Was Tomas Sandström a dirty player?

[MS]

Early-career Sandstrom was a nasty piece of work with his stick but he mellowed through his late-20s and into his 30s after lots of injuries plus the Dave Brown sucker punch.

 

[sr edler]

It's funny because both Sandström and Ulf Samuelsson came up through Fagersta hockey and played on the same team (in said small town) in the early 80s as junior players. Must have been something in the water there.

 

[The Panther]

I can:t really speak to how important Tomas Sandström was to the Rangers in the late-80s (probably very important), but I always thought he was key to the LA Kings' success in the c.1990-1993 period. He got injured all the time, but basically when he was healthy, the Kings were good, and when he was injured, they weren't particularly good.

The difference is most acute in the three 'full' seasons (i.e., seasons he wasn't traded within) tnat he played for LA, 1990-91, 1991-92, and 1992-93:

Overall, during these three seasons, the team was:
120-90-34 (.561)
But in the games that Sandström actually appeared in, the team was:
91-49-20 (.631)

 

[The Panther]

Another thing about Sandström, he had bad luck with injuries (some probably partly his own fault), which really cost him impressive full-season totals:

1986-87
-- pacing for 50 goals (only five players achieved that), but missed 16 games
1990-91
-- pacing for 53 goals and 105 points, but missed 12 games
1992-93
-- pacing for 54 goals and 112 points (albeit small sample), but missed 45 games
1995-96
-- pacing for 49 goals and 99 points, but missed 24 games

As it is, he ended up with only two 40-goal seasons and zero 90-point seasons!

 

[connellc]

I can:t really speak to how important Tomas Sandström was to the Rangers in the late-80s (probably very important), but I always thought he was key to the LA Kings' success in the c.1990-1993 period. He got injured all the time, but basically when he was healthy, the Kings were good, and when he was injured, they weren't particularly good.

The difference is most acute in the three 'full' seasons (i.e., seasons he wasn't traded within) tnat he played for LA, 1990-91, 1991-92, and 1992-93:

Overall, during these three seasons, the team was:
120-90-34 (.561)
But in the games that Sandström actually appeared in, the team was:
91-49-20 (.631)

Love stats like this. Not to derail the thread, but there's also evidence that John Leclair actually scored more on a ppg average with Lindros out of the lineup than in, basically proving that he wasn't a passenger on the LOD line. Really eye opening actually about Sandstrom whose playoff statistics were actually really poor compared to his regular season. I can dig up some numbers, but the drop in his playoff stats is pretty significant from what I can remember.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Love stats like this. Not to derail the thread, but there's also evidence that John Leclair actually scored more on a ppg average with Lindros out of the lineup than in, basically proving that he wasn't a passenger on the LOD line. Really eye opening actually about Sandstrom whose playoff statistics were actually really poor compared to his regular season. I can dig up some numbers, but the drop in his playoff stats is pretty significant from what I can remember.

my only clear memory of sandstrom in the playoffs was 1993, most memoably him gettting winked at by patrick roy

i do remember being surprised that he outscored robitaille in the 93 run, although tbf sandstrom probably had gretzky instead of dave taylor, luc had the better finals, and sandstrom did lay a statistical egg in the finals after a very very good first three rounds including being very dangerous against the canucks

edit: looks like sandstrom was with gretzky and rychel, while robitaille had granato on his oppsite wing with kurri centering