Valuable vs best in MVP voting
- Thread starter Roomtemperature
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GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
How did Perry 'drag' his team to the playoffs in 2011?
He scored 98 points with 50 goals which is great but Selanne, Getzlaf (missed 15 games), Ryan, Visnovzky all had good seasons and their goaltending (other than McElhinney who had bad stats in 21 games) all put up excellent numbers.
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DitchMarner
TheGlitchintheSwitch
He had a really hot stretch toward the end of the season that propelled his team up the standings, and I think that was what clinched the award for him.
GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
Hey that's fair and like I said, he had a great season. To me he wasn't the most valuable that year but it was a dog fight in the west for sure. If you wanted to give it to a team that scraped into the playoff based off of a single player then Rinne is probably the better pick there. Nashville didn't have a single player score over 50 points that year.
Thomas (who won the vezina) was also easily the most important player on his team as they didn't have a scorer over 62 points that year.
tarheelhockey
Offside Review Specialist
Because it’s hockey, and therefore it’s very plausible that the best player in the league ends up on a below-average team. It’s great if you have a guy who can score 130 points, but if your defense and goalies are trash you’ll be hard pressed to get to the playoffs — especially in a league where half the teams miss.
There have been 4 Hart winners who missed the playoffs: goalie Al Rollins in 1954 (goalies are a case where it’s easily plausible that the best in the league could play on the worst team), Andy Bathgate in 1959, Mario Lemieux in 1988, and Leon Draisaitl in 2020.
Lemieux in particular was a glaring case of a Hart-worthy player on a horrible team. He led the league with 70 goals and 168 points (30 goals and 19 points ahead of Gretzky) while his next best teammate had 79 points and his goalies posted a combined .874. The Pens missed the playoffs by one point.
The thing is, though, there’s a feedback loop when we use Hart voting to determine the answer to this question. What about the players who were good enough to deserve votes, but didn’t get them due to their team’s low standing? How do we identify them as Hart worthy if they didn’t get votes?
A few cases which might qualify:
- In 1936, Sweeney Schriner was scoring champion and a Hart finalist. The following year, Schriner was scoring champion and got zero Hart votes. The difference? One year his team made the playoffs, the next year they didn’t.
- In 1994, Wayne Gretzky won the scoring race by 10 points (!) and didn’t receive a single Hart vote (!!) as the Kings were one of the league’s worst teams.
- In a 2004 NHL which was notably devoid of top-tier stars, Roberto Luongo played 72 games and led the league in shots against, while posting an astonishing .931 for a bad Florida team. It’s easy to imagine what the Panthers would have looked like with an average goalie in net. Luongo didn’t even finish top 5 for the Hart.
- In 2013, former Hart winner and recent Hart finalist Martin St Louis won the scoring title on a non-playoff Tampa team. He received only one top-3 Hart vote.
- That same season, Sergei Bobrovsky posted a .931 and won the Vezina, but also was not a Hart finalist. 17th-leading scorer John Tavares was a Hart finalist, as the Islanders qualified for the playoffs in the East and the Jackets missed in the West… with an identical record!
- In 2018, the reigning Hart trophy winner Connor McDavid added 11 goals and 3 assists to his Hart-winning totals, leading the league in assists and goals. However, his team slipped out of the playoffs and he didn’t even finish as a Hart finalist.
- There are a bunch of guys who finished 2nd while missing the playoffs… one must wonder if team performance cost them a 1st place finish. That list includes Iginla’s peak season in 2002, a prime 30-year-old Gordie Howe in 1959, and reigning Hart winner Bill Cowley scoring nearly 2 points per game in a war-weakened league in 1944.
It’s not that it happens a lot, but it does happen with some regularity that the very best players in the league are on non-playoff teams.
Romang67
BitterSwede
A more valuable player would have spent the offseason getting his team moved to the Eastern Conference.
JaegerDice
The mark of my dignity shall scar thy DNA
- Dec 26, 2014
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I prefer 'Most Valuable' for the Hart, as we already have a trophy for 'Best' in the Ted Lindsay. 'Most Valuable' makes for better discussion and more interesting races (short of McDavid-level blowouts).
Likewise, I never had a problem with the unofficial requirement that a player's team make the playoffs to win the Hart. The goal of a hockey team is to win the Stanley Cup. A player that gets their team to, let's say, 3 spots out of the playoffs has not provided any more practical value to his team than a player only good enough to get their team 4 spots out of the playoffs. Both teams are equally eliminated from Stanley Cup contention. At best, the better-performing player ensured his team got a worse draft position.
You can argue that's punishing a player for the weakness of the team around him, and yeah, on some level it is. But that player can still win the Ted Lindsay and is still gonna get paid for his performance, so I'm not crying my eyes out over him being 'robbed' of a subjective award.
Likewise, I never had a problem with the unofficial requirement that a player's team make the playoffs to win the Hart. The goal of a hockey team is to win the Stanley Cup. A player that gets their team to, let's say, 3 spots out of the playoffs has not provided any more practical value to his team than a player only good enough to get their team 4 spots out of the playoffs. Both teams are equally eliminated from Stanley Cup contention. At best, the better-performing player ensured his team got a worse draft position.
You can argue that's punishing a player for the weakness of the team around him, and yeah, on some level it is. But that player can still win the Ted Lindsay and is still gonna get paid for his performance, so I'm not crying my eyes out over him being 'robbed' of a subjective award.
shakes the clown
Registered User
I find the first part of your post interesting and informative, but the second part just reinforces my point. So in the modern era there have been 2 instances where the league's best player didn't make the playoffs.
coolboarder
Registered User
I am of an opinion that there should be two categories, one for the Best player award and one for most valuable player to his team. Best player award can be any player that is the very best, best in term of stats. I suppose that Art Ross is similar to best player in the league stat-wise. MVP is not necessary the top player on the top team in league That is more of a subjectivity. Which is the reason why MVP award is the most overrated because it is the team sport. That is why I do not pay attention to any award that is won, even if my player won this certain award does not mean anything. The only award it should matter is the Stanley Cup at end of the day.
tarheelhockey
Offside Review Specialist
Not sure what you’re defining as the “modern era” here… since 1988 I’m seeing 2 who won the Hart and 6 who had a very good case for it. That’s 8 in 36 years.
shakes the clown
Registered User
you say 6 had a very good case for it, but I see that as 6 who might've won the award if they made the playoffs.
Golden_Jet
Registered User
- Sep 21, 2005
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Ted Lindsey covers that.
That’s the definition of the Hart
Couple points here:
1 - Draisaitl in 19/20 - didn't miss the playoffs.....was the COVID weird year where they had the qualifying round which they made and lost....if the season was played in full and normal process, who knows if they make or miss the playoffs, but technically they didn't miss. If it was a normal year and they missed the playoffs, I suspect he wouldn't have won.
2 - Mario in 1988 - it wasn't as bad of a team as you think and they only missed the playoffs due to the set up at the time. They actually finished with more points than teams that made, significantly more points than some teams. They finished 12th overall in points that year.
GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
OK... how about the other side of the coin?
2003-2004 season.
Marty St. Louis wins the Hart and is the Art Ross winner with 94 points. Tampa Bay wins 1st in the East (2nd overall in the league) and 1st in their division (Southeast) by a mile. They clear 2nd place Atlanta by almost 30 points (28 to be exact).
If Marty doesn't play that entire season, Tampa still wins that division. They drop at most from the 1 seed in the East to the 3 seed.
How valuable was he REALLY in the grand scheme of things for that regular season?
Also keep in mind that teammates, Cory Stillman - 7th in league scoring with 80 points and Brad Richards - 9th with 79 points.
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tarheelhockey
Offside Review Specialist
In both cases, the playoff cut is an arbitrary line. No different than Tavares and Bobrovsky having identical records, with conference dynamics deciding which one went to the playoffs and got Hart votes.
The bottom line is, team results aren’t a direct reflection on a single individual player. Anyone who follows hockey has seen a million cases of a great individual effort resulting in an L.
It sounds like you’ve turned this into a tautology. We know the rule is good because there are no counter-examples, as proven by the lack of counter-examples we found while using the rule.
GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
Ackshully... the play-in round technically did not count as the playoffs, so yes, the Oilers did miss the playoffs that year.
Golden_Jet
Registered User
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I agree on the technicality, but according to the NHL they made the playoffs, as the playoff points counted for player playoff points.
GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
Weird situation where it counts for the player but not the team I suppose.
- Jun 23, 2020
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Presumably extremely valuable, since he was the Art Ross winner.
His value doesn't change just because he happened to have good teammates.
GeeoffBrown
Registered User
- Jul 6, 2007
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I guess calling it Most Valuable separates it from Art Ross Trophy and allows the voters to come up with whatever BS reason they want to vote for who they want to
KevinRedkey
12/18/23 and beyond!
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Player XYZ takes a crap team and gets them into the playoffs. He 'carried them on his back' would be something a lot of people say about him in this case.
In an equal but alternate reality, that same player is 100% as effective, but instead plays on a stacked roster where'd they'd finish in 1st place with or without him. It's simply a larger margin of victory with him. He won't get the same level of credit, despite playing identically.
The only real difference is one will be seen as 'more valuable' because it's a more obvious variation in the standings. The problem with that is it's entirely out of the player's control either way, and is a flawed reason to give out an award.
In an equal but alternate reality, that same player is 100% as effective, but instead plays on a stacked roster where'd they'd finish in 1st place with or without him. It's simply a larger margin of victory with him. He won't get the same level of credit, despite playing identically.
The only real difference is one will be seen as 'more valuable' because it's a more obvious variation in the standings. The problem with that is it's entirely out of the player's control either way, and is a flawed reason to give out an award.
GIN ANTONIC
Registered User
Well according to people in this thread his value would. There is an argument being made that a players value, at least for the award is directly based on how different their teams performance would be with or without them in the lineup.
As I noted, St. Louis could have sat out the entire season and they still won the division and would at most lose 2 spots in the overall east standings, while still being a top seed. Tampa’s season would not have been affected much at all if he hadn’t played the season. Doesn’t sound very valuable when you put it that way does it?
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Yes, but my favourite player playing for my favourite team is much more valuable because [insert random stats]... You hould give more weight to 5on5 stats per 60 minutes, while the team is playing at home or something...
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