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Denis Savard

The Panther

The Panther

Registered User
Mar 25, 2014
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Tokyo, Japan
What do you guys think of Denis Savard in general?

He seems to be a bit forgotten or overlooked today, it seems to me. There was a time when he was generally thought of as the third-best forward in pro-hockey, even if he didn't hold that up consistently.

As with other players (like Peter Stastny), it was Savard's lot to be a center at the same time as Gretzky and Lemieux, and he didn't get as much attention as a result. He had 5 100+ point seasons in 7 years, but for all that he got a lousy one 2nd-Team All-Star to show for it.

1987-88 was probably his best season. 131 points (for the 'Adjusted stats' crowd, that's apparently worth 110 today).

I don't think I've ever seen a player handle the biscuit like Savard could, especially around the net.

So, how do you rank him? How 'high' did he get, at his best? Was he ever a top-3 player in the NHL?
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I see him as a next tier behind Gretzky (and later Lemieux) as very comparable player of eighties to stars like Stastny or Hawerchuk.
Great players stucked on average teams.

The third best player in the world? Not to me, if ever was, it has to be just for very brief period of eighties.
 
He was never overly impressive, he did have some nice high-scoring years but who didn't in the 80's. Essentially fell of a cliff after he left Chicago, so basically he was average after the first 10/11 years of his career.
 
He was really good with flashy moves so he may impress some people that he was better than he actually was.
The argument probably can be made but definitely he was not the 3rd best forward of the eighties and if there was such period we should define it. Because for a very brief time many players caught lighting in the bottle and could be argued they were the 3rd best.
 
Shawked said:
He was never overly impressive, he did have some nice high-scoring years but who didn't in the 80's. Essentially fell of a cliff after he left Chicago, so basically he was average after the first 10/11 years of his career.
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I think you're being maybe a little disingenuous...? From 1981 to 1988, Savard is the third highest scoring player in the NHL (which is to say, 2nd, since Gretzky gets automatically waived) and he's only slightly beaten by Stastny. Over those seven years, he outscored Dale Hawerchuk, Jari Kurri, Paul Coffey, and Mark Messier.

Over the past seven years, the third highest scoring player is Henrik Sedin -- maybe comparable...?

Anyway, Savard is not one of the all-time greats and his longevity leaves a question mark, but his skill level in his heyday was pretty awesome.

I hated his goal celebrations, though.
 
Was he better than Messier or Kurri in eighties?
I am not sure if he was better than Stastny and I would not call Stastny 3rd best forward of 80s in a dream. And Stastny outproduced him.
 
begbeee said:
Was he better than Messier or Kurri in eighties?
I am not sure if he was better than Stastny and I would not call Stastny 3rd best forward of 80s in a dream. And Stastny outproduced him.
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Depends, he clearly didn't have the physical edge or playoff resume of Messier, but he didn't have the line mates Kurri had yet still out produced him.
 
Great centre, 1 of the best of his time, not much defensively but dynamic offensively. I actually drafted him in this year's ATD.
 
Shawked said:
He was never overly impressive, he did have some nice high-scoring years but who didn't in the 80's. Essentially fell of a cliff after he left Chicago, so basically he was average after the first 10/11 years of his career.
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Damn.. you are hard to impress.
 
The Panther said:
1987-88 was probably his best season. 131 points (for the 'Adjusted stats' crowd, that's apparently worth 110 today).
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To clarify, that's 110 in an "average" scoring season, like 1996 or 1997. It would be approximately 100 in this year's NHL, according to their formula.

Adjusted stats adjust to an all-time average, not to today.
 
Shawked said:
He was never overly impressive, he did have some nice high-scoring years but who didn't in the 80's. Essentially fell of a cliff after he left Chicago, so basically he was average after the first 10/11 years of his career.
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Never overly impressive? That's a tough critic, I'd like to hear why. From the year Savard came into the NHL (starting in 1980-'81) this is how he fared for 10 years:

Points:
Gretzky - 1842
Stastny - 1059
Kurri - 1043
Savard - 1013
Coffey - 952
Messier - 937
Hawerchuk - 929

No one else has over 900 points during this time. So how is this not impressive, or even great?

It wasn't just the explosiveness of him and the play he made, he was an elite scorer for a decade in the NHL. Routinely among the elite scorers, the cream of the crop.

In the playoffs Savard didn't disappoint either, even as late as 1995 he had a big postseason for Chicago.

It would be hard to see a prime Savard not be able to outscore Jamie Benn in 2015. Just saying.
 
to me, savard, stastny, and hawerchuk were the guys you pointed to in the 80s as hart trophy/ross guys if there was no gretzky (and later no mario).

but when yzerman came along and blew them all away at the end of the 80s, suddenly their bridesmaid finishes through that decade didn't seem so great anymore. ditto when messier emerged from gretzky's shadow.

on the other hand, any of those guys would have won the hart and art ross this season so maybe their legacies are ripe for revision.
 
vadim sharifijanov said:
to me, savard, stastny, and hawerchuk were the guys you pointed to in the 80s as hart trophy/ross guys if there was no gretzky (and later no mario).

but when yzerman came along and blew them all away at the end of the 80s, suddenly their bridesmaid finishes through that decade didn't seem so great anymore. ditto when messier emerged from gretzky's shadow.

on the other hand, any of those guys would have won the hart and art ross this season so maybe their legacies are ripe for revision.
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Not to anyone who watched these guys do we forget them. Also, I think Yzerman hit his stride a little later than those guys, plus he was younger as it was. Yzerman started peaking in 1989. By then these guys had played a lot of hockey and in all honesty while Yzerman has the best year out of any of Stastny, Savard or Hawerchuk's best the truth is I wouldn't say he "blew them out of the water" even with 1989 either. All three had very close years to Yzerman in 1989 at one point.
 
Big Phil said:
Not to anyone who watched these guys do we forget them. Also, I think Yzerman hit his stride a little later than those guys, plus he was younger as it was. Yzerman started peaking in 1989. By then these guys had played a lot of hockey and in all honesty while Yzerman has the best year out of any of Stastny, Savard or Hawerchuk's best the truth is I wouldn't say he "blew them out of the water" even with 1989 either. All three had very close years to Yzerman in 1989 at one point.
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my only real memories of the stastny, savard, hawerchuk triumvirate are later in their careers. caught a bit of late-prime savard in the '90 playoffs against edmonton, stastny i barely remember at all except as a late career journeyman, and hawerchuk mostly in buffalo where he was still very good but definitely off-peak.

so i'm curious, for those who watched through the 80s: would you say that the best of stastny, savard, and hawerchuk, when they each peaked as basically gretzky's art ross runner-up (discounting coffey/kurri) and contended for the hart trophy, was in the echelon as 65 goal, 155 point yzerman?

because to me, looking at it retrospectively in the early 90s, it seemed like yzerman just completely raised the bar for what the "best mortal center" could be during the gretzky/mario era. i mean that on the level of offensive production and magic, not in the all-round beast sense of trottier in the early 80s, or messier a little later.

and another question to contextualize savard and his peers: i know you'd never say they were on the same level as MVP guys like trottier or messier, but to compare them to the star centers of the early 90s, would you say they were on adam oates' level? (which is, to me, also the same level as peak lafontaine and gilmour, but stretched over a more consistent and longer prime.)

(and maybe also: comparable to dionne's peak? dionne did it for much longer, but...)
 
vadim sharifijanov said:
because to me, looking at it retrospectively in the early 90s, it seemed like yzerman just completely raised the bar for what the "best mortal center" could be during the gretzky/mario era. i mean that on the level of offensive production and magic, not in the all-round beast sense of trottier in the early 80s, or messier a little later.
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that's exactly the way I saw it.
 
The Panther said:
Just to nitpick a little, I would argue the fall of 1987. In 1987-88, Stevie was 2nd in goals-per-game and 4th in points-per-game. (He actually fell one place -- to 3rd -- in goals per game in his big 1988-89 season.)
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Right. I was just referring to his best season. All three of Hawerchuk, Savard and Stastny had a season better than Yzerman in 1988 but not 1989. However I thought while Yzerman's was the best of the bunch in 1989, it isn't by a country mile either.

vadim sharifijanov said:
my only real memories of the stastny, savard, hawerchuk triumvirate are later in their careers. caught a bit of late-prime savard in the '90 playoffs against edmonton, stastny i barely remember at all except as a late career journeyman, and hawerchuk mostly in buffalo where he was still very good but definitely off-peak.

so i'm curious, for those who watched through the 80s: would you say that the best of stastny, savard, and hawerchuk, when they each peaked as basically gretzky's art ross runner-up (discounting coffey/kurri) and contended for the hart trophy, was in the echelon as 65 goal, 155 point yzerman?

because to me, looking at it retrospectively in the early 90s, it seemed like yzerman just completely raised the bar for what the "best mortal center" could be during the gretzky/mario era. i mean that on the level of offensive production and magic, not in the all-round beast sense of trottier in the early 80s, or messier a little later.

and another question to contextualize savard and his peers: i know you'd never say they were on the same level as MVP guys like trottier or messier, but to compare them to the star centers of the early 90s, would you say they were on adam oates' level? (which is, to me, also the same level as peak lafontaine and gilmour, but stretched over a more consistent and longer prime.)

(and maybe also: comparable to dionne's peak? dionne did it for much longer, but...)
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Yzerman, and some will also say Messier, raised the bar as high as the centers could go outside of Gretzky/Mario. Yzerman's 1989 season was one for the ages, there is no doubt, and he kept up a torrid pace for a while too (although a notch down from 1989). The thing is, Yzerman's prime was different than the trio of Savard, Hawerchuk and Stastny. All are older and peaked earlier. If I were just to take a guess this is how I would rank their best seasons:

Messier 1990
Yzerman 1989
Hawerchuk 1985
Stastny 1982
Savard 1988

With the first two very close to each other and the last three very close as well. A bit of a gap between Yzerman and Hawerchuk at their best, but not otherworldly by any means.
 
Big Phil said:
Never overly impressive? That's a tough critic, I'd like to hear why. From the year Savard came into the NHL (starting in 1980-'81) this is how he fared for 10 years:

Points:
Gretzky - 1842
Stastny - 1059
Kurri - 1043
Savard - 1013
Coffey - 952
Messier - 937
Hawerchuk - 929
Click to expand...

Are you cheating Hawerchuk out of points there? He didn't start 80/81. Unless I miscounted, his 10 year span is 1018.
 
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