Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Preliminary Discussion Thread (Revenge of Michael Myers)

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quoipourquoi

Goaltender
Jan 26, 2009
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I think it's some BS from the writers since Goalies and Defensemen have their own award.

They should make a Norris/Vezina equivalent for forwards and then clarify that the Hart means "Most valuable"

I’m not asking for an interpretation of voter mentality though. Just a year and a defenseman. It shouldn’t be like pulling teeth every time the anti-defenseman Hart conspiracy comes up to get people to say Paul Coffey should have been a Hart nominee in 1995. Al MacInnis should have been a Hart nominee in 2003.

Because if none of you would have named Nicklas Lidstrom a top-3 player in any individual season, then don’t complain that the media didn’t, don’t complain that the players didn’t, and don’t try to sell me on a theory that a positional voting record should necessarily translate to a different Hart record. Luc Robitaille was a 5x 1st Team and 3x 2nd Team All-Star and it means nothing other than his standing relative to LWs.
 
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seventieslord

Student Of The Game
Mar 16, 2006
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So a few points -

One - Roloson was a journeyman but he was posting almost .930 in those playoffs behind a not very good team. If the Oilers win, he would have been in the discussion (him or Pronger) for the Conn Smythe. He was also excellent for Tampa when he played for us in the playoffs, but that was like 7 years later so I understand why it doesn't rate. But he was a good playoff goaltender - he just didn't get a lot of shots to show it.

Giguere - there's some revisionism in play with your analysis there. He had 8 straight seasons of plus .910 goaltending (that ended the following year), was four times top ten in Vezina voting (including that season), and of course has a Smythe to his name. Additionally he was posting a .922 save percentage in those playoffs while allowing fewer than 2 goals a game. Now obviously a lot of that had to do with the strong defense (including the defensive forwards who were stellar) in front of him, but those aren't the numbers of a guy that got "dragged" anywhere.

And Leighton...

Yeah, he ****ing sucked.

Can we please all agree not to cite crappy marginal votes for awards as being useful in any way from this point forward?

I knew as soon as you said "four times top 10 for the Vezina" that I wouldn't like what I found when I fact checked it.

8th place with two third place votes.
9th place with one second place vote.
9th place with a second and a third.

Please just don't do this, everyone.
 

seventieslord

Student Of The Game
Mar 16, 2006
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I get what you're saying. But I'm the last guy that you're going to find save pct. mattering for...

The whole thing about save percentage and what it does and doesn't correlate to is going to have to be addressed eventually. One side is going to have to admit defeat on this.
 

BenchBrawl

Registered User
Jul 26, 2010
30,910
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You're on a mission, I am not. I'd give this a little bit more thought, with all due respect.

Or we just let sleeping dogs lie. You don't like Lidstrom, you do like Pronger and we can mumble about each other under our respective breath and not worry about trying to convince each other...#RedTie #BlueTie

I'm not on a mission.Why say I don't like Lidstrom because I question his top level of play? I'm not a terribly biased person, but yeah I have my preferences in how I rank players, like everyone else.

The thing is Lidstrom has been (somewhat) consensually ranked #5 among defensemen, and now apparently Top 20 among all players(?), and to question that status quo is harder than defending it.
 

MXD

Original #4
Oct 27, 2005
50,844
16,591
Can we please all agree not to cite crappy marginal votes for awards as being useful in any way from this point forward?

I knew as soon as you said "four times top 10 for the Vezina" that I wouldn't like what I found when I fact checked it.

8th place with two third place votes.
9th place with one second place vote.
9th place with a second and a third.

Please just don't do this, everyone.

TBH, in that case, marginal votes are useful to show what he was showing, which is, that JS Giguère was better than a shooting tutor.
 
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The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
48,862
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I get what you're saying. But I'm the last guy that you're going to find save pct. mattering for...the point is, those players may have been good in that moment, but the point is, they generally weren't good not in those moments...it's weird that all three of them had noteworthy playoffs (Giguere has 2003 as well, of course) with Pronger managing things for them...and then didn't do diddly-poo for all or nearly all of the rest of their careers...
Save percentage, GAA - flawed stats for sure. But based on available data they're what I have, and even if they aren't themselves convincing, it's rare you'll find players with *good* GAA/save percentage that were outright bad.

And - to your point that they only had noteworthy playoffs with Pronger - I just don't think that's true. JSG was clearly considered - if not outright elite - then at least very good based on his Vezina voting record, already had a Smythe (which involved one of the most impressive playoff series' of all time by a goaltender against the Red Wings), a handful of years prior. With him, we only have 4 data points for his playoff performance, and two of those runs were Smythe-worthy. I don't see how you can give all of the credit to Pronger with a straight face (especially considering how insanely deep that Ducks team was).

Roloson had 2011 with the Lightning, where he was behind a D of Ohlund, Eric Brewer, a baby-giraffe Victor Hedman, Brett Clarke, Ryan Jones(!), and Marc-Andre Bergeron (which I'm sure gave Roloson some flashbacks). There's not a Pronger-level player in the bunch (Hedman is now, but wasn't then).

Neither of these guys had a lot of opportunity to show it in the playoffs, but both had 4 runs, and both had 2 runs that were great (with one of those sans-Pronger).

All of this is to say that I understand why Pronger gets some bonus points for his post-lockout playoffs. I think it's a bit exaggerated, but fine (same with his Hart, frankly). But it becomes the thing where the *legend* of these runs outstrips the reality to a huge degree, and hearing stuff like "Pronger shows that Lids wasn't *really* that great" from BeachBrawl in what should be a discussion based on facts rather than hype really f***ing bothers me. I knock Lidstrom a bit from where you would expect based on his Norris record because I think his quality of competition was *very* low (not another top-50 player in competition for his Norris wins outside of his first which was a last season Bourque), but at the same time he was head and shoulders the best D of that era, and he deserves respect for that.
 

Michael Farkas

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The whole thing about save percentage and what it does and doesn't correlate to is going to have to be addressed eventually. One side is going to have to admit defeat on this.

Meh, maybe...I mean, let's say it's not tied directly to volume somehow...are we going to pretend like it's tied to talent all of a sudden (well, estupidos already do this) and not account for team effects and the like? I mean, the Tim Thomas example is glaring...garbage tendy, has insane numbers behind Chara/Bergeron/Julien has fringe NHL numbers outside of there...

We can't just pretend that he practiced really extra hard in Boston and just didn't care before or after that...at the end of the day, I can't imagine a scenario where save pct. is going to matter to me anyway...just like plus/minus doesn't matter to most or like wins don't matter to most or whatever...

I'm just trying to bury it by tying it to volume so we can stop pretending that GAA and wins are team stats but save pct. isn't somehow...
 

The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
48,862
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TBH, in that case, marginal votes are useful to show what he was showing, which is, that JS Giguère was better than a shooting tutor.
I'm not saying JSG is on my list or anything. I'm saying acting like he's getting dragged around by Pronger's manly prowess alone doesn't really fit with how he was viewed at the time, and the current arguments are based on attempts to elevate Pronger (especially with his mediocre Norris voting record).
 

BenchBrawl

Registered User
Jul 26, 2010
30,910
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Looking back at my list, I had Brodeur, Sakic and Lidstrom back-to-back-to-back in some order.Recalling the general vibe and opinion when they were playing, I don't see this as treating Lidstrom unfairly.
 
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MXD

Original #4
Oct 27, 2005
50,844
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Meh, maybe...I mean, let's say it's not tied directly to volume somehow...are we going to pretend like it's tied to talent all of a sudden (well, estupidos already do this) and not account for team effects and the like? I mean, the Tim Thomas example is glaring...garbage tendy, has insane numbers behind Chara/Bergeron/Julien has fringe NHL numbers outside of there...

We can't just pretend that he practiced really extra hard in Boston and just didn't care before or after that...at the end of the day, I can't imagine a scenario where save pct. is going to matter to me anyway...just like plus/minus doesn't matter to most or like wins don't matter to most or whatever...

I'm just trying to bury it by tying it to volume so we can stop pretending that GAA and wins are team stats but save pct. isn't somehow...

Thomas wasn't great before Julien/Chara/Bergeron because his style scared coaches and because he wasn't suuuper consistent to begin with(one possibly explaing the other). And he wasn't great afterwards because he was ancient. And he wasn't even consistent in Boston either.
 

VanIslander

A 19-year ATDer on HfBoards
Sep 4, 2004
35,395
6,529
South Korea
... I don't see how you can give all of the credit to Pronger with a straight face...
I give as much credit to Michael Peca.

That team lacked scoring, many said, with scoring by committee being necessary. But defensively it was talented. I remember getting real excited and calling them a contender immediately after hearing Pronger AND Peca were traded for.
 

Michael Farkas

Celebrate 68
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Save percentage, GAA - flawed stats for sure. But based on available data they're what I have, and even if they aren't themselves convincing, it's rare you'll find players with *good* GAA/save percentage that were outright bad.

This is a lay-up...Roman Cechmanek, Tim Thomas, Brian Elliott...horrific goalies.

And - to your point that they only had noteworthy playoffs with Pronger - I just don't think that's true. JSG was clearly considered - if not outright elite - then at least very good based on his Vezina voting record,

None of this is right, in my opinion. Nor did he have a Vezina voting record.

I don't see how you can give all of the credit to Pronger with a straight face (especially considering how insanely deep that Ducks team was).

All? No. We're talking about Pronger, not the '07 Ducks. This was a macro level discussion..."look, Pronger jumped from team to team and kept on delivering Campbell Bowls and Wales Trophies...and look, he did it with absolute mutants behind him too" I get that Pronger played with Neids and King Beauch, plus the real Smythe winner that year - Samuel Pahlsson.

Roloson had 2011 with the Lightning, where he was behind a D of Ohlund, Eric Brewer, a baby-giraffe Victor Hedman, Brett Clarke, Ryan Jones(!), and Marc-Andre Bergeron (which I'm sure gave Roloson some flashbacks). There's not a Pronger-level player in the bunch (Hedman is now, but wasn't then).

Great. Two non-consecutive runs in 20 years (15?). Both muted at the same time: short of winning a single Final game. I'm not saying Roloson's bad...I'm just saying he's irrelevant.

Neither of these guys had a lot of opportunity to show it in the playoffs, but both had 4 runs, and both had 2 runs that were great (with one of those sans-Pronger).

Opportunity is made by being good. Don't suck and you'll make the playoffs more, as a general rule...sometimes situations are just untenable (mid to late 80's Jets/Flames or whatever), but these guys bounced around enough to make a break for themselves and, generally, they weren't good enough...

All of this is to say that I understand why Pronger gets some bonus points for his post-lockout playoffs. I think it's a bit exaggerated, but fine (same with his Hart, frankly). But it becomes the thing where the *legend* of these runs outstrips the reality to a huge degree, and hearing stuff like "Pronger shows that Lids wasn't *really* that great" from BeachBrawl in what should be a discussion based on facts rather than hype really ****ing bothers me. I knock Lidstrom a bit from where you would expect based on his Norris record because I think his quality of competition was *very* low (not another top-50 player in competition for his Norris wins outside of his first which was a last season Bourque), but at the same time he was head and shoulders the best D of that era, and he deserves respect for that.

I think that's fair, and if that's all you're trying to say, I don't think it's an entirely disagreeable point...and as someone who is apparently on Team Lidstrom today, I guess I should just come right out and endorse it...

Maybe we aren't familiar with each other enough yet, but you could have just come right out with this paragraph and it would have been understood on intent...trying to sell me on Giguere being anything but a league average goaltender is just distracting from your point, I also hate that a search for him on this forum will produce this thread now... :laugh:
 
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Michael Farkas

Celebrate 68
Jun 28, 2006
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I really liked watching Tim Thomas play in those Montreal vs Boston wars.

If you like goals, it sure did. Montreal knew how to beat him, even with limited talent. Should have won in the 2011 ECQF and squashed that whole thing...Kostitsyn just about ended it on a harmless wrist shot late too...pity that...

But moving on to relevant players........also, I should probably do some work today while I'm in the office. It's 1 pm and I've done almost nothing...
 

blogofmike

Registered User
Dec 16, 2010
2,201
953
1962. First and only 70 game season from Plante. First and only MVP from Plante. First 1st Team AS award for Plante since 1959.

Habs don't win a playoff series after Harvey leaves in 1961 until 1965.

They lost in Round 1 with Harvey in 1961, and after 1960 their playoff opponents started to have winning records, which was a rarity for the last few years of that Habs dynasty. I give more credit for GA prevention to Plante than I do to Harvey. Plante's injury saw a spike in GA. His return, even after losing Harvey, saw a GA decline.
 

The Macho King

Back* to Back** World Champion
Jun 22, 2011
48,862
29,467
I think that's fair, and if that's all you're trying to say, I don't think it's an entirely disagreeable point...and as someone who is apparently on Team Lidstrom today, I guess I should just come right out and endorse it...

Maybe we aren't familiar with each other enough yet, but you could have just come right out with this paragraph and it would have been understood on intent...trying to sell me on Giguere being anything but a league average goaltender is just distracting from your point, I also hate that a search for him on this forum will produce this thread now... :laugh:
All I was saying was that the goaltending behind him wasn't bad (and Rolson was hot as shit during his run in 06). I think I got sidetracked on tire pumping the Michelin Man as a result (which wasn't my intention).
 

seventieslord

Student Of The Game
Mar 16, 2006
36,210
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Regina, SK
Meh, maybe...I mean, let's say it's not tied directly to volume somehow...are we going to pretend like it's tied to talent all of a sudden (well, estupidos already do this) and not account for team effects and the like?

Thought exercise: These are the 20 goaltenders with the most minutes played since the 1999-2000 season. I don't want you to spend much time on it but can you please rank them, in order, based on your perception of their level of talent, specifically in the 1999-2018 period?


I'm just trying to bury it by tying it to volume so we can stop pretending that GAA and wins are team stats but save pct. isn't somehow...

You can find examples of me saying before, that since the lockout it seems that high save percentages seem to follow around certain coaches more than certain goalies. I understand that.

It's still putting one's head in the sand to pretend that sv% is equally as team-dependent as wins and GAA. Just because two things are team-dependent doesn't mean they are equally so.

Take a goalie's error rate (1 minus their save percentage) and multiply by their workload (SA/60) and you have their GAA. You take something that's somewhat team dependent (somewhat as in, we all agree that it's not 0% or 100% but somewhere in between, even if there's a very wide range of opinions there) and multiply it by something that we all agree is 98-100% team dependent (correct me if I'm mistaken in that assumption), you're naturally making the final result MUCH more team-influenced than the first number you started with. Anyone logical can admit that.

Now, if you think that one of those factors is correlated to the other, then the above paragraph can be brushed off rather easily. But that line of thinking is becoming less credible by the day, as it appears you're entering the acceptance stage with regards to that.
 

Michael Farkas

Celebrate 68
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They lost in Round 1 with Harvey in 1961, and after 1960 their playoff opponents started to have winning records, which was a rarity for the last few years of that Habs dynasty.

Huh? They won five straight Stanley Cups with him in command and lost in the first round once vs. after him, they didn't win a playoff series...what are we talking about here...?
 

quoipourquoi

Goaltender
Jan 26, 2009
10,123
4,127
Hockeytown, MI
he was head and shoulders the best D of that era, and he deserves respect for that.

This is how Nicklas Lidstrom gets overrated. Being the best defenseman of that era means that he should be added to the list before Chris Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, Rob Blake, and Sergei Zubov. He will be. He was ahead of all of them on my list too.

But it doesn’t speak to his standing relative to his contemporaries Jaromir Jagr, Dominik Hasek, Joe Sakic, Martin Brodeur, and Peter Forsberg - who were also better than all of Chris Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, Rob Blake, and Sergei Zubov.

So consider where we all have Jaromir Jagr and Chris Pronger on our lists. There’s a pretty big spectrum of players between the two where we can say that being the best defenseman of his era and being worse than Jaromir Jagr are not in conflict.
 
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Michael Farkas

Celebrate 68
Jun 28, 2006
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Thought exercise: These are the 20 goaltenders with the most minutes played since the 1999-2000 season. I don't want you to spend much time on it but can you please rank them, in order, based on your perception of their level of talent, specifically in the 1999-2018 period?



You can find examples of me saying before, that since the lockout it seems that high save percentages seem to follow around certain coaches more than certain goalies. I understand that.

It's still putting one's head in the sand to pretend that sv% is equally as team-dependent as wins and GAA. Just because two things are team-dependent doesn't mean they are equally so.

Take a goalie's error rate (1 minus their save percentage) and multiply by their workload (SA/60) and you have their GAA. You take something that's somewhat team dependent (somewhat as in, we all agree that it's not 0% or 100% but somewhere in between, even if there's a very wide range of opinions there) and multiply it by something that we all agree is 98-100% team dependent (correct me if I'm mistaken in that assumption), you're naturally making the final result MUCH more team-influenced than the first number you started with. Anyone logical can admit that.

Now, if you think that one of those factors is correlated to the other, then the above paragraph can be brushed off rather easily. But that line of thinking is becoming less credible by the day, as it appears you're entering the acceptance stage with regards to that.

This feels like a lot more than 20 goalies haha

I'd be happy to play along, but I also want to make sure I'm fishing in the right lake here...
 

seventieslord

Student Of The Game
Mar 16, 2006
36,210
7,369
Regina, SK
I'm not saying JSG is on my list or anything. I'm saying acting like he's getting dragged around by Pronger's manly prowess alone doesn't really fit with how he was viewed at the time.

but if you want to demonstrate how he was viewed at the time, you will have to do better than one Vezina vote in a season.
 
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