How good of a goal scorer is Gordie Howe?

[Cursed Lemon]

Are you sure?

Because without vetting every single calculation, I see that you have Ovechkin with 760 GP in that table, which is the exact number of games he played in his first ten seasons. And your adjusted goals total of 503 is divided by that 760 in order to achieve the result of 0.66.

That's only correct if you either:

1. Adjusted games played upwards by 34 for the 2012-13 season (you did not)
2. Only adjusted his goals in 2012-13 for scoring level and not schedule length (did you? these are your own calculations and not based on HR so you'll have to tell us)

I normalized all player seasons to a 3 GPG scoring rate individually

Ovechkin is as follows:

Might've typoed something in the original screenshot

 

[authentic]

Because it isn't discredited.

It's just slandered by certain posters because adjusted stats don't work in the favor of their favorite players.

Adjusting for scoring environment is perfectly reasonable, no matter how many times people stomp their feet (without making a coherent point).



If Lemieux were the best goal scorer of all time, he'd at the very least have the highest raw season total or the highest adjusted season total of his own era.

Lemieux has neither.

I don’t think it’s that black and white really. 85 goals in 76 games and 69 in 60 when goalies started to get actually halfway decent, has two playoff runs over a goal per game, only player in the modern era who can say that. 69 in 70 in 1996 to go along with 90+ assists, as a visibly worse version of the player he was in his prime against improved defense and butterfly goalies. 35 goals in 43 games at age 35 after retiring for 3.5 years in the dead puck era when goalies started to become Michelin men. Just because Bobby and Brett Hull’s one best season was slightly more dominant or Ovechkin adjust higher on HR doesn’t change that he’s the best goal scorer that ever lived.

 

[Professor What]

I can't take HR's adjusted stats seriously because they assume equal playing time for everyone. In what universe is the first and the fourth line both getting 15 minutes?

 

[MadLuke]

I don’t think it’s that black and white really

Unlike other debate, there is not a black and white answer for the best goalscorer, if you say it is not Lemieux, who ? Ovechkin, one of the Hull, Gretzky, Richard, no one as a clear edge.

No one has the highest adjusted on HR goal in a season and highest raw goals of its era, which leave absolutely no one

 

[seventieslord]

I normalized all player seasons to a 3 GPG scoring rate individually

Ovechkin is as follows:

View attachment 915205

Might've typoed something in the original screenshot

Okay, you literally did exactly what I'm saying. Look at the 2013 season. You adjusted his goals from 32 to 35, and 35 / 48 equals 0.74. he did

I normalized all player seasons to a 3 GPG scoring rate individually

Ovechkin is as follows:

View attachment 915205

Might've typoed something in the original screenshot

Thank you. I can see you only adjusted his goals for league-wide offense levels and not for schedule length. Your calculations, the way you did them, are mathematically sound.

 

[MadLuke]

The very minor things that I could see missing, is not weighting season length for the 10 years league average, did you use the 48/82 * 2.74 ? this would not move things much if only a single season is of a different lenght and a player play most games all years.

But if Lemieux play 76 games in a very high scoring season in 1989 and only 43 in a very low scoring season 2001, using the average of 1989 and 2001 could make him look better than he was.

The average of the league scored for that player I think should be weighted by the number of game they played those seasons

 

[Midnight Judges]

I don’t think it’s that black and white really. 85 goals in 76 games and 69 in 60 when goalies started to get actually halfway decent, has two playoff runs over a goal per game, only player in the modern era who can say that. 69 in 70 in 1996 to go along with 90+ assists, as a visibly worse version of the player he was in his prime against improved defense and butterfly goalies. 35 goals in 43 games at age 35 after retiring for 3.5 years in the dead puck era when goalies started to become Michelin men. Just because Bobby and Brett Hull’s one best season was slightly more dominant or Ovechkin adjust higher on HR doesn’t change that he’s the best goal scorer that ever lived.

You have to eliminate a key player characteristic (durability) to get Lemieux there. Hockey fans are the only sports fans who discard player availability to this extent.

You have to really really want to put a player with 3 goal scoring titles over a player with 9. Not saying you are doing that but it just doesn’t stand to reason.

 

[authentic]

You have to eliminate a key player characteristic (durability) to get Lemieux there. Hockey fans are the only sports fans who ignore player availability to this extent.

You have to really really want to put a player with 3 goal scoring titles over a player with 9.

That’s why Ovechkin is the greatest. I don’t believe he was a better goal scorer than Lemieux in his prime.

 

[MadLuke]

Hockey fans are the only sports fans who discard player availability to this extent.

Lot of others sports have by plate appearance or by games sports, at least nfl-mlb-nba.

Hockey seem to be the most total season sports of them all.

 

[Midnight Judges]

Lot of others sports have by plate appearance or by games sports, at least nfl-mlb-nba.

Hockey seem to be the most total season sports of them all.

MLB doesn’t count a batting average title unless they have 550 plate appearances.

That’s why Ovechkin is the greatest. I don’t believe he was a better goal scorer than Lemieux in his prime.

And yet he separated himself from other goal scorers in his prime to a demonstrably greater extent than Lemieux did.

 

[MadLuke]

MLB doesn’t count a batting average title unless they have 550 plate appearances.

Been a very long time people looked at something like batting average, OBP, SLG, ops+, not that they not look at career-season totals, but it is a by plate, by inning, by games sports quite a bit.

NBA obviously almost everything people mention is by shots and per games and missing game in the regular season, virtually irrelevant if the teams make the playoff.

NFL of often yards by games, per throw, per carry, completion percentage, almost all the stats you hear are by possession/games, very little per season.

I am not sure about the nhl being particularly less about per games than the rest of sports.

 

[authentic]

MLB doesn’t count a batting average title unless they have 550 plate appearances.



And yet he separated himself from other goal scorers in his prime to a demonstrably greater extent than Lemieux did.

That doesn’t make him the best. Was he going to separate himself from peak Gretzky and Brett Hull?

 

[JackSlater]

You have to eliminate a key player characteristic (durability) to get Lemieux there. Hockey fans are the only sports fans who discard player availability to this extent.

You have to really really want to put a player with 3 goal scoring titles over a player with 9. Not saying you are doing that but it just doesn’t stand to reason.

People are talking about quality (how good) rather than how accomplished whoever is as a goal scorer. You don't become a worse goal scorer because you are injured. You end up less accomplished though.