like 1996-1998 the gap between 86-85G would be even bigger ~16

 

[WarriorofTime]

Not really. Guy scored 85 in the 80d. 69 in 60 in the 90s. And 35 in 41 in the 2000s. Lemieux with no red line. 3 on 3 OT. N lemieux being the most physically talented player of all time and at 6"4 225 pounds would be drawing penalties left, right and center.

Lemieux scored 77 in 170 games after the year 2000.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

You’re not accounting for the number of teams in your analysis. The top 26 scorers in 90-91 made up 20.6% of the top 6 forwards in the league. The top 26 scorers in 2010-11 would make up 14.4% of the top 6 forwards in the league. So of course they’d score a lower percentage league wide. You have a bunch more top 6 roles that are being filled and players are scoring in those minutes. If there were 30 teams in 90-91, those 26 players would automatically score a lower percentage of the number of goals in the league.

If we adjust the league wide goals in 2010-11 to what they’d be if there were only 21 teams (based on the league wide goals per game), then there’d be only 4704 goals. Suddenly those top 26 scorers are getting a point on 42.2% of the goals in the league. Basically the same as the top 26 in 90-91.

But I have been told that having more teams makes it much easier to score, because talent is diluted. Isn't that the whole idea behind expansion being a reason why scoring averages go up? Shouldn't we then assume those guys wouldn't be getting so many easy goals against the 9 expansion teams we've eliminated and would probably score much less as a result?

Similarly, if we use the top 37 scorers in 2010-11 instead, so that we’re using the top 20.6% of the top 6 forwards, we have them combining for 725 more points, or 2708 combined points. With 6720 total goals, that means a point on 40.3% of the total goals.

When you need 37 guys to do the same amount of scoring as 26, I'm not sure your guys are as good as mine.

So, we can argue that there’s a slight difference at the top of the lineup, but it wouldn’t account for all of the league wide scoring. If the top 37 scorers in 2010-11 scored 44% of the league’s offense that would mean 2957 combined points, or 249 more goals. If there were 249 more goals in 2010-11, it would raise the league average from 2.73 to 2.83.

Again, 10 guys creating 250 more goals vs needing 37 guys to get the same increase. Not sure if you're arguing against me or agreeing with me.

Consider this. Even if we believe every one of the top 75 scorers is 25% better in 90-91 than 2010-11, and so we made the top 75 scorers in 2010-11 score 25% more than they did. The top 75 had 4914 points. That would mean they’d have a combined 6143 points or 1229 more goals. If the league scored 1229 more goals in 2010-11, it’d have 7949 goals. That would mean a league wide GPG of 3.23. The league average GPG in 90-91 was 3.45. Even with the absurd notion that the top 75 players were that much better, we still can’t account for the scoring difference.

Again, I'm confused. Do you agree that 75 players being about 25% better is enough to explain the scoring averages being much higher? Or are you saying that your math showing 75 players increasing their scoring by just 25% would increase league averages by 0.5 goals per game isn't good enough to prove that a small number of players can have a big impact?

I mean, you mention that 90-91 only had 75 guys score more than their 2010-11 counterparts, but then say “out of 500+ NHLers”. But there wasn’t 500+ in 90-91. There were 419 players who played at least 40 games. There were 566 who played at least 40 games in 2010-11. It’s not about the players, it’s about the opportunity. If the league suddenly shrunk to 21 teams, the top 75 scorers would not be scoring at much as they are now because a lot of them would see their roles reduced. However they’d all combine for a greater percentage of the leagues total goals because there’d be a lot fewer players.

Adding more players to the league shouldn't change how well the top 26 in the league can perform. If anything, adding so many teams and mediocre players is usually claimed to make it easier to score (expansion causes averages to increase, right?), so you'd think there'd be more guys putting up big numbers skating around the pylons that littered the league in 2010.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

It's math.
In different seasons, like 1996-1998 the gap between 86-85G would be even bigger ~16

If you can explain the differences in scoring by looking at the number of elite scorers around the league in a given year, why is this math necessary? Why do players deserve bonus points for playing in an era full of players who clearly weren't good enough to score more?

 

[Lshap]

Any chance you can show me any sort of evidence to show that smokers are more likely to gamble? I've known a lot of smokers who never gamble and have never seen a single study linking cigarette smoking and the propensity to gamble, so if you want to make that claim, it's going to take a lot more than you saying it for me to believe you're right.


I'm really saying the 80s and 90s was a higher scoring era BECAUSE it had so many more higher scoring superstars. More top tier players scored more and drove the averages up. And every time scoring averages has gone up, there's been new high level scoring talent in the league. Every time averages have gone down, there's high level scorers falling off or retiring and not being replaced. It's almost perfectly consistent going back to at least 1967. The only change it doesn't explain is right after the lockout, when they changed the rules and teams were getting like 100 more PP opportunities per season then in any other season I can find.

Evidence? When did we start using evidence? I say Lemieux would be addicted to online gambling today. You say Ovechkin would be injured back then. Our evidence: Just because.

Wait until you hear my theory about how the mullet era would've changed Maurice Richard's game.

Seriously... as far as the adjusted goals thing, it sounds like a chicken/egg problem. Were goal-scorers better back then, or were goaltenders and defencemen worse? Maybe both. Aside from Patrick Roy, the 80's and 90's featured a lot of mediocre goalies, nowhere close to the goalie class of the 2000's and 2010's. Hasek and Brodeur started in the mid/late 90's. So while it may be true that there were more generational forwards in the 80's and 90's, it's also true that they had easier targets. Not to mention the less systematic defensive systems back then.

 

[IWantSakicAsMyGM]

Evidence? When did we start using evidence? I say Lemieux would be addicted to online gambling today. You say Ovechkin would be injured back then. Our evidence: Just because.

Wait until you hear my theory about how the mullet era would've changed Maurice Richard's game.

Seriously... as far as the adjusted goals thing, it sounds like a chicken/egg problem. Were goal-scorers better back then, or were goaltenders and defencemen worse? Maybe both. Aside from Patrick Roy, the 80's and 90's featured a lot of mediocre goalies, nowhere close to the goalie class of the 2000's and 2010's. Hasek and Brodeur started in the mid/late 90's. So while it may be true that there were more generational forwards in the 80's and 90's, it's also true that they had easier targets. Not to mention the less systematic defensive systems back then.

I never said OV would be injured. I said we shouldn't assume he would definitely be healthy. He obviously might be healthy, but then again, maybe not. But that means we also shouldn't assume Lemieux would definitely have a back injury if he was playing in OVs era. Maybe he does, but then again, maybe not. We simply can't tell whether the difference are due to some attribute of the players or the environment they played in, so using it to compare them seems ridiculous to me.

There's a lot of mediocre goaltenders now, if we compare SV% to the 2010s. Does that discount how good MacKinnon, McDavid, Kucherov, Matthews, etc. are driving the scoring averages up? Or do you think that maybe there are so many mediocre goalies today because scorers are so much better that all but the very best goalies are getting outclassed more frequently by the guys scoring goals, making them look mediocre?

I will give you defensive systems. But there also weren't offensive systems either, so offenses weren't using the same tactics either. It was usually just go out and let your superstars outclass the opponents, while the rest of the team tried to not make mistakes.

 

[PainForShane]

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.

You're saying a lot of things man. Mostly making stuff up on your end and demanding proof / repeatable experiments for everything you're trying to disprove. You're also saying some legitimately dumb things like the bolded above, as well as repeatedly arguing that Shots on Goal are actually a negative stat when it comes to goal scoring. Which is a take that I don't think many people have ever heard before, if at all. I know I certainly haven't.

Anyway re: Mario, he didn't get hurt, he got cancer. Pretty sure the clutching and grabbing (or a lack thereof at times) has absolutely nothing to do with whether a player contracts Hodgkin's Lymphoma