Toggle sidebar

Orr's Stats Against "Original 6" Teams

BobbyAwe

BobbyAwe

Registered User
Nov 21, 2006
3,440
920
South Carolina
It is assumed by some that Orr ran wild against the new expansion teams beginning in his second season and for several years after, accounting, somewhat, for his great numbers. Does anyone know what his stats were against the other original five teams (as opposed to the expansion teams) for at least the first few years of his career?
 
I don't have the stats for this, but you should not be surprised to find that Orr scored a lot more points against the poor teams. Because everyone did. I'm going to guess that the percentage of points Orr scored against expansion teams is right in line with everyone else from his team and division.
 
seventieslord said:
I don't have the stats for this, but you should not be surprised to find that Orr scored a lot more points against the poor teams. Because everyone did. I'm going to guess that the percentage of points Orr scored against expansion teams is right in line with everyone else from his team and division.
Click to expand...

I would think so too but it's in the back of my mind that I once heard someone say the difference in points was not much. I don't remember where I heard this or if the person knew what he was talking about but that's why I started the thread.
 
BobbyAwe check out the 1968-69 season. You'll see that Bobby Orr wasn't the only player who benefitted from playing against the new teams. In 1968-69 the older teams played 12 more games against the new teams and the result was the 100 point mark being reached for the first time, by Phil Esposito, Bobby Hull and Gordie Howe. A number of the league's stars had big seasons. Bobby Orr only had 64 points, and almost doubled that total the next year.

It has also been said that Orr was able to pick up so many assists because the Bruins had so many goal scorers. However it could also be said that Orr's playmaking made it possible for his teammates to score so many goals.
 
You'll have a tough time finding that because you'd need the box scores from those years (or someone who did the tabulations using them). However you can get the Bruins game scores here.

For 1974-75 when Orr led the league in scoring it may be true because many of the big-score games were against the terrible Caps (in order: Bruins won 10-4, 12-1, tied 3-3, won 8-0, 8-2). For his 139-point season in 70-71, Detroit finished last in the East and had a record worse than everyone except the Seals (so that includes all the other 7 expansion teams at that time).
 
You can use the Hockey Summary Project site and tally his game by game stats.

A quick look as far as December, shows he had over half his points for the 67-68 season against the other O6 teams. Of course Orr only played 46 games, and there was an imbalanced schedule, so that might not mean much.
 
BM67 said:
You can use the Hockey Summary Project site and tally his game by game stats.

A quick look as far as December, shows he had over half his points for the 67-68 season against the other O6 teams. Of course Orr only played 46 games, and there was an imbalanced schedule, so that might not mean much.
Click to expand...

I can't figure out how to find anything on that site? Only lists a few teams also?
 
BobbyAwe said:
I can't figure out how to find anything on that site? Only lists a few teams also?
Click to expand...

Pick a season first, and then the teams available will change. I was just able to pull down 1968-69 Boston, for example.
 
i think it was reckoning who posted each bruin's points against each team for the '71 season.


found it, but it only has orr.

I don`t have the numbers for his entire career, but was able to find the summaries for the `70-`71 season. This was Orr`s highest scoring season (139 pts) and should give some representation of who he scored against.

It was a balanced schedule in `70-`71; every team played each other 6 times. Orr didn`t miss any games. Here`s the other 13 teams, from best to worst, their point totals and how Orr did against them:

(109) NY Rangers: G-4; A-5; Pts-9
(107) Chicago: G-2; A-3; Pts-5
(97) Montreal: G-2; A-9; Pts-11
(87) St. Louis: G-3; A-6; Pts-9
(82) Toronto: G-2; A-11; Pts-13
(73) Philadelphia: G-2; A-6; Pts-8
(72) Minnesota: G-1; A-11; Pts-12
(63) Los Angeles: G-3; A-14; Pts-17
(63) Buffalo: G-4; A-6; Pts-10
(62) Pittsburgh: G-3; A-7; Pts-10
(56) Vancouver: G-3; A-8; Pts-11
(55) Detroit: G-1; A-7; Pts-8
(45) California: G-7; A-9; Pts-16

- Orr certainly liked playing against the two California teams, had it not been for expansion his totals would`ve been lower but as mentioned earlier, so would`ve everyone else`s. He was still the best of his time.

- Chicago looks to have done a phenomenal job shutting down both Orr and the entire Bruins team. This was Boston`s monster 57-14-7 year, but Chicago actually had a winning record against them. The Rangers did well against him too, keeping him pointless in 3 games. Both those teams had a trio of great defencemen ( Chi- White, Stapleton, Magnuson; NY- Park, Horton, Seiling) and exceptional goaltending (Chi- Esposito; NY- Giacomin, Villemure). Don`t read too much into his low totals against Detroit; the Bruins usually beat them easy so it was likely a case of Orr choosing not to run up the score.

- Did Orr pad his stats in blowouts? No and yes. There were times when Boston blew out the opposition and Orr didn`t pile up points (i.e. only one assist in a 11-4 win over Detroit). There was also a stretch near the end of the year when they had a long winning streak against mostly bottom-feeders and Orr piled up points there ( 20 pts in 6 games). Also, he had 5 assists in the last two games; easy victories over Toronto and Montreal; which was likely a case of Boston pushing hard to hit 400 goals (they finished with 399).

- Orr was only held pointless in 13 of the 78 games. At one point he had a 16 game point scoring streak, went pointless in a game against Philly, then started a 18 game streak. Had he got a point in that game he`d have a 35 game streak which would`ve shattered the record easily and stood until Gretzky came along.

This was also the year that Phil Esposito scored 76 goals. How many of those 76 goals do you think Orr assisted on? I would`ve guessed around 40. Actually, it was only 23. So even if all the goals Orr assisted on were removed, Esposito still would`ve comfortably led the league in goals. The players who scored the goals on Orr`s 102 assists that year, along with their total goals are:

J. Bucyk 25 (51)
P. Esposito 23 (76)
K. Hodge 9 (43)
E. Westfall 9 (25)
J. McKenzie 7 (31)
D. Sanderson 7 (29)
F. Stanfield 6 (24)
W. Carleton 6 (22)
W. Cashman 3 (21)
D. Marcotte 2 (15)
D. Smith 2 (7)
M. Walton 2 (3)
D. Awrey 1 (4)
Click to expand...

http://hfboards.com/showpost.php?p=4917120&postcount=26
 
I ran the stats for Orr's 1970-71 season from the Hockey Summary Project, and also the numbers for some other players to compare.

I see that nik jr already posted reckoning's research on this, but I'll add what I have.

Here are Orr's numbers broken down vs the rest of the original six teams and vs the expansion teams.

Orr vs O6: 30 GP, 11 G, 35 A, 46 P, 1.53 Pts/G
Orr vs Exp: 48 GP, 26 G, 67 A, 93 P, 1.94 Pts/G (26% higher than vs O6)

I also ran the numbers for a few other top players from that season to compare. I selected players who played a full 78 game season so I didn't need to find out who missed which games.

Phil Esposito vs O6: 30 GP, 30 G, 31 A, 61 Pts, 2.03 Pts/G
Phil Esposito vs Exp: 48 GP, 47 G, 39 A, 86 Pts, 1.79 Pts/G (12% lower than vs O6!)

Bobby Hull vs O6: 30 GP, 12 G, 14 A, 26 Pts, 0.87 Pts/G
Bobby Hull vs O6: 48 GP, 32 G, 34 A, 66 Pts, 1.48 Pts/G (59% higher than vs O6)

Jean Ratelle vs O6: 30 GP, 6 G, 16 A, 22 Pts, 0.73 Pts/G
Jean Ratelle vs Exp: 48 GP, 18 G, 29 A, 47 Pts, 0.98 Pts/G (34% higher than vs O6)

Tom Webster vs O6: 30 GP, 6 G, 9 A, 15 Pts, 0.50 Pts/G
Tom Webster vs O6: 48 GP, 24 G, 28 A, 52 Pts, 1.08 Pts/G (119% higher than vs O6)

In 1970-71 the group of Esposito, Hull, Ratelle, and Webster scored 27% more against expansion teams than against the rest of the original six teams. Orr scored 26% more against expansion teams. His increase in scoring was basically average for a star player of the time. At least for this season, he didn't fatten his scoring totals against weak teams more than other top scorers.

Note: Some of the Hockey Summary Project's numbers are slightly off the official numbers for this season. For example, they have Esposito with 77 G and 70 A, which is probably the biggest difference.
 
barneyg said:
For 1974-75 when Orr led the league in scoring it may be true because many of the big-score games were against the terrible Caps (in order: Bruins won 10-4, 12-1, tied 3-3, won 8-0, 8-2).
Click to expand...

I did a quick tally through the HSP boxscores for that season, so provided I didn't make any errors (something that's always possible with any research I've done here)...

Most points vs. Washington in 1974-75:

Player|Goals|Assists|Points
Guy Lafleur|9|9|18
Marcel Dionne|6|11|17
Bobby Orr|8|8|16
Phil Esposito|2|13|15
Peter Mahovlich|5|8|13
Jacques Lemaire|6|6|12
Gil Perreault|5|7|12
Danny Grant|5|7|12
Dennis Hextall|3|9|12

It doesn't look like Orr's numbers were inflated due to Washington games more than the other top scorers that season. Take away the Capitals games for everybody and Orr still wins the scoring title.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)

Latest posts

Ad

Ad

Top Bottom