Ovechkin just won his 9th Rocket. Does this change how you view him?

[wetcoast]

Also circular logic. You use the results of the top 100 players project to justify the logic used by the top 100 players project.

Well even if what you say here is true, at least HO is using logic, right?

But feel free to break down Ovechkin/Bourque in top 10 Hart finishes since you brought up that somehow Bourque was given some sort of advantage here.

 

[quoipourquoi]

You sure went to great lengths to make a bad translation when Hart votes are directly comparable.

Harts
Ovechkin: 3
Bourque: 0

Hart Finalist
Ovechkin: 5
Bourque: 2

Hart top 6
Ovechkin: 7
Bourque: 6

Hart top 10
Ovechkin: 9 (will likely be 10 after this year, and counting)
Bourque: 8

So it's crystal clear that Ovechkin's peak curb stomps Bourque's peak, and Ovechkin's prime 10 seasons are better than Bourque's prime 10 seasons. So then it's a matter of if you think Bourque's bottom 10 seasons are a big enough difference maker relative to Ovechkin's bottom 5 seasons.

Hart votes are not directly comparable. Bourque played 3/4s of his career when Hart voting was conducted on a 5-3-1 ballot, which means Hart ranking would be more erratic after the top 2 or 3 spots. Even more so for that era, given the overlap with Gretzky and Lemieux who were exceptional players and relegated most Hart ballots during Bourque’s peak to Gretzky + 2 names or Lemieux + 2 names (and occasionally Gretzky + Lemieux + 1 name).

1988 is an obvious example. 5th place in Hart voting received support on just 11 of 63 ballots. 6th place appeared on just 5 ballots. Bourque, the Norris winner, appeared on just one - the same number as Sean Burke (who played just 13 games). Doesn’t mean his season was necessarily worse than Savard’s or Barrasso’s; they just picked up a few more stray votes.

So when you say I went to “great lengths”, it’s because I recognized that Hart voting from separate eras would limit the comparison. And it certainly wouldn’t assist us with assessing their level of play when they weren’t top-3 or top-5 players in the league but were still contributing value.

 

[JasonRoseEh]

Yes Ovechkin shares the Richard trophy this year but he was really quite horrible outside of scoring goals, there are a ton of metrics indicating this and he is sliding fast to father time.

He scores a lot of goals, takes a lot of shots and outside of that is really a very meh player for the ice time and opportunities he gets these days, it's pretty hard to argue otherwise and claim any objectivity.

No he isn't and when the games matter he's still the best player on the ice. By far the best Capital and they win the division every year so if that's meh and terrible, I guess I don't want to be good?

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

We get too obsessed with rankings.

Ovechkin is the best winger of his generation.
No comparison across eras, no comparisons to other positions.

The end.

You do know what section you're in, right?

 

[JasonRoseEh]

I don't get the point about Carlson.

He was 4th in the league in assists this season. 12th in points. Most likely the Norris Trophy winner.

If Carlson wins the Norris I'm convinced voters do not watch the hockey games and simply look at stats. Carlson has been awful, I repeat AWFUL for the last 2 months of the season and he was the biggest reason the Capitals powerplay was at a decade low on the year. He's prone to ridiculous mental lapses and brutal turnovers. He's a good player of course but he should not win the Norris.

 

[quoipourquoi]

The problem with this is defenseman do much worse in Hart voting compared to forwards (so a direct comparison isn't likely to be meaningful).

To illustrate, here's the Hart trophy voting results of two different players (excluding any years where they have less than three votes):

• Player A - 4th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 12th, 19th
• Player B - 1st, 6th, 7th, 7th, 7th, 8th, 14th

On paper they look very close. In fact their placements are nearly identical except Player B won the Hart in his best year, while player A wasn't a finalist. Player A is a defenseman and was ranked 15th on the HOH list (Lidstrom); Player B is a forward and was ranked 32nd (Sakic). It's not because of things not captured in Hart voting (ie playoff performance, international play) because they're roughly equal in these areas. Granted, Lidstrom never had a season as good as Sakic's 2001 campaign, but a defenseman finishing 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th in Hart voting is much tougher and much more impressive than a forward finishing 6th, 7th, 7th, 7th and 8th - and that's reflected in our rankings.

====
Here's another example:

• Player C - 6th, 7th, 10th, 10th
• Player D - 3rd, 5th, 5th, 6th, 9th 13th
• Player E - 2nd, 2nd, 3rd, 10th, 12th, 15th

Player C is clearly the worst player here, right? He was never a Hart finalist (never even in the top five) and only earned >2 votes four times. Player D had three years in the top five in voting; and Player E was a three-time finalist with six years earning >2 votes.

It's actually a trick question. Player C is the combined results of two defensemen ranked 41st (Chelios) and MacInnis (67th). Players D and E is one forward ranked 69th (Selanne) and another who came up in the final round of voting, but never made the list (Iginla). So the 38th and ~65th best forwards on the list have Hart voting records comparable to the combined results of the 11th and 21st best defensemen.

====
Or another quick one. Everyone knows Pronger was the first defenseman since Orr to win a Hart. But he only earned >2 votes once more in his career (finishing 16th in 2004). He was ranked 59th on the HOH list (yes, he has an excellent playoff resume, not captured in regular season awards voting).

Ryan Getzlaf is a very good, underrated player. He finished 2nd, 6th, 7th and 15th. Did he have a better peak than Pronger? What about Markus Naslund (2nd, 5th, 5th, 11th)? Or Claude Giroux (3rd, 4th, 4th)? Or John Tavares (3rd, 3rd, 13th, 17th, 18th)? None of these players received a single vote in the initial (Round 1) list, which included more than 200 players. Meanwhile Pronger is in the vicinity of Malkin, Forsberg, Bathgate, and Dionne.

It's trivial to provide more examples but the point is - comparing the Hart record between forwards and defensemen is obviously misleading.

I actually disagree on this one.

For one, Joe Sakic was a better player than Nicklas Lidstrom.

But more importantly, I don’t think Hart voting is necessarily wrong in telling us that Forward X (who we believe to have had a lesser career than Defenseman Y) has better top-end seasons than that ultimately superior Defenseman.

The 3-person and 5-person ballots are only designed to capture a trophy winner (and two announced nominees). It is not designed for a definitive top-15 ranking.

If every voter was submitting 50-man ballots like a THN list, then you could derive value from ranks beyond the top handful, but since they’re not, it kinda seems like we’re looking for fault in a product when we’re the ones not following its intended use.

When would Chelios and MacInnis appear on a Hart ballot, exactly? Chelios’ best seasons were 1989 and 1993, so... kind of a bad time to try to make a 5-3-1 Hart ballot. 1996 is a little easier with a 5-person ballot, but still a super high threshold. MacInnis had little chance on a 5-3-1 in 1990 and 1991, given he was under Bourque plus the field from other positions. 1999 and 2003 were really his only shot at having a presence on the ballot.

That Selanne (3x top-5) and Iginla (3x top-5) have better Hart records while playing in the era of the 10-7-5-3-1 ballot than two defensemen combined who peaked during the 5-3-1 ballot really shouldn’t shock anyone. What may shock people is when they count how they would have voted personally when given the same restrictive ballot, they may get the same result.

But for the years when Chelios or MacInnis were still great but maybe not top-3 in the league great? Oh they have plenty of those, and that’s how they make up plenty of ground. Same with Bourque, which is why we shouldn’t restrict ourselves to the Hart record.

Sakic/Lidstrom doesn’t work for me, because they were direct contemporaries, jockeying for position on the same ballot - with Sakic being the one disadvantaged by having more excellent years during the 5-3-1 ballot.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

That differentiates them from forwards none at all.



You are entitled to your opinion. But in real life Ovechkin was quite excellent on a pretty bad and poorly coached team that year.

The 1980s had vastly less talent than today's NHL. Chances are slim that the several players each year who were better than Bourque were better than the best player in 2013.

Ovechkin was so excellent that I recall discussions debating whether or not Washington was screwed as a franchise going forward due to his big contract and sharply declining performance.

In a normal schedule, Ovechkin probably puts in a run of the mill 70 point season. Which is what he did in the two surrounding years. The Southeast Division was terrible, and you'll notice numerous players on those teams just coincidentally had either a career year (Ladd, Tlusty, Ribeiro) or suddenly returned to a level not seen in years and not to be seen again (St. Louis, Staal).

I think the fact that Ovechkin is an all time great who put in several other MVP level seasons masks how truly ridiculous the 2013 Hart win was, and why I consider it the worst of the post-expansion era at a minium.

He really didn't check a single box beyond the obligatory statistical thresholds. Lone wolf carrying a weak team? Nope, two other teammates right behind him in the scoring race. Best player on a team that had either a great season or was seen to over-achieve? Nope, Washington was nothing special this season and considered to be under-achieving if anything. Lifetime achievement award for someone who maybe came up short in other years but had sentimental value as an older guy having a renaissance year? Certainly not, he'd already won the award twice and had visibly declined despite not being very old.

Phil "hot dogs" Kessel (not one single vote) had a better argument to win the 2013 Hart than Ovechkin. That's how bad the voters blew it that season. These are the same voters who also voted him to the all star team at a position he didn't play that year, which sums up their credibility quite nicely. Any argument that Ovechkin was actually the best player in 2013 is about as strong as an argument that he was the best player in 2020.

As for the 80s having less talent than today...Leon Draisaitl, maybe a Dale Hawerchuk-level player, just ran away with the Art Ross and will probably win the Hart. Jamie Benn of all people has a Ross win and runner up in recent years. Might want to revisit that talent assessment. And to think Makarov and the Soviets weren't even available to the NHL at that time.

 

[Fantomas]

Draisaitl's last two years are, by any serious measure of adjustment, better than anything Hawerchuk put together. But go off.

 

[wetcoast]

If Carlson wins the Norris I'm convinced voters do not watch the hockey games and simply look at stats. Carlson has been awful, I repeat AWFUL for the last 2 months of the season and he was the biggest reason the Capitals powerplay was at a decade low on the year. He's prone to ridiculous mental lapses and brutal turnovers. He's a good player of course but he should not win the Norris.

I kind of agree with you as voters are prone to having recency bias but with the break in play alot of voters are going to rely on the stats.

It's also ironic how you view Carlson and Ovechkin in much different light this year.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Man, that Hart Trophy Ovechkin/Bourque comparison was such a huge point in Bourque's favor...the fact that he's in the conversation like he is as a defenseman whose career overlapped with Gretzky and Lemieux is insane. Not that Hart Trophy voting is the be-all, end-all, but that's as close to a self one-punch knockout as I've seen on this board...

 

[Fantomas]

His 12-13 Hart (which he only won by 1090-1058 over Crosby who played in 3/4 of that seasons games BTW) is extremely weak and a result more from the schedule as evidenced by his 65 point season the year before than another weak year the year after.

Ovechkin's 12-13 Hart wasn't weak. Ovechkin led the entire league is major offensive categories. Weak Hart winners don't do that.

Even Gordie Howe won a weak Hart in 1960 (way weaker than Ovechkin) and I don't see anyone knocking him for that.

Actual weak winners would be ones like Ted Kennedy in '55 or Mark Messier in '92. People who won on reputation rather than results. That's not Ovechkin.

 

[wetcoast]

Draisaitl's last two years are, by any serious measure of adjustment, better than anything Hawerchuk put together. But go off.

I have to agree and I think Hawerchuk gets a bit under rated around here at times but mind you he did fall off a cliff surprisngly quickly in his alst year in Philly.

I can't remember but that injury must have had long term impact on him.

I looked it up, it turns out he had to retire due to a degenerative left hip.

Now that makes sense, still he was a great player and it makes me wonder how he only went 6th overall in the 1979 OHL priority selection draft as his legendary status in youth hockey was well known at the time.

 

[Sentinel]

Montreal wins 5 straight Cups in Captain Maurice Richard's final 5 seasons.

Doug Harvey becomes captain when Richard retires. Beliveau is still there, as is Geoffrion, Henri Richard, Dickie Moore, Jacques Plante, Tom Johnson, J.C. Tremblay Claude Provost. Toe Blake is still the coach. So basically all they lose is The Rocket.

In the 5 year Cup winning run, the Canadiens were shutout once. They were leading Boston 3-0 in the finals when that happened.

In 1961 Montreal falls to Chicago in the first round 4-2. Montreal is shutout in the last two games.
In 1962 Montreal falls to Chicago in the first round 4-2. Montreal is shutout in game 6.
In 1963 Montreal falls to Toronto in the first round 4-1. Montreal is shutout in games 3 and 5.
In 1964 Montreal falls to Toronto in the first round 4-3. Montreal gets one goal in Game 6, shutout in Game 7.

Four first round defeats in which they get shutout in the final game.With all that talent, they seemed to be missing something.

Oh, I don't know maybe Chicago with Hull, Mikita, etc. was finally good enough to match Montreal? Like, you think they would just keep winning, and winning, and winning forever?

Who cares anyway? Again, by all other metrics except playoff goalscoring, Ovechkin (the subject of this thread, in case you've forgotten) has already left Richard far behind.

 

[wetcoast]

Ovechkin's 12-13 Hart wasn't weak. Ovechkin led the entire league is major offensive categories. Weak Hart winners don't do that.

Even Gordie Howe won a weak Hart in 1960 (way weaker than Ovechkin) and I don't see anyone knocking him for that.

Actual weak winners would be ones like Ted Kennedy in '55 or Mark Messier in '92. People who won on reputation rather than results. That's not Ovechkin.

Messier wouldn't have been my choice in 92 but it was a hell of alot better performance than Ovi put up in 12-13 plain and simple.

Howe in 60 was also better in context and the Kennedy one in 55 really sucked as it was a lifetime achievement award.

 

[Fantomas]

Messier wouldn't have been my choice in 92 but it was a hell of alot better performance than Ovi put up in 12-13 plain and simple.

Messier was borderline top-10 in offensive production that year. Even Gary Roberts was arguably better.

You know, it's okay to think that Crosby still deserved the Hart in 2013. But Ovechkin didn't have a weak Hart.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

I actually disagree on this one.

For one, Joe Sakic was a better player than Nicklas Lidstrom.

But more importantly, I don’t think Hart voting is necessarily wrong in telling us that Forward X (who we believe to have had a lesser career than Defenseman Y) has better top-end seasons than that ultimately superior Defenseman.

The 3-person and 5-person ballots are only designed to capture a trophy winner (and two announced nominees). It is not designed for a definitive top-15 ranking.

If every voter was submitting 50-man ballots like a THN list, then you could derive value from ranks beyond the top handful, but since they’re not, it kinda seems like we’re looking for fault in a product when we’re the ones not following its intended use.

When would Chelios and MacInnis appear on a Hart ballot, exactly? Chelios’ best seasons were 1989 and 1993, so... kind of a bad time to try to make a 5-3-1 Hart ballot. 1996 is a little easier with a 5-person ballot, but still a super high threshold. MacInnis had little chance on a 5-3-1 in 1990 and 1991, given he was under Bourque plus the field from other positions. 1999 and 2003 were really his only shot at having a presence on the ballot.

That Selanne (3x top-5) and Iginla (3x top-5) have better Hart records while playing in the era of the 10-7-5-3-1 ballot than two defensemen combined who peaked during the 5-3-1 ballot really shouldn’t shock anyone. What may shock people is when they count how they would have voted personally when given the same restrictive ballot, they may get the same result.

But for the years when Chelios or MacInnis were still great but maybe not top-3 in the league great? Oh they have plenty of those, and that’s how they make up plenty of ground. Same with Bourque, which is why we shouldn’t restrict ourselves to the Hart record.

Sakic/Lidstrom doesn’t work for me, because they were direct contemporaries, jockeying for position on the same ballot - with Sakic being the one disadvantaged by having more excellent years during the 5-3-1 ballot.

I just lost the response that I had started writing. Where's the old emoticon where the smiley face is banging its head against the wall?

Without re-typing the whole thing, I'll say that I agree with a lot of this. (I still have Lidstrom comfortably ahead of Sakic, but by a smaller margin than the Top 100 list). I've stated in previous threads that Sakic's Hart record probably short-changes him (hard to imagine he wasn't top five in any of 1991, 1995, 1996, 2002 or 2004) but if you look at his record as is, vs Lidstrom's - aside from their very peak season, their records are nearly identical. Both have great longevity, both were stellar in the playoffs, so it's not like I'm comparing, say, Dionne to Lidstrom (where one could argue that the difference in their all-time rankings is due to playoffs - something that wouldn't be captured in the Hart voting).

Fair point re MacInnis and Chelios - most of their best hockey was played during the 5-3-1 ballot. I agree that there were few votes available for anyone else after Gretzky and Lemieux. But I think the post stands if you use another defenseman. Look at the Getzlaf/Tavares/Naslund/Giroux examples. All very good players with good peaks - but I'm not convinced they were actually better, more impactful at their peaks than, say, Pronger or Chara or (overrated as he can be) Niedermayer, who all have weaker Hart voting results.

We can definitely fine-tune the examples I used, but I think we're in agreement that defensemen get the short end of the stick in the voting.

(The more interesting question is why. One obvious reasons is that defensemen "have their own award". You see a similar phenomenon with pitchers in baseball. The fact that defensemen's share of Hart votes dropped very quickly after the Norris was introduced supports this theory.

The other obvious reason is it's pretty easy to measure offense through stats. "Getzlaf finished 2nd in scoring so he deserves my 2nd place vote" is what 80% of the voters apparently thought in 2014. Nothing against Getzlaf (I actually find him somewhat underrated in general), but I was surprised he got such decisive support. Maybe Duncan Keith (nearly 25 minutes per game in all situations, 2nd at his position in scoring, very strong GF/GA relative to his teammates) was actually more valuable. But that would require some careful thought about how to measure and value defensive play. What gets measured gets rewarded - that's the other reason why defensemen get the short end of the stick for the Hart trophy - there isn't a great metric to compare them to high-scoring forwards).

 

[wetcoast]

Messier was borderline top-10 in offensive production that year. Even Gary Roberts was arguably better.

One guy was 5th in scoring and the other guy was 17th.

Put another way mosse had 107 points and roberts had 90.

Look Moose went to the NYR and they increased in points by 25 so that's part of the narrative for his Hart.

Also splits are important, I have already outlined how weak Ovi was (among Hart candidates) outside of the southeast division, moose was balanced in offensive production against all 4 divisions and his home/road splits are almost identical as well plus he played in all situations...just a night and day difference between his win and Ovi in 13.

You know, it's okay to think that Crosby still deserved the Hart in 2013. But Ovechkin didn't have a weak Hart.

I have already outlined the problems with Ovi winning in 13 and not that it impacted the voting (nor should it), Ovi had probably his worst playoff when he had to play a real team in the NYR.

 

[Fantomas]

One guy was 5th in scoring and the other guy was 17th.

Put another way mosse had 107 points and roberts had 90.

Roberts had 53 goals to Messier's 25.

I have already outlined the problems with Ovi winning in 13 and not that it impacted the voting (nor should it), Ovi had probably his worst playoff when he had to play a real team in the NYR.

Considering that playoffs don't figure into Hart voting, my dear sir, I don't see how this is relevant.

 

[JackSlater]

Ovechkin should have three Harts given his level of play, but it should be 2008, 2009, and 2010. He wins the 2010 Hart if not for poor luck and he doesn't win the 2013 Hart without a lot of good luck. The number of Ovechkin's Harts turned out right but the 2013 Hart was clearly quite weak.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Anything outside of top 5 in hart voting is redundant. You can be 8th place with like two votes

 

[wetcoast]

Roberts had 53 goals to Messier's 25.

Sorry I thought we were talking about the Hart not the Richard here?

Considering that playoffs don't figure into Hart voting, my dear sir, I don't see how this is relevant.

It just goes further to the point of the season before and after and how the unbalanced schedule is really the only thing that caused Ovechkin to win the Hart.

 

[Fantomas]

Sorry I thought we were talking about the Hart not the Richard here?

As I said, Messier's production that year was borderline top-10 and comparable to many other forwards, including Gary Roberts who outscored him by 18 goals.

That's what a weak Hart looks like.

It just goes further to the point of the season before and after and how the unbalanced schedule is really the only thing that caused Ovechkin to win the Hart.

This is not at all coherent, sorry.

 

[Zuluss]

Just as a starting point, would we say there are between 6-8 seasons when we would say Alex Ovechkin had a better season than the best defenseman in the league?

2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, and 2015 seem pretty clear cut, but I would also suggest 2006 and maybe even 2019.

So that gives "defenseman Ovechkin" 6-8 Norris trophies despite us holding him to a higher standard - Bourque had to beat the 2nd-best defenseman to win a Norris, and Ovechkin has to beat the best one.
To put it differently, are we sure that in his worst Norris-winning season Bourque would have beaten Karlsson-2015, or Lidstrom-2008, or Lidstrom-2006, or Keith-2010? If not, Ovechkin deserves extra credit for winning his 6-8 imaginary Norris trophies.
And Bourque won only 5 of those.

So if I said he’s got the comparative resume of an 8x 1st Team Defenseman and 3x 2nd Team Defenseman (to Ray Bourque’s 13x and 6x), but with stronger value in some of his 1st Team equivalents, am I that far off?

1st All-star (being better than 3rd-best defenseman) and "imaginary Norris" (being better than the best defenseman) are not comparable at all.

 

[Zuluss]

Man, that Hart Trophy Ovechkin/Bourque comparison was such a huge point in Bourque's favor...the fact that he's in the conversation like he is as a defenseman whose career overlapped with Gretzky and Lemieux is insane. Not that Hart Trophy voting is the be-all, end-all, but that's as close to a self one-punch knockout as I've seen on this board...

Wouldn't you say the same about any forward's Hart record compared to Bourque though?

If you go with "wow, Bourque had just as many top5/top10 Hart placings than a forward, so he must be way better", Bourque "knocks out" anyone not named Gretzky or Howe.

Harts
Ovechkin: 3
Richard: 1
Bourque: 0
Jagr: 1

Hart Finalist
Ovechkin: 5
Richard: 6
Bourque: 2
Jagr: 6

Hart top 6
Ovechkin: 7
Bourque: 6
Richard: 6
Jagr: 7

Hart top 10
Ovechkin: 9
Bourque: 8
Richard: 7
Jagr: 8

 

[quoipourquoi]

Messier was borderline top-10 in offensive production that year. Even Gary Roberts was arguably better.

He also joined a Rangers’ penalty kill unit that finished 13th, 14th, and 15th in the preceding years, and they immediately became the #1 penalty kill in the league. Messier scored 9 shorthanded points, while being on the ice for just 21 powerplay goals against.

Had voting trends been more similar to what we’d see later on, he’d probably get one of those star-player-is-responsible-enough nominations we so often see for 30-year-old Centers.

So... probably not in the category of players Gary Roberts was arguably better than. And probably not a season to be compared too much against 2013 Ovechkin, who was under a point-per-game for literally every day of the first 73% of the season until a hot streak in the final 13 games.