Is Alex Ovechkin a top 10 player of all time?

[Toby91ca]

The leading goal scorer in the history of the sport is by definition a top-10 player.

Huh? Can you point me to that definition?

 

[Hockey Outsider]

The "Ovechkin had a bad season at age 26" argument is so obviously biased. It applies to nearly every forward after the big three:

• Jaromir Jagr, at age 30 and 31, was considered a massive disappointment. (He was a disappointment at age 29 too, but at least you could argue that it was due to him transitioning to a new team and dealing with some nagging injuries). That's why Washington traded the five time Art Ross winner for hardly anything, and they even had to retain part of his salary.
• Maurice Richard, at age 27, scored 38 points in 59 games. (The season was 60 games long back then).
• Howie Morenz, at age 26, scored 27 points in 42 games - half his total from the year before and after. (The season was 44 games long).
• Bobby Hull, at age 22, scored 56 points. (He missed three of the 70 games on the schedule). This was sandwiched between two years where he led the league in goals and points.
• It's hard to nitpick Jean Beliveau very much (which is one of the reasons I rank him 5th). But he didn't have an all-star calibre season until he was 23. At the same age, Ovechkin already had two Hart trophies.
• Guy Lafleur had maybe the greatest six-year peak of any forward after the big three. But he accomplished very little outside of those six years (which includes four seasons in his 20's).
• Maybe I'm going too far down the all-time list, but Bryan Trottier scored 59 points at age 28 (playing in the high-scoring mid 1980's). He missed 12 games, but still not a good showing.

Here's a question. Would Ovechkin have been a better player if he didn't play through injuries, and he sat out 40 games in 2012? It (maybe) would have preserved his points per game, but he clearly would have contributed less value to his team.

 

[WarriorofTime]

The convo that people aren't ready to have is that it's extremely unlikely that like 9 out of the 25 or so greatest players ever were all born between 1961-1965. Same thing going on with NBA players today, people struggle to contextualize for era.

 

[Midnight Judges]

No - there isn't. You're full of shit on that one, and have been called out on it multiple times.

But when all else fails - I guess propaganda is the way to go. Lies, lies and more lies by you. Par for the course in a thread about Ovechkin.

I was vindicated on this. You guys asked him to respond and the guy doubled down on his claim that he would take Getzlaf over Ovechkin.

You are misremembering.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Does him scoring 900+ goals cement him in the top 10?

Don't bump three-year-old polls when the answer to the question being asked has changed meaningfully.