Round 2, Vote 8 (HOH Top Defensemen)

[TheDevilMadeMe]

More on Ching Johnson via hfboards poster Canadiens Fan

A moment later Ching Johnson stopped Bruneteau's drive ... Ching Johnson carried the puck the length of the ice ... Ching Johnson got in to stop Mackie's drive from right wing on a rush with Wally Kilrea.

All teams ... get away with as much interference as possible and, naturally, some of them are more proficent than others. Occasionally erring players are penalized and games are lost during their absence but even under these conditions it has been profitable to adhere to the nuisance. We think that the Ranger defensemen have always been past masters in this art, with good natured Ching Johnson as the ace performer.

Most of this interference occurs near the boards, preferably at the end of the ice surface, and is overlooked ninety percent of the time - at least by the officials. Defensemen will hold or shove attackers into the boards, knowing that as a general rule, the worst they can get out of it is a face-off in their own zone. We remember one night in Madison Square Garden when Johnson held the late Howie Morenz helpless against the side of the rink. The whistle roared to signify a penalty but in that fraction of a second Morenz hit his big tormentor on the top of his nearly bald head. Ching was chased as well as hurt, but he thought that was all right when Morenz received a major. We mention this incident as only one of the many numerous ones in the career of Ching Johnson.

Seems pinning a forward against the boards was commonplace in the era, rarely called a penalty, and frustrated the hell out of the opposition. And Ching Johnson was the master of this tactic.

Here's a hilarious anecdote about Ching Johnson and Eddie Shore. Seems like Shore was quite the diver (something I think I read before)

There is much joy around Madison Square Garden today. Ching Johnson, the great Ranger defenseman, has signed a contract and will chase the puck again while his supporters cheer and his enemies jeer... There is not a better natured hockeyist in existence than the amaible Ching but he has an unusual way of checking which confounds his critics and upsets his opponents. "Elbows" Harry Broadbent never had anything on Johnson the latter being most playful in the art of using his arms to ward off attackers. But "it's all fun" as far as Johnson is concerned and even opposing players are among his most loyal admirers. [Johnson can take the bumps as well as deliver them, and he stepped into many terrific jolts, most of them engineered by the Bruins at Boston, where they would willingly play $10,000 to keep Johnson out of hockey. The latter invariably has selected Eddie Shore as his body-checking victim, and the moans and groans of disapproval in the Hub have been something out of the ordinary. Shore is a great player. He is colorful. In Boston he is an idol and he knows how to play to the gallery. His specialty is falling to the ice, as if in tremendous pain. So Johnson, an obliging sort of player, has helped along the hero act by upsetting Shore at every opportunity. May the good work continue.

 

[Pear Juice]

This has been far and away the most difficult round for me so far. At least 4 of the newly added candidates are likely to make my top 6. I'm also starting to notice some of the apparent mistakes I've made on my original list, in hindsight, I should have placed Ching much higher, but that's the benefit of having two rounds.

I also realized a while ago that I made an unfortunate mixup when I sent in my original list, resulting in Hod Stuart placing very much lower than I intended, to the benefit of another early era player. Correcting for this mixup, my highest unplaced player is currently 37th, as this round solved some issues I had with two lingering players from the 20s.

 

[tarheelhockey]

This has been far and away the most difficult round for me so far.

For me too, and I think part of it is that we're seeing less separation between the players top to bottom. Being ranked #50 vs #40 isn't as huge a jump as it sounds, and could happen to two players who are basically equal when compared head-to-head. That wasn't the case early in the project.

 

[MXD]

I'm just curious if there is anyone from your list that has risen or fell in your order of rankings in the voting in this process?

Oh sure.
I had Chara and Ching Johnson way too low. I had Buck Boucher a tad too high, amongst others.

I'm just going by the list I submitted. I'm not doing a 2nd list over the 1st one...

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

It's not much, but this is the best footage I've seen of Suchy:



First off, if anyone has any questions about the quality of hockey at the World Championships at the time, watch the whole video. Footage from the first 2 minutes are from the 1963 WCs. At 2:00, you get footage from 1969, which is when Suchy played. Just from this video, it appears to me the pace in 1969 was already much higher than in 1963.

Fast forward to 3:10 in for footage from the famous 1969 Czech win over the Soviets. This is the game they won 2-0 (they would win the second game 4-3). Suchy is #17. He's the guy on the far (left) point on what looks like a powerplay and he ends up scoring the first goal of the game after sneaking in from the point on a rebound. This is this famous goal:

In the footage from game one, after defenceman Jan Suchy had given CSSR a 1-0-lead, one can see how Jaroslav Holik taunts Soviet goaltender Viktor Zinger after the goal, poking his stick repeatedly at Zinger’s face, calling him a “bloody communist”. Holik even put hockey tape over the Czechoslovak crest on his jersey, covering the star that symbolized the country’s allegiance to the Warsaw Pact.

On Czechoslovakia's second goal, Suchy grabs the puck in the defensive zone, is double-teamed by two Soviets and springs a perfect outlet pass leading to a 2-on-1 Czech goal.

Here's a video that focuses more on the historical ramifications of the game than the hockey itself. It has a good closeup on the jersey insignia that Jaroslav found so offensive. Jaroslav Holik is Bobby Holik's father by the way.



Here's an excerpt from an article about the 1969 World Championship games between the USSR and CSSR.

There is absolutely no doubt that the most emotionally charged games in the history of international hockey were the two between Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union in the 1969 IIHF World Championship in Stockholm. These were two games which the Czechoslovaks simply could not lose.

“We said to ourselves, even if we have to die on the ice, we have to beat them,” said team captain Jozef Golonka in an interview many years later. “We received hundreds of telegrams from fans back home when we arrived in Stockholm. Almost all of them said: ‘Beat the Soviets. You don’t have to beat anyone else. Just beat the Soviets.’”

Canadian goaltender and future Hall of Famer Ken Dryden made his first international appearance in that championship: “Even though this was my first and only World Championships, the only thing I or anyone else remembers about them were the Soviet-Czechoslovakian games. They were fantastic.”

http://www.iihf.com/iihf-home/the-iihf/100-year-anniversary/100-top-stories/story-18.html

 

[begbeee]

OMG, the immortal story of Jozef Golonka He is very famous person, often you can see him in many TV shows and all he is doing is telling this story again and again and again and again
I swear he is the only one person in whole world who is every month in TV with the same story.. how he defended Firsov.

Seriously, it's such a great moment in our history, it's not hockey related but I can not post it:

One of the greatest moment in our sports history, watch about 2:20, I almost cry everytime I watch it.

 

[Hardyvan123]

There is a good link about some early 00's players here including a bit on Hod.

http://hockeyhistorysis.blogspot.com/

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

There is a good link about some early 00's players here including a bit on Hod.

http://hockeyhistorysis.blogspot.com/

I have a lot of respect for Iain's research, but I'm not sure about that formula. Just from the list of names, it seems like an awfully strong emphasis is placed on accumulating accomplishments. I wouldn't be surprised if such a formula would rank Bourque, Lidstrom, and possibly Chelios over Orr.

I might be misinterpreting the formula, but that's what it looks like at first glance.

I mean, when literally every source we have from the period says that Hod Stuart was the best defenseman of the era, and someone comes up with a formula that ranks him well below Harvey Pulford, I question its utility. The formula is good for what it does (assign a numerical value to accomplishments and add them up), but that's not how I rank defensemen.

Edit: I asked Iain about it on his blog.

 

[Hardyvan123]

I have a lot of respect for Iain's research, but I'm not sure about that formula. Just from the list of names, it seems like an awfully strong emphasis is placed on accumulating accomplishments. I wouldn't be surprised if such a formula would rank Bourque, Lidstrom, and possibly Chelios over Orr.

I might be misinterpreting the formula, but that's what it looks like at first glance.

At this point, any information up for debate in this round and it's getting really hard to compare a guy like Moose Johnson to Larry Murphy (both are very good but not elite players who played for a very long time.)

Ching Johnson and Chara are being weighed as well as they have somewhat similar games.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

At this point, any information up for debate in this round and it's getting really hard to compare a guy like Moose Johnson to Larry Murphy (both are very good but not elite players who played for a very long time.)

Ching Johnson and Chara are being weighed as well as they have somewhat similar games.

Yeah, it does indicate that Hod Stuart's longevity wasn't all that impressive (certainly nothing close to Harvey Pulford). But we already knew that as he died at the age of 27.

 

[Hardyvan123]

Voted.

I was somewhat comfortable with my 1st 4 picks and the 5th guy with the info I have.

Last 5 guys I would probably switch the order 9 different times in a week as all of them have their plus sides and downside at this point in the rankings.

 

[Hardyvan123]

I have a lot of respect for Iain's research, but I'm not sure about that formula. Just from the list of names, it seems like an awfully strong emphasis is placed on accumulating accomplishments. I wouldn't be surprised if such a formula would rank Bourque, Lidstrom, and possibly Chelios over Orr.

I might be misinterpreting the formula, but that's what it looks like at first glance.

I mean, when literally every source we have from the period says that Hod Stuart was the best defenseman of the era, and someone comes up with a formula that ranks him well below Harvey Pulford, I question its utility. The formula is good for what it does (assign a numerical value to accomplishments and add them up), but that's not how I rank defensemen.

It looks like they are counting points for every season so a good guy with a long career will have more points than a great guy with a shorter career. It's just a variation of the peak, prime, career debate.

IMO Hod is clearly the best Dman of that decade, it's the decade that I have some problems weighing.

In the end I took a middle of the road approach to him as I've been quite up front with my preference in separating the rankings pre and post WW2 but this project is for all time so I had to figure out a way to rank everyone somehow anyways.

I'm guessing other people are having similar problems at this stage of the rankings?

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Votes received from: BiLLYShOE1721; Canadiens1958; DaveG; Dennis Bonvie; Epsilon; Hawkey Town 18;
Hardyvan123; intylerwetrust; MXD; ; overpass; pappyline; reckoning; seventieslord; TheDevilMadeMe; tony D; tarheelhockey; VanIslander

Need votes from: chaosrevolver; Der Kaiser; Dreakmur; Hockey Outsider; JaysCyYoung; McNuts

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

I will be voting later today. This is a very tough round.

This hadn't happened up to this point in the project for me, but IMO there are guys available to be voted in for the first time that should've been ahead of some of the guys we put in the round prior...

It's throwing me off, because I think certain players should be relatively close to each other in the rankings, but they won't be now because some will get left behind from these new guy leap-frogging.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I'm guessing other people are having similar problems at this stage of the rankings?

At this stage I'm running into a few common problems:

- peak vs longetivity
- dominance in a weak era vs merely being competitive in a strong era
- dominance in a non-NHL context vs merely being competitive in the NHL
- complimentary to a strong team vs one-man show on a weak team

Almost all my tough decisions fall into those categories.

 

[Hardyvan123]

At this stage I'm running into a few common problems:

- peak vs longetivity
- dominance in a weak era vs merely being competitive in a strong era
- dominance in a non-NHL context vs merely being competitive in the NHL
- complimentary to a strong team vs one-man show on a weak team

Almost all my tough decisions fall into those categories.

Pretty much the same problems then throw in a couple of guys who have very impressive playoff resumes but weren't elite in the regular season.