ted2019
History of Hockey
There will always be some people who rank Howe #1, #2, or #3. And if you were to poll only people aged 80+, a majority might say Howe is #1. That age group would certainly be very favourable to Gordie.
But, right now, I think a majority of the entire hockey world would have Howe at #4. And among the younger half of the hockey world, Howe is behind Lemieux by quite a significant margin.
I don't think it makes any sense that this is going to change.
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Lemieux obviously has a lot going for him. But one of the biggest pluses for him is that he's the most recent megastar in the sport. Everybody knows how dominant he was as a scorer. And everybody knows that nobody has approached his dominance since he played.
How long will it be before another player of Lemieux's caliber comes along? Connor McDavid is 32 years younger than Lemieux, and it doesnt look like McDavid is going to do it.
The longer we go without a super-dominant player, the better Lemieux looks.
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If Crosby has 5 more elite seasons, I think most people will have him ahead of Howe. But Crosby will never, for the vast majority of people, get to Lemieux.
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Mr. Hockey
Gordie might be Mr. Hockey to those of us who are really into hockey. But, to the general population, he's not. Gretzky is.
Gretzky is both Mr. Hockey and hockey's equivalent to Babe Ruth.
Gretzky is untouchable at #1, probably for a hundred years.
This hurts Howe a little bit (but not very much).
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In Gretzky's shadow
Lemieux was in Gretzky's shadow in the sense that Lemieux is 4 years younger, and also because Gretzky was the biggest "star" in the history of the sport.
But this also helps Lemieux (a lot, I would say), in the minds of most people, because for the large majority of their common seasons, Lemieux was either in the same ballpark as Gretzky, or about the same in quality, or better. Really, from CC '87 onward.
I'm pretty sure a few voters in the previous top 100 player voting had Gordie at #1.