Who would you pick 1OA, Lemieux or McDavid?

[Midnight Judges]

McDavid disappeared and disappointed in the biggest game of his career in his prime.

So did Mario Lemieux on numerous occasions. -that’s hockey.

 

[WalterLundy]

"Lifelong Penguins fan".

And I'm actually a Capitals fan who simply thinks Crosby is better than Ovechkin because I'm totally unbiased.

Giving an accurate description of history doesn’t warrant this. A lot of Lemieux’s back issues were on him. That’s true but you probably didn’t know that. The guy I was tagging actually says Lemieux is his second favorite player. Those types of fans you describe exist by the way. If you want any memorabilia, signed jerseys, pictures with players, icetime programs/ game programs going back to the 90s cup teams, 91 finals ticket stubs, etc. I’d be glad to just hand them over since I’m not a real fan. You and the majority of the online pens fans are scum. Go fly a kite.

 

[Regal]

Doesn't that just make this a case of take McDavid for how he is, but we can imagine a bunch of different scenarios for how Mario can improve?

Can we assume that either player gets drafted by better run teams than Edmonton or Pittsburgh?

It’s a fair point as well. You run into a ton of what ifs down that line of thought rather than just taking them as what their careers ended up being. But I also tend to think those are fun to discuss as well even if there’s obviously no objective answer

 

[BenningHurtsMySoul]

Mario, with no injuries, is the greatest player of all time

No disrespect to Connor, but he's never displaying Gretzky or Lemieux.

 

[the_fan]

This poll results are closer than I was expecting

 

[Conspiracy Theorist]

McDavid disappeared and disappointed in the biggest game of his career in his prime.

It will definitely take a toll on his legacy if he doesn't win a cup, preferably in a big role.

 

[BKarchitect]

Mario’s draft year he had 133 goals and 282 points…

Yea, high scoring era but for perspective…next highest guy was a year older and had 170 points and was his wingman. Mario had more goals than all but 4 players had total points.

He was 6-4 with magical skates, hands and hockey sense.

McDavid as a prospect beats almost ever single human to pick up a stick. Not Mario though.

 

[tabness]

This poll results are closer than I was expecting

as time goes on people will forget or disregard older players like Lemieux... will happen to today's players in the future too

 

[bobholly39]

Definitely Lemieux.

Do Crosby vs McDavid instead. I did that a year ago or so and Crosby still won. Wonder how that goes over today.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Definitely Lemieux.

Do Crosby vs McDavid instead. I did that a year ago or so and Crosby still won. Wonder how that goes over today.

Crosby was easily the better prospect

 

[Three On Zero]

Definitely Lemieux.

Do Crosby vs McDavid instead. I did that a year ago or so and Crosby still won. Wonder how that goes over today.

Crosby would still win, he’s still the better player(in their primes)

 

[bobholly39]

Crosby was easily the better prospect

Yeah he was.

I figure this is with hindsight though, not as prospects. That makes it a worthy comparison

 

[2024CubsAreReallyBad]

Put Mario in the current NHL where he isn't getting butchered by beer leaguers or carrying defenders piggy back and still scoring he would be an actual, real life cheat code.

 

[stevo61]

McDavid is the best in todays game but hes no Lemieux.

 

[Fledgemyhedge]

Crosby was easily the better prospect

Definitely the better prospect. Depends if you use hindsight

 

[Video Nasty]

@Video Nasty we need you with the quotes regarding this myth/misconception.

Needs to be stickied at this point.

As for the question, Lemieux is the better player and contrary to what some might think, my favorite player of the two, but I’m much more confident I’d get 20 years out of McDavid. I’m not too interested in drafting a player who can’t be bothered to stick to a simple stretch regimen.

If McDavid becomes extremely injury prone and misses significant time from here on out, I’ll be happy to revisit it.

 

[SillyRabbit]

If we look at Lemieux's career from his 2nd season in the league (1986) until he retired from back injuries and cancer in 1997:

During this 11 year period the only people to ever outscore Lemieux in a season where he played at least 30 or more games were Gretzky (3x), Kurri, Messier and Yzerman.

In 1987, Kurri had 1 more point than Lemieux in 16 more games played.
In 1990, Yzerman had 6 more points and Messier had 4 more points than Lemieux in 20 more games played each.

That's it.

When Lemieux played more than 30 games, he was either winning the scoring race or finishing second to a prime Wayne Gretzky.

And he actually beat out a healthy Gretzky for the Art Ross five times (three of which happened when Gretzky was 30 or younger).

How many players do you think could win an Art Ross trophy over a prime, healthy Gretzky even once?

 

[bambamcam4ever]

McDavid. As a prospect he showed he was willing to work to be great. Mario was historically lazy and a lot his health issues were self inflicted.

He had cancer and a degenerative back condition. Your post is borderline libelous.

 

[bambamcam4ever]

Needs to be stickied at this point.

As for the question, Lemieux is the better player and contrary to what some might think, my favorite player of the two, but I’m much more confident I’d get 20 years out of McDavid. I’m not too interested in drafting a player who can’t be bothered to stick to a simple stretch regimen.

If McDavid becomes extremely injury prone and misses significant time from here on out, I’ll be happy to revisit it.

I love the tag team, hopefully you don't forget to switch accounts one day and quote yourself.

 

[lawrence]

Mario easily.

cause we wouldn't know who would have injury issues right?

 

[Video Nasty]

And he actually beat out a healthy Gretzky for the Art Ross five times (three of which happened when Gretzky was 30 or younger).

Under your conditions, this only happened once (1988-1989), and by the time that happened, Gretzky had already played nearly as many games as Lemieux would end up playing before the latter’s first retirement.

 

[MovesLikeJagr68]

This is ridiculous.

Mario came back to play at the age of 35 after not playing for 3 years, and put up 76 points in 43 games. That’s the pace of 144 points over a full season, in a year where only 2 players broke the 100 mark.

And that’s not even close to being one of his biggest accomplishments.

 

[loadie]

I can imagine the numbers Mario would put up if he didn’t have someone hooking and cross checking him and towing themselves along with him. No center ice line to deal with and modern nutrition and workout routines. I love watching McDavid, but this is clearly Lemieux

 

[loadie]

All those things were available then. He just didn't care enough to take care of his body.

How do you know this? I don’t remember ever reading or seeing reports that Lemieux let himself go and didn’t care about this health

 

[Midnight Judges]

If we look at Lemieux's career from his 2nd season in the league (1986) until he retired from back injuries and cancer in 1997:

During this 11 year period the only people to ever outscore Lemieux in a season where he played at least 30 or more games were Gretzky (3x), Kurri, Messier and Yzerman.

That's the wrong metric though. The world does not stop spinning when Lemieux quits (which is often).

The actual measurement that matters for a GM is total career value.

During Mario Lemieux's career, 12 other teams (out of 21) won more games than Lemieux's team did.

Lemieux's teams failed to even make the playoffs 9 times during Lemieux's 21 year career (despite 16 out of 21 teams making it in for much of his career) - including missing the playoffs during 5 of Mario's first 6 seasons when he was as healthy as he ever would be. That's a 57% playoffs-made percentage for Mario Lemieux's team during his career. That is a piss poor result.

McDavid, by contrast, has gotten his team to the playoffs 66.7% of the time despite it being far more difficult to get in than it was in Mario's day (due to the increase to 32 teams while still only having 16 playoff spots).

Lemieux played in the same era as another player who had more assists than Lemieux had points, and that player also has 200 more goals than Mario. Lemieux had slightly more points than Ron Francis and Steve Yzerman during his career, and fewer goals than Brett Hull.

McDavid will likely trounce the league in points by a massive margin.