I understand it will take some convincing for a few of you, but why would it be far-fetched? We're talking about a five-time all-star defenseman versus a one-time 2nd all-star.
Savard had some stiff competition for the Norris and ASTs, but he never really rose above them either - all these great defensemen always finished ahead of him.
Quackenbush may have had the worst name in the history of hockey, but managed 5 AST nominations, the first three among Black Jack Stewart, Butch Bouchard, and Ken Reardon, (no, this isn't Orr, Robinson, Park, and Salming, but Quackenbush finished ahead of all his competition, not behind, in 1948 and 1949) two of whom are borderline top-100 candidates, the fourth behind Red Kelly, and the fifth behind Harvey, Kelly, and Gadsby.
I'm three seasons into Vol. 3 of "The Trail", which much of his career left to come, and he's been described as "hard-hitting" and a "good checker" - this completely changes my perception of him - I always assumed he was just a gentlemanly offensive player but he managed to be effective defensively and physically while taking very, very few penalties - this is a valuable trait.
His offensive output was very solid. Just twice he was out of the top-10 in scoring by defensemen - and he was 12th both times. In total, it went 12, 7, 2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 2, 7, 10, 12, 7, 3. Evil Speaker, I know you have easier access to these numbers than I do - how many defensemen have been top-2 five times or more? And while you're at it, how many have been top-3 seven times or more?
BM67 likes this metric a lot and I am starting to use it more too. During Quackenbush's career, he was 2nd in scoring by defensemen:
Kelly 367
Quackenbush 282
Harvey 270
Gadsby 252
Thomson 211
Egan 182
Bouchard 169
Mortson 161
Goldham 160
Harmon 132
He didn't win a cup, but he was still 4th in playoff points during that time as well:
Kelly 35
Harvey 33
Bouchard 29
Quackenbush 21
Thomson 15
Harmon 14
St. Laurent 14
I seem to recall a few others mentioning his name on more than a couple occasions during the top-100 process last time. He'll have one more in his corner this time around.