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Canada All Time Team

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Eye of Ra

Eye of Ra

Grandmaster General of the International boards
Nov 15, 2008
17,957
4,459
Malmö, Sweden
Spinning around with this theme..

There been several threads like this before..but now its 2025.

Any changes? Could any active players outside of Crosby and McDavid take a spot? Mackinnon? Makar?

Bobby - Le gross Bill - Howe
Lemieux - Gretzky - Yzerman
McDavid - Crosby - Sakic
Messier - Lindros - Bossy

Potvin - Orr
Bourque - Pronger
Coffey - MacInnis

Roy
Brodeur

Probably forgot someone.
 
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All Canadians, even pre 72

Hull- Gretzky - Howe
McDavid - Lemieux- Morenz
Crosby- Beliveau - Richard
Messier- Nighbor - Clarke
Lafleur, Cook

First line is easy, but trying to balance out 2 and 3. 4th line is a wall.

Orr - Harvey
Bourque - Shore
Potvin - Kelly
Robinson, Clancy

Canada's best offensive defenseman paired with our best defensive defenseman. Others are a bit more of a balance.

Roy
Plante
Sawchuk
 
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Eye of Ra said:
Spinning around with this theme..

There been several threads like this before..but now its 2025.

Any changes? Could any active players outside of Crosby and McDavid take a spot? Mackinnon? Makar?

Bobby - Le gross Bill - Howe
Lemieux - Gretzky - Yzerman
McDavid - Crosby - Sakic
Messier - Lindros - Bossy

Potvin - Orr
Bourque - Pronger
Coffey - MacInnis

Roy
Brodeur

Probably forgot someone.
Click to expand...

Since it's been a point of question in the USA thread, can you clarify (here and there) whether you're referring to "people who played internationally for Team Canada" or just "Canadians who play hockey"?

(And if it's the former, is their full resume in play or just international games?)
 
Messier & Lemieux played some LW IRL, which reduces the number of tough decisions....

Messier-Gretzky-G. Howe
Lemieux-Beliveau-M. Richard
Bo. Hull-Crosby-Bi. Cook
Lindsay-Morenz-Bossy

Harvey-Orr
Potvin-Bourque
Kelly-Shore

Roy
Plante

Feels wrong leaving off McDavid (want more time in the developing fluid), Nighbor, & Clarke. Also doesn't sit well to leave off L. Robinson.

This is much more fun if you do it by provinces...
 
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Lemieux-Gretzky-Howe
Hull-Béliveau-M.Richard
Messier-Crosby-Lafleur
Lindsay-H.Richard-Cook

Robinson-Orr
Bourque-Harvey
Potvin-Shore

Roy
Plante

Tried to limit centers on the wing, Lemieux and Mess are OK.

Henri Richard makes the team because he was the biggest gamer and because I want a right-handed center beyond Lemieux. Yzerman was the only other choice and I prefer Henri as a 4th liner. I guess Newsy Lalonde would be another one but I wanted better defense.
 
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jigglysquishy said:
All Canadians, even pre 72

Hull- Gretzky - Howe
McDavid - Lemieux- Morenz
Crosby- Beliveau - Richard
Messier- Nighbor - Clarke
Lafleur, Cook

First line is easy, but trying to balance out 2 and 3. 4th line is a wall.

Orr - Harvey
Bourque - Shore
Potvin - Kelly
Robinson, Clancy

Canada's best offensive defenseman paired with our best defensive defenseman. Others are a bit more of a balance.

Roy
Plante
Sawchuk
Click to expand...
Come on. There has to be a Zamuner or Odelein there somewhere. This is too pristine.
 
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Maybe one day roster without McDavid or Makar will look strange, but I am not sure why, the BenchBrawl roster is the one that made me the most at peace, nothing bad could happen.

I think it would be just because of how the first 2 line started.
 
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MadLuke said:
Maybe one day roster without McDavid or Makar will look strange, but I am not sure why, the BenchBrawl roster is the one that made me the most at peace, nothing bad could happen.

I think it would be just because of how the first 2 line started.
Click to expand...
I think that both Makar and McDavid will end up on any list and there is a very good argument to have them on as of now but it is what it is.

Makar had a killer game out there yesterday and both teams were evenly matched was great to watch.
 
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It's very unlikely players like Morenz, Nighbor, Clancy, and Cook were good enough to play on an all-time Team Canada. We're getting into fantasy here.

Robinson and Lafleur are also very questionable. Neither were very good on Team Canada when they played.

Lindsay wouldn't even be invited to tryouts.

Kariya - Lemieux - Howe would be a good line. A good mixture of skills.

Beliveau and Howe played really well together too.
 
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Prime MacKinnon bring so much energy, speed, it is hard to keep all that package at home, since 2020 the guy scored at a 48 goals-110 pts pace per 82 games in the playoff and 42 goals-122 pts in the regular season.

If we use what they did with team Canada, Bossy/Esposito/Perrault/Toews/Sakic/long list > Lafleur I imagine. It is true that it could hurt him a little bit
 
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I personally think, in these fantasy hockey teams, the ideal is about 3 lines of skill and 1 line of checkers.

Some of this depends on officiating. If the setting were the late-80s, when it was "Australian rules" hockey and blind-eye reffing, having 3 lines of skill with little grit might lose, because the other teams would just run the skill guys all night, with impunity.

But in today's environment, I think 3 lines of skill and 1 checking is what you want. (Not to say "skill" can't be physical, like Lindros or Messier.)
 
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Are we picking based on who are actually the best players or who were the best in their era?

Because that's two very different teams.

There's only two forwards on McDavid's level IMO, Gretzky and Lemieux, the end. Guys like MacKinnon and Makar would make it easily too if you're just talking like who is actually the best at hockey. So would Pronger.

Like no offense to guys like Morenz and so on but they're not on the level with a player like MacKinnon, probably not even Lindros. Even Gordie Howe ... like do I literally think he's one of the 5 best Canadian hockey players ever in ability? No I don't. Guys like that built the foundation for the game, but the game has moved past those eras significantly.
 
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jigglysquishy said:
Hull- Gretzky - Howe
McDavid - Lemieux- Morenz
Crosby- Beliveau - Richard
Messier- Nighbor - Clarke
Lafleur, Cook
Click to expand...
Good line-up here, but I think I'd have to include prime Eric Lindros. Matched Mario Lemieux in scoring in 1996-97, better ES results than almost any forward during his prime, won a scoring title, led playoffs in scoring, top-5 all-time in PPG up to age 26 or whatever.

I think I'd have him in there over Clarke, and maybe (though it pains me to say it) Richard. Probably over Lafleur and Cook, too.
 
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Bear of Bad News said:
Since it's been a point of question in the USA thread, can you clarify (here and there) whether you're referring to "people who played internationally for Team Canada" or just "Canadians who play hockey"?

(And if it's the former, is their full resume in play or just international games?)
Click to expand...
Canadians who play hockey and full resume. But if anyone wanna do it different they are welcome. Same in the USA thread and the upcoming threads.
 
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Soundwave said:
Like no offense to guys like Morenz and so on but they're not on the level with a player like MacKinnon, probably not even Lindros. Even Gordie Howe ... like do I literally think he's one of the 5 best Canadian hockey players ever in ability? No I don't.
Click to expand...
Depends on how you look at it. I think (this being the History board, where recency-bias is understandably frowned upon) that we tend to rank players based on how they did in their own eras (which is how we should rank players, in my opinion).

I guess the question is: Is there any reason why the most highly skilled / physically dominant player in, say, 1952 (i.e., Howe) would not be similarly skilled / dominant today, if he were raised in the environment of today? To me it's just a "goldfish bowl" situation -- like, if you change the environment, the goldfish changes accordingly.

There's also this:
gettyimages-539285922-612x612.jpg

If nothing else, the photo proves that a guy who played in the 1940s could (way, way, way past his prime) still compete at the NHL level against a guy who retired just four years before Crosby played.
 
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Soundwave said:
There's only two forwards on McDavid's level IMO, Gretzky and Lemieux, the end. Guys like MacKinnon and Makar would make it easily too if you're just talking like who is actually the best at hockey. So would Pronger.

Like no offense to guys like Morenz and so on but they're not on the level with a player like MacKinnon, probably not even Lindros. Even Gordie Howe ... like do I literally think he's one of the 5 best Canadian hockey players ever in ability? No I don't. Guys like that built the foundation for the game, but the game has moved past those eras significantly.
Click to expand...

I am sure they are blushing at such high praise.
 
I suppose Crosby makes a guy like Trottier redundant, but if you want a great traditional third line centre for match-up purposes, Bobby Clarke may be a better option. He'd be better at neutralizing opposing centres.

I'd go with Mess - Clarke - Crosby as a third line that would be absolute hell to play against (have fun scoring goals or possessing the puck much against that line).

I don't know how you leave McDavid out of the top six. Obviously Gretzky, Lemieux and Howe are locks. I'd definitely have Beliveau in there. After that, how do you justify leaving McDavid out?

Forwards:

Hull - Gretzky - Howe
McDavid - Beliveau - Lemieux
Messier - Clarke - Crosby
Sakic - Lindros - Richard

Extras: Yzerman, Lafleur, Bossy
 
Team CANADA - All time:

Sawchuk. Plante. Roy

Orr. Shore. Harvey. Bourque.
Potvin. Kelly

M Lemieux. Gretzky. Bossy.
M Richard. Hull. Beliveau. G Howe.
Lafleur. Morenz. Conacher.
McDavid. Crosby
 
Hmm...

Lemieux - Gretzky - Howe
Hull - Beliveau - Cook
Messier - McDavid - Bossy
Bergeron - Crosby - MacKinnon

Pronger - Orr
Bourque - Harvey
Potvin - Shore

Roy

Some tough names to leave off. Bossy over Richard due to overpass's work on Bossy's ice time leaving me more convinced of him as a legit depth scorer than the Rocket. Bergeron over someone like Nighbor because Nighbor needs to be playing in the middle to fully utilize his hook and poke check, but he's not beating out any of my centres here for a spot. I agree with the thought that you can't leave off MacKinnon's speed. And you just have to stack the top line; no need to spread the wealth when there's too much wealth to spend.
 
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There's a lot of really fun line combinations you can throw out.

Gretzky-Richard. Gretzky's passing from behind the net paired with Richard's knack for the net.

Harvey outlet passing to Bobby Hull.

The speed, skill, and stickhandling of Lemieux-Beliveau-McDavid

You can even throw out Messier-Lindros-Howe with Shore-Pronger on the blue line. Try playing against that line.
 
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