Bourque vs Lidstrom: Who's better and why

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TheDevilMadeMe

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That's fine then as long as his longer and sometimes much longer time than most getting to his peak is stipulated.

Why should it be stipulated if we are comparing two players at their best (which is the whole point of comparing points-per-game)? Do we need to talk in length about what every player was doing outside his prime when comparing primes, or just Lidstrom?
 

tarheelhockey

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It doesn't impress me more if a player is great from the ages of 20-33 than it does if they are from 27-40.

Except that in this case the comparison is between a player 19-37 and one 27-40. That still leaves a half-decade's worth of greatness to be accounted for, which seems to be the fundamental issue behind all of this.

The formula for Bourque over Lidstrom is:
Longer Prime + Higher Peak + Equal Longetivity = Better Career

I have yet to see anyone make a successful, verifiable challenge to any of the three elements on the left side of that equation.
 

Rhiessan71

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I still fail to see the relevance of going on about how early a player became elite, other than the fact that this site, being devoted to prospects and young players, is naturally going to attract that sort of bias.

It doesn't impress me more if a player is great from the ages of 20-33 than it does if they are from 27-40.

Except in this case, it's Bourque vs Lidstrom and it's not 20-33 vs 27-39, it's 19-37 vs 27-39.


Oh I defintely agree, people think it was some golden age of defenseman when in reality the quality of defenseman play in that era was quite bad, everyone went all offense all the time. Thats why many d-man are made to look better than they actually were.

Except that Bourque was still elite in the 90's, when the play wasn't the "garbage" you say it was in the 80's.

But why even bring it up when the second player is still an elite player after the age of 40 when the first was basically done as an elite player by his 30th birthday?
Wait, so we're not allowed to use Lidstrom's pre-prime years but you are allowed to use Leetch's post-prime years?
I think at some point both have to get used to make it fair, no?


Not sure if you're being sarcastic or not but if you look up my posts on Pronger, it's all there.


That would be the case if Lidstrom was actually finished as an elite player in 2009. Considering he won the 2011 Norris, I'm going to have to disagree with you there.
And you honestly believe that the Lidstrom over the last couple of years is any where as good as the Lidstrom in the early 2000's?
C'mon man, no one counts or should count Bourque's '98-'01 seasons as elite. I'm certainly not going to do the same for a declined Lidstrom.
Just because Lidstrom's competition isn't good enough to unseat a very good but not elite Lidstrom does not make him elite.


No, it really isn't a tossup. While I think prime Leetch's defense is sometimes underrated, the defensive gap between them is much bigger than the offensive gap.

Agree to disagree, the points difference and the r-on/r-off numbers from Overpass's data seem to say different.
 

BraveCanadian

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And you honestly believe that the Lidstrom over the last couple of years is any where as good as the Lidstrom in the early 2000's?
C'mon man, no one counts or should count Bourque's '98-'01 seasons as elite. I'm certainly not going to do the same for a declined Lidstrom.
Just because Lidstrom's competition isn't good enough to unseat a very good but not elite Lidstrom does not make him elite.


Agree to disagree, the points difference and the r-on/r-off numbers from Overpass's data seem to say different.

They say that Lidstrom dropped from a 1.40 in his prime years to a 1.30 the last couple... however the Red Wings in general aren't as strong and the R-Off of the Wings has lowered too.. so he is almost maintaining the gap he had over them before. Actually when I look at it again he has increased it.

Meanwhile Bourque's last 4 years are not flattering. ;)

Not that I think any derivative of +/- or team stats is really conclusive of anything individual.
 
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Rhiessan71

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They say that Lidstrom dropped from a 1.40 in his prime years to a 1.30 the last couple... however the Red Wings in general aren't as strong and the R-Off of the Wings has lowered too.. so he is almost maintaining the gap he had over them before. Actually when I look at it again he has increased it.

Meanwhile Bourque's last 4 years are not flattering. ;)

Not that I think any derivative of +/- or team stats is really conclusive of anything individual.

Still, look at his last couple of years. He was a minus last year for the first time in his career.
The year before that, he had the 3rd lowest point total of his career and was not very impressive at the Olympics.
Is anyone actually going to argue that the Lidstrom we are seeing now and over the last couple of years is even in the same class as the Lidstrom we saw 10 years ago?

I have seen him get beat more outside more times and lost more battles in the last few years than I did from 97-07 combined.
His prime is over and has been for a couple of years now. He is not elite anymore. Lack of anyone else stepping up to de-throne doesn't change that.

I agree that Bourque's last few years are not very flattering compared to what he was but it's absolutely no different with Lidstrom right now but Bourque was still a very good play as is Lidstrom right now.
Both players could/can still play well but neither were/are any where near as dominant as they were, that's a fact.
 
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Reds4Life

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Still, look at his last couple of years. He was a minus last year for the first time in his career.
The year before that, he had the 3rd lowest point total of his career and was not very impressive at the Olympics.
Is anyone actually going to argue that the Lidstrom we are seeing now and over the last couple of years is even in the same class as the Lidstrom we saw 10 years ago?

I have seen him get beat more outside more times and lost more battles in the last few years than I did from 97-07 combined.
His prime is over and has been for a couple of years now. He is not elite anymore. Lack of anyone else stepping up to de-throne doesn't change that.

Lidstrom is no longer St. Nick. He is getting beat more often and does not play half the game anymore. That said, he is still elite NHL defenseman.
 

Rhiessan71

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Lidstrom is no longer St. Nick. He is getting beat more often and does not play half the game anymore. That said, he is still elite NHL defenseman.

In the context of his competition right now maybe but in the context of all-time, no, he really isn't. No more than Bourque was still elite in '01.
Last I checked Bourque won a Cup, finished second in Norris voting and was a 1rst team all-star that year. Still doesn't mean he was elite.
Just means he was arguably as good or better than everyone else not named Lidstrom that year. Still doesn't make him elite.

When Duncan Keith won the Norris in '10, did you consider him elite?
I didn't. He was a very good player that had a very good season. He was not an elite player that had an elite season.
 
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Reds4Life

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Just means he was as good or better than everyone else not named Lidstrom that year. Still doesn't make him elite.

On the contrary. Just because you are not other-worldly does not mean you can't be elite. If you had a point, then only the peak would matter. Everything else would be irrelevant.
 

BraveCanadian

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Still, look at his last couple of years. He was a minus last year for the first time in his career.
The year before that, he had the 3rd lowest point total of his career and was not very impressive at the Olympics.
Is anyone actually going to argue that the Lidstrom we are seeing now and over the last couple of years is even in the same class as the Lidstrom we saw 10 years ago?

I have seen him get beat more outside more times and lost more battles in the last few years than I did from 97-07 combined.
His prime is over and has been for a couple of years now. He is not elite anymore. Lack of anyone else stepping up to de-throne doesn't change that.

I agree that Bourque's last few years are not very flattering compared to what he was but it's absolutely no different with Lidstrom right now but Bourque was still a very good play as is Lidstrom right now.
Both players could/can still play well but neither were/are any where near as dominant as they were, that's a fact.

I agree Lidstrom has lost a step, I just took issue with your use of the numbers which don't back up your earlier statement at all.

In fact, by those numbers Lidstrom is better at 40+ than Bourque was at 36+, and that doesn't do much for the longevity argument the Bourque backers always fall back to..

And even if he isn't at his best any longer, and chewing up less ice time that he used to - Lidstrom is still elite.
 

Reds4Life

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When Duncan Keith won the Norris in '10, did you consider him elite?
I didn't. He was a very good player that had a very good season. He was not an elite player that had an elite season.

Of course. Keith was arguably the best defenseman in the World at that time. If that's not elite, what is?

You start going this way (seriously, if his name wasn't Keith, would you still say he was not elite?) and sooner or later, you can start questioning old time hockey players. Was Shore elite when he won the Hart trophy? If yes, what's the difference between his case and Keith's? Except for names and legendary status, of course.
 

Rhiessan71

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I agree Lidstrom has lost a step, I just took issue with your use of the numbers which don't back up your earlier statement at all.

In fact, by those numbers Lidstrom is better at 40+ than Bourque was at 36+, and that doesn't to much for the longevity argument the Bourque backers always fall back to.

Are you saying that because Lidstrom is playing marginally better ages 38-40 that that makes up for Bourque playing significantly better than Lidstrom from ages 18-27???

And even if he isn't at his best any longer, and chewing up less ice time that he used to - Lidstrom is still elite.
Agree to disagree, we obviously have different criteria for using the word elite.
 

overpass

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I agree Lidstrom has lost a step, I just took issue with your use of the numbers which don't back up your earlier statement at all.

In fact, by those numbers Lidstrom is better at 40+ than Bourque was at 36+, and that doesn't do much for the longevity argument the Bourque backers always fall back to..

And even if he isn't at his best any longer, and chewing up less ice time that he used to - Lidstrom is still elite.

Regarding plus-minus and its derivatives, I think aging Lidstrom has had a real advantage over an aging Bourque in his team situation. Especially with better defensive partners (Brian Rafalski) and a better first forward unit. In 2010-11, Henrik Zetterberg was on the ice for slightly more than half of Lidstrom's 5-on-5 minutes. (Source.) In 2009-10, Pavel Datsyuk was on the ice for almost half of Lidstrom's 5-on-5 minutes.

Bourque definitely appears to have lost a step at even strength in the late 90s, and it's fair to dock him for that relative to Lidstrom. But he was partnered with the likes of Kyle McLaren and Hal Gill. And I don't think his forward group was giving him a lot of help either. Who were the top two-way forwards on Boston? Look at Bourque's final season with a top team in Colorado - he bounced back to +25 while playing shutdown minutes, but it helped that he was partnered with Adam Foote and had a great forward group.
 

TheDevilMadeMe

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Regarding plus-minus and its derivatives, I think aging Lidstrom has had a real advantage over an aging Bourque in his team situation. Especially with better defensive partners (Brian Rafalski) and a better first forward unit. In 2010-11, Henrik Zetterberg was on the ice for slightly more than half of Lidstrom's 5-on-5 minutes. (Source.) In 2009-10, Pavel Datsyuk was on the ice for almost half of Lidstrom's 5-on-5 minutes.

Bourque definitely appears to have lost a step at even strength in the late 90s, and it's fair to dock him for that relative to Lidstrom. But he was partnered with the likes of Kyle McLaren and Hal Gill. And I don't think his forward group was giving him a lot of help either.

Bourque was paired with Adam Foote in his "comeback year" in 2000-01 and IIRC, they played an awful lot with Joe Sakic. I realize his last few Boston years were terrible teammate-wise though.
 

BraveCanadian

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Are you saying that because Lidstrom is playing marginally better ages 38-40 that that makes up for Bourque playing significantly better than Lidstrom from ages 18-27???

You really need to review the numbers you were citing.

They don't reflect what you are trying to state using them at all.

In fact they say that Lidstrom runs about 1.4 r-on from 92-2008 and then he is 1.3. That is 16 years at 1.4ish and 2-3 at 1.3 so far..

Bourque has a blip of 1.7 for 2 years at the start of his career, settles in between 1.4 and 1.5 for 82 to 96 then falls off to 1.0 for 4.

That puts them right in the same range for years and effectiveness for their careers overall.

Now obviously as I said I don't say these are anything conclusive because a myriad of factors come into play with the team stats.. however, if you are relying on these numbers to back up your points - they don't.

Agree to disagree, we obviously have different criteria for using the word elite.

If being voted the best all around defenseman in the NHL isn't elite, I don't know what possible definition you could be using here, Rhiessan.
 

overpass

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Bourque was paired with Adam Foote in his "comeback year" in 2000-01 and IIRC, they played an awful lot with Joe Sakic. I realize his last few Boston years were terrible teammate-wise though.

Good point, I added that in an edit.

So Bourque, like Lidstrom, had excellent support from his teammates in his final season, and he took advantage of it with a +25 and an R-on/off of 1.61/1.39.
 

Rhiessan71

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Of course. Keith was arguably the best defenseman in the World at that time. If that's not elite, what is?

You start going this way (seriously, if his name wasn't Keith, would you still say he was not elite?) and sooner or later, you can start questioning old time hockey players. Was Shore elite when he won the Hart trophy? If yes, what's the difference between his case and Keith's? Except for names and legendary status, of course.

It's just like getting into the Baseball HoF.
Every year, there are plenty of good and very good players looking to get in but most of them don't because they are not elite.

Let me put it another way...is there any year, pre-lockout, where Keith's season wins a Norris?

Is it truly elite when you're the best of the best when the best aren't the best.
Sounds funny but seriously, are you?

Like with Jagr in the early 2000's, he was elite. Not only was he the best of the best, he was putting distance between himself and others while doing it.
Winning Art Ross' by big margins or despite missing big chucks of games.
Separation to elite status, where is it?
 

Rhiessan71

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I didn't see him mention their age 18-27 years in the post you quoted.

He's talking about longevity though. Bourque is playing FULL NHL seasons at 18, he's an elite d-man by 19. Lidstrom starts playing FULL NHL seasons by 21 and isn't elite till 27.
Lidstrom started 3 years later and looks like he's going to finish 1 year later.
Is there another way to read that?
Bourque played his 22nd season at 40, Lidstrom, his 21rst at 41.


You really need to review the numbers you were citing.

They don't reflect what you are trying to state using them at all.

In fact they say that Lidstrom runs about 1.4 r-on from 92-2008 and then he is 1.3. That is 16 years at 1.4ish and 2-3 at 1.3 so far..

Bourque has a blip of 1.7 for 2 years at the start of his career, settles in between 1.4 and 1.5 for 82 to 96 then falls off to 1.0 for 4.

That puts them right in the same range for years and effectiveness for their careers overall.

Now obviously as I said I don't say these are anything conclusive because a myriad of factors come into play with the team stats.. however, if you are relying on these numbers to back up your points - they don't.

Hold on there, it's not just about the R-on numbers here. It's about how the R-on are in relation to the R-off.
It's not about whether both players are 1.4 or 1.3, it's about how Bourque is 1.40 to his teams .97 compared to Lidstrom's 1.4 to his teams 1.2.
That's where the gap is. Look at the numbers agai nwith that in mind and my reading of them makes a hell of a lot more sense.
You're right though, my use of "marginally" better for Lidstrom's last 2 years to Bourque's last 4 years was wrong although you have to admit, those B's teams that make up 3/4's of that data were absolutely brutal.
I'd like to see just Bourque's '01 season if possible.

For the rest of it though, look at the comparison between the two of them for the previous years. Seriously, it's not even close. Bourque made the Bruins a much better team. Lidstrom only made the Wing's better and sometimes only marginally. (There I used "marginally) correctly this time ;) )

In fact, why don't we do the same thing for Lidstrom that we did for Orr when OP first posted all that data.
We looked at other players from his team to see where they ended up and quickly discovered that not only are they not close, almost every one of them had actually had R-on numbers that were lower than their R-off.

Lets look at Fedorov...hmmm..interesting, he comes back with a 1.35 - 1.09.
Damn, looks like Detroit was an even worse team when Fedorov wasn't on the ice than when Lidstrom wasn't.
Interesting no?
Granted, those numbers are Fedorov's career and I don't know how much that skews them. He had a best 10 seasons list in there, I'll see if I can find it and if Feds is on it.


If being voted the best all around defenseman in the NHL isn't elite, I don't know what possible definition you could be using here, Rhiessan.

Refer back to my baseball HoF post.
 
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overpass

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I'd like to see just Bourque's '01 season if possible.

Here's Bourque's 97-01 regular season, split up into Boston and Colorado.


Player | Start year | End year | Team | GP | EV% | $ESGF/S | $ESGA/S | R-ON | R-OFF | $ESP | $PPP | PP% | TmPP+ | SH% | TmSH+
Raymond Bourque | 1997 | 2000 | BOS | 290 | 41% | 81 | 88 | 0.92 | 0.90 | 25 | 40 | 88% | 1.10 | 61% | 1.01
Raymond Bourque | 2000 | 2001 | COL | 94 | 38% | 94 | 53 | 1.77 | 1.36 | 30 | 47 | 85% | 1.32 | 68% | 1.00

As you can see, his Colorado numbers were way better. Could be an example of how team strength affects the numbers, although Bourque had some injury issues during this time in Boston as well IIRC.
 

MadLuke

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As you can see, his Colorado numbers were way better. Could be an example of how team strength affects the numbers, although Bourque had some injury issues during this time in Boston as well IIRC.

Maybe motivation did make Bourque play a little better, maybe my memory is affected because I saw the av's almost only in the playoff, but Bourque seemed inspired and great, while is last time with the bruins is seemed to become old, but maybe it was injury issues also.
 

MadLuke

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Why should it be stipulated if we are comparing two players at their best (which is the whole point of comparing points-per-game)? Do we need to talk in length about what every player was doing outside his prime when comparing primes, or just Lidstrom?

When comparing 2 players with close prime value, sure. But anyway they are mainly trying to evaluate the length of the real elite prime of the 2 here, no ?

I think this is the defining factor for Bourque, a longuer elite prime.
 

tarheelhockey

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Maybe motivation did make Bourque play a little better, maybe my memory is affected because I saw the av's almost only in the playoff, but Bourque seemed inspired and great, while is last time with the bruins is seemed to become old, but maybe it was injury issues also.

It can't be overstated just how hot of a mess the Bruins organization became toward the end of his career. It's remarkable that he didn't just walk away.
 

Rhiessan71

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It can't be overstated just how hot of a mess the Bruins organization became toward the end of his career. It's remarkable that he didn't just walk away.

Yeah dude, even as a Habs fan, we were all laughing hard at the Bruins back then (as I'm sure they are laughing at us right now heh) but even so. To man or woman, I think every one of us still felt sad watching Bourque play for that team.
To his credit, he never lashed out or wallowed about it. One of the classiest players ever imo.


As to Feds: Nope, neither Lids or Feds qualified for the top 10 season list.
Just have to ask Overpass nicely, if he would provide Fed's numbers with the Wings. Maybe even a few other notable Wings during Lidstrom's tenure while he's at it like Coffey, Yzerman, Shanny, Murphy, Dats and Zetterberg ;)

To be fair, maybe some numbers for notable Bruin's during Bourque's time as well like Neely, Oates, Janney, Wesley, Sweeny, Galley maybe.

Only if you have the time and feel like OP.
 

canucks4ever

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I think oates should get some credit for bourque's offensive numbers in the mid 90's, it seems like bourque's offense went downhill as soon as oates was traded. Im not saying this to insult bourque or anything, but i find it odd that his best ppg was in 1994, the year of the oates-neely duo. While lidstrom's best offensive years are not necessarily the years detriot players put up thier big numbers.
 

BraveCanadian

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Here's Bourque's 97-01 regular season, split up into Boston and Colorado.


Player | Start year | End year | Team | GP | EV% | $ESGF/S | $ESGA/S | R-ON | R-OFF | $ESP | $PPP | PP% | TmPP+ | SH% | TmSH+
Raymond Bourque | 1997 | 2000 | BOS | 290 | 41% | 81 | 88 | 0.92 | 0.90 | 25 | 40 | 88% | 1.10 | 61% | 1.01
Raymond Bourque | 2000 | 2001 | COL | 94 | 38% | 94 | 53 | 1.77 | 1.36 | 30 | 47 | 85% | 1.32 | 68% | 1.00

As you can see, his Colorado numbers were way better. Could be an example of how team strength affects the numbers, although Bourque had some injury issues during this time in Boston as well IIRC.

I think it is a pretty good indication of how much these numbers are affected by things outside the individual's play.
 
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