Ovechkin milestone thread - 850 and Beyond!

[LevelingSolo]

Vintage goal for 801

 

[BallardEra]

 

[Bounces R Way]

Big Save Dave in the history books

 

[TheBeard]

I can feel the anger of the ovi haters from my couch and it warms my soul.

 

[Caps8112]

Doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Does anyone believe Gretzky (the guy with more assists than anyone else has points) was incapable of shooting more? To the tune of 2000? Or did he make more productive decisions?

Don't think gretzky was ever passing to linemates like Joey crabbe, Jay beagle, Tyler Sloan, career non shooter Marcus Johanson. If ovi had hof shooting linemates maybe he would have passed more. Also so much harder to score now then the 80s early 90s. Weird that the majority of the top 50 scorers ever came from that era

 

[Megustaelhockey]

Gordie Howe would have loved this.

 

[holy]

Let him use the visor tint with that jersey gosh darn it! C’mon league, we need some special treatment for special players.

 

[Fantomas]

I can feel the anger of the ovi haters from my couch and it warms my soul.

Careful, they might point out that he's too happy about his accomplishment.

 

[mrv52]

They just showed a video of Howe's 801st.

LOL to the whole sequence.

 

[MacMacandBarbie]

On the contrary, I suspect Gretzky recognized when his team was more likely to score (which wasn’t always with him shooting) and decided whether best to pass or shoot. If you do something 2000 times without result, it may not have been the most productive decision.

His lifetime shooting percentage is ~13%, so he seems to be shooting pretty productively.

 

[ghostingtaro]

801!!!!

I think the question is will there be a trophy named after him when he retires

 

[Rants Mulliniks]

But there is a result. It’s got him to 800 goals in his career. Gretzky himself said “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”

There is a reason why many advanced stats revolve around SOG as a key metric. It’s a proven recipe for success.

Gretzky was a playmaker first, he had an accurate shot but it wasn’t overpowering like Ovechkin’s. Both of these players made the best use of the natural abilities that were given to them.

So your argument is he’s a vastly inferior goal scorer given the massive efficiency gap (let alone points gap)

 

[Video Nasty]

Also as amazing as Lemieux was in 2000-01, he was absolutely propped up playing alongside Jagr who at that time was the best player in the world.

While it always helps to have an extreme talent like Jagr at one’s side, full credit goes to Lemieux who had to come out of retirement to attempt to persuade a listless and disinterested Jagr (37 points through 36 games) to lead the floundering Penguins into the playoffs (and try to get him to not flee in free agency).

There’s a reason Lemieux finished ahead of Jagr in Hart voting as the runner up to Sakic and anyone watching at the time knew it. The passage of time in this case has dulled some of the context and people just look at the final numbers for Jagr, the scoring race duel with Sakic, and see a 4th consecutive Art Ross without remembering (or even knowing) that it was all due to Lemieux in that particular half season.

Any way, congrats to Ovechkin for tying Howe. As imagined, having his name associated on a daily basis with legend after legend is adding a power and mystique to his name and career that will only continue to magnify with the passage of time and Gretzky’s record squarely in his sights now.

 

[Fantomas]

While it always helps to have an extreme talent like Jagr at one’s side, full credit goes to Lemieux who had to come out of retirement to attempt to persuade a listless and disinterested Jagr (37 points through 36 games) to lead the floundering Penguins into the playoffs (and try to get him to not flee in free agency).

There’s a reason Lemieux finished ahead of Jagr in Hart voting as the runner up to Sakic and anyone watching at the time knew it. The passage of time in this case has dulled some of the context and people just look at the final numbers for Jagr, the scoring race duel with Sakic, and see a 4th consecutive Art Ross without remembering (or even knowing) that it was all due to Lemieux in that particular half season.

Any way, congrats to Ovechkin for tying Howe. As imagined, having his name associated on a daily basis with legend after legend is adding a power and mystique to his name and career that will only continue to magnify with the passage of time and Gretzky’s record squarely in his sights now.

Yeah this kind of stuff is why Jagr is just not close to top 10 for me.

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

So your argument is he’s a vastly inferior goal scorer given the massive efficiency gap (let alone points gap)

Inferior to who? Gretzky who was shooting against goaltenders that couldn’t save a beachball?

I’m not saying he’s a better player, but he is hands down the better goalscorer

 

[Rants Mulliniks]

His lifetime shooting percentage is ~13%, so he seems to be shooting pretty productively.

Is he? The end of this season will be the end of Matthews 7th season. If he gets I think it is 42 goals, his raw total through first 7 years will exceed Ovechkin despite many less minutes, much less PP and about 1000 less shots. That’s like one guy going to work for 3 - 3.5 days per week while the other goes 5 days only to produce the same amount of widgets. Same holds true with Gretzky.

Don’t see any good argument for “takes a lot of shots to produce same result”. Certainly wouldn’t be my focus if I was picking a sniper on a battlefield.

It’s interesting but questionable. Like Iverson.

Inferior to who? Gretzky who was shooting against goaltenders that couldn’t save a beachball?

I’m not saying he’s a better player, but he is hands down the better goalscorer

Is Matthews shooting against terrible goalies? It’s going to take him roughly 1000 less shots to have the same amount of goals through their first 7 seasons.

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

801!!!!

I think the question is will there be a trophy named after him when he retires

I can easily see the Rocket being renamed for Ovi but it would probably be several decades after he retired. Maybe even not until after he dies.

 

[KOPITARRULEZ11]

Absolutely surreal to see this happen in my lifetime. People can hate Ovi all they want but what he's doing is just surreal especially with today's goalies and defense.

 

[Emerica]

Man i wish Washington would make these jerseys their permanent ones. With the red one as their alternate

 

[TheBeard]

Careful, they might point out that he's too happy about his accomplishment.

I hope he scores an empty netter and starts stripping like that dude in Slap Shot

I can easily see the Rocket being renamed for Ovi but it would probably be several decades after he retired. Maybe even not until after he dies.

Why would they when it was only named fairly recently after an iconic goal scorer already?

 

[M2Beezy]

Moved up to 12th in the entire league in points tonight as well with his two points. At 37 my my that is impressive as well.

Granted Sid Crosby is ahead of him in points (3) at age 35...

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

Is he? The end of this season will be the end of Matthews 7th season. If he gets I think it is 42 goals, his raw total through first 7 years will exceed Ovechkin despite many less minutes, much less PP and about 1000 less shots. That’s like one guy going to work for 3 - 3.5 days per week while the other goes 5 days only to produce the same amount of widgets. Same holds true with Gretzky.

Don’t see any good argument for “takes a lot of shots to produce same result”. Certainly wouldn’t be my focus if I was picking a sniper on a battlefield.

It’s interesting but questionable. Like Iverson.


Is Matthews shooting against terrible goalies? It’s going to take him roughly 1000 less shots to have the same amount of goals through their first 7 seasons.

Ovechkin had a big slump around Matthews’ current age (25-26). He won 7 Rockets after 2012. Let’s see if Matthews can keep up.

 

[ViD]

Moved up to 12th in the entire league in points tonight as well with his two points. At 37 my my that is impressive as well.

Granted Sid Crosby is ahead of him in points (3) at age 35...

Geno at 36 is also a PPG player. The big three still produces

 

[BallardEra]

Is he? The end of this season will be the end of Matthews 7th season. If he gets I think it is 42 goals, his raw total through first 7 years will exceed Ovechkin despite many less minutes, much less PP and about 1000 less shots. That’s like one guy going to work for 3 - 3.5 days per week while the other goes 5 days only to produce the same amount of widgets. Same holds true with Gretzky.

Don’t see any good argument for “takes a lot of shots to produce same result”. Certainly wouldn’t be my focus if I was picking a sniper on a battlefield.

It’s interesting but questionable. Like Iverson.


Is Matthews shooting against terrible goalies? It’s going to take him roughly 1000 less shots to have the same amount of goals through their first 7 seasons.

Ovie had 339 career goals after his first 7 seasons.

Matthews had 259 career goals after his first 6 seasons coming into this season.

 

[TRASHCAT]

Is he? The end of this season will be the end of Matthews 7th season. If he gets I think it is 42 goals, his raw total through first 7 years will exceed Ovechkin despite many less minutes, much less PP and about 1000 less shots. That’s like one guy going to work for 3 - 3.5 days per week while the other goes 5 days only to produce the same amount of widgets. Same holds true with Gretzky.

Don’t see any good argument for “takes a lot of shots to produce same result”. Certainly wouldn’t be my focus if I was picking a sniper on a battlefield.

It’s interesting but questionable. Like Iverson.


Is Matthews shooting against terrible goalies? It’s going to take him roughly 1000 less shots to have the same amount of goals through their first 7 seasons.

Man have you ever seen baseball? people fail 1/3 1/4 of the time and are superstars