Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 2

[Michael Farkas]

All of these were backstopping dynasties (except Brodeur who didn't win the CS and shouldn't have and Hall who should've backstopped a dynasty), all of which did fine without them as well.

This is a negative...? Or...? Where we going with this? Because, like, the Red Wings were just fine before and after your boy too...with far inferior goalies. The Habs didn't do anything after Dryden left either...neither did the Red Wings without Sawchuk, right?

I don't really get where we're going with this here...

 

[Canadiens1958]

Patrick Roy was more important to his team's Stanley Cup success than goalies with more cups (e.g., Smith, Fuhr, Plante). There are many arguments detailing this.

We have to compare goalies to skaters in this project and it should be done in a way to reflect each player's relative greatness. Hasek in the regular season and Roy in the playoffs have been THE best player on the ice time and again. Goaltending is an important position and some do a decent enough job, and a few are standouts.

It's hard to believe that no goalies are among the top 10 players of all time.

Some of us have spoken of a goalie as 5th greatest player ever. Others about them as not among the top 12 to 15. I guess I'm in the middle.

Goalies have been traditionally lower listed in the all-time drafts and not a huge difference maker in many playoff series votes. But in this project, looking at the best of the best of every position, goalies look more important if one is focused on heroes and impact players.

For instance, I have a hard time seeing Harvey as greater than Roy. I'm open to being suaded, I just don't see it.

Crosby over Hasek? Sid had neither the legendary peak nor all-time acclaim to being a legitimate contender as the best ever at his position (nor even top three).

And if one wanted to be hard on goaltenders and excuse away every goalie's accomplishment as being a product of the play of the skaters in front of him, then... it is hardest to do so to the two goalies up for consideration now. They stand head and shoulders above other great goalies in this regard. The third best goalie may not be higher than 20th or 25th and that would be fine. But these two are unshakably the greatest.

No filtering method just your say so.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Why would you think that Eddie Shore was not an intelligent hockey player? Shore was an innovator in hockey strategy (the power play), technique, and worked on every aspect of his game obsessively throughout his career.

As a player, Shore frequently tried to coach his teammates and was fined by Art Ross when Ross caught him doing so. Late in Shore's career, he was writing a how to book about hockey, with the best techniques for every aspect of the game. He never published the book and instead used his knowledge as a team owner and coach after his playing days were over. Shore had an opinion and a preferred technique on every aspect of hockey that he insisted his players use. Shore's reputation as a coach tends to be a bit of a joke thanks to Don Cherry and his stories -- and the stories were pretty ridiculous -- but it sounds like he knew what he was doing on the ice.

Quotes from C. Michael Hiam's book "Eddie Shore and that Old Time Hockey"

Kent Douglas: "My feeling has always been that the old man knew more about hockey than anyone else before or since."
Brian Kilrea on Shore's system, which emphasized quick passing: "With that puck movement, we appeared to be a faster team than we were."
Shore's son Ted: "He was always interested in the little things, and the little things make the big things easier. In other words, if you can't pass the puck, if you can't give and receive a pass, if you can't turn, if you can't flip the puck, you are going to have a problem playing this game. How to take a guy out on the boards, how to balance--balance, he was big on balance."
Jimmy Anderson: "Like, he'd show you how to hit a guy with your hip and not have to use your hands and stick. You just hit a part of him so he will hit the boards, and the boards will roll him right around. He taught little things like that, you can't believe it, little things, and they all worked. And we had to do these things, you know we had to do these things. He'd either bench you or penalize you if you didn't do them, and then the next day, he'd get you alone and talk to you about it."
Harry Pidhirny: "When (Ted) Harris first came to Springfield he could hardly skate. By the time he left he was good."
Brian Smith: "Shore was years ahead of his time."
Gordie Howarth: "Whatever they teach now in hockey schools, it'll be what Shore taught."

Maybe Shore wasn't as smart as he thought he was (who was), but he was hardly indifferent to the details. His personality and reputation don't sound at all like a dumb hockey player.

First, interesting post, thanks.

Second, a lot of the things that you touched on seemed to be athlete related, as opposed to hockey tactician related. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Shore had a short and indistinguishable coaching career, yes?

My feeling on his smarts is transcribing what habits I identify from his game and viewing the game through his eyes (that's what I do with all the players that I scout) and the vision of it seems fairly limited. I am handicapped in the sense that I didn't grow up in his era and it's vastly different from my own, therefore, I can't necessarily take what I know about youth skill development now and apply it 1:1...

Naturally, I could be mistaken...but that's not the impression I get from what I see, what the contemporary reports describe (you gotta read in between the lines on those to get a real feel) and how he performed in best on best situations...

That said, your post is worth strong consideration as well, of course. I wonder if there's more out there on this...

 

[BenchBrawl]

Honestly, everyone who can afford it should get a subscription to newspapers.com

The basic cost about 7$ a month, I think the complete one cost 20$ a month.But you can actually research the key words and there's a wealth of information to uncover there.It works better than google newspaper archive.

 

[Canadiens1958]

I hope you keep digging deeper on Harvey because someone has to.

Look at his Norris in ‘60-61. The runner up Pronovost had 17 points and was a -15 that season. Crushing him in Norris voting is not something to really hang one’s hat on. After Kelly fell out of voters eyes there wasn’t much there. Not even close to what Bourque faced.

Half and end of season voting allowed Pronovost to finish second overall. 4th second half.

 

[Michael Farkas]

I mean, I’m not going to stop you from saying that we should have 4 or 5 eligible goalies to go along with the 8 named forwards and 4 named defensemen. But I also don’t think one necessarily has to separate himself from literally every other person to play the position to warrant consideration at this point.

Gretzky, Howe, Orr, Lemieux... they’re all gone. There’s not going to be any Forward, Defenseman, or Goaltender left that can say they put incredible distance between themselves and any other candidate who is going to end up eligible at the same time.

I don't know qpq, I think we're still in the rarefied air of this thing...I mean, we're talking about the fifth best player in the history of hockey...we still have guys that put together, 10, 12, 15+ years of just mega dominance or even regular dominance...I don't see a goalie that can offer that right now...

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Maurice Richard was top 3 in scoring 7 times (5 times 2nd).

He was top 3 in goals 9 times (5 firsts, 3 seconds).

He was a 14 time all-star (8 first teams, 6 second team).

He was top 3 in Hart voting 6 times (1 win, 2 seconds).

But the big feature on his resume is 82 goals in 132 playoff games. Behind only Mario & Bossy. Playing in the 40's and 50's. That's incredible. But what really makes it special is the fact that 8 Cups were won while scoring at that pace.

 

[K Fleur]

RE: Longevity

How exactly are people defining longevity as a player trait? Is it how old the players were when they retired? Number of games played? Number of elite seasons?

I haven’t done much research on Hasek’s side but does he really have much more elite NHL seasons than Crosby? In my gut it feels like it’s not that far off.

Crosby is in his 14th season with, give or take, 10 of them being “full” seasons. 9(atleast) of these full seasons would constitute as elite. Now Hasek’s elite seasons may be of higher quality, but does he have more of them? Is the longevity gap in elite play that big?

 

[VanIslander]

Maurice Richard... 82 goals in 132 playoff games. Behind only Mario & Bossy. Playing in the 40's and 50's. That's incredible. But what really makes it special is the fact that 8 Cups were won while scoring at that pace.

Yes and no.

The Rocket set the NHL record for career playoff goals in 1947 (his 31 passed Gordie Drillon) and totalled 82 by 1960 and no one (not Howe or Lafleur) passed it until Bossy in 1983 (Kurri led for a year and of course Gretzky shattered the record). Kuddos to Richard. That is special. It influences my esteem for him.

However, Richard's playoff goal scoring contributed less to dynasty victories than losing playoff years. Richard five times led the playoffs in goals (great, see paragraph above) but only one was during a dynasty cup win (his scoring is less than Boom Boom and others over the dynasty span). Three times that he led in goals his team didn't win the cup, and the first time he did was 1944, at the weakest time of competition due to late WWII enlistment.

So, divorce his goal scoring prowess from cup success. Heck, he is in Bobby Hull territory, not some tier above, at least in terms of significance of playoff scoring.

 

[quoipourquoi]

I don't know qpq, I think we're still in the rarefied air of this thing...I mean, we're talking about the fifth best player in the history of hockey...we still have guys that put together, 10, 12, 15+ years of just mega dominance or even regular dominance...I don't see a goalie that can offer that right now...

It depends on what we mean by mega or regular dominance. Roy has just the four seasons with 1st Team selections (1989, 1990, 1992, 2002), but he has two extra seasons with 2nd Team selections (1988, 1991), two extra seasons with Vezina nominations (1994, 1997), an extra season with a Jennings Trophy (1987), three extra seasons with Conn Smythe Trophies (1986, 1993, 2001) - that’s 12 individual years in which he had to go to the awards ceremony and sit next to Michael J. Fox and Denis Leary. A baker’s dozen if they have him holding the Stanley Cup on-stage in 1996.

Starting goaltender for 9 Conference Finalists. 11 Division Winners. He was pretty consistently relevant from start-to-finish. I don’t know if it meets the qualification of mega dominance, but if we’re not comparing him to Wayne Gretzky’s 11 Art Ross Trophies and instead to his three best comparables in Doug Harvey, Jean Beliveau, and Maurice Richard, it’s not an out-of-place candidacy.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Fittingly, Roy is my #1 goalie...just not top 10...he was 17 for me. I think we still have some racetrack to eat up before we can really start getting these goalies in. That doesn't necessarily mean as low as I set the bar, but I really don't think I can make a good case for one of these goalies to be top 10...in fact, I'll be cheering against that...you guys just stand around and do nothing for most of the game any how...

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Lots of major accomplishments from this group:

Jean Beliveau - 10 Cups (2nd to Henri Richard), 2 Harts and a Conn Smythe, 7 times top 3 in scoring

Eddie Shore - 4 Hart Trophies (behind only Gretzky & Howe)

Doug Harvey - 7 Norris Trophies (2nd to Orr)

Patty Roy - 3 Conn Smythe Trophies (The Most)

Hasek - 6 Vezina Trophies (2nd to Plante) 2 Hart Trophies (only goalie with 2)

Bobby Hull - 7 time goal leader, 3 Art Ross Trophies, 2 Hart Trophies, 610 goals in NHL, 303 more in WHA, 9th in goals per game in playoffs

Ray Bourque - 13 times first team all-star (The Most) 19 times total (2nd to Howe)

Howie Morenz - 3 Hart Trophies, 2 time scoring leader

Sid Crosby - 2 Hart Trophies, 2 Conn Smythe Trophies, 2 Richard Trophies, 2 Art Ross Trophies, still time to add

 

[The Macho King]

Plantes Vezinas aren't really a comparison. 1st team all-stars are better for that era against post 80 Vezinas.

 

[BenchBrawl]

Sidney Crosby's per-game dominance

We all know his injuries history, but when he was on the ice, Crosby was consistently dominant from day one.

PPG finishes

05-06: 6th
06-07: 1st
07-08: 2nd
08-09: 3rd
09-10: 4th
10-11: 1st
11-12: Injured*
12-13: 1st
13-14: 1st
14-15: 1st
15-16: 3rd
16-17: 2nd
17-18: 12th

*In the 22 games he played in 11-12, he was 1st too.

I could also get the PPGVsX numbers, but my PC is struggling right now with excel.

Except for his rookie season where he finished 6th, Crosby was Top 5 in PPG for 11 straight years, except that one year (11-12) where he played too little games to count (but was still leading in PPG anyway).

How good was Crosby at his peak? - or Mozart Assassinated?

Did Crosby have the highest non-Big 4 peak ever, but buried under a smokescreen? I'm talking about how dominant he was as a specimen, not the cold accomplishments.

Let's define Crosby's peak as 10-11 to 14-15, where he leads the league in PPG for 5 straight years.He was 23, 24, 25, 26 and 27 years old in that window.

Gretzky peaked at 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25 years old.
Howe peaked at 22, 23, 24 and 25 years old.
Orr peaked at 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 and 26 years old.
Lemieux peaked at 22, 23, 24, 25, 26 and 27 years old.

So we're pretty much exactly in the age range we're looking for.

So what's the smokescreen?

10-11: Missed half the season (incredibly dominant)
11-12: Played 22 games
12-13: Lock-out year
13-14: Super dominant season
14-15: Mike Johnston factor

If we wanted to assassinate Mozart and hide his true talent, we could hardly do better than what happened to Crosby.Now I'm not arguing that we should credit Crosby things he never accomplished, but I'm just bringing attention to the fact that Crosby might have been a more dominant specimen than most usually think.His career is seen as some sort of ''strong plateau'', but is that really the case behind the smoke? Was there a gigantic peak behind the clouds that we unfortunately never got to see?

Guess I want to generate discussion more than I'm making a point, since we can't credit him for what he didn't do.But it's something to keep in mind.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Sid Crosby - 2 Hart Trophies, 2 Conn Smythe Trophies, 2 Richard Trophies, 2 Art Ross Trophies, still time to add

I agree that Crosby still has time to add to his resume, but (and I'm saying this more for anyone who might be reading this 5-10 years down the road), we're operating on the assumption that he stops playing hockey tomorrow. So we're evaluating Crosby through 13 seasons (and 13 games into 2017-18), and not speculating on what he still has time to accomplish. This, of course, is also true for Ovechkin, Malkin, and any other active player who comes up.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

First, interesting post, thanks.

Second, a lot of the things that you touched on seemed to be athlete related, as opposed to hockey tactician related. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Shore had a short and indistinguishable coaching career, yes?

My feeling on his smarts is transcribing what habits I identify from his game and viewing the game through his eyes (that's what I do with all the players that I scout) and the vision of it seems fairly limited. I am handicapped in the sense that I didn't grow up in his era and it's vastly different from my own, therefore, I can't necessarily take what I know about youth skill development now and apply it 1:1...

Naturally, I could be mistaken...but that's not the impression I get from what I see, what the contemporary reports describe (you gotta read in between the lines on those to get a real feel) and how he performed in best on best situations...

That said, your post is worth strong consideration as well, of course. I wonder if there's more out there on this...

As did Wayne Gretzky.

 

[VanIslander]

... Conn Smythe Trophies (1986, 1993, 2001)... Starting goaltender for 9 Conference Finalists. 11 Division Winners

Two very different things.

The former is impressive evidence of repeated dominant impact on team success at the beginning, middle and end of a 16-year stretch. (Having seen a lot of his career, I know how intense and big game performer he was. That said, rollercoaster might be a metaphor for his play at times, down, then right back up high.)

The latter is a team accomplishment. How much of a driver vs. passenger was he? A lot of Colorado games in the regular season were won by Sakic & Forsberg and a talented support crew. In Montreal coaching and team defense were praised. Carbonneau won three Selkes during the Roy years, shutting down/containing opposing top line centers. Jack Adams trophy winner Pat Burns coached the Habs for four years during Roy's years in Montreal. Simply citing conference or divisional titles indicates little, especially with top 10 candidates who should be in the rarified air of transcending their team and their era, not simply being a part of it.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Yes and no.

The Rocket set the NHL record for career playoff goals in 1947 (his 31 passed Gordie Drillon) and totalled 82 by 1960 and no one (not Howe or Lafleur) passed it until Bossy in 1983 (Kurri led for a year and of course Gretzky shattered the record). Kuddos to Richard. That is special. It influences my esteem for him.

However, Richard's playoff goal scoring contributed less to dynasty victories than losing playoff years. Richard five times led the playoffs in goals (great, see paragraph above) but only one was during a dynasty cup win (his scoring is less than Boom Boom and others over the dynasty span). Three times that he led in goals his team didn't win the cup, and the first time he did was 1944, at the weakest time of competition due to late WWII enlistment.

So, divorce his goal scoring prowess from cup success. Heck, he is in Bobby Hull territory, not some tier above, at least in terms of significance of playoff scoring.

Maurice Richard played 132 playoff games. 71 games in SC years scoring 51 goals. 61 games in non-winning SC years,scoring 31 goals. Rather obvious that his goals contributed more to winning.

 

[Nick Hansen]

So, we consider Crosby and his coach (rightly so), but isn't there reason to take that into account with older players as well? The importance of the coach has expanded with time but what do we know about the coach of Shore? Morenz? Hull? and so on.

 

[Michael Farkas]

As did Wayne Gretzky.

Yeah, but we saw that Gretzky was actually a genius on the rink. We see good evidence that Shore was not. That was answered with coaching tips, which he failed at.

 

[MXD]

As a sidenote, I personally will do as if 18-19 never started. It's not super relevant for Crosby and Ovechkin, but things might be really different for players like Malkin, Keith, Chara and Lundqvist.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Two very different things.

The former is impressive evidence of repeated dominant impact on team success at the beginning, middle and end of a 16-year stretch. (Having seen a lot of his career, I know how intense and big game performer he was. That said, rollercoaster might be a metaphor for his play at times, down, then right back up high.)

The latter is a team accomplishment. How much of a driver vs. passenger was he? A lot of Colorado games in the regular season were won by Sakic & Forsberg and a talented support crew. In Montreal coaching and team defense were praised. Carbonneau won three Selkes during the Roy years, shutting down/containing opposing top line centers. Jack Adams trophy winner Pat Burns coached the Habs for four years during Roy's years in Montreal. Simply citing conference or divisional titles indicates little, especially with top 10 candidates who should be in the rarified air of transcending their team and their era, not simply being a part of it.

No one wins one against six.

 

[VanIslander]

...coaching tips, which he failed at.

Well, you could argue the greatness of Gretzky and Shore (like Orr) was independent of coaching: they broke the mold, they did things differently, their way.

Coach Hap Day was fanatical about player commitment to defensive play. He was hard nosed about it. Then a reporter asked him why Babe Pratt (a future HHOFer) was allowed to be a rushing defenseman, unfettered in his many surges up ice, not making the safe dump in pass. And coach Day said it was because when you have a special talent like that, you just let it go. Bowman has said a similar thing about Lafleur.

Speaking of failed coaching tips... Chicago goalie coach Tretiak was helping Belfour and a TV reporter asked him about the other Blackhawks goalie Hasek and Tretiak said he had nothing to teach Hasek because Hasek doesn't do anything he teaches. He was unorthodox in the extreme. Hasek was sent to the farm club to work on his stickhandling, which was deemed poor. Hasek had the habit of throwing his stick away while flopping around the crease making saves! Hasek never really lost this habit. I have fond memories of laughing at him on Buffalo. I called him a fluke the first two Vezina-winning years. Then one day in a sports bar I said "fluke" on a Hasek save and one of the guys I was with said "You say that a lot, like ten times already tonight." I thereafter chewed on that and, well, Hasek of course had his best years still ahead of him and I became appreciative of his unorthodox style in terms of how effective he was.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Yeah, but we saw that Gretzky was actually a genius on the rink. We see good evidence that Shore was not. That was answered with coaching tips, which he failed at.

The point is it doesn't translate to coaching.

Also, with the level of truly violent play in the 20's and 30's, wouldn't it be a big advantage to have your best player one who relished that kind of play? Seems the Hart voters must have felt somewhat that way.

 

[Michael Farkas]

The point is it doesn't translate to coaching.

Also, with the level of truly violent play in the 20's and 30's, wouldn't it be a big advantage to have your best player one who relished that kind of play? Seems the Hart voters must have felt somewhat that way.

You're going backwards, Den...Gretzky was smart and it didn't translate into being a coach for other reasons...Shore does not seem as smart and then also didn't make it as a coach...whether it's because he wasn't that smart about the game after all or because he was just the d word, I don't think we exactly know...but there's more smoke there than there is with Gretzky certainly...