I am Bettman
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Could you pick a less relevant stat?
Gretzky GWG/Game : .061
Mcdavid GWG/Game : .106
Your cherry picked stat of game winning goals makes Mcdavid seem even better haha.
Connor McDavid will go down as the 2nd best player of all-time
- Thread starter HFpapi
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Gretzky GWG/Game : .061
Mcdavid GWG/Game : .106
Your cherry picked stat of game winning goals makes Mcdavid seem even better haha.
If Wayne Gretzky never won a cup, he would statistically still be the best player to ever play the game.
Why do you keep ignoring the Osgood/Lundqvist question? Is it because you realize your entire argument falls apart?
And yes, anyone who follows hockey knows who a recent HoF inductee is. Sure of a hell lot more than a random average player who’s won a cup
80s-mid-90s is IMO the most entertaining era of hockey, I loved it ... that said taking off the nostalgia glasses ... the goalies and defense are a joke. There's no defensive strategy at all other than pond hockey. Look at these highlights and really ask yourself what the d-men and goalies are thinking.
First of all, if any goalie was allowing unscreened goals in clean from 15+ feet out, a goalie would get roasted by the media for that today. This isn't even modern ECHL quality goaltending in many instances and how many points would McDavid score if you put him in the ECHL even with a wood stick and crappy skates?
Look at the game 7 goal that decides this epic series:
C'mon. McDavid would score 2-3 ppg easy against this level of garbage D and tiny goaltending, the whole "well guys could elbow you back then!" as if that would stop McDavid is just laughable. Tikkanen could've snuck 5 pucks past Vernon's left pad there.
Also there's like zero defense all through the neutral zone, lol, they just let players waltz up there all they wanted all day long, you give McDavid that kind of space to wind up and build speed ... forget it. You're toast.
You put McDavid in the above game and c'mon ... anyone who thinks he isn't leaving the rink with like 3-5 points is lying to themselves. And these guys are two of the better goalies of the time, the D is uh ... yeah.
First of all, if any goalie was allowing unscreened goals in clean from 15+ feet out, a goalie would get roasted by the media for that today. This isn't even modern ECHL quality goaltending in many instances and how many points would McDavid score if you put him in the ECHL even with a wood stick and crappy skates?
Look at the game 7 goal that decides this epic series:
C'mon. McDavid would score 2-3 ppg easy against this level of garbage D and tiny goaltending, the whole "well guys could elbow you back then!" as if that would stop McDavid is just laughable. Tikkanen could've snuck 5 pucks past Vernon's left pad there.
Also there's like zero defense all through the neutral zone, lol, they just let players waltz up there all they wanted all day long, you give McDavid that kind of space to wind up and build speed ... forget it. You're toast.
You put McDavid in the above game and c'mon ... anyone who thinks he isn't leaving the rink with like 3-5 points is lying to themselves. And these guys are two of the better goalies of the time, the D is uh ... yeah.
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Arthur Morgan
Registered User
well let me know when McDavid is still number 1 point wise when you take away all of his goals.
Not true. Nobody thinks Trout and Ohtani are not the best players of this generation. If someone would argue that an inferior player was "greater" than them because they won a championship they would get laughed at.
I can just picture how dumb it would look
"Altuve has 2 championships, he is a winner" "Trout only cares about personal stats"
McDavid would light goalies like this up like a Christmas tree, this looks like a child in net by today's standards. In the 80s this was just normal, every second night type of thing, teams playing guys who are like 5 foot 8 in net, lol.
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This is a ridiculous argument . If those players played today, they would as fit as today’s players. And you have no data to comment on their fitness when they actually played. By your argument, when someone plays would trump everything else. That means future less, talented players would get the nod just because of when they play. Thats nonsense.
Troubadour
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Perhaps, or very likely.
Not necessarily. Fedorov, Sakic, Jagr -- most of Forberg's superstar contemporaries did better, or even much better. Anyway, I grew up a Forsberg fan, and for good reason -- he was magnificent. All I meant to do was throw a damp blanket over what I perceived as glorification.
HFpapi
Registered User
McDavid is, in a vacuum, the most gifted and skilled hockey player to ever live. 99 & 66 are better than him in relative terms. Straight up teleport every player to ever live into 2024 in their prime and McDavid is the best.
When considering era and peers, 66 & 99 are better.
I'm not sure why people want to go down this road of "if xxx played today."
Watch YouTube clips of hockey in the 80's and then watch an NHL game from today right after and get back to me.
Beukeboom
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If you teleported Napoleon into 2024 and let him command an army/navy of carriers, figther jets and drones, against another contemporary army led by some crappy general, Napoleon would lose. If you'd transfer his talent into a person born today, and raised him in our time, it's another story.
It's baffling to me people still use the "if you teleport player born in 1997 to the 80's and let him compete against players born in the50's and 60 bah bah bah"
You do understand McDavid developed his skills and tactics by building upon the acheivements of the previous generations? In fact he perfected his toolset based off what's important now. Speed was not as much of a factor in the 80's and 90's, since you could slash, hold, climb and mount any player. Gretzky in turn, molded his style based on what was effective back then.
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Hockey Outsider
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Just accept that you're smarter than Isaac Newton (because you know how use a calculator and are familiar with Einstein's theory of relativity).
HFpapi
Registered User
Reading comprehension on these boards at an all-time low. I agree with you. We are making the same point. It's not fair to players of the past to compare their skills straight up in a vacuum to current ones. That's why I was confused why the guy was making that point in Mario's favor "if Mario played today..."
McDavid has shooting, skating, agility, and stick handling skills that players of the past could only dream of. We don't know for absolute certain if we gave Wayne and Mario the same training and equipment that they'd be able to surpass Connor in that respect, it's pure theory, so let's leave that out and also leave out the "McDavid would literally die if he played in the 80's with the clutching and grabbing and open ice hitting" bs.
Beukeboom
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Your conclusion of your own analysis is not particularly correct in that case.
As I added to my previous post: McDavid developed his skills and tactics by building upon the acheivements of the previous generations. In fact he perfected his toolset based off what's important now. Speed was not as much of a factor in the 80's and 90's, since you could slash, hold, climb and mount any player. Gretzky in turn, molded his style based on what was effective back then.
You're making the mistake of assuming McDavid would have the same insane speed and dekes had he been born 1960. It is obviously not possible due to the crappy skates and sticks they had, but it's also hard to know what sort of qualities he'd spend more time developing back then. It's also unlikely he'd practice as hard as he has done his whole life in this era etc. ALL of which would have made his "highlight reels" look less impressive to the modern eye.
And to the person posting all the youtube videos from the early 90's. I'm pretty sure twenty years from now (maybe earlier) these boards will see posters born 2022 posting videos of Ovechkins all goals and say "look how easy it was back then, no defense, they just leave him alone, he'd be in the AHL if he played now"
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Arthur Morgan
Registered User
Why is Brady considered the best?
except that if McDavid played back in those days he wouldnt be the player he is today back then.
Lafleurs Guy
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No.
But he’s incredible and might be 5th. Considering the competition that’s a huge compliment.
But he’s incredible and might be 5th. Considering the competition that’s a huge compliment.
And the reason why Gretzky is the greatest all time is because he was 20 years ahead of the meta.
All these fantasy scenarios we come up with "What if so and so played in the 80s", well Wayne was that.
He had a 2000's skillset and brain playing in the 80s.
All these fantasy scenarios we come up with "What if so and so played in the 80s", well Wayne was that.
He had a 2000's skillset and brain playing in the 80s.
Brady is by far the weakest "goat" of the big 4 sports, which, IMO is because his goat status is tied to him winning and him not actually being the best player. The other goats (Jordan, Gretzky, Ruth), all have one thing in common: they have the best individual stats. Brady does have the counting stats and a few elite seasons, but I doubt many agree that he was the most skilled QB ever.
Either way, you can hardly compare sports like the NBA or NFL to the NHL. QBs control half the game, and superstars in the NBA are on the court for 85% of the game in the playoffs. Baseball is a better comparison to hockey, where you need a full team to win.
dirtydanglez
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Hockey Outsider
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To add some perspective to this (as a History forum regular - not that I presume to speak for everyone there):
When you look at the number of Stanley Cups that Gordie Howe won, relative to the length of his career, the size of the league, and the strength of his team, it's pretty much in line with what we'd expect. No worse, but no better. (The same is true, more or less, with Bobby Orr and Mario Lemieux).
But nobody should be counting the number of Stanley Cups a player wins. That's not a meaningful way to evaluate a career. A player has some degree of influence over the number of championships their team wins, but it's ultimately beyond the control of any one man. That's why nobody seriously thinks that Chris Kunitz > Sidney Crosby, or that Larry Murphy is the best player of the 1990's, or that Henri Richard is the greatest player of all-time.
What counts is: how well did the player perform in the postseason? That's the only thing he has control over. Obviously, there tends to be a correlation between how an all-time great player performs, and how his team does. But a player who drags a weak team to the Stanley Cup finals (or even the conference finals), only to be betrayed by bad goaltending or a bunch of injuries, should be celebrated.
In the case of Gordie Howe - what seems to carry a lot of weight on HOH is Howe's performance in many of the years where he didn't win the Stanley Cup. Take 1961 as an example. Detroit had a losing record, and, although they qualified for the playoffs, they were closer to dead last, than they were to 2nd place. In the spring, Howe dragged the team to game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals (he scored 1.36 PPG - an extraordinary rate for the low-scoring 1960's). He helped upset the Toronto Maple Leafs (who finished 24 points higher in the standings - and they'd go on to win three straight Cups after this season). Howe scored/assisted on some of the team's biggest goals and (as we already know) he was a physical force and a very good two-way player. Howe led the Red Wings by a 6 point margin (big for only two rounds). Ultimately the team lost to the much stronger Chicago Blackhawks (featuring four high-end Hall of Fame players, all at their peaks), but it's hard to imagine what else Howe realistically could have done. I don't care that Howe won four Cups; I care that he had a bunch of very strong playoff runs including probably the best performance of the entire Original Six era (1955).
To bring this back to Connor McDavid - I'll go on the record and say that I don't care how many Stanley Cups he wins. What I care about is the level of performance. 2017 and 2021 were underwhelming - but he was playing at a historically great level in 2022 and 2023. If he spends the next decade scoring 1.6+ PPG in the spring, and he's let down by his teammates, that shouldn't be held against him. (People will say that "he didn't do enough to win" - but that's a circular argument, a platitude with no substance behind it). Unless he was doing something to sabotage his team (ie being on the ice for so many goals against that it negates his historic production), we shouldn't hold the decisions of McDavid's coach and GM against him.
Bear of Bad News
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Publicly posting as a History regular that @Hockey Outsider speaks for me on any issues, past, present, or future.
I’m just saying your logic is flawed.
If you think that number of Stanley cups won is the metric to define how good a player is, then I personally think your argument has little merit.
Really how so?
It clearly shows Mario with a significant advantage but I guess one can always bash adjusted stats because they don't line up with a preconceived POV?
North Cole
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The mythos of a player is never appreciated while watching it unfold. Time accentuates most things...the same way good and bad become better or worse, great becomes epic, legendary becomes timeless.
Sadly, you just become used to what's happening in real time because you process it without comparison. Sure, you compare McDavid to his peers, but that just makes him mortal. McDavid compared to Drai, Kuch, Matthews. Great players no doubt but not the same.
When you try to reach back into older eras and against greater heights, it becomes way more difficult. McDavid compared to the shooting stars of older eras is a different story. Lemieux was a titan that still dominated going in and out of the hospital with an illness that kills most of us. Gretzky was a genius watching players in the glass or going somewhere and having the puck magically come to him 4 seconds later like telepathy. Howe was the ageless wonder that laid the foundation of the superstar player and broke all the rules of what anyone thought was possible in terms of longevity in sport. Orr was a transcendent 2 way player that destroyed everyone in every single part of the ice. Not to mention two of these guys burned incredibly bright in a limited career leaving people questioning what else they could have done.
It's not really about the cups, people say it is, but it's more about all the superlatives that come along with these players. No player viewed presently will compete with them because as much as we talk about McDavid being superhuman, we can still see him do all of these things, so it's not as unrealistic as we make it sound. We can still rationalize it. How many highlights of the big 4 are lost to time in someone's attic on a Rotten VHS tape you can't ever watch again? It's all word of mouth now, like the time before the Prose Edda.
Recommend the whole video (which NFL has blocked for site playback) but the salient part is 3:36:
"For me a lot of people want to talk about other actors. Nobody wants to talk to Jim Brown about other football players."
Same is true for the big 4.
Sadly, you just become used to what's happening in real time because you process it without comparison. Sure, you compare McDavid to his peers, but that just makes him mortal. McDavid compared to Drai, Kuch, Matthews. Great players no doubt but not the same.
When you try to reach back into older eras and against greater heights, it becomes way more difficult. McDavid compared to the shooting stars of older eras is a different story. Lemieux was a titan that still dominated going in and out of the hospital with an illness that kills most of us. Gretzky was a genius watching players in the glass or going somewhere and having the puck magically come to him 4 seconds later like telepathy. Howe was the ageless wonder that laid the foundation of the superstar player and broke all the rules of what anyone thought was possible in terms of longevity in sport. Orr was a transcendent 2 way player that destroyed everyone in every single part of the ice. Not to mention two of these guys burned incredibly bright in a limited career leaving people questioning what else they could have done.
It's not really about the cups, people say it is, but it's more about all the superlatives that come along with these players. No player viewed presently will compete with them because as much as we talk about McDavid being superhuman, we can still see him do all of these things, so it's not as unrealistic as we make it sound. We can still rationalize it. How many highlights of the big 4 are lost to time in someone's attic on a Rotten VHS tape you can't ever watch again? It's all word of mouth now, like the time before the Prose Edda.
Recommend the whole video (which NFL has blocked for site playback) but the salient part is 3:36:
"For me a lot of people want to talk about other actors. Nobody wants to talk to Jim Brown about other football players."
Same is true for the big 4.
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KeithIsActuallyBad
You thrust your pelvis, huh!
Of course it matters. His career also isn’t over yet. Crazy that a generational player can’t fix a dysfunctional franchise, huh?
