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Ovechkin Milestone Thread - Countdown to 894 (891 and counting)

filinski77 said:
It's probably because Gretzky IS closer to Selanne in goal scoring than he is to Ovechkin.

Note that I didn't need to even sort Ovechkin's goal finishes because he is the king of consistency. Outside of ONE season where a 38 year old Ovechkin finished 36th in goals, Ovechkin has never finished outside of the top-15 in goals. That is insane.

Gretzky and Selanne have relatively similar finishes. Both have 5x top-3 finishes (Gretzky of course with a higher peak). Gretzky beats him in the middle, and Selanne has a better end.

I still have Gretzky higher than Selanne.

View attachment 1003890

Gretzky's issue is that he had a super high peak, and then fell off significantly. If you look at raw goals, you'd think Ovi and Gretzky were close. But when you look at the complete opposite quality of their second half of their careers, then you can see why the adjusted goals tell a much more accurate story.

View attachment 1003898
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People would argue Gretzky tailed off in his late 30s because playing in all 3 zones during his 20s winning cups and that burned him out faster than someone who didn't start until his 30s.
 
Video Nasty said:
Or one player suffering injuries due goon tactics and also nearly retiring early over the other tells a more real story than this perceived notion that Gretzky simply couldn’t hang in the back half of his career.

Interesting how much talk there is about protection for Gretzky, yet not a peep about how well protected all stars are today (different days, different arguments for some of the same people), even though the NHL still does an overall poor job at it and begins to let more things slide after a handful of good years.
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There simply is just no real validity to this claim that an injury is what caused Gretzky's lower goalscoring.

Goal scoring simply is just historically much harder to maintain post-28 years old. Point scoring is too, but it is easier to maintain that elite level of playmaking than goal scoring.

It is evidently clear the following things:
1) Gretzky peaked from 21 to 26 years old from a goal scoring perspective.
2) In the FOUR seasons before either of the 2 major injuries that Gretzky had that almost ended his career, there is a very clear decline in his goal scoring abilities. Despite him remaining the top point producer in the league, he showed a huge decline in his ability to maintain a top goal scorer in the league.
3) Even after the injuries, it is abundantly clear that Gretzky still maintained a very high level of play, but was never a top goal scorer, despite him being a top player.

So to say that he got injured which is the reason that caused him to stop scoring as many goals, then you also have to explain how he could have so many seasons as a top-4 point producer, but not be able to be an elite goal scorer. And if your logic is "he just didn't want to score goals cause he focused on playmaking" - then you're arguing in bad faith and think Gretzky was a moron for not trying to score goals if he was in a better position to score.

1743536308410.png
 
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mjhfb said:
People would argue Gretzky tailed off in his late 30s because playing in all 3 zones during his 20s winning cups and that burned him out faster than someone who didn't start until his 30s.
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See my post above.

I would argue with those people that FACTUALLY, Gretzky's goal scoring tailed off at 27, not his late 30's.

I would also argue that FACTUALLY, it wasn't Gretzky overall that tailed off. But simply the fact that his goal scoring was no longer as good. Can't use the "he was burnt out" factor, when his overall play remained high, but not his goal scoring ability.
 
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filinski77 said:
See my post above.

I would argue with those people that FACTUALLY, Gretzky's goal scoring tailed off at 27, not his late 30's.

I would also argue that FACTUALLY, it wasn't Gretzky overall that tailed off. But simply the fact that his goal scoring was no longer as good. Can't use the "he was burnt out" factor, when his overall play remained high, but not his goal scoring ability.
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In 1997 playoffs Gretzky's goalscoring was as elite as they come.
 
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filinski77 said:
It's probably because Gretzky IS closer to Selanne in goal scoring than he is to Ovechkin.

Note that I didn't need to even sort Ovechkin's goal finishes because he is the king of consistency. Outside of ONE season where a 38 year old Ovechkin finished 36th in goals, Ovechkin has never finished outside of the top-15 in goals. That is insane.

Gretzky and Selanne have relatively similar finishes. Both have 5x top-3 finishes (Gretzky of course with a higher peak). Gretzky beats him in the middle, and Selanne has a better end.

I still have Gretzky higher than Selanne.

View attachment 1003890

Gretzky's issue is that he had a super high peak, and then fell off significantly. If you look at raw goals, you'd think Ovi and Gretzky were close. But when you look at the complete opposite quality of their second half of their careers, then you can see why the adjusted goals tell a much more accurate story.

View attachment 1003898
Click to expand...
Gretzky is AT WORST #3 greatest goalscorer of all time (I have him at #2). Selanne is AT BEST #10 (I have him at #11).
 
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filinski77 said:
See my post above.

I would argue with those people that FACTUALLY, Gretzky's goal scoring tailed off at 27, not his late 30's.

I would also argue that FACTUALLY, it wasn't Gretzky overall that tailed off. But simply the fact that his goal scoring was no longer as good. Can't use the "he was burnt out" factor, when his overall play remained high, but not his goal scoring ability.
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I think many people seem to forget that goalie equipment started getting larger and moved to synthetic right around that time, popularizing the butterfly style. Gretzky's unscreened slappers from just inside the blue line were no longer a thing.
 
Sentinel said:
Gretzky is AT WORST #3 greatest goalscorer of all time (I have him at #2). Selanne is AT BEST #10 (I have him at #11).
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Out of curiosity, who's in your top ten? (I assume you have - and this is just in chronological order - Richard, Howe, Hull, Esposito, Bossy, Gretzky, Lemieux, Hull Jr and Ovechkin).
 
filinski77 said:
There simply is just no real validity to this claim that an injury is what caused Gretzky's lower goalscoring.

Goal scoring simply is just historically much harder to maintain post-28 years old. Point scoring is too, but it is easier to maintain that elite level of playmaking than goal scoring.

It is evidently clear the following things:
1) Gretzky peaked from 21 to 26 years old from a goal scoring perspective.
2) In the FOUR seasons before either of the 2 major injuries that Gretzky had that almost ended his career, there is a very clear decline in his goal scoring abilities. Despite him remaining the top point producer in the league, he showed a huge decline in his ability to maintain a top goal scorer in the league.
3) Even after the injuries, it is abundantly clear that Gretzky still maintained a very high level of play, but was never a top goal scorer, despite him being a top player.

So to say that he got injured which is the reason that caused him to stop scoring as many goals, then you also have to explain how he could have so many seasons as a top-4 point producer, but not be able to be an elite goal scorer. And if your logic is "he just didn't want to score goals cause he focused on playmaking" - then you're arguing in bad faith and think Gretzky was a moron for not trying to score goals if he was in a better position to score.

View attachment 1003954
Click to expand...

I’m intimately familiar with Gretzky’s decline and what attributed to it at key points.

For instance, in your chart, you fail to mention in his age 27 season that he was 1 goal behind Lemieux for the league lead in goals before going down with a knee injury, his first major injury leading to missed time. He had 30 goals in 38 games up to that point. He scored just 10 goals and played 26 games upon his return, well off of what he had been doing which was completely in line with the 62 he potted the season prior. Call me crazy, but I suppose that contributed to his 23rd place finish and what you point to as a significant drop off at age 27, even though he was tracking for another 60 goal season and what seemed likely a #2 finish to Mario.

Look, since Gretzky accomplished so much, it’s not much fun to do a deep dive into his own injuries and play the what if game like we do for other players, but it’s all there and there’s more than just the Suter hit.

But hey, let’s keep the deep dives exclusive to a few players and also expect Gretzky to score 60+ goals and 180+ points for 20 years in a row.
 
filinski77 said:
It's probably because Gretzky IS closer to Selanne in goal scoring than he is to Ovechkin.

Note that I didn't need to even sort Ovechkin's goal finishes because he is the king of consistency. Outside of ONE season where a 38 year old Ovechkin finished 36th in goals, Ovechkin has never finished outside of the top-15 in goals. That is insane.

Gretzky and Selanne have relatively similar finishes. Both have 5x top-3 finishes (Gretzky of course with a higher peak). Gretzky beats him in the middle, and Selanne has a better end.

I still have Gretzky higher than Selanne.

View attachment 1003890

Gretzky's issue is that he had a super high peak, and then fell off significantly. If you look at raw goals, you'd think Ovi and Gretzky were close. But when you look at the complete opposite quality of their second half of their careers, then you can see why the adjusted goals tell a much more accurate story.

View attachment 1003898
Click to expand...
Pretty wild that he only finished as the top goal scorer 5 times. His last one was at age 26, he played 12 more seasons
 
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