After reading through the discussion here, I think my previous post was (unintentionally) misleading. I thought there was broad consensus that most people wanted to do both projects (101-200 and pre-consolidation) and it was just a matter of figuring out the order. It sounds like there are some people who don't want to do the "next 100" project at all.
Reading through this thread, and thinking things over, I think this is a fair summary of the three arguments against doing the "next 100" project (with some comments on each):
Objection 1 - the "next 100" project will, for the most part, cover relatively little new ground. We'd be discussing players who have been already been analyzed to death. I think this is a fair point, to an extent. There's no question that the pre-consolidation would encourage us to cover newer territory (or, at the very least, consolidate existing research in a more organized way). (A counter argument is, if we're being honest, most of what we do here covers relatively new ground. I've been here for more than 15 years - time flies! - and while the knowledge has certainly advanced, I don't think that comparing Mark Recchi and Patrik Elias for the 200th spot really covers less ground than us comparing Pavel Bure and Ron Francis for the 100th spot - which nobody objected to then).
Objection 2 - the "next 100" project will run into issues where we struggle to rank active players. How do we rank McDavid's five seasons against, say, Gartner's 20 years? That ranking probably says as much about each voter's preferences than it does about the players themselves. (Another risk is the discussion threads get derailed with posts from current fans, coming in to support their favourite players- but that's not likely as most people on the main board don't visit here). With the pre-consolidation project, there's no such concern - it's not like Didier Pitre is going to rise from the grave and score a few more goals. (Counter-argument - given the number and varying quality of different leagues that existed pre-consolidation, and the range in the length of players' careers, we'd likely encounter similar issues - how do we compare Frank McGee's 45 games, or Hobey Baker's zero professional games, against Reg Noble's 500+ NHL games? And how do we deal with players whose careers straddled 1927 - would Morenz be eligible?)
Objection 3 - by the time we get to player 200, we'd be comparing players like Mark Recchi, Jan Suchy, and Didier Pitre. It may be difficult to rank them with any accuracy. We can agree they'd all be on the same general tier with, say, Jean Ratelle and Anze Kopitar, but ranking them feels like an exercise in futility - trying to force a precise answer to something that's largely subjective. (Counter-argument - I don't even know who the 37th best pre-consolidation player would be, but I'd imagine we'd face exactly the same issue trying to distinguish them from 36th or 38th).
My preference is still the 101-200 project, but I'm less sure than before, and I think I have a better sense of what the objections are.
