What's The Argument For Lemieux Over Orr?

[Michael Farkas]

Uh what?? He’s 1st all time in save-percentage among goaltenders with at least 100 playoff games played.

He's not.

Look up the murderers row of legends he’s ahead of by that metric.

The 100 game threshold isn’t just some arbitrary mark either.

It is.

Save-percentage tends to regress hard toward the mean with increasing games played, regardless of whether it’s the same season or not.

At his zenith (1997-98 to 1998-99), he put up a .938 save-percentage in a combined 34 playoff games where his two best defensemen by a landslide were Jason Woolley and Alexei Zhitnik - two undersized guys that would be on the bottom pairing on most other teams. That ‘99 Sabres team had absolutely no business being anywhere near the finals, and it took some funny business by the absolute powerhouse Stars (the controversial goal) for them to overcome Hasek.

He also dragged the Czech national team to gold at the ‘98 Olympics over the best roster Canada ever iced, in what is probably the greatest goaltending performance of all time (the tournament as a whole, not just the gold medal game).

I actually just posted something about this about how Hasek was good, but not great. It was the Czech's incredible defense that won it for them. It's after all the time has passed that people are shoehorning all this stuff into Hasek being a God, and every team that he played for was rubbish. That's not exactly how it went.

But regardless, I agree...Hasek was great in '99. I'm not saying that he was always bad...I just said he was uneven.

It really isn’t, unless you make it that way. It’s a hypothetical question, so there’s no sense in talking about team building and things like that because that makes it an entirely different question.

Well, you're talking about swapping two legends of the game for each other at a time where one of them wasn't in the league. So, you can simplify it any way you want...but I don't normally operate in that space. Questions are more complex than just: "Well, this guy had 27 points on Calgary, and this other guy had 26 points on Philadelphia...so therefore the one guy is better..."

Simply remove Hasek from the ‘99 Sabres and insert Lemieux in the manner I described, then speculate as to whether they still make the finals.

If you don’t want to answer the question, just say that instead of turning it into a different question entirely and saying you can’t answer it due to outside variables that you introduced yourself.

Ok fine. With Lemieux, the Sabres win the Cup because they'd be able to score. Their leading scorer had 7 goals and went to the Final. The Sabres effectively lost by 1 in every game of the series vs. Dallas, except one where they gave up a goal with four minutes left of a 1-0 game. Lemieux scores it.

I really don’t think you realize how bad those Sabres teams that Hasek played on are. Conversely, if you subtract Lemieux from the championship Pens from the early 90s and add prime Hasek, I think there’s a very good chance they still win both years.

This isn't a good paragraph haha

Not seeing the uneven playoffs from Hasek. He has 1 bad playoff.

The video didn't load, all I saw was some averaging stats.

 

[MadLuke]

I really don’t think you realize how bad those Sabres teams that Hasek played on are. Conversely, if you subtract Lemieux from the championship Pens from the early 90s and add prime Hasek, I think there’s a very good chance they still win both years.

the 1994-2001 Sabres were a exactly median offensive team with a .899 save percentage with a .467 pts %, with Hasek it was .561 winning with a .928 save percentage, that seem like the result of someone that should be in MVP conversation every year.

But that 91-92-93 Penguins without Mario did not had a spectacular track record, they were barely a .500 team, while one of the best when he play.

With Mario
150 games, 93 W, 15 T, 42 L, .670 team, 56% GF
GF: 4.62
GA: 3.57
PPG: 1.23
SH: 0.273

Without:
94 games, 43 W, 7 T, 44 L, .495 team, 51% GF
GF: 3.82
GA: 3.67
PPG: 1.09
SH: 0.075

Those numbers are obviously, non-brainer MVP if he play enough game... and prime Gretzky is not there doing his thing at the same time.

For the 1999 Sabres with 1989 playing on it what happen, Roloson-Biron is a particularly strong back-up situation (i.e. you are not using a bad trick to make taking Lemieux look bad).

That obviously hard for a brain to run such simulation, but if peak 1989 style Mario Lemieux achieve to add 0.5 goals per games to the 1999 playoff Sabres, they have by far, by really far the best offense of those playoff.

Lindy Ruff coached Peca teams, if Roloson get hot, who knows.... specially if they still avoid the Devils that year. One issue they got lucky on the powerplay that year and was excellent until the final, making the biggest Mario impact smaller than it would versus the regular season Sabres.

 

[JackSlater]

At his zenith (1997-98 to 1998-99), he put up a .938 save-percentage in a combined 34 playoff games where his two best defensemen by a landslide were Jason Woolley and Alexei Zhitnik - two undersized guys that would be on the bottom pairing on most other teams. That ‘99 Sabres team had absolutely no business being anywhere near the finals, and it took some funny business by the absolute powerhouse Stars (the controversial goal) for them to overcome Hasek.

He also dragged the Czech national team to gold at the ‘98 Olympics over the best roster Canada ever iced, in what is probably the greatest goaltending performance of all time (the tournament as a whole, not just the gold medal game).

I dislike the recent trend of overrating Hasek. I'd probably rank him fifth overall all time but even with that the way people talk about him in the last year or two is so odd. Buffalo was the highest scoring team in the 1999 playoffs heading into the finals in terms of goals per game, and it was a consistent offence that scored at least two goals every game. Generally the team with the best offence has at least some business being somewhere near the finals, Hasek or not. 1998 is not Canada's best international roster but full credit to Hasek for a great tournament, he was great but no, he didn't drag the team either. Even against Canada the Czech skaters outplayed the Canadian skaters for at least the first two periods and parts of the third.

I doubt that Buffalo wins with Lemieux rather than Hasek since Roloson generally stunk at the time, but who knows. I also don't care, it's such an extreme comparison to remove a team's starting goaltender. I do think that they have strong odds to get just as far (lose to Dallas in the finals) if Orr is inserted and Roloson is the goaltender though since Orr improves their defence significantly and elevates what was already an offence on a bit of a hot streak.

 

[MVP of West Hollywd]

Lemieux had 915 games played to Orr's 657. An oversimplification since the ones that the end aren't as good as Orr's peak, but on the other hand a season like 91 he only plays 26 games, but is healthy for the playoffs and puts up 44 pts in a title run. He has 745 by his first retirement, while Orr has 621 at the end of his last real season. The 170 games for Lemieux after his comeback are not exactly meaningless, he was still one of the best forwards in the league and puts up 229 points over that span.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Yep.

Wake up n smell the coffee.

Lemieux had 915 games played to Orr's 657. An oversimplification since the ones that the end aren't as good as Orr's peak, but on the other hand a season like 91 he only plays 26 games, but is healthy for the playoffs and puts up 44 pts in a title run. He has 745 by his first retirement, while Orr has 621 at the end of his last real season. The 170 games for Lemieux after his comeback are not exactly meaningless, he was still one of the best forwards in the league and puts up 229 points over that span.

This will sadly be ignored

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

It is a literal fact that lemieux dominated the toughest era in talent in nhl history and that that orrs time was far weaker. Are we really going to deny this?

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Lemieux had 915 games played to Orr's 657. An oversimplification since the ones that the end aren't as good as Orr's peak, but on the other hand a season like 91 he only plays 26 games, but is healthy for the playoffs and puts up 44 pts in a title run. He has 745 by his first retirement, while Orr has 621 at the end of his last real season. The 170 games for Lemieux after his comeback are not exactly meaningless, he was still one of the best forwards in the league and puts up 229 points over that span.

i wanted to see how this bore out so i calculated how many games orr lost to seasons being fewer than 80 games long and how many mario gained from seasons being more than 80.

orr up to his last real season = -32 from full 80 game seasons

mario up to his first retirement, not counting the lockout year he missed completely = +12

so that’s a 44 game swing, so if you added all those extra games orr couldn’t have played to his GP total, that’s 665 games to mario’s 745 up to retirement #1. the difference of exactly one season.

so not quite so stark. fwiw it’s the difference between bossy and rick martin’s longevity. tbh before i just looked it up i couldn’t even have told you which guy played one more season than the other.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Orr was losing harts to esposito. Who added nothing but offense. Losing to espo 153 point year. Now imagine orr in a league where lemieux is going 199 and 160 in 60. Throw in a 46 game point streak n a 44 point playoff. Gretzky being alive is the only reason this is a discussion. Like i said. If 99 was better so was 66.

 

[Gorskyontario]

Orr was losing harts to esposito.

Mario lost harts to Gretzky, and Brett hull? Messier, Fedorov.

Whats your point, aside from making less than zero sense? Orr helped Esposito completely shatter scoring records. He was a good player. He would take harts off Lemieux aswell.

Deal with it.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

Orr was losing harts to esposito. Who added nothing but offense. Losing to espo 153 point year. Now imagine orr in a league where lemieux is going 199 and 160 in 60. Throw in a 46 game point streak n a 44 point playoff. Gretzky being alive is the only reason this is a discussion. Like i said. If 99 was better so was 66.

I know right? It's almost like Esposito broke the single season points record by 26 and the single season goals record by 22 in the same year or something...

 

[WarriorofTime]

Lemieux was a bit uneven as well in terms of some bad 5 on 5 matchup play, which is kind of the name of the game in the playoffs. Obviously both are greats and that includes playoffs but I disagree there is a big separation with postseason

 

[blogofmike]

You are basing performance strictly on point totals. When comparing the greatest offensive players ever to a defenseman. Seems like a stacked deck.

Anyway, my post was about how small sample sizes can make anyone look much better or much worse than they really are. Can you agree on that?

No I wasn't basing it on point totals, otherwise I'd just outright say it was his 4th best. Nevertheless, if you really want to stick it to me, list 5 better postseasons from Orr.

Yes, small sample sizes are less reliable for that reason. (Although that's part of Orr's problem here.)

The thing about +/- is that while Gretzky and Lemieux played in some of the easiest seasons to pile up large point totals, Orr played in the ideal situation to pile up large +/- totals.

They'll all beat up the bad teams a little more, and struggle with the excellent ones. But Orr's got some REALLY BAD teams on his schedule.

Look at 1970. Best player in the NHL, surely. But +4 against the Original 6 (40 games), and +50 against the Expansion 6 (36 games). He had better marks in the playoffs, but the imbalance was still there with a +14 (+10 in 6 games against New York, +4 in 4 against Chicago) vs a +10 ( in 4 games against the Blues).

In his other Art Ross year in 1975, Orr is a -4 in 16 GP against the top teams (100+ points), +34 in 41 GP against the average teams (78-89 points), and a whopping +50 in 23 games against the dregs (21-58 points). That includes a ridiculous +20 in 4 GP against the worst team of all time expansion Capitals.

The quantity and quality of punching bag teams available to Orr was unmatched. Lemieux smashed the 93 Sharks/Sens/Lightning for 18 points and a +10, but they made up 5 games on his schedule. Post-merger, most teams in the NHL had the talent to score goals and inflict minuses on the opposition. Across a sample size of several years, Boston's defense remained strong for the whole 1970s, even after Orr left, because a lot of teams couldn't score.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

No I wasn't basing it on point totals, otherwise I'd just outright say it was his 4th best. Nevertheless, if you really want to stick it to me, list 5 better postseasons from Orr.

Yes, small sample sizes are less reliable for that reason. (Although that's part of Orr's problem here.)

The thing about +/- is that while Gretzky and Lemieux played in some of the easiest seasons to pile up large point totals, Orr played in the ideal situation to pile up large +/- totals.

They'll all beat up the bad teams a little more, and struggle with the excellent ones. But Orr's got some REALLY BAD teams on his schedule.

Look at 1970. Best player in the NHL, surely. But +4 against the Original 6 (40 games), and +50 against the Expansion 6 (36 games). He had better marks in the playoffs, but the imbalance was still there with a +14 (+10 in 6 games against New York, +4 in 4 against Chicago) vs a +10 ( in 4 games against the Blues).

In his other Art Ross year in 1975, Orr is a -4 in 16 GP against the top teams (100+ points), +34 in 41 GP against the average teams (78-89 points), and a whopping +50 in 23 games against the dregs (21-58 points). That includes a ridiculous +20 in 4 GP against the worst team of all time expansion Capitals.

The quantity and quality of punching bag teams available to Orr was unmatched. Lemieux smashed the 93 Sharks/Sens/Lightning for 18 points and a +10, but they made up 5 games on his schedule. Post-merger, most teams in the NHL had the talent to score goals and inflict minuses on the opposition. Across a sample size of several years, Boston's defense remained strong for the whole 1970s, even after Orr left, because a lot of teams couldn't score.

Still, Orr's plus/minus totals dwarfed everyone else's in his era. Much like Gretzky's and Mario's point totals dwarfed those of everyone else's in their high scoring era. That's why these guys are top 4 players.

Orr led the league in plus/minus 6 out of 7 seasons. The one season he came in 4th, he missed 15 games due to injury. Montreal had 5 of the top 6.

Gretzky led the league in plus/minus 5 or 6 seasons. The other season, oddly, was his 215-point season. He came in behind Howe/McCrimmon.

Mario led the league once in plus/minus. Never came in in the top 5 aside from that.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

Still, Orr's plus/minus totals dwarfed everyone else's in his era. Much like Gretzky's and Mario's point totals dwarfed those of everyone else's in their high scoring era. That's why these guys are top 4 players.

Orr led the league in plus/minus 6 out of 7 seasons. The one season he came in 4th, he missed 15 games due to injury. Montreal had 5 of the top 6.

Gretzky led the league in plus/minus 5 or 6 seasons. The other season, oddly, was his 215-point season. He came in behind Howe/McCrimmon.

Mario led the league once in plus/minus. Never came in in the top 5 aside from that.

Which leads me to a gripe I have when folks want to discount a player/accomplishments because of the era.

If it was so easy to do in that era, then why didnt more people do it?

 

[blogofmike]

Still, Orr's plus/minus totals dwarfed everyone else's in his era. Much like Gretzky's and Mario's point totals dwarfed those of everyone else's in their high scoring era. That's why these guys are top 4 players.

Orr led the league in plus/minus 6 out of 7 seasons. The one season he came in 4th, he missed 15 games due to injury. Montreal had 5 of the top 6.

Gretzky led the league in plus/minus 5 or 6 seasons. The other season, oddly, was his 215-point season. He came in behind Howe/McCrimmon.

Mario led the league once in plus/minus. Never came in in the top 5 aside from that.

Leading in +/- can be misleading.

Orr led the NHL in 1975 by a narrow margin, and a very similar margin to Gretzky in 1982.

Here's how the +/- looks when you slowly remove the worst teams.

	Gretzky	Engblom		Orr	Clarke
vs All teams	80​	78​	vs All Teams	80​	79​
no Rockies	71​	70​	no Caps	60​	76​
no Wings	66​	71​	no Scouts	55​	67​
no Leafs	60​	72​	no Seals	45​	64​
no Whalers	60​	58​	no Stars	41​	55​
no Kings	54​	55​	no Wings	30​	51​
no Capitals	51​	53​

Lemieux only led the NHL once, but here's how he looks against Orr in 1970.

	Lemieux	Bourque		Orr	Brewer
vs All Teams	55​	38​	vs All Teams	54​	43​
no Sharks	49​	36​	no Kings	40​	37​
no Sens	45​	32​	no Flyers	33​	35​
no TBL	45​	32​	no Seals	21​	27​
no Whalers	42​	25​	no Stars	12​	23​
no Oilers	43​	25​	no Pens	5​	20​

The plus/minus doesn't fall off quite so quickly for anybody else, as it does for Bobby Orr. For Gretzky and Lemieux, the relationship between them and Engblom and Bourque doesn't change much.

Edit: Should note Bourque was 3rd in 1992-93, but I used him because #2 was a Lemieux teammate, Larry Murphy.

 

[HFpapi]

My argument for Lemieux is this (I have him #2).

Gretzky is the undisputed GOAT. Please don't say it's not undisputed, the 3-4% of ppl who would have someone else are an anomaly and I think it's just a contrarian view anyways, not sure anyone really believes it.

Mario is the only player in NHL history to breathe the same rarified air as 99. He is the only player to climb equally as high on the mountain and look down on the rest. He was also putting up 200 (ok 199) point seasons. He was also doing absurd things like winning the Art Ross with 160 points despite a quarter of the season missed. He was also putting up 40+ point playoff seasons.

Mario is Wayne's only equal and peer. Difference is injuries, cancer, retirement etc vs 99 doing it for 20 (almost) full seasons.

The only mega star more hampered by a short career than Mario is Orr. If Mario is the only player as good as Wayne but Orr doesn't even have the longevity on him to make it up (and in fact has 300 less games played) why shouldn't Mario be ranked higher?

 

[JackSlater]

My argument for Lemieux is this (I have him #2).

Gretzky is the undisputed GOAT. Please don't say it's not undisputed, the 3-4% of ppl who would have someone else are an anomaly and I think it's just a contrarian view anyways, not sure anyone really believes it.

Mario is the only player in NHL history to breathe the same rarified air as 99. He is the only player to climb equally as high on the mountain and look down on the rest. He was also putting up 200 (ok 199) point seasons. He was also doing absurd things like winning the Art Ross with 160 points despite a quarter of the season missed. He was also putting up 40+ point playoff seasons.

Mario is Wayne's only equal and peer. Difference is injuries, cancer, retirement etc vs 99 doing it for 20 (almost) full seasons.

The only mega star more hampered by a short career than Mario is Orr. If Mario is the only player as good as Wayne but Orr doesn't even have the longevity on him to make it up (and in fact has 300 less games played) why shouldn't Mario be ranked higher?

Your argument is basically just assuming that Lemieux is the best or second best ever, then concluding that Lemieux is the best or second best ever. Only the bolded forms an argument at all, and it isn't all that convincing when discussing Lemieux vs Orr given that they played different positions in different environments.

People who actually saw Orr play often rank him above Gretzky and especially Lemieux. I doubt that that "3-4%" is just ranking them that way for laughs and not really believing it.

 

[Gorskyontario]

My argument for Lemieux is this (I have him #2).

Gretzky is the undisputed GOAT. Please don't say it's not undisputed, the 3-4% of ppl who would have someone else are an anomaly and I think it's just a contrarian view anyways, not sure anyone really believes it.

Mario is the only player in NHL history to breathe the same rarified air as 99. He is the only player to climb equally as high on the mountain and look down on the rest. He was also putting up 200 (ok 199) point seasons. He was also doing absurd things like winning the Art Ross with 160 points despite a quarter of the season missed. He was also putting up 40+ point playoff seasons.

Mario is Wayne's only equal and peer. Difference is injuries, cancer, retirement etc vs 99 doing it for 20 (almost) full seasons.

The only mega star more hampered by a short career than Mario is Orr. If Mario is the only player as good as Wayne but Orr doesn't even have the longevity on him to make it up (and in fact has 300 less games played) why shouldn't Mario be ranked higher?

This post, somehow makes less than zero sense.

 

[Crosby2010]

I guess if anything you make the case that Lemieux played longer. Both were cut short, but Lemieux had more elite seasons I think. You can argue if a prime Orr is better than a prime Lemieux, and overall he just might be I think. I think that is where you get the idea that Orr is slotted in at #2 all-time, ahead of Lemieux and Howe. He did things no one else did at the time. For example in 100+ years of NHL hockey a defenseman has won the scoring title twice. Both times were Orr. And he still was great defensively. But if you are looking at career value I can see the argument for Lemieux, it is valid. He just did it longer.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Orr was losing harts to esposito.

Orr played with Esposito for eight years. Orr finished ahead in Hart voting five times (1968, 1970, 1971, 1972 and 1975).

Esposito finished ahead three times (1969, 1973, and 1974). In 1973, Orr missed 15 games. It's not good that he was injured, but it's not like they were both healthy and the voters said that Esposito was better.

Then consider that the Hart voters have heavily preferred forwards over defensemen over the past 70 years (ever since defensemen got the Norris trophy). Also consider that Orr won the Conn Smythe both times the Bruins won the Cup. Orr probably should have finished ahead of Esposito in 1974 but overall he looks really good by this metric.

 

[jigglysquishy]

Since the Norris was created in 1954 here are all the top 3 Hart finalists for defensemen.

1954
Kelly (2nd)
1958
Harvey (3rd)
1962
Harvey (2nd)
1976
Potvin (2nd)
1984
Langway (2nd)
1986
Howe (3rd)
1987
Bourque (2nd)
1990
Bourque (2nd)
2000
Pronger (1st)

9 times in 70 years

Then Orr
1969 (3rd)
1970 (1st)
1971 (1st)
1972 (1st)
1973 (3rd)
1974 (3rd)
1975 (3rd)

7 times

Orr has 7 of the 16 Hart finalists for all defensemen in a 70 year period.

 

[JackSlater]

Orr played with Esposito for eight years. Orr finished ahead in Hart voting five times (1968, 1970, 1971, 1972 and 1975).

Esposito finished ahead three times (1969, 1973, and 1974). In 1973, Orr missed 15 games. It's not good that he was injured, but it's not like they were both healthy and the voters said that Esposito was better.

Then consider that the Hart voters have heavily preferred forwards over defensemen over the past 70 years (ever since defensemen got the Norris trophy). Also consider that Orr won the Conn Smythe both times the Bruins won the Cup. Orr probably should have finished ahead of Esposito in 1974 but overall he looks really good by this metric.

Esposito's 1974 Hart is maybe the poorest smoking gun used against Orr. In 1969 Esposito quite possibly did deserve it over Orr but in 1974 the voters just made an indefensible choice. These trophies are not divinely given, there are plenty of mistakes and that's one of the most obvious ones. It's like holding it against Lemieux that in 1989 Yzerman won the Pearson over Lemieux in Lemieux's highest scoring year. Who cares? Lemieux was obviously the better player that year regardless.

 

[Golden_Jet]

Lemieux dominated in the toughest era ever. Orr dominated in the weakest era going back to at least 1955.

I don’t know, define toughest era I guess.

Orr played when there were bench clearing brawls,
Played against the broad street bullies.
I don’t think Lemieux had nothing as tough as that.
Guess it all depends on toughest era definition.

 

[BraveCanadian]

My argument for Lemieux is this (I have him #2).

Gretzky is the undisputed GOAT. Please don't say it's not undisputed, the 3-4% of ppl who would have someone else are an anomaly and I think it's just a contrarian view anyways, not sure anyone really believes it.

Mario is the only player in NHL history to breathe the same rarified air as 99. He is the only player to climb equally as high on the mountain and look down on the rest. He was also putting up 200 (ok 199) point seasons. He was also doing absurd things like winning the Art Ross with 160 points despite a quarter of the season missed. He was also putting up 40+ point playoff seasons.

Mario is Wayne's only equal and peer. Difference is injuries, cancer, retirement etc vs 99 doing it for 20 (almost) full seasons.

The only mega star more hampered by a short career than Mario is Orr. If Mario is the only player as good as Wayne but Orr doesn't even have the longevity on him to make it up (and in fact has 300 less games played) why shouldn't Mario be ranked higher?

Orr may have the highest peak of them all

 

[Gorskyontario]

Lemieux that in 1989 Yzerman won the Pearson over Lemieux in Lemieux's highest scoring year. Who cares? Lemieux was obviously the better player that year regardless.

Not according to Rod Langway.