Eric Zweig: You've Gotta Have Hart ... But Come O-n-n-n Teeder!

[Eric Zweig]

Well, let’s face it. It ain’t the Stanley Cup. Then again, the Leafs have won the Stanley Cup twice in my lifetime. (I don’t remember them. I was six months old in 1964 and 3 1/2 years old in 1967.) But I wasn’t even born the last time a Toronto player was named the NHL’s Most Valuable Player. Before last night, it had only happened twice in team history.

I don’t understand where the stars of the current team go once the playoffs start. Better analysts than I am have (and will continue) to discuss that. But Auston Matthews has won the Hart Trophy after a team record-breaking 60-goal season. You can’t take that away from him. And even if you want to argue that Connor McDavid is still the better player, the voting wasn’t all that close.

I took this picture with my phone off the TV during last night’s NHL Awards.​

What do sportswriters know?

Well, Matthews also won the Ted Lindsay Award, and that’s given to the most outstanding player as voted on by his fellow players. If they think he deserves it, who are we to say he doesn’t?


The first Leafs player to win the Hart as MVP was Babe Pratt in 1944. The second — and last, until last night — was Teeder Kennedy in 1955.

The complete vote for the 2021-22 NHL MVP.​

Ted Kennedy was just a 17-year-old kid when the Leafs acquired him in the spring of 1943. With so many players serving in the military during Word War II, the NHL was populated mainly with young kids and worn-out veterans.

Kennedy was never the most skilled player. He wasn’t very fast. He wasn’t a big scorer. But he was a good playmaker. Most importantly, he was a leader who knew how to win. He starred during the most successful era in team history, winning the Stanley Cup in 1945, 1947, 1948, 1949 and 1951. He was named captain of the team before the 1948-49 season.

It’s often said that the Leafs used this red lettering only during the 1947-48 season …
But Teeder Kennedy wasn’t named the team captain until the following year.​

Though he was still just 28 at the time, Teeder Kennedy had completed 11 seasons in the NHL by the end of 1953–54. He had planned to retire, but was convinced to come back for another year. Kennedy would score just 10 goals in 1954-55, but his 42 assists ranked third in the NHL and his leadership was a key reason why the Maple Leafs even made the playoffs.

Unlike the current team, the Leafs of Kennedy’s era won the Stanley Cup plenty of times, but didn’t win a lot of individual honours. “As coach Hap Day put it so well,” team owner Conn Smythe told reporters after the team’s Stanley Cup win in 1948, “we may not have the all-stars on our team, but we have the world champions.”

So it was somewhat ironic that Kennedy won the Hart Trophy in a year the Leafs struggled just to make the playoffs. (They were swept by the Detroit Red Wings, who went on to beat the Montreal Canadiens in seven games for the Stanley Cup.) But, when the results of the voting for the 1954-55 MVP award were announced, Kennedy easily out-polled teammate Harry Lumley as well as Maurice Richard, Jean Beliveau, and Doug Harvey of the Montreal Canadiens. Gordie Howe and Red Kelly of the Stanley Cup champions were well back in the voting.

Still, the general censuses was that it was about time that Teeder Kennedy was finally recognized for his talents. Everyone seemed to agree, except perhaps for the Leafs captain himself. “It comes as quite a thrill, one of the biggest I’ve had in hockey,” said Kennedy. “But I believe it should have been Harry Lumley. Leafs would have been down the drain without him. And I’m not just being modest.”

Not only did Auston Matthews win the Hart Trophy last night, he and teammate Mitch Marner were both named to the First All-Star Team. The last time two Leafs made the First Team it was Frank Mahovlich and Carl Brewer in 1963!​

“Kennedy deserves the Hart,” said the Leafs goalie. “I hate to think of us without him. He was the guy that made our club tick.”

Despite winning the Hart, Kennedy made good on his plans to retire … though he did return to the team again during the 1956-57 season to help out when the club was hit with a rash of injuries. After that, he retired for keeps.

Sixty years later, in 2017, Teeder Kennedy was ranked third all-time — behind Dave Keon and Syl Apps — when the Toronto Maple Leafs celebrated their centennial season by naming their top 100 players. Auston Matthews undoubtedly has more sheer talent than any of those three. He’s probably already among the greatest players in Toronto’s history. But if he’s ever truly going to be the best, he’s going to have to lead the Leafs to the Stanley Cup … and pretty darn soon!


[For the original post and lots of other information, please visit ericzweig.com.]

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[sr edler]

@Eric Zweig Who in today's league would you say is closest to Ted Kennedy either style wise or impact wise?

 

[Eric Zweig]

@Eric Zweig Who in today's league would you say is closest to Ted Kennedy either style wise or impact wise?

Ha! Interesting question. Here's who the web site Hockey-Reference.com compares him to:

But that's just got to be solely statistical based. I'm not sure if that's the best way to go.

Kennedy was a decent scorer, but never wracked up big points. I don't honestly know how effective a defensive player he was, but I do know that Hap Day demanded his forwards be defensively responsible. So, I'm sure Kennedy was. Therefore, the best comparables are probably Selke Trophy winners. At a high end, let's say Jonathan Toews. A little lower, maybe Anze Kopitar, or, maybe Ryan O'Reilly.

Admittedly, I haven't given this a ton of thought.

What do you think?

 

[sr edler]

Ha! Interesting question. Here's who the web site Hockey-Reference.com compares him to:

View attachment 561687

But that's just got to be solely statistical based. I'm not sure if that's the best way to go.

Kennedy was a decent scorer, but never wracked up big points. I don't honestly know how effective a defensive player he was, but I do know that Hap Day demanded his forwards be defensively responsible. So, I'm sure Kennedy was. Therefore, the best comparables are probably Selke Trophy winners. At a high end, let's say Jonathan Toews. A little lower, maybe Anze Kopitar, or, maybe Ryan O'Reilly.

Admittedly, I haven't given this a ton of thought.

What do you think?

Patric Hörnqvist, haha.

I still like Koivu there a little bit though, not necessarily regarding overall impact, but he was a heart and soul-ish smallish C and captain who raised his game in the playoffs and internationally. I don't think Koivu was necessarily renowned defensively though.

Other than that I haven't really thought much about it. But yeah, perhaps Toews is a good one.

 

[MS]

Hart Trophy voting went through a weird period in the early 1950s with a bunch of bizarre selections.

Kennedy in 1955 and Milt Schmidt in 1951 won as veteran retiring stars basically being given a lifetime achievement award.

Chuck Rayner in 1950 and Al Rollins in 1954 won for enduring a shooting gallery and performing well as the starting goalie on a bad team.

None of these players were anywhere near the best/most valuable players in the NHL. Voting then normalized in 1956 and the winners are generally reasonable and defendable from that point onward.

Hell, even in 1953 when Gordie Howe had the single greatest season of any player in the O6 era he only got 50% of the first place votes for the Hart.

 

[Eric Zweig]

Hart Trophy voting went through a weird period in the early 1950s with a bunch of bizarre selections.

Kennedy in 1955 and Milt Schmidt in 1951 won as veteran retiring stars basically being given a lifetime achievement award.

Chuck Rayner in 1950 and Al Rollins in 1954 won for enduring a shooting gallery and performing well as the starting goalie on a bad team.

None of these players were anywhere near the best/most valuable players in the NHL. Voting then normalized in 1956 and the winners are generally reasonable and defendable from that point onward.

Hell, even in 1953 when Gordie Howe had the single greatest season of any player in the O6 era he only got 50% of the first place votes for the Hart.

Yes, there are definitely some oddball selections in that time period. It's like, for a few years, the voters took the "Most Valuable To His Team part very seriously. (None of those guys were the best player in the league in those seasons ... but they were extremely valuable to their teams.)

 

[MS]

Yes, there are definitely some oddball selections in that time period. It's like, for a few years, the voters took the "Most Valuable To His Team part very seriously. (None of those guys were the best player in the league in those seasons ... but they were extremely valuable to their teams.)

Exactly.

Most years before and after, the award has been probably 90% 'Outstanding Player' with a 10% 'value to team' factoring in, give or take.

But for a 5 year stretch in the 1950s, voters seemed to take the award definition exactly literally. And it probably cost Gordie Howe two Harts.

 

[Vilica]

@Eric Zweig Who in today's league would you say is closest to Ted Kennedy either style wise or impact wise?

I've done a ton of statistical analysis of Ted Kennedy, and the most similar current player to him, who put up nearly identical numbers to him on teams that scored nearly identical amount of goals, is Ryan O'Reilly. There's a lot of similarities between them, as both are noted for defensive prowess and not the best offensively. Both also played important roles on Stanley Cup winning teams. The difference between them is that Kennedy played in a 6 team league, and O'Reilly in a 30-32 team league. Kennedy played just as what we think of as being the modern NHL was starting, so there was no real reference point for his scoring to be seen as low for one of the best centers in the league. However, given we now have over 70 years of further seasonal stats, a 4-5 year span where Ryan O'Reilly is the 2nd-3rd best center in the league and people would be asking where all the 1Cs have gone.

 

[rmartin65]

Kennedy was a decent scorer, but never wracked up big points. I don't honestly know how effective a defensive player he was, but I do know that Hap Day demanded his forwards be defensively responsible. So, I'm sure Kennedy was. Therefore, the best comparables are probably Selke Trophy winners. At a high end, let's say Jonathan Toews. A little lower, maybe Anze Kopitar, or, maybe Ryan O'Reilly.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but you think Toews is a high-end Kennedy? With all due respect, I think you need to look into Kennedy a bit more.

I'd also argue that Kopitar is superior to Toews (though still well below Kennedy in the all-time rankings), but I'm not looking to turn this thread into another Toews thread.

I've done a ton of statistical analysis of Ted Kennedy, and the most similar current player to him, who put up nearly identical numbers to him on teams that scored nearly identical amount of goals, is Ryan O'Reilly. There's a lot of similarities between them, as both are noted for defensive prowess and not the best offensively. Both also played important roles on Stanley Cup winning teams. The difference between them is that Kennedy played in a 6 team league, and O'Reilly in a 30-32 team league. Kennedy played just as what we think of as being the modern NHL was starting, so there was no real reference point for his scoring to be seen as low for one of the best centers in the league. However, given we now have over 70 years of further seasonal stats, a 4-5 year span where Ryan O'Reilly is the 2nd-3rd best center in the league and people would be asking where all the 1Cs have gone.

I'd be interested in seeing some of this analysis, if/when you have the time.

 

[Eric Zweig]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but you think Toews is a high-end Kennedy? With all due respect, I think you need to look into Kennedy a bit more.

I'd also argue that Kopitar is superior to Toews (though still well below Kennedy in the all-time rankings), but I'm not looking to turn this thread into another Toews thread.


I'd be interested in seeing some of this analysis, if/when you have the time.

I won't argue that I need to look into Kennedy more! (As I said at the beginning of this discussion, I haven't given this a lot of thought.) I didn't so much mean that Toews is a high-end Kennedy, I just meant he'd be near the top of my list when making such a comparison. Perhaps Kopitar is a better player ... but three Stanley Cup wins for Toews are closer to the five Kennedy won, so there's that. (But, of course, it was much more difficult to win the Cup in a 30-team league than a 6-team league, so two for Kopitar is plenty.) As for Ryan O'Reilly, I doubt we'll ever see him in the Hockey Hall of Fame ... but who knows?

 

[Big Phil]

I have often thought that Kennedy's Hart in 1955 has got to have some context in there that we aren't seeing. In other words, think of the years that other players won certain trophies that we were around for. We remember them because we saw it, or have enough evidence to have figured it out. So I try to think that with Kennedy there must have been something that stuck with them other than just the career achievement stuff. The best I can see is that he had a bit of a comeback year that season. And throw in the fact that there would be that whole Richard fiasco where the press didn't want to give it to him because of the suspension, and then didn't want to give it to Geoffrion because he only surpassed Richard in points because of the suspension. Harvey and Beliveau both had huge years but they cancel each other out.

Maybe Howe has some voter fatigue against him by then perhaps?

That's the best I've got. There must be something else that triggered them to pick him. Because it wasn't as if 1955 wasn't a packed year to choose someone.

 

[Eric Zweig]

I have often thought that Kennedy's Hart in 1955 has got to have some context in there that we aren't seeing. In other words, think of the years that other players won certain trophies that we were around for. We remember them because we saw it, or have enough evidence to have figured it out. So I try to think that with Kennedy there must have been something that stuck with them other than just the career achievement stuff. The best I can see is that he had a bit of a comeback year that season. And throw in the fact that there would be that whole Richard fiasco where the press didn't want to give it to him because of the suspension, and then didn't want to give it to Geoffrion because he only surpassed Richard in points because of the suspension. Harvey and Beliveau both had huge years but they cancel each other out.

Maybe Howe has some voter fatigue against him by then perhaps?

That's the best I've got. There must be something else that triggered them to pick him. Because it wasn't as if 1955 wasn't a packed year to choose someone.

As discussed a little bit above, it does seem like for a brief time in the early 1950s, the voters were taking the "most valuable TO HIS TEAM" part of the trophy to, well, heart! All those Canadiens had great years, but was any one of them more valuable than the rest? Same with several star members of the Red Wings. That's the best I can come up with...

 

[Hockey Outsider]

@Eric Zweig - see my post on Kennedy's playoff scoring (there's another one a few posts down to give additional context).

Kennedy had a knack for scoring/assisting on big goals in the playoffs, not quite at the Messier/Sakic/Crosby level, but not much below either.

Of course, none of that justifies his 1955 Hart trophy. The other point to mention is, back then, voting was done twice, once roughly around New Year's Day, and again at the end of the season. The results were then added together. I looked at whether Kennedy had a strong start or finish to the season, but his scoring was consistently good (but not great) all year, and he led the Hart trophy voting for both halves of the year. (So the "maybe he had a hot streak and stole the Hart due to the weird voting rules" theory doesn't work).

 

[Neutrinos]

Is Kennedy the most egregious selection for the Hart in league history?

He only finished 7th in Point Shares that season --- on his own team!!!

 

[sr edler]

Perhaps he wanted to share the points with his teammates?

 

[JackSlater]

Hart Trophy voting went through a weird period in the early 1950s with a bunch of bizarre selections.

Kennedy in 1955 and Milt Schmidt in 1951 won as veteran retiring stars basically being given a lifetime achievement award.

Chuck Rayner in 1950 and Al Rollins in 1954 won for enduring a shooting gallery and performing well as the starting goalie on a bad team.

None of these players were anywhere near the best/most valuable players in the NHL. Voting then normalized in 1956 and the winners are generally reasonable and defendable from that point onward.

Hell, even in 1953 when Gordie Howe had the single greatest season of any player in the O6 era he only got 50% of the first place votes for the Hart.

Schmidt is a defensible Hart winner that year among everyone but Howe. Early 50s Hart voting and early 80s Norris voting both stand out like sore thumbs historically.

 

[Eric Zweig]

Is Kennedy the most egregious selection for the Hart in league history?

He only finished 7th in Point Shares that season --- on his own team!!!

I'm not really sure how you apply modern analytics to old-time guys. And, I'm sure, Kennedy was one of those players you really had to see to appreciate. He's the kind of guy who was the heart of his team, even if it's not obvious that he was the Hart of the NHL... (Not that I'm saying he should have won that year. I'm just saying that, nearly 70 years later, it's impossible to know what all went into the decision.)

 

[Vilica]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but you think Toews is a high-end Kennedy? With all due respect, I think you need to look into Kennedy a bit more.

I'd also argue that Kopitar is superior to Toews (though still well below Kennedy in the all-time rankings), but I'm not looking to turn this thread into another Toews thread.


I'd be interested in seeing some of this analysis, if/when you have the time.

I had to find my spreadsheet, and I have to mask the URL to prevent it from just loading in-thread, but here's the stuff I did, which I haven't really touched in 3 years.



I don't even remember why I removed O'Reilly's 12-13 season, it doesn't really change any of the analysis. The long story short of all those numbers and summaries is that in Kennedy's age-21 to age-29 prime, ignoring the WW2 affected years, the Leafs scored 1549 goals in 600 games, whereas in O'Reilly's age 20 to 27 years, in 574 games his teams scored 1493 goals (I took a look and if you add in the 12-13 season, the Avalanche scored 66 goals in the 29 games O'Reilly played, so add that in and you end up with 1559 goals in 603 games). So both teams are right around that 2.6 goals per game mark, and in their respective time periods, Kennedy scored 429 points in 545 games, while O'Reilly scored 427 points in 549 games. (Actually, typing that sentence reminds me why I may have skipped that year - I wanted Kennedy/O'Reilly to play almost the exact same number of games, and didn't care as much about how many games their teams played.)

The other rabbit hole was when I was trying to figure out why Kennedy's production dropped so much against "good teams", which in his time were Montreal and Detroit, and what I found was that he just did not put up any even strength points away from Toronto against them. If I'm reading my sheet correctly, in 45 away games against Detroit during this time period, Kennedy put up a 3+13=16 line, with 1 even strength, 1 power play, and 1 shorthanded goal, all of which occurred in 1 game. Of the assists, 6 were even strength and 7 were on the power play, so Kennedy put up 7 even strength points in 45 games in Detroit. In comparison, again if I'm reading my stats correctly, Gordie Howe put up 32 even strength points in those same games. Neither reading of the possible matchups gives Kennedy any credit - either he was matched up against the Howe line and got outscored 32-7 at even strength, or he wasn't matched against the Howe line and still only put up 7 even strength points in 45 games.