So, to help aid (in my own way, with my own eyes)...I went back and watched most of the 1969 World Championships Czech vs USSR (group play). I didn't look up rosters to not bias myself, I just affirmed that Suchy was playing. I took a couple of very casual notes on players that stuck out to me while taking a long lunch...
CZE 3 - Good skill, puck rush, decent wheels. Revs it up a good bit. If he's a young player, I'd bet he has a decent future if he progresses.
CZE 17 - Late touch player, terrific skater. Really loves to join the rush. Forces himself into some situations that he doesn't really belong in. You never know where he's going to show up...I saw him as last guy back, I saw him as fifth man in, I saw him accept a two-line zone entry pass for a breakaway where he split the d-men...all in the 1st period. He plays an aggressive style of D, he's small but he tries to hit players up at the entry point - it's a gamble, when it pays off it's really something, when it doesn't, it's a guaranteed scoring chance against. To his credit, he was put out to defend a two-goal lead for the last 90 seconds or so and really buttoned it up. Didn't chase a lot, played within his zone of control. It really went a long way to selling me on his hockey sense.
CZE 7 - Really balanced, composed defenseman. Can rush and play defense. Decent skill level. Wish he was a little better skater (he gets around fine, but he'd be more dangerous with more pop to his stride) and a little bit more accurate passer. If he put more right on the tape, he has a Fetisov Jr. look to him, but Fetisov seemed to never miss a pass. He ended fading as the game went on though.
CZE 14 - Absolute horse. Terrific skill level in the interior, big shot. Beast. Not a great skater in small area, but he did rev it up a couple times. One of those big powerful stride guys that can pull away if he has a three-stride runway. He might be the most technically skilled player on the rink, him and CZE 17 probably.
CZE 20 - Doesn't suck, but he's not on the level of the other players I've seen.
SOV 11 - Has some real nice hands on him. Needs to be a little better with coordination and finishing his plays. He was just a little off on some real nice opportunities. He'll make a nice move or a nice skating play, and then just kind of heel the pass or the shot. Just misses being a super impactful player.
SOV 17 - Has some interesting east-west skill and some giddyup to him. I question his spatial awareness though. He gets pushed into the margins on plays that he shouldn't...if he didn't drift into useless ice, he'd be better because there's a skill+shot combo there.
SOV 12 - Had a few nice rushes, especially late in the game when he really stood out as one of the best players out there. Real good technical skill. He's a late add to the podium for most technically skilled player on the rink for me after a fairly slow start.
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Again, just very casual notes in the blind...if EP has the correct roster numbers, this is the legend...
CZE 3 = Josef Horesovsky
CZE 17 = Jan Suchy
CZE 7 = Frantisek Pospisil
CZE 14 = Vaclav Nedomansky
CZE 20 = Jiri Holik
SOV 11 = Anatoli Firsov
SOV 17 = Evgeni Zimin
SOV 12 = Valeri Kharlamov
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I don't know who Horesovsky I don't think...it's promising to me that I know the rest though and they're the ones that stuck out. I also didn't see who I might have "missed"...
I'll also say that this 1969 international game is better than any NHL game I've seen between 1981-1985 by a not-insignificant step except for maybe the Oilers/Islanders series...this is a quality game with quality players, from the goalies out.
Suchy can really play. He's better defensively in this game, even with the flaws, than anything I saw of Housley really...but he has a lot of the same offensive pop. He plays the game very uniquely for the time. I don't know what his career accolades look like, but on pure technical skill among d-men in 1969 he might well be in the conversation for second best in the world (Orr)...check that, he's 100% in the conversation, but he actually might be the answer. I don't think I need to see a second game to say that he's a lock for the top 200, or at the very least, I'll need a lengthy list of d-men that surpass him.
Nedomansky is a [bleepin'] horse, boys...I have a lot of time for Mahovlich, so it's no surprise that I liked this player as well. I don't really know what we think of him or if he left some meat on the bone like The Big M did, but man alive, this guy can play too...
It was cool to find out that 11 was old Firsov, who is like 37 or 38 in this game...he must have been a cut above in the 1960's and this Soviet group isn't nearly as impressive as what we see even by 1976...I think he's considered something like a Morenz or whatever for Soviet hockey, as like the first real bonafide superstar, and that seems to have merit considering he was still standing out at the beginning of the next generation...
There's that Zimin again
@Theokritos haha...maybe I'm not that good at this after all, that's the second time this month he's stood out to me and I had never heard of him before you pointed me in the right direction...
Young Kharlamov, you look back and see he's 21 and doing that...you know that player is gonna be unreal, and sure enough...