Perhaps, but as I have gotten older, old sports heroes, like old girlfriends, look better with the passage of time.
The players of the current era are bigger, faster, and better overall athletes than those of the 70's and 80s. The game has also changed. Back when I first started to watch hockey, Canadian born players made up 95% of all NHL players. Most pundits and fans mockingly sneered at players from other countries who audaciously pretended that they could play our national game. Who of my generation can forget the "Chicken Swede' moniker that many called the first Swedish players that ventured into the NHL. Then came the Summit Series and many Canadian fans and sport writers learned the hard way that perhaps Canada wasn't the only place in the world that produced elite level hockey players. These 'other' players never had a chance.
The game in the 1990s and this century, is a global game where Canadian dominance is inexorably shrinking. Not only is the percentage of Canadian players in the NHL shrinking but many of the current and up and coming stars in the league are non-Canadian. One only has to review the rosters of each team and see the growing preponderance of non- Canadian players who have become core players for those teams. Even Montreal's most exciting current player, Caufield is American. Several of the Canadiens most promising players prospects are non-Canadian: Hutson, Farrell, Struble, Slafkovsky, Mesar, etc. Montreal is no different that all other teams.
The availability and presence of this flood of additional talent has made the game better and faster than the game and environment that the heroes of our past played in. Just watch some of the games from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s and you will come away with the simple question: why is the level of play so slow? The answer is simple: because it is. Not to hurt too may readers' feelings, many of their and their fathers' favorite players wouldn't even be drafted to day. And this is an observation from a writer whose favorite player was and will always be the great Jean Beliveau. The fact that I believe he wouldn't be as great against the stronger competition he would face today doesn't lessen my admiration for 'my hero.' I have had the opportunity to debate my view of the comparative strengths of players over the decades/era many times. Mostly with people of my age, and who are staunch and knowledgeable Canadiens fans. As an illustrative/argumentative tool, I always ask this simple question: How would Montreal's Stanley Cup winning defensive corps of the mid to late 1960s (J. C.. Tremblay, Terry Harper, Ted Harris, Larry Hillman, Jacques Laperriere, Jim Roberts, Noel PicardJean Guy Talbot, Serge Savard and Guy Lapointe) fare against the likes of McDavid, Mackinnon, etc. today? Most acknowledge that the result would be embarrassing.
There is little doubt that the best few players of the 1950s-1980s players could play and flourish in the current game. But the fact remains that most players of that era couldn't. And Lemieux, Orr and the other great heroes of the past played against the most who couldn't play today. They were playing in a lesser talent pool, which makes McDavid's current level of domination, all the more impressive. When Orr was interviewed a few years ago and was asked if he was a faster skater than McDavid, Orr only smiled and gave the interviewer a wry look that said it all: Are you kidding me?
%. He was asked around the same time of the Mitch Miller fiasco. Logan has done everything asked of him and has proven himself worthy of a second chance.
