2018 ATD Finals! Pittsburgh Bankers (1) vs New York Americans (2)

[ImporterExporter]

Forwards:


-I think Pittsburgh has a decided advantage here.


First Lines:

Looking at the first lines Pittsburgh comes out on top for me whether looking collectively or individually. We'll start off with scoring acumen and go from there.

Gretzky - 155.6
Foyston - 78.4 (Consolidated NHA/PCHA 7 year score via Dreakmur)
Martinec - ?

vs

Mikita - 107.8
Kariya - 84.9
Mikhailov - ?

-As in any series Gretzky's going to give the Bankers a big leg up as a scoring unit. He's flat out the most dominant offensive player in history by a wide margin be it regular or postseason. Consider if he doesn't score a single goal in his career he's still the all time points leader. That's mind boggling. And in the postseason he's got almost 100 more points than 2nd place (Messier) and more than 150 that of 3rd (Kurri). Mikita is actually one of the better scoring C's of all time but even he can't come close to matching the pace of Gretzky and is nowhere remotely close in terms of postseason production or peak play.

Kariya obviously gives the Americans a slight edge at LW in terms of scoring (regular season) but that's about the only advantage he has. Foyston is an all time great playoff performer, Kariya is not. Kariya offers no value defensively or in the way of checking/physical play. Foyston does. If you're looking at the overall package and for a player that is going to rise to the occasion this really isn't a contest. But for all intents and purposes we'll call this a wash as both players are generally drafted close to one another and I'm inclined to say Kariya was superior in the regular season while Foyston much more so in the postseason.

Now we get to the fun part. Mikhailov and Martinec. I think this is quite close in all reality. Martinec, to me is one of the most underrated players in the ATD, and I've thought that since did an incredible bio on him, and Batis (along with a few other European HoH members) really shined a light on his defensive and PK abilities. I'm not going to sell Martinec as Mikhailov's equal but it IS c fairly close match up especially when you factor in the international stage and Martinec's dominance there. This is another comparison where I think you have to say Mikhailov was the better domestic player but Martinec was every bit as good, if not better (especially considering he didn't play for a loaded USSR team) than Mikhailov in major tournaments.

At the end of the day Mikhailov gets the advantage here but it's not a big one IMO.

Thanks to TDMM's thorough breakdown of Martinec we have more than enough to make this battle come out much closer than people might think on the surface: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/threads/round-2-vote-8-hoh-top-wingers.1775699/page-2#post-92733299

I. Martinec looks to have peaked higher in international play than Boris Mikhailov or Alexander Maltsev

A. Martinec was the All-Star RW at the World Championships 4 straight years in the middle of the primes of all three (1974, 1975, 1976, 1977)

-Mikhailov was only an All-Star at the WCs twice (1973, 1979)
-Maltsev was an All-Star at the WC in 70, 71, 72, 78, 81 - The gap in the middle is Martinec's prime.

B. Martinec was the best player in the WCs in 1976, competing against prime Mikhailov, Maltsev, and all the 70s Soviet greats

1) Martinec was the top scorer in at the 1976 World Championships, with 20 points in 10 games.

2) He was voted the best forward at the 1976 World Championships

C. The Soviets feared Martinec so much that they felt the need to take him out in the 1974 WCs, similar to what Clarke did to Kharlamov in the Summit Series.

D. Czechoslovakia was almost as good as the USSR during Martinec's prime and he was the best Czech skater at the time.

1) During the course of Martinec's international career (71-77), the Czechs won 3/7 World Championships (72, 76, 77), and were 5-7-3 against the Soviets overall.

Even before then, the Czechs were apparently right up there with the Soviets:
From 66-72, the Czechs were 12-11-2 against the USSR and 5-5-2 in "meaningful games." Source.

2) Martinec was considered the best Czech player at the time.

a) He won 3 of 4 "Golden Stick" awards for best Czechoslovakian player during this time (73, 75, 76). Goalie Jiri Holocek won in 74.

b) Overall, Martinec won 4 Golden Stick awards (73, 75, 76, 79) - the most ever until Jagr and Hasek.

3. Martinec is the All-Time leading Czechoslovakian scorer in "major international" tournaments by a wide margin.

■135 pts 69 goals 66 assists 115 appearances Vladimir MARTINEC
■113 pts – 60 g – 53 a – 117 appearances — Jiri HOLIK
■110 pts – 78 g – 32 a – 111 appearances — Vaclav NEDOMANSKY (all before '74)
■104 pts – 53 g – 51 a – 114 appearances— Ivan HLINKA

4) Nedomansky defected after the 74 WCs. Martinec was undisputed star forward for the Czech National Team afterwards.

II. Maltsev and Mikhailov have slight longevity advantages.

A. Martinec seems to have been a star player from 1971 (when he first joined the national team) to 1979 (his last golden stick win. I believe he led the Czech league in goals that year for the first time, finally playing on a good team).

B. Mikhailov seems to have been a star from 69-80 and Maltsev seems to have been a star from from 69-81.
http://hfboards.com/showthread.php?t=565254

C. Maltsev might have been at his best from 70-72 and Mikhailov might have been at his best from 78-80.

D. This isn’t a huge longevity advantage, but its enough to probably make the three players about even in offensive value.

III. Intangibles and other considerations

A. Mikhailov oozes intangibles in a way that perhaps no other non-NHL Euro ever did.

B. Martinec and Maltsev are not known for much besides offense.

C. Martinec and Maltsev were both likely above average defensively, but I haven’t seen anything definitive.

D. One big difference between Maltsev and Martinec is that Maltsev has shown that he didn’t handle physical play very well. Whereas Martinec always bounced right back when physically abused (except when deliberately injured in 1974, but he can hardly be faulted for that:



Conclusion and All-Time rankings:

Martinec looks to have peaked higher internationally while Maltsev and Mikahilov had greater longevity as top scorers.

Mikhailov definitely beats the other two in intangibles. Martinec and Maltsev are about the same.

If Mikhailov is the 20th best winger of all-time, what does that make Martinec, who looks to have been better in his peak/prime in the international arena, but doesn't quite have the longevity, and definitely doesn't have the grit?

Where should Martinec be ranked in relation to Alexander Maltsev, considering again, Martinec looks to have been better in his peak/prime in the international arena, without quite having the longevity? Martinec wasn't known as gritty, but he seems to have handled physical play quite well.

By the way, Mikhailov and Maltsev were the two players with unusually good longevity as top scorers for the Soviets, so having less longevity than them isn't necessarily a bad thing (Martinec's prime looks at first glance to have been slightly longer than Kharlamov's).

Here's a great quote from VMBM on Martinec

I reckon his defensive play was one of those "areas" that "everyone" talked about?

Vladimír Martinec. He is one of our most wittiest hockey players. By two assists on goals he contributed a great deal to the victory over USSR. He attacks and defends very well, has an intuition for the game, he is a constructive player. If he gains better conditioning and experience yet, he can become the backbone of CSSR team

This (bolded) passage is also notable, and I remeber that poster Robert Gordon Orr already mentioned during the Non-NHL Europeans project that Martinec hated physical training (and was not maybe always in great condition). However, Martinec did become the backbone of Team CSSR, at least in 1974-77 (and good years beyond that too), even though I don't think his conditioning necessarily improved awfully lot in later years. This could also explain a little bit why his domestic numbers aren't as great as one might think.

At the end of the day, both 1st lines are loaded with offensive firepower, the Bankers more so thanks to Gretzky. Neither line will play great defense as the only plus defensive players on them are Foyston and maybe Mikita. Neither line is particularly heavy and certainly relies more on finesse but Foyston was very aggressive and Martinec, while not a big checker was arguably the most abused European of his time and handled it exceptionally well. Mikita and Mikhailov were "ornery". Gretzky, Foyston and Martinec is thoroughly dominant in the postseason/international realm vs the Americans top line.


2nd Lines:

-Another interesting match up. This one is tighter, let's take a look. Starting off with the scoring:

Stewart - 90.3
Giroux - 88.0 (100 this past full season at LW)
Broadbent - ?

vs

Stamkos - 88.4
Abel - 87.3
Gilbert - 83.1

From a scoring standpoint you have to give the Americans the advantage here because Gilbert is probably about 20-25 points superior to Broadbent, who doesn't have an official score because his career was prior to the consolidation point but I've guesstimated it to be roughly 55-60.

An interesting thing to note is both lines have a player in their secondary position. Giroux is coming off an elite 100 point season which was his first, full time at LW for the Flyers. Sid Abel's best years and most dominant period was at C on the production line between Lindsay and Howe (has any C ever had better wingers? I can't imagine so). Abel did manage 1 2nd team AS at left wing earlier in his career and I'd wager Giroux deserves/gets one for his elite season, as long as the voters don't just automatically toss him at C, which he didn't play (that'd be Coutourier). Both lines are well balanced, have a dominant goal getter (Stewart and Stamkos) and able facilitators (Giroux, Abel, Gilbert). The Bankers do possess a great deal more grit and physicality on their line. I do think the Americans top 6 can be pushed around some and you better believe that Gorman will have his checking lines doing a great deal of smart hitting when available.

Stewart was a 2 time Hart winner at C and had an elite all time season in 1925-26 all the way through being thoroughly dominant in the Cup finals. It's also important to note there is some real life chemistry here with Stewart and Broadbent who played 25-26 and 26-27 together on the same line for the Maroons so there is an added bonus in terms of cohesion.

Overall, I want to call this is a wash, but the Americans do possess a fairly large advantage in terms of pure scoring thank to RW, although the Bankers do have real life chemistry and more Cup winning experience on it. I absolutely rate Stewart above Stamkos all time, even before I unearthed the treasure trove of information regarding his defensive play and speed. Each line has 1 plus defensive player (Broadbent and Abel) although the advantage here overall is with the Bankers IMO. Giroux is at least average and Stewart as well after all the information I dug up on him was presented. But the Americans have the advantage on both wings in my estimation and that gives them a slight advantage overall.



3rd lines:
-I think we're back to seeing the Bankers on top here. Ted Kennedy is by far the best player on either line. We're talking about a borderline top 20 C ever. One of the all time great postseason performers. The only thing he really wasn't elite/great at was scoring and skating. He's one of the greatest players in the dot of all time. An elite checker, great defensive forward who also routinely killed penalties and obviously an elite leader with elite intangibles. I think he's about as perfect as you can get as a two way, checking line C to go up against Mikita. Mikita for the first portion of his career was prone to taking stupid penalties and Kennedy is exactly the type of guy who could draw those with his relentless checking and physical play. Plus he's got plenty of offense for a 3rd line C on the counter attack. I'm one of Kopitar's biggest fans and even with this years elite season is still a ways off from Kennedy all time. I think Kopitar has a chance to get to Kennedy's level if things go right but he's not there yet. Offensively they're almost dead even and I'd say defensively they are as well. But Kennedy's regular and postseason resume's are simply better. Better Hart finishes, AS finishes, and Kennedy was essentially an elite player on 5 SC winning teams vs 2 for Kopitar. He has simply done more but that's partially because Kopitar is still playing. Either way, it's an advantage for Pitt.

Ed Westfall is one of the all time great pure defensive wingers and PK'ers. He was so good he completely owned the likes of Bobby Hull in the playoffs and you better believe he'll be keeping a close eye on Mikhailov/Kariya. Ace Bailey provides a touch more offense and he's certainly a good to great defensive player (namely on the PK) but he's not on the level of Westfall who's routinely mentioned as the best ever in his own end, at ES or on the PK. Consider Westfall tied/led the playoffs in short handed goals 4 times and has a big advantage in terms of longevity, which is due to Bailey suffering a horrible career ending injury which is unfortunate because he would likely be ranked a good bit higher had he not been hurt so badly by Eddie Shore. Advantage Pittsburgh.

Sid Smith is a fairly underrated player all time IMO. He was a 3 time postseason AS (one 1st and two 2nds) and was there around the same time as guys like Ted Lindsay, Bert Olmstead, and Dickie Moore. Not shabby competition at LW. Rarely took penalties, was a decent scorer and all around player and like the 2nd line for the Bankers (Stewart/Broadbent) played the better part of a decade with or on the same line as Ted Kennedy (they won 3 titles together) so again Pittsburgh has some real life chemistry brewing. I do think Gordon Roberts is a touch better though simply because he was a bit more highly thought of during his days vs his peers in the PCHA and was a better overall scorer.

All in all I think this is a decent advantage for Pittsburgh, namely due to the depth at C and having a player like Ted Kennedy here. Westfall>Bailey and Roberts>Smith. Both lines are built to be two way units as far as i can see but both can absolutely handle a more pure checking role if needed.


4th lines:
-Like other series, this boils down to C depth. Getzlaf is miles better than Luce. I don't think there is much separating the wingers (Bourne and Paiement vs Balon and Russell). The Bankers have more of a two way checking line vs a pure defensive line from the Amerks. Because of Getzlaf >>Luce I see this as a decided advantage for Pittsburgh.


Overall:
-I think the Banker possess an advantage to one degree or another on the 1st, 3rd and 4th lines, while the Americans have a slight advantage on the 2nd.

 

[Dreakmur]

2nd Lines:

-Another interesting match up. This one is tighter, let's take a look. Starting off with the scoring:

Stewart - 90.3
Giroux - 88.0 (100 this past full season at LW)
Broadbent - ?

vs

Stamkos - 88.4
Abel - 87.3
Gilbert - 83.1

I have Broadbent with a 7 season score of 63.9.

 

[rmartin65]

First Lines:

Looking at the first lines Pittsburgh comes out on top for me whether looking collectively or individually. We'll start off with scoring acumen and go from there.

Gretzky - 155.6
Foyston - 78.4 (Consolidated NHA/PCHA 7 year score via Dreakmur)
Martinec - ?

vs

Mikita - 107.8
Kariya - 84.9
Mikhailov - ?

-As in any series Gretzky's going to give the Bankers a big leg up as a scoring unit. He's flat out the most dominant offensive player in history by a wide margin be it regular or postseason. Consider if he doesn't score a single goal in his career he's still the all time points leader. That's mind boggling. And in the postseason he's got almost 100 more points than 2nd place (Messier) and more than 150 that of 3rd (Kurri). Mikita is actually one of the better scoring C's of all time but even he can't come close to matching the pace of Gretzky and is nowhere remotely close in terms of postseason production or peak play.

Kariya obviously gives the Americans a slight edge at LW in terms of scoring (regular season) but that's about the only advantage he has. Foyston is an all time great playoff performer, Kariya is not. Kariya offers no value defensively or in the way of checking/physical play. Foyston does. If you're looking at the overall package and for a player that is going to rise to the occasion this really isn't a contest. But for all intents and purposes we'll call this a wash as both players are generally drafted close to one another and I'm inclined to say Kariya was superior in the regular season while Foyston much more so in the postseason.

Now we get to the fun part. Mikhailov and Martinec. I think this is quite close in all reality. Martinec, to me is one of the most underrated players in the ATD, and I've thought that since did an incredible bio on him, and Batis (along with a few other European HoH members) really shined a light on his defensive and PK abilities. I'm not going to sell Martinec as Mikhailov's equal but it IS c fairly close match up especially when you factor in the international stage and Martinec's dominance there. This is another comparison where I think you have to say Mikhailov was the better domestic player but Martinec was every bit as good, if not better (especially considering he didn't play for a loaded USSR team) than Mikhailov in major tournaments.

At the end of the day Mikhailov gets the advantage here but it's not a big one IMO.

Thanks to TDMM's thorough breakdown of Martinec we have more than enough to make this battle come out much closer than people might think on the surface: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/threads/round-2-vote-8-hoh-top-wingers.1775699/page-2#post-92733299



Here's a great quote from VMBM on Martinec


At the end of the day, both 1st lines are loaded with offensive firepower, the Bankers more so thanks to Gretzky. Neither line will play great defense as the only plus defensive players on them are Foyston and maybe Mikita. Neither line is particularly heavy and certainly relies more on finesse but Foyston was very aggressive and Martinec, while not a big checker was arguably the most abused European of his time and handled it exceptionally well. Mikita and Mikhailov were "ornery". Gretzky, Foyston and Martinec is thoroughly dominant in the postseason/international realm vs the Americans top line.

Yeah, I have no problem saying that you have a superior top line from an offensive standpoint. Honestly, any line with Gretzky is going to be the best offensive line, unless a GM screws up pretty drastically (which you certainly didn't!). That said, I do think my line (and when you add in my defensive pairing, 1st unit) is actually pretty well equipped to mitigate a lot of the damage. Mikita seems like a great C option to line up against Gretzky- tenacious, and clever. He wont fall into the mistake of trying to bully Gretzky (as that doesn't work), he will play smart and aggressive positional defense. He also has the offensive chops to keep the other side honest- and let's be real, outside of Foyston, your line is weak, and your defensive pairings are as well. Kariya and Foyston look to be about equal- Kariya is better offensively, but Foyston has a great all-around game. However, Foyston is going to be working hard- he is the line's sole defensive safety, as well as the sole puck-winner. That's asking a lot of one player.

As for Mikhailov v Martinec, I'll see your quotes with my own:

Did he though?

We know for certain that Martinec (in 1970-79, when they played at the same WHCs) received more votes in 1974, 1975, 1976 and 1977, when he was the WHC All-Star RW wing over Mikhailov.

We know too that Mikhailov finished ahead of Martinec in 1973 and 1979 (Mikhailov the All-Star RW) plus in 1970, 1971 and 1972 (barely tho) --> http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=67956409&postcount=38.
So that's Mikhailov 5 and Martinec 4, as far as we know. There is still the 1978 World Championships left, and when looking at their stats (Mikhailov 9 g., 3 a. = 12 pts, Martinec 4 g., 4 a. = 8 pts), I'd put all my money on that Mikhailov did better in the all-star voting.
Ergo, Mikhailov probably finishing 6 times ahead of Martinec and Martinec 4 times ahead of Mikhailov? Martinec arguably had the better 'WHC peak', but overall, was he the better player at the World Championships? I am not so very sure.

Sometimes too big a deal is made by the fact that Martinec was a 4-time WHC all-star and Mikhailov only 2-time all-star. I mean, you also have to consider the world championship tournaments where neither was an all-star - and it looks like Mikhailov was definitely the better player in those. Also, compare their overall WHC points; there's about 55 point difference there in Mikhailov's favour. Certainly much of it can be explained by Mikhailov playing on Team USSR's top line for almost the whole 1970s and Martinec playing just on one of the CSSR's forward lines, but all of it?

Hey, Martinec over Mikhailov wouldn't be a crime by any means IMO. But right now it is something that is quite hard to agree with.

Add in Mikhailov's incredibly strong domestic record (in a better league than Martinec played in)- To use @Namba 17 's work

Points: 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7
Goals: 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 7
MVP: 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8
AST: 7

... as well as his superior overall play, and I have to say that Mikhailov was a level above Martinec. Martinec has a nice peak, but it's not nearly long enough to compete.

In summary: Pittsburgh is stronger offensively, but in terms of all around play, New York claws back some ground. Not enough to make it a New York advantage, but enough that it doesn't place the Americans in a huge hole.

2nd Lines:

-Another interesting match up. This one is tighter, let's take a look. Starting off with the scoring:

Stewart - 90.3
Giroux - 88.0 (100 this past full season at LW)
Broadbent - ?

vs

Stamkos - 88.4
Abel - 87.3
Gilbert - 83.1

From a scoring standpoint you have to give the Americans the advantage here because Gilbert is probably about 20-25 points superior to Broadbent, who doesn't have an official score because his career was prior to the consolidation point but I've guesstimated it to be roughly 55-60.

An interesting thing to note is both lines have a player in their secondary position. Giroux is coming off an elite 100 point season which was his first, full time at LW for the Flyers. Sid Abel's best years and most dominant period was at C on the production line between Lindsay and Howe (has any C ever had better wingers? I can't imagine so). Abel did manage 1 2nd team AS at left wing earlier in his career and I'd wager Giroux deserves/gets one for his elite season, as long as the voters don't just automatically toss him at C, which he didn't play (that'd be Coutourier). Both lines are well balanced, have a dominant goal getter (Stewart and Stamkos) and able facilitators (Giroux, Abel, Gilbert). The Bankers do possess a great deal more grit and physicality on their line. I do think the Americans top 6 can be pushed around some and you better believe that Gorman will have his checking lines doing a great deal of smart hitting when available.

Stewart was a 2 time Hart winner at C and had an elite all time season in 1925-26 all the way through being thoroughly dominant in the Cup finals. It's also important to note there is some real life chemistry here with Stewart and Broadbent who played 25-26 and 26-27 together on the same line for the Maroons so there is an added bonus in terms of cohesion.

Overall, I want to call this is a wash, but the Americans do possess a fairly large advantage in terms of pure scoring thank to RW, although the Bankers do have real life chemistry and more Cup winning experience on it. I absolutely rate Stewart above Stamkos all time, even before I unearthed the treasure trove of information regarding his defensive play and speed. Each line has 1 plus defensive player (Broadbent and Abel) although the advantage here overall is with the Bankers IMO. Giroux is at least average and Stewart as well after all the information I dug up on him was presented. But the Americans have the advantage on both wings in my estimation and that gives them a slight advantage overall.

And here is where the Americans make up the their deficit in top lines. Offensively, clearly an advantage to New York, and I want to point out that a straight VsX comparison works wonders for Pittsburgh, as it doesn't take into account Stewart's negative influence on his own linemates. I believe most of Stewart's linemates saw their own production go down when skating on his wing.

Defensively, I see the lines as about equal. I think Abel and Broadbent are about the same, Stamkos and Giroux are probably about equal, and Stewart and Gilbert are probably about the same level. In terms of physicality, I wont try to argue that the Americans have the edge. But I dont think the Americans have any players that can be cowed by physicality- as the modern-day Pittsburgh Penguins are showing, you dont have to be physical to win. You just have to not be afraid of physicality.

3rd lines:
-I think we're back to seeing the Bankers on top here. Ted Kennedy is by far the best player on either line. We're talking about a borderline top 20 C ever. One of the all time great postseason performers. The only thing he really wasn't elite/great at was scoring and skating. He's one of the greatest players in the dot of all time. An elite checker, great defensive forward who also routinely killed penalties and obviously an elite leader with elite intangibles. I think he's about as perfect as you can get as a two way, checking line C to go up against Mikita. Mikita for the first portion of his career was prone to taking stupid penalties and Kennedy is exactly the type of guy who could draw those with his relentless checking and physical play. Plus he's got plenty of offense for a 3rd line C on the counter attack. I'm one of Kopitar's biggest fans and even with this years elite season is still a ways off from Kennedy all time. I think Kopitar has a chance to get to Kennedy's level if things go right but he's not there yet. Offensively they're almost dead even and I'd say defensively they are as well. But Kennedy's regular and postseason resume's are simply better. Better Hart finishes, AS finishes, and Kennedy was essentially an elite player on 5 SC winning teams vs 2 for Kopitar. He has simply done more but that's partially because Kopitar is still playing. Either way, it's an advantage for Pitt.

Ed Westfall is one of the all time great pure defensive wingers and PK'ers. He was so good he completely owned the likes of Bobby Hull in the playoffs and you better believe he'll be keeping a close eye on Mikhailov/Kariya. Ace Bailey provides a touch more offense and he's certainly a good to great defensive player (namely on the PK) but he's not on the level of Westfall who's routinely mentioned as the best ever in his own end, at ES or on the PK. Consider Westfall tied/led the playoffs in short handed goals 4 times and has a big advantage in terms of longevity, which is due to Bailey suffering a horrible career ending injury which is unfortunate because he would likely be ranked a good bit higher had he not been hurt so badly by Eddie Shore. Advantage Pittsburgh.

Sid Smith is a fairly underrated player all time IMO. He was a 3 time postseason AS (one 1st and two 2nds) and was there around the same time as guys like Ted Lindsay, Bert Olmstead, and Dickie Moore. Not shabby competition at LW. Rarely took penalties, was a decent scorer and all around player and like the 2nd line for the Bankers (Stewart/Broadbent) played the better part of a decade with or on the same line as Ted Kennedy (they won 3 titles together) so again Pittsburgh has some real life chemistry brewing. I do think Gordon Roberts is a touch better though simply because he was a bit more highly thought of during his days vs his peers in the PCHA and was a better overall scorer.

All in all I think this is a decent advantage for Pittsburgh, namely due to the depth at C and having a player like Ted Kennedy here. Westfall>Bailey and Roberts>Smith. Both lines are built to be two way units as far as i can see but both can absolutely handle a more pure checking role if needed.

I would say this one is a wash. Pittsburgh's line is clearly better defensively, but New York is just as clearly superior offensively. Different units with different goals in mind. At the end of the day, I have no problem saying Kennedy is better than Kopitar, but I do have to challenge your assertion that Westfall was better than Bailey- defensively, sure, but offensively, it is Bailey and it is not even close. And I agree that Roberts is better than Smith, so that gives the Americans an edge on both wings.

4th lines:
-Like other series, this boils down to C depth. Getzlaf is miles better than Luce. I don't think there is much separating the wingers (Bourne and Paiement vs Balon and Russell). The Bankers have more of a two way checking line vs a pure defensive line from the Amerks. Because of Getzlaf >>Luce I see this as a decided advantage for Pittsburgh.

Yeah, Getzlaf is the best player between the 6. But Balon and Russel are better than Bourne and Paiement, in everything but physicality. I also suggest looking up Russel a bit more, as he was lauded for his offensive abilities as well as his excellent defense. Additionally... let's be real, neither of these lines is playing a whole bunch. And if they do, New York looks forward to the PP opportunities that it will see do to Paiement.

Overall:
-I think the Banker possess an advantage to one degree or another on the 1st, 3rd and 4th lines, while the Americans have a slight advantage on the 2nd.

I'd probably have it
Pittsburgh>>New York
New York>Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh=New York
Pittsburgh=New York

So, Pittsburgh definitely has the advantage offensively, but it is hardly an overpowering advantage. Once we add in defense (strong advantage to New York), coaching (another large advantage to New York), and goaltending (large advantage to Pittsburgh), we have what we should have in the finals- a close series that likely goes down to the wire.

I obviously think New York is better, but I think Pittsburgh is a fantastic team as well, and would have no complaints if we fall short. It is an honor just to make it this far.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Yeah, I have no problem saying that you have a superior top line from an offensive standpoint. Honestly, any line with Gretzky is going to be the best offensive line, unless a GM screws up pretty drastically (which you certainly didn't!). That said, I do think my line (and when you add in my defensive pairing, 1st unit) is actually pretty well equipped to mitigate a lot of the damage. Mikita seems like a great C option to line up against Gretzky- tenacious, and clever. He wont fall into the mistake of trying to bully Gretzky (as that doesn't work), he will play smart and aggressive positional defense. He also has the offensive chops to keep the other side honest- and let's be real, outside of Foyston, your line is weak, and your defensive pairings are as well. Kariya and Foyston look to be about equal- Kariya is better offensively, but Foyston has a great all-around game. However, Foyston is going to be working hard- he is the line's sole defensive safety, as well as the sole puck-winner. That's asking a lot of one player.

As for Mikhailov v Martinec, I'll see your quotes with my own:



Add in Mikhailov's incredibly strong domestic record (in a better league than Martinec played in)- To use @Namba 17 's work

Points: 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7
Goals: 1, 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 7
MVP: 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8
AST: 7

... as well as his superior overall play, and I have to say that Mikhailov was a level above Martinec. Martinec has a nice peak, but it's not nearly long enough to compete.

In summary: Pittsburgh is stronger offensively, but in terms of all around play, New York claws back some ground. Not enough to make it a New York advantage, but enough that it doesn't place the Americans in a huge hole.



And here is where the Americans make up the their deficit in top lines. Offensively, clearly an advantage to New York, and I want to point out that a straight VsX comparison works wonders for Pittsburgh, as it doesn't take into account Stewart's negative influence on his own linemates. I believe most of Stewart's linemates saw their own production go down when skating on his wing.

Defensively, I see the lines as about equal. I think Abel and Broadbent are about the same, Stamkos and Giroux are probably about equal, and Stewart and Gilbert are probably about the same level. In terms of physicality, I wont try to argue that the Americans have the edge. But I dont think the Americans have any players that can be cowed by physicality- as the modern-day Pittsburgh Penguins are showing, you dont have to be physical to win. You just have to not be afraid of physicality.



I would say this one is a wash. Pittsburgh's line is clearly better defensively, but New York is just as clearly superior offensively. Different units with different goals in mind. At the end of the day, I have no problem saying Kennedy is better than Kopitar, but I do have to challenge your assertion that Westfall was better than Bailey- defensively, sure, but offensively, it is Bailey and it is not even close. And I agree that Roberts is better than Smith, so that gives the Americans an edge on both wings.




Yeah, Getzlaf is the best player between the 6. But Balon and Russel are better than Bourne and Paiement, in everything but physicality. I also suggest looking up Russel a bit more, as he was lauded for his offensive abilities as well as his excellent defense. Additionally... let's be real, neither of these lines is playing a whole bunch. And if they do, New York looks forward to the PP opportunities that it will see do to Paiement.




I'd probably have it
Pittsburgh>>New York
New York>Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh=New York
Pittsburgh=New York

So, Pittsburgh definitely has the advantage offensively, but it is hardly an overpowering advantage. Once we add in defense (strong advantage to New York), coaching (another large advantage to New York), and goaltending (large advantage to Pittsburgh), we have what we should have in the finals- a close series that likely goes down to the wire.

I obviously think New York is better, but I think Pittsburgh is a fantastic team as well, and would have no complaints if we fall short. It is an honor just to make it this far.

I don't know why people insist on going top line vs top line with me.

There is nothing you make up ground with comparing first lines. If you're going to go power on power you automatically force your most potent scoring line into a slightly slanted defensive posture to start because the Bankers have a significant scoring advantage in the first place.

Mikita is at best average to maybe just above so, defensively. There is very little evidence either way to this point regarding his defensive play so we have to put him into the territory above. Kariya plays zero D and is soft. Mikhailov is a zero sum defensive player from the lack of info I saw in the bios. So now, not only do you have a big disadvantage offensively you don't have a very good defensive C to slow him down. I think the best defensive player on either line is pretty easily Frank Foyston and he'll be going up against Mikhailov, so I have at least a plus defensive player on your 1B option on offense. And then that would leave Kariya trying to cover Vlad Martinec who was an absolute genius with the puck on his stick. Good luck with that. So since you locked in that lineup I'd say you're at a pretty big disadvantage.

My defensive pairings are average as well? Ok, we'll get to that later.


I don't see how Nels Stewart is a negative influence at all on his wingers. I certainly have not read anything like that from a scoring standpoint or otherwise. Remember he and Punch Broadbent were teammates/linemates in real life and Stewart had his finest season ever in 1926 with Punch where they won the Cup. Plus, as Stewart being a predominately slot and net area player, having a great checker/corner man like Broadbent does wonders. And we now know, at least during his Montreal days that he was at least an average defensive player (and sometimes more than that) rather than the long stereotyped thought of him not playing any. Yes, he's not Frank Nighbor but he can at least contribute in coverages and occasionally make a plus play rather than be a strictly negative player. And Giroux is a responsible defensive guy as well. Not great, not bad. Broadbent is the best defensive player on either line.

Also what C are you using on Stewart? Kopitar or Luce? I think he'd east Kopitar's lunch. Stewart was an elite physical player near the net. I like Koppy but he doesn't play that style. Luce was a big guy as well and certainly tougher so I'd use him (free advice) but then that still leaves Kopitar for Kennedy (Kennedy is another uber physical player especially in the checking game) and Stamkos on Getzlaf. Plus Stamkos is very injury prone. Something to keep an eye on.

Plus my C's are better than yours in the dot.

Is Balon really better than Bourne? Bourne scored 76 points over 74 playoff games for the 4 year Islanders dynasty. He's a sneaky decent counter attacking player on a 4th line. He was arguably the fastest skater in the entire NHL then. Great to elite on PK. And he could play any position on the F line. He's an overall more useful player to a contender.

You have guys who would rack up PIM's. Mikhailov was extremely dirty, which is bad considering he's a high end offensive player. Mikita over the first 3rd of his career was a heavily penalized player but he did quit most of that by hid mid 20's. Babe Siebert was pretty heavily penalized. And Joe Hall was an absolute basket case. He'll be responsible for 2-4 minutes in the box a game most likely. And nobdy wants to see my PP on the ice as the opposing team. And we do have elite deterrents in dirty play with Nels Stewart and Wilf Paiement

 

[rmartin65]

I don't know why people insist on going top line vs top line with me.

There is nothing you make up ground with comparing first lines. If you're going to go power on power you automatically force your most potent scoring line into a slightly slanted defensive posture to start because the Bankers have a significant scoring advantage in the first place.

Mikita is at best average to maybe just above so, defensively. There is very little evidence either way to this point regarding his defensive play so we have to put him into the territory above. Kariya plays zero D and is soft. Mikhailov is a zero sum defensive player from the lack of info I saw in the bios. So now, not only do you have a big disadvantage offensively you don't have a very good defensive C to slow him down. I think the best defensive player on either line is pretty easily Frank Foyston and he'll be going up against Mikhailov, so I have at least a plus defensive player on your 1B option on offense. And then that would leave Kariya trying to cover Vlad Martinec who was an absolute genius with the puck on his stick. Good luck with that. So since you locked in that lineup I'd say you're at a pretty big disadvantage.

Oh noes!!! I forgot that once I set a line-up, my coach couldn't/wouldn't change it if it wasn't working! Might as well just quit now, then.

Mikita has been cited as being a very good player defensively when asked to be.

Stop suggesting that it's forward vs forward only; the defenders are the primary... well, defenders. I know why you are doing it- because your 1st pairing is one of the weakest, if not the weakest in the draft. I can't believe no one has really called you on it this far.

My defensive pairings are average as well? Ok, we'll get to that later.

It's not even average. You have a number 2 as a number 1, and a weak 2 as your number 2. Your second pairing is better, but that first pairing, from a relative skill standpoint, sucks. Also, Gretzky is going to be hurting, because I dont see any Coffey-esque player on your D-line.

In that line of thinking- Gretzky is beatable. How many Cups did he win without his Oilers posse? The Oilers won without him, but he couldn't do it without them. Heck, he even lost while with the Oilers. So ... let's not make containing Gretzky out to be an impossible task. It happened. It happened rather more frequently than one would assume when just looking at the raw numbers.

I don't see how Nels Stewart is a negative influence at all on his wingers. I certainly have not read anything like that from a scoring standpoint or otherwise. Remember he and Punch Broadbent were teammates/linemates in real life and Stewart had his finest season ever in 1926 with Punch where they won the Cup. Plus, as Stewart being a predominately slot and net area player, having a great checker/corner man like Broadbent does wonders. And we now know, at least during his Montreal days that he was at least an average defensive player (and sometimes more than that) rather than the long stereotyped thought of him not playing any. Yes, he's not Frank Nighbor but he can at least contribute in coverages and occasionally make a plus play rather than be a strictly negative player. And Giroux is a responsible defensive guy as well. Not great, not bad. Broadbent is the best defensive player on either line.

I'll have to look into it, but I'm certain that someone here (TDMM, maybe? Sturm?) mentioned Stewart's negative impact on his teammates a few years ago. I could be wrong, which is why I added that I wasn't certain about it, but I am almost positive I read that somewhere. I'll go and look for it if I find the time, if no one else gets there first.

I think you have shown that Stewart could be a decent defensive player. However, how much he was willing to do that is still a mystery to me. And, please, spare me the novel of quotes. I've read them. Everyone has read them. The stereotype has been around for 80+ years for a reason.

Also what C are you using on Stewart? Kopitar or Luce? I think he'd east Kopitar's lunch. Stewart was an elite physical player near the net. I like Koppy but he doesn't play that style. Luce was a big guy as well and certainly tougher so I'd use him (free advice) but then that still leaves Kopitar for Kennedy (Kennedy is another uber physical player especially in the checking game) and Stamkos on Getzlaf. Plus Stamkos is very injury prone. Something to keep an eye on.

Whoever Tarasov decides is better. I would think Kopitar, and sure, the 6'4" 225 lbs Kopitar would have problems with Stewart. Stewart was a big man, but let's not make him out to be Hercules. I don't know what you see when you watch him, but I see a C who can easily play a physical game. And does.

And jeez, again with the "Stamkos is injury-prone" myth. Before this year, Stamkos only missed significant time due to freak injuries. That's hardly injury-prone.

Plus my C's are better than yours in the dot.

Nope. Mikita was a beast in the dot, Abel was damn good as well.

Is Balon really better than Bourne? Bourne scored 76 points over 74 playoff games for the 4 year Islanders dynasty. He's a sneaky decent counter attacking player on a 4th line. He was arguably the fastest skater in the entire NHL then. Great to elite on PK. And he could play any position on the F line. He's an overall more useful player to a contender.

I still prefer Balon to Bourne, but I'm not going to waste time on 4th line wings. But if you really believe this, the trade you made to acquire White/Bourne was an attempt to tilt the balance of the draft.

You have guys who would rack up PIM's. Mikhailov was extremely dirty, which is bad considering he's a high end offensive player. Mikita over the first 3rd of his career was a heavily penalized player but he did quit most of that by hid mid 20's. Babe Siebert was pretty heavily penalized. And Joe Hall was an absolute basket case. He'll be responsible for 2-4 minutes in the box a game most likely. And nobdy wants to see my PP on the ice as the opposing team. And we do have elite deterrents in dirty play with Nels Stewart and Wilf Paiement

3 players (4 if you count Mikita, who proved that he could be equally, if not more effective, when he cut the dirty crap. And did so for long enough that I dont consider him a penalty risk here). Was Mikhailov really dirty? I read hard-nosed and scrappy, but nothing to suggest that he was a liability. Siebert got in a lot of fights, so it's not like he was leaving his team short-handed. So, really, Hall is my only loose cannon.

Your team has Paiement and Broadbent, who are probably equal to a guy like Siebert in terms of penalties. I dont really think one team is going to be much more penalized than the other.

 

[rmartin65]

Found something on Stewart

ATD 2015 - Draft Thread III

He's in the exact same boat as Hooley Smith, then.

That's the thing with Nels Stewart. There are no "perfect fits" because Old Poison was a vampire who made his linemates worse. Every complaint about Watson on Stewart's wing applies just as much to Smith, maybe even more so because Smith was the better defensive player at center, and Smith is Stewart's best real-life linemate. If it were possible to get full value out of his linemates, Stewart would go a lot earlier than he does, no?

Considering that it's Nels Stewart we're talking about here, Phil Watson at RW is actually a pretty damned good fit. He's pretty much a poor man's Hooley Smith in every way.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Oh noes!!! I forgot that once I set a line-up, my coach couldn't/wouldn't change it if it wasn't working! Might as well just quit now, then.

Mikita has been cited as being a very good player defensively when asked to be.

Stop suggesting that it's forward vs forward only; the defenders are the primary... well, defenders. I know why you are doing it- because your 1st pairing is one of the weakest, if not the weakest in the draft. I can't believe no one has really called you on it this far.



It's not even average. You have a number 2 as a number 1, and a weak 2 as your number 2. Your second pairing is better, but that first pairing, from a relative skill standpoint, sucks. Also, Gretzky is going to be hurting, because I dont see any Coffey-esque player on your D-line.

In that line of thinking- Gretzky is beatable. How many Cups did he win without his Oilers posse? The Oilers won without him, but he couldn't do it without them. Heck, he even lost while with the Oilers. So ... let's not make containing Gretzky out to be an impossible task. It happened. It happened rather more frequently than one would assume when just looking at the raw numbers.




I'll have to look into it, but I'm certain that someone here (TDMM, maybe? Sturm?) mentioned Stewart's negative impact on his teammates a few years ago. I could be wrong, which is why I added that I wasn't certain about it, but I am almost positive I read that somewhere. I'll go and look for it if I find the time, if no one else gets there first.

I think you have shown that Stewart could be a decent defensive player. However, how much he was willing to do that is still a mystery to me. And, please, spare me the novel of quotes. I've read them. Everyone has read them. The stereotype has been around for 80+ years for a reason.



Whoever Tarasov decides is better. I would think Kopitar, and sure, the 6'4" 225 lbs Kopitar would have problems with Stewart. Stewart was a big man, but let's not make him out to be Hercules. I don't know what you see when you watch him, but I see a C who can easily play a physical game. And does.

And jeez, again with the "Stamkos is injury-prone" myth. Before this year, Stamkos only missed significant time due to freak injuries. That's hardly injury-prone.





Nope. Mikita was a beast in the dot, Abel was damn good as well.



I still prefer Balon to Bourne, but I'm not going to waste time on 4th line wings. But if you really believe this, the trade you made to acquire White/Bourne was an attempt to tilt the balance of the draft.



3 players (4 if you count Mikita, who proved that he could be equally, if not more effective, when he cut the dirty crap. And did so for long enough that I dont consider him a penalty risk here). Was Mikhailov really dirty? I read hard-nosed and scrappy, but nothing to suggest that he was a liability. Siebert got in a lot of fights, so it's not like he was leaving his team short-handed. So, really, Hall is my only loose cannon.

Your team has Paiement and Broadbent, who are probably equal to a guy like Siebert in terms of penalties. I dont really think one team is going to be much more penalized than the other.

1. Your first pairing is far weaker than the Orr-Horton pairing I already defeated. The Leafs second pairing was better than yours too. And it's absolutely no better than Kelly-Bouchard from my last series against Kenora IMO, and only marginally better than Langway-Pilote. And another aspect you failed to acknowledge from my earlier write up is the lack of playoff winning experience for your top pair (0 Cups and Salming quite frankly was quite average at best, IMO. More likely below average to poor). How are they going to respond in a best of 7 series against the greatest postseason performer ever in Gretzky, another top 10 guy in Kennedy who routinely elevated his game and Frank Foyston, 99's LW? That's a lot of elite big game talent coming in waves. My top pair is absolutely more well equipped based on history. Clapper is not a definite 2 either, certainly a low end 1 IMO.

2. Stewart's stereotyped negatives took a major hit with what i found. Plain and simple. Outside of players like Frank Nighbor, Frank Boucher, and other great/elite defensive guys from Stewart's era (who are clearly defined by reliable sources as great), what players have even a fraction of the 1st hand accounts that I have on Stewart regarding defensive ability through their prime/peak years? There are very few, if any, I can promise you that.

And forgive me if I'm skeptical of one HoH/ATD member saying Stewart was a negative linemate for his wingers, who btw, cited zero sources in that quote you provided. Not to mention, I already identified that Broadbent and Stewart had major success together in real life (specifically 1926) so that kind of puts a big damper on your assertion IMO. Stewart is tough to build around, yes, because he's a goal dominant offensive C but that's mitigated by having his real life partner in Broadbent who was an excellent checker up and down the ice and handles the dirty work in rough areas very well. And Giroux who's extremely slanted towards play making which bodes well for a C like Stewart. What I like about my line is it is a stark physical contrast all the way around and brings a different element to the table for Gorman and the Bankers.

2. I don't think Balon is inferior to Bourne necessarily but Bourne is an experienced and frankly good big game player who can slide anywhere across the F line and brings elite speed and able checking either way to the table which is quite useful here. Paiement doesn't have the speed but again, he is a big time, bottom 6 power F who will lean hard on people and offers solid offensive value on the 4th line, especially when you have a C who could easily pass for a 2nd line scoring C in Getzlaf who was/is a brilliant facilitator.

3, Mikhailov was very dirty. He alludes to it himself with his mindset on retaliation (see link)
-http://www.sport-express.ru/newspaper/2014-10-03/12_1/

Mikhailov about himself:
I never forgave. If you hurt me, I'll find a moment and hurt you.
Но спуску не давал. Если меня обидите, найду момент и сделаю вам так же больно.

-Phil Esposito:
(Mikhailov is) one of the dirtiest players I've ever played against

-He's not going to get away with that kind of play here. He might have in Russia but I certainly don't think that'd be the case in a normal, neutral hockey environment.

 

[jarek]

2. Stewart's stereotyped negatives took a major hit with what i found. Plain and simple. Outside of players like Frank Nighbor, Frank Boucher, and other great/elite defensive guys from Stewart's era (who are clearly defined by reliable sources as great), what players have even a fraction of the 1st hand accounts that I have on Stewart regarding defensive ability through their prime/peak years? There are very few, if any, I can promise you that.

I'll admit I haven't gone through what you found on Stewart, but *I* can promise you that virtually every player of note from that era has had glowing praise piled on, even if only for a short stretch. Take the time to actually read the entire game summaries, and not just what you're looking for. I can't speak to the volume of praise you've found for Stewart in relation to this, however.

I don't even think you've put up much of an argument in favour of Stewart here either. "Outside of the great/elite defensive guys of that era".. so, where does Stewart place defensively overall? 70th percentile? 80th percentile?

I'll put it this way - I think Harry Westwick is a better defensive player than Stewart, despite the very limited information on Westwick's defensive abilities. This is because Westwick is described as a good defensive player in general, overarching terms. First hand accounts from the first two years of a 15 year career, for example, don't do a whole lot for me.

 

[ImporterExporter]

I'll admit I haven't gone through what you found on Stewart, but *I* can promise you that virtually every player of note from that era has had glowing praise piled on, even if only for a short stretch. Take the time to actually read the entire game summaries, and not just what you're looking for. I can't speak to the volume of praise you've found for Stewart in relation to this, however.

I don't even think you've put up much of an argument in favour of Stewart here either. "Outside of the great/elite defensive guys of that era".. so, where does Stewart place defensively overall? 70th percentile? 80th percentile?

I'll put it this way - I think Harry Westwick is a better defensive player than Stewart, despite the very limited information on Westwick's defensive abilities. This is because Westwick is described as a good defensive player in general, overarching terms. First hand accounts from the first two years of a 15 year career, for example, don't do a whole lot for me.

This bothers me. If you haven't even bothered to read what I found (which is a lot btw) then why comment in the first place? All you're doing is posting conjecture really, about Stewart or other non elite defensive players having glowing praise. A lot of these reports aren't generic in praise either. A good chunk post stellar reviews of Stewart's ability to play a strong defensive game, again mainly in the Maroon portion of his career.

Here's a wonderful take by @Canadiens1958 which offers up some finer points about Stewart's game:

Well done and extensive effort.

A few comments.

First five years have been referenced.Ironically this is coincides with the liberalization of the forward pass before the 1929-30 season. This deserves further study especially his Boston days.

First five years. From what I have read, the Maroons used ,mainly a team defence featuring zone coverage.

Boston years. Different responsibilities with Shore rushing. Someone would have to cover.Like with Orr rushing it would not be Esposito. This could be the genesis of Shore's comments.

Blake comparison to Beliveau. Leaves out the ability to shield the puck. Lost art today. Imagine Zdeno Chara with offensive skills and hands. With the reach advantage, catching the skater from behind would not be enough.

Not only is there a near mountain of evidence regarding Stewart's defensive accumen, which goes beyond 1927 btw (especially compared to most offensively dominant contemporary stars of the time) but also a good amount of information about his speed, which arguably the greatest coach of all time cleared up when he said this:

The Montreal Gazette - Google News Archive Search

Beliveau has often been likened to the late Nels Stewart. Toe Blake was asked if Stewart was a slow skater, as has been alleged.

"I've heard that and it wasn't true," he said. "You couldn't catch him from behind. He didn't look to be going fast because he took those long strides. Beliveau is like that, too."

There is more in my bio (please actually read it) on this issue as well but coming straight from the mouth of Toe Blake means more than anything else I've seen to date. Couple that better than advertised speed, his cat like quickness around the net, and being nearly impossible to knock off the puck, with a very long reach and elite stick handling skills, who was an elite all time goal scorer and you have the recipe for an extremely tough person to defend in the slot and crease area.

 

[jarek]

This bothers me. If you haven't even bothered to read what I found (which is a lot btw) then why comment in the first place? All you're doing is posting conjecture really, about Stewart or other non elite defensive players having glowing praise. A lot of these reports aren't generic in praise either. A good chunk post stellar reviews of Stewart's ability to play a strong defensive game, again mainly in the Maroon portion of his career.

It isn't conjecture. I've read hundreds of game reports from that era and can tell you with absolute certainty that a bunch of quotes about a guy playing good defensively doesn't mean much of anything. Just to put this into perspective, Frank Nighbor had something said about his defensive excellence almost every single game he played that I read.

This honestly has nothing to do with whether I have read the information or not. I am merely responding to the conjecture on your part with some actual facts.

And again - where does Stewart rank defensively among his contemporaries? I'm guessing you're avoiding this because you know it won't do much for you. He goes from "worst of the era" to "behind all the guys that matter".. which quite honestly doesn't really change much of anything. In modern terms, he went from being Phil Kessel to Patrick Kane, basically.

There is more in my bio (please actually read it) on this issue as well but coming straight from the mouth of Toe Blake means more than anything else I've seen to date. Couple that better than advertised speed, his cat like quickness around the net, and being nearly impossible to knock off the puck, with a very long reach and elite stick handling skills, who was an elite all time goal scorer and you have the recipe for an extremely tough person to defend in the slot and crease area.

I've been purposely avoiding saying anything about this because I hoped others would chime, but I guess I'll do it now. Toe Blake saw him skate fast, once. That says just about nothing. Toe Blake saying he skated well that one time is nice supplementary evidence, but if it's all you're leaning on, then it's worthless IMO. That being said, I'm not saying it's your only evidence, but given how strongly you're grasping onto this one quote, it kind of suggests it's one of your main pieces.

 

[ImporterExporter]

It isn't conjecture. I've read hundreds of game reports from that era and can tell you with absolute certainty that a bunch of quotes about a guy playing good defensively doesn't mean much of anything. Just to put this into perspective, Frank Nighbor had something said about his defensive excellence almost every single game he played that I read.

This honestly has nothing to do with whether I have read the information or not. I am merely responding to the conjecture on your part with some actual facts.

And again - where does Stewart rank defensively among his contemporaries? I'm guessing you're avoiding this because you know it won't do much for you. He goes from "worst of the era" to "behind all the guys that matter".. which quite honestly doesn't really change much of anything. In modern terms, he went from being Phil Kessel to Patrick Kane, basically.



I've been purposely avoiding saying anything about this because I hoped others would chime, but I guess I'll do it now. Toe Blake saw him skate fast, once. That says just about nothing. Toe Blake saying he skated well that one time is nice supplementary evidence, but if it's all you're leaning on, then it's worthless IMO. That being said, I'm not saying it's your only evidence, but given how strongly you're grasping onto this one quote, it kind of suggests it's one of your main pieces.

Yes it absolutely does. Put yourself in a court of law or simply around sensible people and show up spouting off conjecture because you failed to read the evidence in the first place and see where that gets you.

I'm not avoiding anything. Don't know why you'r suggesting that. Stewart is not Frank Nighbor. Never said he was, in fact have stated repeatedly that's not my goal or reality. But when you show up stating you read this and you read that, I can easily retort with "so have I". If there are soooooo many game reports from the 20's/30's that add up to anything close to what I have on Stewart's defensive acumen from 1925 through 1929-30, a superstar, not some extra skater, btw, by all means share them. Point out the bios done by people on players who were negatively associated with being a loser defensively. Hell the Maroons played Stewart on defense on more than one occasion because he could play good defense. If he was so damn bad they wouldn't have stuck him back there in the first place lol.

He's an average defensive player in my book now. Because his prime/peak seasons are littered with defensive highlights and praise while we have much less/nearly nothing from his short stint in Boston and quite frankly I don't care much about New York given it was the tail end of his career and he was in his mid 30's by then. A lot of guys in that era didn't even play through 36-37 years of age.

Last bolded part really bothers me. Where in that quote does it talk about Blake seeing Stewart once???? I'll save you the trouble. It doesn't.

Toe Blake's career overlapped Stewart's from 1935 to 1940. Blake would have seen Stewart quite a bit as a player. And probably a good deal before he reached the NHL ranks a a player too. Either way, he would have had numerous chances to see Stewart skate and the fact he directly compared him to Jean Beliveau is telling.

Mar 31 1926: Montreal Gazette: SCF Game 1 Stewart was amazing. Defense, Scoring, Speed. "Rushed through the Victoria players at mid-ice with LONG, SWERVING STROKES". Sounds A LOT like what Toe Blake described above, doesn't it???

Same game: "He tore down right wing"....."Stewart was following in fast on the cage"

Same game: "Traveling like lightning".....lightning is pretty fast

Nov 26th 1927 Ottawa Citizen: Stewart and Siebert noted making a "speedy" rush

View attachment 98527

Nov 26 1930 Montreal Gazette: Stewart shows great speed and then makes a great drop pass to Siebert who scores. "Sped down center" sounds like he was moving pretty darn fast....

Jan 26 1931 Montreal Gazette: Stewart scores game winner of full length of the ice rush. "Speeding abreast the length of the ice" wouldn't be used to describe a slow skater.

Dec 1st 1933 (Stewart would be 31 years old now, so well past his prime)

Ottawa Citizen - Google News Archive Search

"Nels Stewart appeared with the familiar black cap. He has lost a great deal of his speed, but is still a dangerous customer around the inner defense."

Kind of hard to lose A GREAT DEAL of speed if you didn't already posses it in the first place. Based on all my findings the speed stereotype surely came about from his Boston and NY days, certainly not from his time in Montreal which was his peak and prime.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Defense:

1st pairs:

-Your top pair (Salming-Park) is absolutely superior to my top pair (Laperriere-Clapper). You have an advantage no double about it. A few things though. Salming and Park and never won a Cup. Their experience in the biggest moments is lacking compared to Lappy-Clapper. Also, I defeated Orr-Horton, and Kelly-Bouchard already and your pair is certainly weaker than the 1st one listed and not definitively better than the 2nd either.

How much better is Salming compared to Laperriere? Salming faced stiffer competition at D to be fair but he was also an offensively slanted defender while JL was more heavily focused on defense, yet Lappy won a Norris over Pilote, Trembaly and Stapleton, certainly not a bunch of nobodies and had an overall record of 1, 2, 4, 4, 5, 8 (vs 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 10) and was a 4 time postseason AS. Again, he didn't put up gaudy point totals yet got plenty of recognition as a defender by the voters. Salming is superior because his regular season resume is better but Lappy makes up a lot of ground with his postseason experience and performances. I don't think this is much of a gap at all in reality because most people don't realize how impressive JL's regular season awards are given he was much more of a defensive dman, and the difference in playoff output and background.

Park is probably 10-12 spots better than Clapper but again Clapper's intangibles are through the roof, he has a peak that, IMO rivals Park on D (Clapper was thought of as every bit as good as Eddie Shore was from 1938 through 1941, and won the equivalent of 2 Norris trophies as determined by TDMM and others and had 2 Hart finalist nods). Obviously Park did it better on D for longer, but that's in large part because Clapper spent the first 2/3 of his career as an AS caliber RW. Either way, you're ahead all together. It's a decided advantage but comes with some caveats IMO.


2nd Pairs

-I think Pittsburgh wins here for 2 reasons.

One, I simply think Stapleton-White is slightly superior to Siebert-Goldham. And two, Staples-White was a stellar real life defensive pairing for quite some time in Chicago, including during the 1972 Summit series where they were flat out amazing and big part of why the Canucks ended up victorious in a monumentally important series both in terms of talent involved but also due to the political and cultural times. The Stapleton-White will be less prone to communication breakdowns.

Also consider how much Stapleton and White were used at ES and the impact they had there (along with Laperriere). See graphs below:

Even Strength - Defencemen

Player	GP	$ESP/82	$ESGF/82	$ESGA/82	R-ON	R-OFF	EV%
Bobby Orr	657	64	130	66	1.99	1.03	49%
Pat Stapleton	635	31	104	87	1.18	1.14	49%
Bill White	604	24	93	75	1.24	1.06	49%
Pierre Pilote	660	36	108	81	1.34	1.11	49%
Tim Horton	1010	24	97	83	1.16	1.17	48%
Jacques Laperriere	691	21	104	77	1.35	1.29	47%
Marcel Pronovost	636	21	93	91	1.02	0.98	46%
Gilles Marotte	808	23	85	99	0.86	0.87	46%
Leo Boivin	728	23	87	115	0.76	0.73	46%
Erik Karlsson	556	44	85	84	1.01	0.95	46%
Harry Howell	932	21	88	101	0.87	0.77	46%
Ian Turnbull	628	33	86	82	1.05	1.02	45%
J.C. Tremblay	796	25	101	78	1.30	1.30	45%
Moose Vasko	600	19	89	83	1.07	1.09	45%
Brian Leetch	1205	33	84	80	1.06	0.97	45%
Barry Gibbs	792	19	74	85	0.87	0.95	45%
Gary Bergman	838	26	86	88	0.97	0.90	44%
Bob Baun	826	19	88	77	1.15	1.16	44%
Carl Brewer	533	27	100	70	1.42	1.07	44%
Allan Stanley	627	26	92	79	1.17	1.21	44%
Ted Harris	788	19	84	71	1.18	1.17	43%
Dale Rolfe	509	19	83	79	1.06	1.02	43%
Jim Schoenfeld	719	20	88	68	1.29	1.19	43%
Paul Coffey	1409	41	95	77	1.23	1.20	43%
Jim Neilson	1024	22	81	86	0.94	1.00	43%
Dallas Smith	889	24	96	76	1.27	1.34	43%
Borje Salming	1148	28	86	75	1.14	0.82	43%
Larry Robinson	1384	32	97	61	1.60	1.34	43%
Reed Larson	904	29	73	81	0.90	0.82	43%
Denis Potvin	1060	36	87	58	1.49	1.23	43%
Duncan Keith	913	33	88	73	1.20	1.08	43%
Serge Savard	1040	23	94	65	1.44	1.52	43%
Terry Harper	1066	17	85	68	1.24	1.04	43%
Ted Green	620	26	89	100	0.89	1.07	42%
Ron Stackhouse	889	25	82	79	1.05	0.82	42%
Dave Burrows	724	14	76	85	0.89	0.99	42%
Carol Vadnais	1087	24	78	82	0.96	1.00	42%
Phil Russell	1016	22	75	73	1.04	0.96	42%
P.K. Subban	500	31	77	69	1.11	0.99	42%
Drew Doughty	688	25	72	63	1.15	1.02	42%
Scott Stevens	1635	28	83	63	1.31	1.19	42%
Guy Lapointe	884	28	91	64	1.41	1.66	42%
Bob Stewart	575	14	62	95	0.65	0.75	42%
Dustin Byfuglien	521	35	79	78	1.02	0.92	42%
Brad Park	1115	33	89	64	1.40	1.20	42%
Alex Pietrangelo	539	33	77	68	1.13	1.14	42%
Ray Bourque	1612	35	86	63	1.37	0.95	42%
Victor Hedman	549	35	81	74	1.08	0.99	42%
Bob Dailey	561	26	74	68	1.09	1.18	41%
Derian Hatcher	1045	21	73	70	1.04	1.10	41%
Robert Svehla	655	25	73	70	1.04	0.95	41%
Jocelyn Guevremont	571	24	79	75	1.05	0.97	41%
Dion Phaneuf	902	22	74	73	1.02	0.97	41%
Barry Beck	615	23	75	73	1.02	0.84	41%
Nicklas Lidstrom	1564	30	88	62	1.41	1.17	41%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Consider your TOP PAIR wasn't even used near as much at even strength as my 2nd pair or Jacques Laperierre.

Stapleton and White's teams produced a lot of offense with them essentially playing half the game at ES over the course of their careers and neither one of them ever enjoyed having a F like Gretzky or overall scoring ability in the top 6 to get the puck up to. Nor the depth of C talent. And they also have the benefit of having the greatest goalie of all time behind them in Patrick Roy. Remember Glenn Hall was out of Chicago by the time Stapleton and White were a thing.

Bernie Parent is a fine goalie, but which defensive corps is going to be more relaxed? I'd say Pittsburgh's easily.


3rd Pairs

-Pittsburgh is ahead here again for much of the same reasons as the 2nd pairing.

Frank Patrick, to me is the best player on either pairing. He's paired with a longtime teammate in Si Griffis. So again you have a real life chemistry advantage for Pittsburgh. And a pair that's actually going to be on the ice a lot more because Joe Hall is one of the most violent/PIM'd players in the entire ATD.

Look at Patrick's offensive dominance: (taken from RB's bio)

First Lets Look At the PCHA (Source Empire of Ice)

- PCHA defense scoring leader all 4 full PCHA seasons he played (1912, 1913, 1914, 1917)

1912 Season
Frank - 24 Goals (Points) - 4th League Wide
Lester - 10 Goals (Points) - 11th League Wide
Johnson - 9 Goals (Points) -12th League Wide

Notable forwards he outscored: Tommy Phillips, Fred Taylor

1913 Season
Frank - 12 Goals - 20 Points - 4th League Wide
Lester - 14 Goals - 5 Points - 5th League Wide
Johnson - 6 Goals - 10 Points - 13th League Wide

Notable forwards he outscored: Fred Taylor, Eddie Oatman

1914 Season
Frank - 11 Goals - 20 Points - 6th League Wide
Lester - 5 Goals - 10 Points - 16th League Wide (was injured though)
Johnson - 3 Goals - 8 Points - Tied for 17th

Notable forwards he outscored: Didier Pitre, Frank Nighbor, Smokey Harris

1917 Season
Frank - 13 Goals - 26 Points - Tied for 10th
Lester - 10 Goals - 21 Points - Tied for 12th
Cook - 13 Goals - 22 Points - Tied for 11th
Jonhson - 12 Goals - 21 Points - Tied for 12th

Notable forwards he outscored: Jack Walker, Tommy Dunderdale (tie)

Looking at the scoring in these four years and arbitrarily picking the best defenceman each team in the PCHA had that season (L.Patrick, L.Cook and E.Johnson) it's fairly clear that Frank was on a level above them in terms of offensive production. PCHA all-time defense points-per-game leaders, min. 80 GP


Finally to make it as apples to apples as I can, in these 4 seasons Frank played 68 games, so taking those other defencemens ppg over their best seasons as close as I can get to 68 games gives

This is from SIHR
F. Patrick - 1.32 Pts/Game
L. Patrick - 1.10 Pts/Game
L.Cook - 0.97 Pts/Game

The retirement of (Frank) Patrick from the game means the passing of one of the greatest, if not the greatest, player who ever handled a puck in Canadian hockey. ... As a defence player there are few better than Patrick. A wonderful stickhandler, fast on his skates and possessing wonderful judgment, he has played brilliantly during the many years of services with the various teams. ... Patrick and Griffis proved the most formidable pair of defence players in the Coast League since the inception of the game in these parts. Patrick has not only proved himself one of the most wonderful puck chasers of the last decade, but he has clearly won honor as one of the best leaders in the history of the game. - Calgary Daily Herald, Dec. 10, 1917

Frank Patrick and Griffis were in the limelight with many speedy rushes. - Morning Leader, Mar. 21, 1913 (during exhibition game between NHA and PCHA)

Frank Patrick played a great game, and time after time he carried the puck from end to end, only to be foiled by the wonderful work of Lehman. Patrick's stick-handling and skating was a revelation to the fans, and they applauded it heartily. - Calgary Daily Herald, Mar. 18, 1913

The outstanding feature of the Renfrew team's performance was the gilt edged work of Frank Patrick at point. Patrick was head and shoulders over any other player on the ice, his sensational goal-to-goal rushes being directly responsible for three or four Renfrew goals. Frank seems to have hit his championship clip for in every movement, he showed the same speed and cleverness which made him such a tower of strength to the Montreal Victorias two years ago. With Lester he electrified the crowd time after time. - Ottawa Citizen, Jan. 20, 1910

Fred Whitcroft at left wing put up a fine game, nevertheless, he and Frank Patrick often making many a dangerous rush. Several of the Renfrew goals were scored on individual rushes. In this respect Frank Patrick, Lester Patrick and Fred Taylor shone. - Ottawa Citizen, Feb. 5, 1910

The rushes of Joe Power and Frank Patrick were features of the team's play, and their clever stick-handling and fast skating won them applause. - Montreal Gazette, Jan. 1, 1908

The brothers, Lester and Frank Patrick, were really good ones. Lester was a classical player in every phase of the game whereas Frank was strong defensively. But Frank could also carry the puck from one end of the rink to the other if he had to, and he often did.

The Victoria forwards were unable to do much against the Vancouver defence, Griffis and (Frank) Patrick, intercepting many rushes, while Taylor was to the fore in leading attacks on the Victoria goal. - Saskatoon Phoenix, Dec. 19, 1912

Seattle put up a better brand of combination than they have shown this season; they checked back as hard as ever, but they lacked the power to finish work well begun, largely because Lehman and (Frank) Patrick and Griffis put up their usual line of defence. - Morning Leader, Jan. 31, 1916

The thing that sticks out at me from the above is the "usual" part, which implies that, at the very least, the group that Patrick was a part of normally were very steady defensively.

Frank Patrick was easily the most conspicuous man on the ice, the youngster showing up in brilliant form. His long combination rushes with Whitcroft were features of the game, while his defence play was of a high class. - Ottawa Citizen, Feb. 5, 1910

Cook and Frank Patrick were in great form on the defence and were hard to beat. The rushes of both of them were of the spectacular order. - Backcheck: A hockey retrospective, regarding game 3

Frank Patrick beat the shit out of Joe Hall

One night Lester went down on the ice under a mass of kicking, struggling players, among them Bad Joe Hall, one of the roughest hockey players of all time. Frank leaned over the prostrate Lester, his eyes focused on a gash on his brother's forehead. "Who did it, Lester?" he asked grimly. "Was it Hall? Never mind answering. I'll take care of him." Actually Lester didn't need any help at all. He was bigger than Frank to begin with. But in less time than it takes to tell the tale Frank had Bad Joe stretched out on the ice, listening to the sweet tune the birdies sing. - New York Times, Nov. 18, 1943

Patrick again bests Hall in a scrap

Through the contest, Hall and Patrick had been exchanging pokes and chops, and already bloodied by a swipe from Patrick, Hall had had enough. After taking one more of these knocks, Joe went splashing up the ice after Frank, who hit him again. Hall stopped and struck back with his stick, slicing Frank's cheek. A lively scrap ensued, during which Hall received yet another nasty gash, this time over his eye. - The Patricks: Hockey's Royal Family

Bod Joe was constantly running at the Patricks... Frank had fought back, too hard, insisted Hall, who said that he had been crosschecked by Patrick earlier, without a penalty being called... Hall was continually frustrated in his attempts to corner Frank Patrick. The latter was retaliating... Their lively scrap terminated when Hall dropped his stick and hit Patrick, who retaliated with a Jeffreys punch. - The Renfrew Millionaires

​

Overall:

I think like the series against Kenora, this ends up being a wash.

-The Americans certainly have the advantage on the top pair but the Bankers bridge the gap IMO, with their superior depth and 2 real life pairings that had a ton of success together at the highest levels. Plus throw in the fact that Stapleton-White logged elite ES minutes and were very productive with them, they'll be able to contribute a bit more than your ordinary 2nd pair IMO.​

 

[jarek]

Yes it absolutely does. Put yourself in a court of law or simply around sensible people and show up spouting off conjecture because you failed to read the evidence in the first place and see where that gets you.

I'm not avoiding anything. Don't know why you'r suggesting that. Stewart is not Frank Nighbor. Never said he was, in fact have stated repeatedly that's not my goal or reality. But when you show up stating you read this and you read that, I can easily retort with "so have I". If there are soooooo many game reports from the 20's/30's that add up to anything close to what I have on Stewart's defensive acumen from 1925 through 1929-30, a superstar, not some extra skater, btw, by all means share them. Point out the bios done by people on players who were negatively associated with being a loser defensively. Hell the Maroons played Stewart on defense on more than one occasion because he could play good defense. If he was so damn bad they wouldn't have stuck him back there in the first place lol.

He's an average defensive player in my book now. Because his prime/peak seasons are littered with defensive highlights and praise while we have much less/nearly nothing from his short stint in Boston and quite frankly I don't care much about New York given it was the tail end of his career and he was in his mid 30's by then. A lot of guys in that era didn't even play through 36-37 years of age.

Last bolded part really bothers me. Where in that quote does it talk about Blake seeing Stewart once???? I'll save you the trouble. It doesn't.

Toe Blake's career overlapped Stewart's from 1935 to 1940. Blake would have seen Stewart quite a bit as a player. And probably a good deal before he reached the NHL ranks a a player too. Either way, he would have had numerous chances to see Stewart skate and the fact he directly compared him to Jean Beliveau is telling.

Mar 31 1926: Montreal Gazette: SCF Game 1 Stewart was amazing. Defense, Scoring, Speed. "Rushed through the Victoria players at mid-ice with LONG, SWERVING STROKES". Sounds A LOT like what Toe Blake described above, doesn't it???

Same game: "He tore down right wing"....."Stewart was following in fast on the cage"

Same game: "Traveling like lightning".....lightning is pretty fast

Nov 26th 1927 Ottawa Citizen: Stewart and Siebert noted making a "speedy" rush

View attachment 98527

Nov 26 1930 Montreal Gazette: Stewart shows great speed and then makes a great drop pass to Siebert who scores. "Sped down center" sounds like he was moving pretty darn fast....

Jan 26 1931 Montreal Gazette: Stewart scores game winner of full length of the ice rush. "Speeding abreast the length of the ice" wouldn't be used to describe a slow skater.

Dec 1st 1933 (Stewart would be 31 years old now, so well past his prime)

Ottawa Citizen - Google News Archive Search



Kind of hard to lose A GREAT DEAL of speed if you didn't already posses it in the first place. Based on all my findings the speed stereotype surely came about from his Boston and NY days, certainly not from his time in Montreal which was his peak and prime.

I did not post conjecture. I have actually and physically read hundreds of game reports from the era and can conclusively say that if a guy had a particularly good game in just about any aspect, it was noted in the game report. A few mentions here and there of something is not special at all. Far, far more meaningful are descriptions that talk about the entire career of a player, which admittedly are not easy to find for the old timers.

For example, of the quotes you posted, the only one I really care about is the last one, and even then, what does it really mean? I can find quite a few descriptions of Cy Denneny tearing down the ice, and he's generally considered a slow skater.

Also, regarding the Toe Blake thing, we need more context in order to figure out what Toe meant. I have absolutely no idea based on what he said if he was talking about that one moment, his entire career, or just the general state he was in at the time that he said it.

And for as many references to his supposed speed that you've found, there are at least as many that say otherwise from what I can tell. The Wikipedia article has cited sources to his lack of foot speed as well, although some of those articles are not viewable any longer.

Re. His defense:

I disagree about him being average. I don't see why I should think of him as anything more than below average in the ATD. The fact that his good defensive days came in just a subset (but an admittedly important one) of his career is very important. If you average out his entire career, you should come to that same conclusion.

Then there's shit like this, from Pelletier's bio:

Another referee, Bobby Hewitson, was not a fan.

"I always felt that Stewart had an exaggerated reputation. I never thought he was such a great player. Nels was big and tall but awfully lazy. He wouldn't backcheck and he'd just stand around the net waiting for the centering pass, then flip the puck in. That much he could do. We used to say that Nels stood in one spot all of the time."

He also saw Stewart play.

In short, for all the nice stuff you find on Nels, there's easily as much, if not more negative stuff. Again, you can find instances of a player doing well in any area of the game. In the case of Stewart, if speed and back checking were prominent parts of his game, there would be nowhere near the amount of negativity surrounding those elements as there is.

 

[rmartin65]

Since you seem to like the HoH lists (you've cited the playoff list extensively) so much:
Park at 11 vs Clapper at 24
Salming at 22 vs Laperriere at 38
Siebert at 47 vs White at... not ranked.

So, D's 1-3, I come out SIGNIFICANTLY ahead. Heck, my number 2 is generally rated better than your number one. I have no problem saying Stapleton is better than Goldham, so I can maybe consider the 2nd pairing a wash. But my advantage returns on the 3rd pairing. I'll take Hall over Patrick every. single. time.

seventieslord on Hall

Joe Hall, D.

Offense: I took a look at every season he played in the east, from 1908 to 1919. First thing I wanted to do was make sure that he didn't have a season or two at forward "tainting" his numbers. But a thorough look at his team's roster every single season satisfied me that he was never a forward after coming east. The only possible exception is 1912, when he greatly outscored a guy who was usually, but not always, a forward. But I think it's remote; I do think he was exclusively a defenseman after 1907. Second thing was check his defense VsX scores. Here are the results:

1908: 83 (10 points to Cyclone Taylor's 12)
1909: 77 (10 points to Cyclone Taylor's 13)
1910: 100 (15 points led all NHA/CHA defensemen)
1911: 3 (1 point, he battled a serious shoulder injury all season)
1912: 100 (16 points, 2nd behind outlier Art Ross with 21)
1913: 44 (a decent 8 points, only half Sprague's total, used PCHA leader as benchmark this season)
1914: 85 (17 points to Cleghorn's 20)
1915: 25 (5 points, he was thought to be losing it at this point)
1916: 18 (3 points)
1917: 48 (12 points to Cleghorn's 25)
1918: 75 (15 points to Gerard's 20, cameron's 27 treated as outlier)
1919: 60 (9 points to Noble's 15)

This would give him a 7 year VsXD score of 100+100+85+83+77+75+60 = 580. For some perspective, this type of metric says that his level of offensive dominance from the blueline is a little higher than a Ryan Suter (534), Eddie Gerard (552), Hap Day (557) or Harry Howell (561), right in line with an Allan Stanley (583) or Shea Weber (587), but not quite a Dan Boyle (607), Tim Horton (608) or Rob Blake (608). I would stop shy of calling Hall a legitimate #2 PP defenseman, but he should be a very good #3 on the 2nd unit. (yes, these numbers exclude Hall's, Gerard's and Day's seasons at forward)

In addition to the numbers, the articles in last year's bio frequently describe him rushing the puck and displaying fine puck skills, not only for a defenseman but for any player of the time. Lastly, his offensive chops were well on display in the preceding 5 seasons as he was a star RW in the west:

1903 MNWHA: 4th in league scoring, 60% of the leader, this was a league that included 3 HHOFers
1904 WCHA: 3rd in league scoring, 42% of the leader, league leaderboard is clearly incomplete
1905 MHL: 5th in league scoring, 42% of leader Tommy Phillips, but nearly led his own team (Rat Portage had a CSKA-type thing going on here with all 4 of the league's HHOFers!)
1906 IHL: 3rd in league scoring, 80% of leader Didier Pitre, league had 6 other HHOFers and one more ATDer
1907 MHL: 2nd in scoring, 65% of the leader Tommy Phillips, 6 other HHOFers besides them played in this league plus Alf Smith for a game)

Defense: Hall was known as a very strong defender and consistently had a strong reputation as an all-around player throughout his career. This is the hardest part to quantify, though, because he was frequently cited for playing good defense, and so were others. All we know is that for his career, he was judged worthy of the HHOF along with Ross, Cleghorn, and Cameron, and a few others weren't. Yearly all-star teams would help to illuminate who, if anyone, was considered more or less valuable than their offense. But nothing in the language used in Hall's bio tells me he had any kind of problem in this area.

Physicality: There's no guesswork here. Hall was very physical and very tough. He was also mean and dirty, but in a weird way, it was almost like he had honour about it, not cheaply attacking anyone vulnerable, offending in a sneaky way out of the ref's view, or being a bully. That said, he still dished out a lot of punishment and by the end of his career was the most penalized player in hockey history. The downside to Hall, is that he's one of those ATD players who is a threat to snap, leading to a major penalty and/or ejection and/or suspension. But, I don't have one of those yet so

Hall was the #1 defenseman on two cup winning teams in Quebec, and from what I can tell, the best defenseman on the 1919 Habs who were deadlocked after a 5-game final, when he passed at age 37. I've counted to the best of my abilities, and Hall ended up with 238 points in 264 senior level games between 1903 and 1919, with 998 minutes in penalties.

And while we are quoting ATD greats, @Sturminator also has Hall over Patrick, by 3 "levels"- ATD 2017 Draft Thread IV

Orr = 1

+ Harvey, Bourque = 3

+ Lidstrom, Potvin, Kelly, Shore = 7

+ Robinson, Fetisov = 9

+ Chelios, Park = 11

+ Pilote, Clancy, Coffey = 14

+ MacInnis, Pronger, Cleghorn, Seibert, Stevens, Horton = 20

+ Clapper, Gadsby, Salming, Leetch, Chara = 25

----------------------- #1 D ^^

+ Howe, Quackenbush, Vasiliev = 28

+ Lapointe, Savard, Gerard = 31

+ Langway, Stewart, Tremblay, Weber, Keith, Blake, Goodfellow = 38

+ Niedermayer, L. Conacher, Pronovost, Laperriere, C. Johnson = 43

+ G. Boucher, E. Johnson, Kasatonov, Stuart = 47

+ Murphy, Siebert, Brewer, Coulter = 51

----------------------- #2 D ^^

+ Cameron, Reardon, Pospisil, Suchy, Doughty = 56

+ T. Johnson, Mantha, Bouchard, Thomson = 60

+ Stanley, Wilson, L. Patrick, Howell, Flaman, White, Karlsson = 67

+ Zubov, Stapleton, Desjardins, Gardiner = 71

+ Ross, Lutchenko, Gonchar, R. Suter, Crawford, Ragulin = 77

----------------------- #3 D ^^

+ Pulford, Hitchman, McCrimmon, Hall, Wentworth, Goldham, G. Suter, D. Hatcher, Mohns = 86

+ Neilson, Mortson, Day, Baun, Grant, Horner, Schoenfeld, Vasko, Beck, Duncan = 96

+ Heller, Cook, Boyle, Pratt = 100

----------------------- #4 D ^^

+ F. Patrick, Ramsey, Svedberg, Lowe, Boivin, Simpson, Green, Burns, Reise Jr., Dutton = 110

+ Foote, Rowe, Davydov, Harper, Konstantinov, Housley = 116

+ Sologubov, Harris, Harmon, Kuzkin, Burrows, Numminen, Bergman = 123

+ Watson, K. Hatcher, Griffis, Carlyle, Hollett, Seiling= 129

----------------------- #5 D ^^

...and so on.

As you see, Davydov rates higher than Griffis by a couple levels as well. Granted, it is one GMs opinion, but I think it is worth looking at.

To sum up:

New York has a huge advantage on the top pair, as both New York defensemen are superior to even the best defenseman on the Bankers. And it is not like the Bankers' pairing has any better stylistic fit.

New York has the best 3rd D in the series as well. Siebert lacks longevity, but he was dominant in his time on D. Pittsburgh has the better 4 D, but is it enough to make up for the massive difference between White and Siebert? I mean, Siebert is a low-end number 2, while White is merely an average 3. At worst, it is a wash for New York, but I think it is a small advantage, myself.

On the 3rd pairing, I readily admit that Hall is going to take some penalties. He is also the best player between the two bottom pairings, and Davydov is also superior to Griffis. Real-life chemistry may bring it close-ish, but it is still a decided advantage to New York.

To sum it all up:
New York>>Pittsburgh
Park>>>Clapper
Salming>>Laperriere
Siebert>>White
Goldham<Stapleton
Hall>Patrick
Davydov>Griffis

Finally- I don't care who you beat to get here. New York is a different team than the ones you played previously.

 

[ImporterExporter]

I did not post conjecture. I have actually and physically read hundreds of game reports from the era and can conclusively say that if a guy had a particularly good game in just about any aspect, it was noted in the game report. A few mentions here and there of something is not special at all. Far, far more meaningful are descriptions that talk about the entire career of a player, which admittedly are not easy to find for the old timers.

For example, of the quotes you posted, the only one I really care about is the last one, and even then, what does it really mean? I can find quite a few descriptions of Cy Denneny tearing down the ice, and he's generally considered a slow skater.

Also, regarding the Toe Blake thing, we need more context in order to figure out what Toe meant. I have absolutely no idea based on what he said if he was talking about that one moment, his entire career, or just the general state he was in at the time that he said it.

And for as many references to his supposed speed that you've found, there are at least as many that say otherwise from what I can tell. The Wikipedia article has cited sources to his lack of foot speed as well, although some of those articles are not viewable any longer.

Re. His defense:

I disagree about him being average. I don't see why I should think of him as anything more than below average in the ATD. The fact that his good defensive days came in just a subset (but an admittedly important one) of his career is very important. If you average out his entire career, you should come to that same conclusion.

Then there's **** like this, from Pelletier's bio:



He also saw Stewart play.

In short, for all the nice stuff you find on Nels, there's easily as much, if not more negative stuff. Again, you can find instances of a player doing well in any area of the game. In the case of Stewart, if speed and back checking were prominent parts of his game, there would be nowhere near the amount of negativity surrounding those elements as there is.

I'm going to post a quote from a VERY respected and long term member of the HoH section that I've been having discussion with on Stewart that sums up my feelings on what you're trying to do here:

And now you understand why I do not participate in the ATD after one experience.The "Once" argument used by Jarek. Setting aside that Blake played a few seasons against Stewart and was making the comment in the context of pace, overlooking the resulting mechanics-first step,acceleration,straight line,angular,turns,edge work,etc that don't suddenly appear and disappear just "Once".

The point borders on lunacy.Like arguing in criminal court that a person charged with murder should be acquited because there is evidence of only one murder.

The point is not to make Stewart out to be a plus defender. I keep saying that. But prior to my investigation of him there was almost only negative speculation and a handful of comments on the aspect of defensive play and speed. What I've done is unearth a lot of material that should, by the standard of proof, bring Stewart into a more positive light in those areas. That's not to say he's an elite defender or even good. It's not to say he's Howie Morenz on skates, but he's certainly not slow.

The quote you have from referee Hewitson only calls him lazy. He sure as heck doesn't read like that as a Montreal player. I read, literally every single available game report (there are a good number missing from the newspaper archives, mostly from Boston) available through his Montreal and Boston days and can count on one, maybe 2 hands the number of times I saw specific negative comments regarding Stewart's play. It's far less than the praise I saw. Now, maybe there is more negative (I've surmised this because of the overall lack of negative evidence in Montreal) from his Boston and NY days, but that is also in the latter stages of his career, not peak or prime.

Stewart was noted as a "tower of strength", a "colossus", etc on D more than once. He literally played defensemen in the 1926 SC finals and was amazing there. I have reports of him outclassing Morenz, equaling Frank Boucher's defensive efforts, etc, etc. It's not 2-3 instances. It's many, especially given the time period. We're talking about nearly 100 years ago as well so game reports are really the best way to find out about a player because there wasn't TV. There wasn't the internet. The men writing those game reports watched each game, every day/night. It was extremely thorough writing. Not some general overview. So when you add up all I found and place it next to the negative things (which I'm not dismissing btw) you average it out IMO. And to me, that brings him into the average territory overall from prior big negatives.

 

[jarek]

I'm going to post a quote from a VERY respected and long term member of the HoH section that I've been having discussion with on Stewart that sums up my feelings on what you're trying to do here:



The point is not to make Stewart out to be a plus defender. I keep saying that. But prior to my investigation of him there was almost only negative speculation and a handful of comments on the aspect of defensive play and speed. What I've done is unearth a lot of material that should, by the standard of proof, bring Stewart into a more positive light in those areas. That's not to say he's an elite defender or even good. It's not to say he's Howie Morenz on skates, but he's certainly not slow.

The quote you have from referee Hewitson only calls him lazy. He sure as heck doesn't read like that as a Montreal player. I read, literally every single available game report (there are a good number missing from the newspaper archives, mostly from Boston) available through his Montreal and Boston days and can count on one, maybe 2 hands the number of times I saw specific negative comments regarding Stewart's play. It's far less than the praise I saw. Now, maybe there is more negative (I've surmised this because of the overall lack of negative evidence in Montreal) from his Boston and NY days, but that is also in the latter stages of his career, not peak or prime.

Stewart was noted as a "tower of strength", a "colossus", etc on D more than once. He literally played defensemen in the 1926 SC finals and was amazing there. I have reports of him outclassing Morenz, equaling Frank Boucher's defensive efforts, etc, etc. It's not 2-3 instances. It's many, especially given the time period. We're talking about nearly 100 years ago as well so game reports are really the best way to find out about a player because there wasn't TV. There wasn't the internet. The men writing those game reports watched each game, every day/night. It was extremely thorough writing. Not some general overview. So when you add up all I found and place it next to the negative things (which I'm not dismissing btw) you average it out IMO. And to me, that brings him into the average territory overall from prior big negatives.

You have to understand that the general overviews of a player's career are much more useful than individual game reports, especially if they get repeated over and over again. I'm not dismissing what you've found. To be honest, more than anything it just proves the point Nalyd tried to make a while back about Stewart - that he was capable of doing all these things, but chose not to most of the time. Ching Johnson said as much:

"But he doesn't backcheck."
"Not if he sees there's no need of it. He doesn't waste any energy. But if he sees that there's help needed, he'll backcheck with any of 'em. He's a terror around the nets. Just bad news, that's all."

The above is from an interview with Ching Johnson. There's also this:

The Battering Rams. That is what they call this Stewart-Barry-Clapper line. It is the heaviest forward line in professional hockey. That line averages close to 200 pounds on the hoof. Clapper and Barry eventually refused to play with him because he was too slow.

All from the comments in Pelletier's bio.

The above comments are so much more useful than individual game reports, if they exist. And there's so many of them it's not even funny. If Toe Blake says he was fast, quick, whatever, but almost literally everyone else says he was slow.. how much can you trust Blake's words?

Post more later but I gotta go.

 

[Namba 17]

3, Mikhailov was very dirty. He alludes to it himself with his mindset on retaliation (see link)
-http://www.sport-express.ru/newspaper/2014-10-03/12_1/
-Phil Esposito:
(Mikhailov is) one of the dirtiest players I've ever played against
-He's not going to get away with that kind of play here. He might have in Russia but I certainly don't think that'd be the case in a normal, neutral hockey environment.

Mikhailov is a very interesting case here. He could be really dirty and mean at times, but he had an unbelievable ability to get away with it no matter what tournament we are talking about - WC, Soviet League, games vs NA professional. Mikhailov never got any major in his career.
You can add it to his intangibles, if you want

 

[ImporterExporter]

You have to understand that the general overviews of a player's career are much more useful than individual game reports, especially if they get repeated over and over again. I'm not dismissing what you've found. To be honest, more than anything it just proves the point Nalyd tried to make a while back about Stewart - that he was capable of doing all these things, but chose not to most of the time. Ching Johnson said as much:



The above is from an interview with Ching Johnson. There's also this:



All from the comments in Pelletier's bio.

The above comments are so much more useful than individual game reports, if they exist. And there's so many of them it's not even funny. If Toe Blake says he was fast, quick, whatever, but almost literally everyone else says he was slow.. how much can you trust Blake's words?

Post more later but I gotta go.

"But he doesn't backcheck."
"Not if he sees there's no need of it. He doesn't waste any energy. But if he sees that there's help needed, he'll backcheck with any of 'em. He's a terror around the nets. Just bad news, that's all."

The above is from an interview with Ching Johnson. There's also this:

The Battering Rams. That is what they call this Stewart-Barry-Clapper line. It is the heaviest forward line in professional hockey. That line averages close to 200 pounds on the hoof. Clapper and Barry eventually refused to play with him because he was too slow.

​

Ching Johnson actually gives me a big opening here. You're trying to equate "not if he sees there's no need for it", as some sort of universal negative. You're trying to view Stewart through a modern hockey lens and that doesn't fly. The rules were drastically different. For crying out loud you couldn't make a forward pass for the first portion of his career. Tactics drastically different. Stewart was a noted smart and brainy player.

And "if he sees there's help needed, he'll backcheck with any of them". Guess what that tells me? He had zero issue with playing defense when needed and he did it quite well actually in Montreal from what I found. So when you have a noted players coach who was one of the great motivators of all time and seemed to always get the best out of his players running Pittsburgh, and an elite corps group of leaders that the Bankers possess, I think you'll see the peak of Stewart, not Boston or NY when he was well, old and well past his prime.

Also, your quote about Boston players refusing to play with Stewart because he was slow is not anything new. He was in his 30's by the time he got there. I don't know why you're bringing them up because I never said his speed carried over to his latter years. Most players slow down as they age. I'm more concerend with what he did in Montreal, you know when he was at his peak and where his entire prime occurred.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Not to mention, if Stewart was soooooo lazy and soooooo slow how did he win the Hart trophy (his 2nd) in 1930 at 28 years of age over a 27 year old Howie Morenz, a 28 year old Frank Boucher, a 26 year old King Clancy, and 25 year old Cooney Weiland?

Consider Stewart didn't lead the league in goals or points yet the voters still awarded him the Hart trophy. I'm guessing his play beyond just scoring was pretty darn good considering at that point and time voters didn't just look at stats sheets.

 

[jarek]

​

The above is from an interview with Ching Johnson. There's also this:

​

Ching Johnson actually gives me a big opening here. You're trying to equate "not if he sees there's no need for it", as some sort of universal negative. You're trying to view Stewart through a modern hockey lens and that doesn't fly. The rules were drastically different. For crying out loud you couldn't make a forward pass for the first portion of his career. Tactics drastically different. Stewart was a noted smart and brainy player.

And "if he sees there's help needed, he'll backcheck with any of them". Guess what that tells me? He had zero issue with playing defense when needed and he did it quite well actually in Montreal from what I found. So when you have a noted players coach who was one of the great motivators of all time and seemed to always get the best out of his players running Pittsburgh, and an elite corps group of leaders that the Bankers possess, I think you'll see the peak of Stewart, not Boston or NY when he was well, old and well past his prime.

Also, your quote about Boston players refusing to play with Stewart because he was slow is not anything new. He was in his 30's by the time he got there. I don't know why you're bringing them up because I never said his speed carried over to his latter years. Most players slow down as they age. I'm more concerend with what he did in Montreal, you know when he was at his peak and where his entire prime occurred.

Are you saying we should ignore what he did outside of Montreal? If so, then yes, he's a speed skating champion, a defensive mastermind.. and there's also nothing else to talk about. Even if I look at him as fast and good defensively in Montreal, that was less than half of his career. I don't believe you've shown much of anything to suggest that carried over to his NYA and BOS days, and thus the narrative for those years should go back to what it was, lacking any evidence to the contrary. If I average all of this out, he's no better than below average at anything except scoring and playing physical in the ATD.

The fact that he played those years after Montreal is VERY important, even if you don't want them to be.

To be honest, as far as I'm concerned, the only really interesting bit of information you've found on Stewart is that he has some value as a LW, and I don't know why you moved him back to C given that. In practical terms, nothing else really changes. You know why? If you draft Stewart, it's still going to be a scoring line that should get most of its zone starts in the offensive zone, and you still need to insulate him with good defensive players that can get him the puck. The only real difference is that the line may give up slightly fewer goals because Stewart isn't quite as bad as we thought.

Honestly, the LW bit is the most important part, especially since GMs are being allowed to use pretty much anyone they want at any position, provided they had at least one good year there. This allows you to build a line around Stewart that doesn't have him playing C. I think his skillset is much more useful along the boards.

 

[Johnny Engine]

A sort of philosophical note on Steward being "stereotyped" in the ATD.

What we're doing in this game is playing out a (ostensibly 82-game) season, using players' (anywhere from 3 to 32-season) careers as the measuring stick for how they'll perform. So, since every player in this league aside from Nikita Kucherov and Herb Gardiner is neither young nor old, everyone's characteristics need to be at least distilled, if not stereotyped.

It would be a stereotype to suggest that Stewart is going to coast through every single shift like a pre-game warmup. It's in keeping with the point of the ATD that there will be shifts where he engages in no puck pursuit whatsoever, and that on balance he's either the slowest or second-slowest centre in the series (and Kennedy will at least move his feet no matter what).

It's a balance we have to strike in the ATD. When we make hyperbolic claims, and call certain players literally unbeatable, or unable to execute very basic hockey skills in the ATD, we're stereotyping. However, I think insisting that every ATD player can be shown to be at least average at everything fails to distill what we know about those players into usable game pieces.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Goalies:

-To me this is where the series is truly decided. The Bankers have already faced and defeated Ken Dryden and Turk Broda. Both of whom are superior to Bernie Parent in regular and post season accolades (Dryden very much so).

Patrick Roy is the greatest goalie of all time in the minds of most. He combines a very good regular season resume with the greatest postseason career ever by any netminder and only Wayne Gretzky is definitively ahead of him when you bring skaters into the mix (and i personally don't think the gap is very large).

Roy's value (and goalies in general) has been underrated for years around here. In large part because we've never really addressed the fact that goalies are on the ice for 60 (or more) minutes a game. There value (positive or negative) goes well beyond simply stopping shots. No one position is on a bigger island than goalie. No one position can swing the momentum for his team like goalie. And here, Roy swings the pendulum greatly in Pittsburgh's favor. His presence, confidence and resume allows his skaters to be more relaxed in front of him and puts an added burden on the opposing team knowing they're facing an elite goalie, especially in a best of 7 type series.

The Bankers possess a massive advantage in net. That's not a knock on Parent, who was a fine netminder and obviously gets serious points for his 2 Conn Smythe runs but other than 1974 and 1975 his career is void of any real ATD value. That's not being harsh, it's simple reality. Parent in a 24 team draft is at best below average here. And Parent played for the broad street bullies. I don't see the Americans being able to play that style with their roster make up or with Tarasov

Roy blows him away no matter what area you look at. Better Hart record, better AS record, better Vezina record, his adjusted regular season SV% is elite (see graph below thank you Hockey Outsider and Q from HoH for these studies) and shows just how dominant he was beyond the postseason. He has elite longevity, his peak was longer and more sustained. And he carried multiple teams on his back to Stanley Cups in Montreal.

Career Save Percentage PLAYOFFS - minimum 1,000 adjusted shots

* This table is now updated for 2017

Goalie	Shots	Saves	Sv%
Tim Thomas	1,526	1,409	92.4%
Olaf Kolzig	1,446	1,330	92.0%
Patrick Roy*	7,218	6,638	92.0%
John Vanbiesbrouck	2,030	1,865	91.9%
Tuukka Rask	1,639	1,505	91.8%
Ken Wregget	1,767	1,622	91.8%
Dominik Hasek	3,422	3,140	91.7%
Braden Holtby	1,774	1,627	91.7%
Ed Belfour*	4,641	4,256	91.7%
Jean-Sebastien Giguere	1,546	1,416	91.6%
Craig Anderson	1,482	1,356	91.5%
Kirk McLean	2,099	1,918	91.4%
Patrick Lalime	1,105	1,010	91.4%
Cam Ward	1,137	1,038	91.3%
Dwayne Roloson	1,478	1,348	91.2%
Felix Potvin	2,186	1,992	91.1%
Curtis Joseph	4,044	3,685	91.1%
Martin Brodeur	5,439	4,953	91.1%
Grant Fuhr*	3,966	3,610	91.0%
Jonathan Quick	2,322	2,113	91.0%
Henrik Lundqvist	3,739	3,402	91.0%
Mike Liut	1,064	968	91.0%
Mike Richter	2,182	1,985	91.0%
Miikka Kiprusoff	1,679	1,527	90.9%
Bill Ranford	1,536	1,396	90.9%
Tom Barrasso	3,521	3,197	90.8%
Roberto Luongo	2,087	1,895	90.8%
Ryan Miller	1,697	1,540	90.7%
Chris Osgood	3,246	2,943	90.7%
Jimmy Howard	1,424	1,291	90.6%
Corey Crawford	2,522	2,284	90.6%
Nikolai Khabibulin	2,155	1,951	90.5%
Ron Hextall	2,632	2,382	90.5%
Pekka Rinne	1,970	1,781	90.4%
Reggie Lemelin	1,147	1,036	90.3%
Marty Turco	1,345	1,215	90.3%
Kelly Hrudey	2,531	2,286	90.3%
Carey Price	1,702	1,536	90.3%
Sean Burke	1,101	993	90.2%
Greg Millen	1,336	1,205	90.2%
Brian Boucher	1,069	964	90.2%
Don Beaupre	1,538	1,386	90.1%
Mike Vernon	3,493	3,146	90.1%
Jose Theodore	1,730	1,559	90.1%
Jon Casey	1,789	1,611	90.1%
Andy Moog	2,655	2,385	89.8%
Marc-Andre Fleury	3,210	2,882	89.8%
Evgeni Nabokov	2,314	2,077	89.7%
Ilya Bryzgalov	1,304	1,169	89.7%
Arturs Irbe	1,513	1,357	89.6%
Antti Niemi	1,808	1,618	89.5%
Brian Elliott	1,063	951	89.5%
Ray Emery	1,051	937	89.2%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

This table shows why it's critically important to take the era into consideration when evaluating goalies' playoff performances. For example, Grant Fuhr posted a seemingly unimpressive 89.9% save percentage between 1984 and 1988, when he helped the Oilers win four Stanley Cups in five years. Adjusted for era, Fuhr stopped 91.8% of the shots he faced during those four seasons. That's not quite elite, but it's a very strong performance over a large sample size (79). That doesn't even take into account the strong likelihood that Fuhr faced tougher quality shots than average due to playing on a run-and-gun team.

Keep in mind that career save percentage is, by definition, a career average. Tom Barrasso had a few rough playoffs at the start and end of his career, and that dragged down his average. His career average of 90.8% is barely above average; if one focuses on his prime from 1988 to 1996, Barrasso's save percentage rises to a very strong 91.6%.

Patrick Roy is tied for the second highest career save percentage out of any goalie who faced at least 1,000 shots (Roy faced more shots than the other top five goalies combined). He's also faced 33% more shots than the next closest goalie (Brodeur). No goalie during the past thirty years has surpassed (or even approached) Roy's combination of an extremely high level of performance, and longevity.

Top Thirty Playoffs – minimum 1,000 minutes

* updated for 2017

Goalie	Cup?	Smythe?	Year	Team	Minutes	Shots	Saves	Sv%
Martin Brodeur	Yes		1995	NJD	1,222	475	448	94.4%
Patrick Roy*	Yes	Yes	1993	MTL	1,293	611	577	94.3%
Pelle Lindbergh			1985	PHI	1,008	468	441	94.3%
Ed Belfour*			1995	CHI	1,014	491	462	93.9%
Patrick Roy*	Yes	Yes	1986	MTL	1,218	489	458	93.7%
Jean-Sebastien Giguere		Yes	2003	MDA	1,407	760	711	93.6%
Patrick Roy*			1989	MTL	1,206	521	488	93.6%
Reggie Lemelin			1988	BOS	1,027	442	414	93.5%
Olaf Kolzig			1998	WSH	1,351	770	720	93.5%
John Vanbiesbrouck			1996	FLA	1,332	720	672	93.4%
Tim Thomas	Yes	Yes	2011	BOS	1,542	789	736	93.3%
Jonathan Quick	Yes	Yes	2012	LAK	1,238	546	509	93.2%
Dominik Hasek			1999	BUF	1,217	616	574	93.2%
Tom Barrasso	Yes		1991	PIT	1,175	600	559	93.2%
Bill Ranford	Yes	Yes	1990	EDM	1,401	676	629	93.2%
Patrick Roy*	Yes	Yes	2001	COL	1,451	693	645	93.0%
Mike Smith			2012	PHX	1,027	611	568	93.0%
Dwayne Roloson			2006	EDM	1,160	625	581	92.9%
Sean Burke			1988	NJD	1,001	530	492	92.9%
Kirk McLean			1994	VAN	1,544	813	755	92.8%
Martin Brodeur			1994	NJD	1,171	526	488	92.7%
Andy Moog			1990	BOS	1,195	489	453	92.7%
Arturs Irbe			2002	CAR	1,078	511	474	92.7%
Marc-Andre Fleury			2008	PIT	1,251	603	559	92.6%
Tuukka Rask			2013	BOS	1,466	724	669	92.4%
Alain Chevrier			1989	CHI	1,013	478	441	92.3%
Ed Belfour*	Yes		1999	DAL	1,544	648	597	92.3%
Martin Brodeur	Yes		2003	NJD	1,491	678	626	92.2%
Chris Osgood	Yes		2008	DET	1,160	425	392	92.2%
Henrik Lundqvist			2014	NYR	1,516	731	674	92.2%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I realize that 93.0% is an arbitrary threshold, but it's a pretty good summary of the best playoff performances of the past thirty years.

As I said in the previous post, there is little doubt that Roy is the greatest playoff goalie of the past three decades. He has three of the top seven performances, and five of the top thirty-three. He performed at an exceptionally high level on five different occasions where his team made the Stanley Cup finals, and he was a major reason why they were victorious four times.

Support Neutral Wins & Losses

* update for 2017

Goalie	Decision	Wins	Losses	Win%
Patrick Roy*	245	143	102	58.2%
Martin Brodeur	204	109	95	53.5%
Ed Belfour*	156	89	67	57.0%
Grant Fuhr*	137	72	65	52.3%
Curtis Joseph	129	69	60	53.6%
Henrik Lundqvist	126	68	58	53.7%
Mike Vernon	133	65	68	49.1%
Dominik Hasek	114	65	49	57.2%
Chris Osgood	123	63	60	51.4%
Tom Barrasso	115	59	56	51.7%
Marc-Andre Fleury	113	53	60	47.1%
Andy Moog	100	47	53	47.3%
Ron Hextall	90	46	44	50.8%
Jonathan Quick	81	44	37	54.7%
Corey Crawford	85	43	42	50.8%
Kelly Hrudey	82	41	41	49.8%
Mike Richter	74	40	34	53.4%
Evgeni Nabokov	84	39	45	46.5%
Felix Potvin	72	38	34	53.0%
Kirk McLean	68	37	31	54.8%
Nikolai Khabibulin	70	36	34	51.2%
Roberto Luongo	69	36	33	51.7%
Pekka Rinne	70	35	35	50.2%
Braden Holtby	59	34	25	58.3%
Tim Thomas	50	31	19	62.4%
Tuukka Rask	53	31	22	58.6%
Ken Wregget	53	31	22	58.6%
Jon Casey	63	30	33	47.6%
Antti Niemi	65	29	36	45.2%
Ryan Miller	55	28	27	51.4%
Jean-Sebastien Giguere	50	28	22	56.5%
Miikka Kiprusoff	53	28	25	52.6%
Carey Price	56	28	28	49.7%
Bill Ranford	53	27	26	51.6%
Olaf Kolzig	44	26	18	59.1%
Don Beaupre	53	26	27	48.8%
Craig Anderson	45	25	20	56.6%
Dwayne Roloson	46	25	21	53.9%
Jose Theodore	51	24	27	47.9%
Arturs Irbe	50	24	26	48.1%
Jimmy Howard	47	24	23	50.8%
Marty Turco	47	24	23	50.8%
Patrick Lalime	41	23	18	55.5%
Cam Ward	41	22	19	54.8%
Greg Millen	46	22	24	48.8%
Ilya Bryzgalov	45	21	24	46.5%
Mike Liut	35	19	16	53.5%
Reggie Lemelin	36	19	17	51.6%
Ben Bishop	34	18	16	54.4%
Jonas Hiller	30	17	13	57.2%
Pete Peeters	34	17	17	50.2%
Brian Elliott	37	17	20	45.6%
Sean Burke	35	17	18	47.6%
Martin Jones	30	16	14	55.0%
Ray Emery	38	16	22	42.8%
Frederik Andersen	32	16	16	48.9%
Mario Gosselin	31	15	16	47.3%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

This is a concept developed by Taco McArthur – link. Essentially, it shows how many games a goalie would be expected to win, had they played on an average team. I’m not sure if I like this or Wins Added more (the latter is a statistic I created), but TM’s statistic is far easier to calculate and gives fairly similar results, so let’s go with his! The chart above shows the results for all goalies with 30+ decisions.

Roy’s dominance continues. He has the most Support Neutral Wins by a massive margin. He also has the best win percentage out of any goalie with 60+ decisions. Once again, there is little doubt that Roy is greatest playoff goalie of the past three decades.

I've put together a chart comparing the playoff save percentage of every Stanley Cup Finalist of the official save percentage era (1984-2014) to the average regular season shooting percentage of their four respective playoff opponents.

Example: In 2002, Dominik Hasek and the Detroit Red Wings played the Vancouver Canucks, St. Louis Blues, Colorado Avalanche, and Carolina Hurricanes. Their respective shooting percentages were 10.9%, 9.5%, 9.4%, and 9.2%, for an average of 9.75%, meaning that the expected save percentage was .9025 or .903. Dominik Hasek had a .920, so he exceeded expectations by .017.

Looking strictly at a raw difference undoubtedly has its flaws, as it's not adjusted to the exact amount of games played against each team. And the higher the expectation, the harder it is to exceed those expectations by the same raw amount. And conversely, if one were to play against the Edmonton Oilers or Pittsburgh Penguins in their heyday (Lindbergh, Smith, Vanbiesbrouck, Vernon, etc.), very little was expected at all.

More than that, some of the goalies on the list didn't play 100% of their teams' games - for instance, Grant Fuhr was absent for much of the 1984 Finals against a team shooting at 14.7%.


Top Performances - Stanley Cup Winners
1. Patrick Roy, 1993 (+.057)
2. Patrick Roy, 1986 (+.049)
3. Grant Fuhr, 1984 (+.044)
4. Martin Brodeur, 1995 (+.039)
4. Patrick Roy, 2001 (+.039)
6. Patrick Roy, 1996 (+.037)
7. Bill Ranford, 1990 (+.036)
8. Jonathan Quick, 2012 (+.035)
9. Tim Thomas, 2011 (+.033)
10. Martin Brodeur, 2000 (+.032)

Top Performances - Stanley Cup Losers
1. Pelle Lindbergh, 1985 (+.053)
2. John Vanbiesbrouck, 1996 (+.049)
3. Patrick Roy, 1989 (+.043)
3. Jean-Sebastien Giguere, 2003 (+.043)
3. Tuukka Rask, 2013 (+.043)
6. Dominik Hasek, 1999 (+.041)
7. Billy Smith, 1984 (+.040)
8. Ron Hextall, 1987 (+.038)
8. Kirk McLean, 1994 (+.038)
10. Olaf Kolzig, 1998 (+.035)
10. Arturs Irbe, 2002 (+.035)

Hockey Outsider's look at adjusted regular season save % which shows Roy to be incredibly elite:

Save percentage is, in my opinion, the best statistic to evaluate a goalie with. Every goaltending statistic (save percentage, wins, GAA, shutouts, etc) is influenced by the goalie’s team, however save percentage is less team-dependent than the others. I think this is intuitively obvious to anyone who studies goaltending, but I’ll explain if anybody’s curious.

The problem with save percentage is that it’s highly era-dependent. The purpose of this study is to adjust save percentage so that it’s comparable across seasons. I have data for 1983-2009.

Career Adjusted Save Percentage REGULAR SEASON(min 400 games)

Name	Adj GP	Adj SA	Adj Sv	Sv%
Dominik Hasek	741	21368	19768	92.5%
Patrick Roy	1040	29471	27114	92.0%
Roberto Luongo	517	16744	15360	91.7%
Martin Brodeur	1009	26215	23943	91.3%
Tomas Vokoun	486	14928	13628	91.3%
John Vanbiesbrouck	872	25316	23110	91.3%
Guy Hebert	488	15379	14029	91.2%
Jean-Sebastien Giguere	436	12837	11707	91.2%
Ed Belfour	957	25678	23406	91.2%
Andy Moog	686	19252	17548	91.1%
Kelly Hrudey	664	20724	18888	91.1%
Daren Puppa	423	12179	11096	91.1%
Curtis Joseph	923	27638	25168	91.1%
Ron Hextall	605	16727	15211	90.9%
Mike Richter	660	20122	18294	90.9%
Martin Biron	407	12147	11043	90.9%
Tom Barrasso	746	22001	19999	90.9%
Evgeni Nabokov	471	12872	11697	90.9%
Sean Burke	804	24389	22162	90.9%
Marty Turco	433	11044	10035	90.9%
Felix Potvin	636	18855	17121	90.8%
Jon Casey	401	11172	10143	90.8%
Dwayne Roloson	435	12861	11674	90.8%
Bob Essensa	404	11976	10869	90.8%
Mike Liut	466	12993	11789	90.7%
Nikolai Khabibulin	661	19627	17807	90.7%
Jeff Hackett	473	14210	12891	90.7%
Jose Theodore	474	14133	12810	90.6%
Chris Osgood	690	18559	16809	90.6%
Olaf Kolzig	703	20961	18980	90.5%
Don Beaupre	585	16927	15318	90.5%
Jocelyn Thibault	558	16424	14856	90.5%
Tommy Salo	511	14333	12949	90.3%
Patrick Lalime	400	11085	10012	90.3%
Grant Fuhr	787	22904	20680	90.3%
Ron Tugnutt	498	14570	13154	90.3%
Mike Vernon	768	20514	18518	90.3%
Arturs Irbe	556	16034	14473	90.3%
Glenn Healy	418	12188	10996	90.2%
Ken Wregget	559	17368	15653	90.1%
Greg Millen	416	12054	10859	90.1%
Bill Ranford	628	18796	16925	90.0%
Kirk McLean	616	17573	15817	90.0%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Patrick Roy is incredibly underrated from a save percentage perspective. His peak occurred in the high-scoring late eighties and early nineties. He towered over his peers with almost Hasek-like dominance, but his raw numbers aren’t impressive because his played during an era that was very unfriendly to goalies. I often see people argue that Brodeur is better than Roy due to a higher save percentage. That would like comparing stats from an eighties player to a modern player, and concluding that the former was better. Adjusted for era, Roy was a significantly better regular season goalie than every goalie aside from Hasek in the past three decades.

 

[rmartin65]

Goalies:


The Bankers possess a massive advantage in net. That's not a knock on Parent, who was a fine netminder and obviously gets serious points for his 2 Conn Smythe runs but other than 1974 and 1975 his career is void of any real ATD value. That's not being harsh, it's simple reality. Parent in a 24 team draft is at best below average here. And Parent played for the broad street bullies. I don't see the Americans being able to play that style with their roster make up or with Tarasov

So... yeah, Pittsburgh has an advantage in net. No arguments there. I do think you are selling Parent a bit short- before the Broad Street Bullies became the Broad Street Bullies, he carried that team to legitimacy. He got very little in the way of offensive or defensive support, so his win/loss record doesn't look particularly great, but if you read what people said at the time... he was a star. He also was a 2nd team all-star in the WHL.

A couple quotes from his bio:

Reaching the finals for the first time in their history, the Flyers weren't expected to beat the mighty Bruins led by Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito. But Parent had other ideas and with every sparkling stop, he installed that belief system within his teammates... No goalie in the league controlled rebounds better than Parent. he stood up and challenged the shooters, rarely presenting an opening to them. "He was so patient, that was his best quality", says XXXXX. "he didn't make the first move. He'd wait the shooter out."... In the decisive sixth game of that 1974 final, Parent made the first period goal stand up, stopping 30 shots for a 1-0 victory... "If you look at that era, Dryden was coming up, but if you said 'who would you want in a seven-game series, Dryden or Parent?' it would be Parent", says XXXXXXX. Even opponents marvelled at Parent's capabilities. "There was a year or two when he was invincible", former NY Islanders GM Bill Torrey says. "He never got the credit. It was always the Broad Street Bullies or Bobby Clarke. he never got the credit for how important he was to that team."... Often he'd laugh in the midst of the most significant games. "He would lean over to me and say 'hey XXXXXX, how's she going?' and he would laugh. I think it was to relax me, to break the tension, and to relax himself. And part of it was his sense of humour. In the middle of the heat of battle he would do this."

Without him, there is no cup in Philadelphia

It is almost a universally accepted fact that the most talentless teams to win the cup were Philadelphia's in 1974 and 1975. It also is an even greater surety that the Flyers never, ever would have won had it not been for the mind-boggling goaltending of Bernie Parent.

Granted, Parent had a losing record at the time, but that was because he often had to have a shutout to earn a tie.

Bernie was the artist and charmer whom everyone loved to cherish and adore... for those two back to back seasons, no goaltender was ever better, and no goaltender could have been any better...

Not only was he a tough-as-nails goaltender on the ice, he was the team joker. He would keep the guys loose and alive in the dressing room by cracking jokes and pulling pranks... bernie had two things going for him. He had good quick hands and played angles well. He wouldn't race out to the shooter, rather, he'd coolly edge out to cut down the angle. Before the shooter was ready to let the shot go, there wasn't much net exposed. He basically said to the shooter, "Go ahead, try to beat me. You're not going to score."

Bernie always talked about the pressure, but he seemed immune to it.

Bernie is the most valuable player in all of hockey... Bernie makes you feel like you can walk on water.

Bernie is the only guy who can win games by himself.

As you can see, Parent gets underrated, interestingly, because he either played for bad teams, or for good teams with more popular stars who got the credit (I'm looking at you, Clarke).

The quotes also show some leadership, maybe not in the "rah-rah" way, but in the sense that he kept his team loose, and instilled confidence in his teammates.

Considering the Americans' massive advantage on defense, and the superior coaching of Tarasov, I believe Parent is more than capable of giving New York a chance to win the series.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Special Teams:

-Another area that I think Pittsburgh is clearly ahead of the Americans in.

Gretzky, like even strength gives Pittsburgh a big leg up here. He was heavily used on the PP (11% more than Mikita) and was a prolific scorer and distributor there. Claude Giroux has been arguably the most dominant PP player of his generation, along with folks like Backstrom and Ovechkin. Giroux scores 40% of his points on the PP and is heavily slanted towards play making which bodes well with an elite net front/slot player with a huge frame, long reach and elite stick handling/shooting/scoring skills in Nels Stewart, and frankly an underrated goal scorer in his own right, Gretzky.

I do like the F group of Stamkos, Mikita and Mikhailov but they simply are a notch below Pittsburgh here.

See overpasses special teams roles that focuses on PP usage and production:

Notice the number far to the right. 1.00 is considered league average, standard. Gretzky is well over that at 1.10, and Getzlaf/Giroux both look good as well at 1.07 and 1.09 whereas the Americans don't look as hot with Karyia (0.93), Stamkos (0.94) and Mikita (1.02).

Now, Brad Park is easily the best blue liner on either unit. It's hard to compare him with Clapper because Clapper played in an earlier era but he was an elite scorer as a defensemen and possessed elite intangibles and scoring prowess and had a big time shot. Getzalf has been more effective as a F point man looking at the numbers than Kariya. You have to give the blue line advantage to NY because of Park but I think as an overall unit the Bankers are ahead.

-The 2nd units favors Pitt as well. I absolutely believe Martinec is the most gifted offensive player on either 2nd unit and you have an elite physical presence inside with Kennedy. Foyston was a wizard with the puck on his stick and is thoroughly superior to Gordon Roberts. I'll give Abel the offensive advantage to Kennedy here and Martinec is quite superior to Rod Gilbert offensively.

I see no difference with the blue liners on the 2nd pairing. Salming is obviously a superior defensemen to Stapleton but when looking at their power play production they're almost dead even (Stapes is actually a tad better but I'll call it a wash given Salming was used more on the PP). Patrick and Hall were both elite scoring defensemen but Hall never once led his league in scoring among D in the NHA. Patrick did it 4 times, against guys like his brother Lester, Moose Johnson and Lloyd Cook. This is about a big a wash as you can get IMO.

Overall, I have to say Pittsburgh enjoys an advantage on the PP.

Updated numbers here. These go back to 1959-60, and through 2014-15. I haven't fully updated the 2015-16 and 2016-17 numbers yet.

Edit: Now updated through 2016-17.

Power Play - Forwards

Player	GP	$PPP/82	$PP%	$TmPP+
Mario Lemieux	915	50	92%	1.06
Evgeni Malkin	706	41	90%	1.06
Alex Ovechkin	921	38	89%	1.12
Ilya Kovalchuk	816	31	89%	0.87
Sidney Crosby	782	41	84%	1.06
Wayne Gretzky	1487	40	82%	1.10
Kent Nilsson	553	33	81%	1.06
Guy Chouinard	578	27	79%	1.08
Joe Sakic	1378	34	78%	1.05
John Tavares	587	31	78%	0.97
Bobby Hull	923	34	78%	1.00
Gordie Howe	921	35	77%	1.03
Marcel Dionne	1348	35	77%	1.03
Paul Kariya	989	31	77%	0.93
Nicklas Backstrom	734	40	76%	1.22
Andy Bathgate	686	32	76%	0.95
Rene Robert	744	28	76%	1.05
Mike Bossy	752	35	75%	1.27
Alex Delvecchio	1017	28	75%	1.03
Steven Stamkos	586	34	74%	0.94
Ron Francis	1731	30	73%	1.00
Brad Richards	1126	28	73%	0.96
Pavel Bure	702	26	72%	0.91
Adam Oates	1337	28	72%	1.08
Johnny Bucyk	1299	31	72%	1.26
Jason Spezza	911	30	72%	1.03
Patrick Kane	740	32	72%	1.03
Peter Forsberg	708	36	72%	1.14
Dale Hawerchuk	1188	30	72%	1.01
Phil Esposito	1282	38	72%	1.34
Zigmund Palffy	684	31	71%	1.01
Teemu Selanne	1451	32	71%	1.07
Pat Lafontaine	865	29	71%	1.05
Stan Mikita	1393	33	71%	1.02
Bernie Federko	1000	28	71%	0.91
Brett Hull	1269	30	71%	1.10
Peter Stastny	977	30	71%	0.98
Rick Martin	685	27	70%	1.10
Daniel Alfredsson	1246	28	70%	1.03
Guy Lafleur	1126	28	70%	1.20
Gilbert Perreault	1191	28	70%	1.06
Ryan Getzlaf	861	30	69%	1.07
Dany Heatley	869	28	69%	0.99
Jean Beliveau	748	41	69%	1.07
Joe Thornton	1446	29	69%	1.08
Steve Yzerman	1514	27	68%	1.10
Doug Weight	1238	28	68%	0.97
Alexei Yashin	850	28	68%	0.90
Eric Lindros	760	27	68%	1.06
Jonathan Toews	717	22	67%	1.04
Claude Giroux	656	36	67%	1.09
Frank Mahovlich	1048	27	67%	1.08
Bill Barber	903	24	67%	1.18
Paul Stastny	742	25	66%	1.02
Doug Mohns	649	24	66%	1.00
Craig Janney	760	26	66%	1.00
Jaromir Jagr	1711	28	66%	1.09
Keith Tkachuk	1201	24	65%	0.96
Mark Recchi	1652	26	65%	1.01
Jason Allison	552	31	65%	1.13
Ray Whitney	1330	26	65%	0.88
Joe Pavelski	806	28	65%	1.13
Anze Kopitar	840	29	64%	1.05
Theoren Fleury	1084	25	64%	1.02
Mats Sundin	1346	25	64%	0.96
Yvan Cournoyer	968	30	64%	1.22
Rod Gilbert	1065	28	63%	1.15
Tyler Seguin	508	27	63%	0.94
Tim Kerr	655	23	63%	1.07
Thomas Vanek	885	24	63%	0.93
Marc Savard	807	28	62%	1.01
Jarome Iginla	1554	24	62%	0.95

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Power Play - Defencemen

Player	GP	$PPP/82	$PP%	$TmPP+
Bobby Orr	657	43	98%	1.46
Ray Bourque	1612	33	88%	1.11
Brian Leetch	1205	33	87%	1.11
Denis Potvin	1060	31	87%	1.19
Al Macinnis	1416	35	87%	1.18
Jeff Brown	747	29	84%	0.99
Phil Housley	1495	28	84%	1.01
Brad Park	1115	26	81%	1.15
Gary Suter	1145	28	80%	1.13
Paul Coffey	1409	31	78%	1.13
Risto Siltanen	562	25	77%	1.02
Erik Karlsson	556	32	77%	0.96
Paul Reinhart	648	28	77%	1.03
Stefan Persson	622	24	76%	1.30
Doug Wilson	1024	24	75%	1.01
P.K. Subban	500	29	75%	0.91
Sergei Gonchar	1301	27	73%	1.07
Nicklas Lidstrom	1564	30	73%	1.23
Kimmo Timonen	1108	25	73%	1.01
Pierre Pilote	660	24	70%	0.99
Dan Boyle	1093	23	70%	1.06
Andrei Markov	990	25	69%	1.04
Sandis Ozolinsh	875	25	69%	1.04
Dion Phaneuf	902	22	69%	0.94
Tomas Kaberle	984	23	69%	0.98
Mathieu Schneider	1289	23	69%	1.02
Chris Pronger	1167	26	68%	1.12
Craig Hartsburg	570	25	68%	1.03
Brian Rafalski	833	22	67%	1.11
Dustin Byfuglien	521	23	67%	0.89
Shea Weber	841	23	66%	1.01
Rob Blake	1270	23	66%	1.04
Reed Larson	904	21	66%	0.89
Tom Kurvers	659	21	66%	1.03
Bryan Berard	619	22	65%	0.91
Mark Streit	784	24	65%	1.13
Kris Letang	603	25	65%	1.05
Larry Murphy	1615	22	65%	1.05
Drew Doughty	688	23	65%	1.04
Keith Yandle	743	24	64%	0.92
Guy Lapointe	884	23	64%	1.29
Norm Maciver	500	18	64%	0.91
Mike Green	721	24	64%	1.13
Dick Redmond	771	20	64%	1.04
Scott Niedermayer	1263	20	64%	1.05
Lubomir Visnovsky	883	22	63%	1.04
Dave Babych	1195	20	63%	0.94
Tomas Jonsson	552	18	63%	1.14
Borje Salming	1148	19	62%	0.98
Joni Pitkanen	535	18	62%	0.95
Steve Duchesne	1113	20	62%	0.99
Fredrik Olausson	1022	21	62%	1.06
Ian Turnbull	628	17	60%	1.06
Ryan Suter	913	18	60%	0.99
Robert Svehla	655	19	59%	0.86
Dennis Wideman	815	20	59%	0.90
Zarley Zalapski	637	18	59%	0.96
Jason Woolley	718	19	59%	0.89
Mark Howe	929	17	59%	0.99
Vladimir Malakhov	712	18	58%	1.02
Brad Maxwell	612	19	58%	0.94
John Van Boxmeer	588	18	58%	1.01
Brian Benning	568	15	58%	0.97
Doug Bodger	1071	18	58%	0.99
Rob Ramage	1044	17	58%	0.91
Red Kelly	520	19	57%	1.00
Dennis Kearns	677	18	57%	0.94
Mark Giordano	673	19	57%	0.97
Tobias Enstrom	676	18	57%	0.90
Jean Potvin	613	18	56%	0.98
Bruce Driver	918	16	56%	0.98
Jocelyn Guevremont	571	17	56%	1.05
John-Michael Liles	836	18	56%	0.96
Steve Chiasson	751	16	56%	0.97
Bryan Mccabe	1135	18	55%	0.95
Alexander Edler	688	19	55%	1.03
Carol Vadnais	1087	17	54%	1.04
Kevin Hatcher	1157	18	54%	0.98
Dale Tallon	542	15	54%	0.92
Oleg Tverdovsky	713	17	54%	0.90
Christian Ehrhoff	789	17	53%	1.05
Dave Ellett	1129	16	53%	1.02
Rick Lanz	569	16	53%	0.91
Randy Carlyle	1055	18	53%	0.98
Jeff Norton	799	14	53%	0.95
Igor Kravchuk	699	15	53%	0.93
Pat Stapleton	635	13	53%	1.02
Dmitri Mironov	556	16	53%	1.03
Bob Dailey	561	15	52%	1.05
Roman Hamrlik	1395	17	52%	0.92
Bob Murray	1008	14	52%	1.00
Chris Chelios	1651	17	52%	1.01
Eric Desjardins	1143	15	52%	1.04
Patrice Brisebois	1009	15	52%	1.03
Doug Crossman	914	14	51%	1.04
Kenny Jonsson	686	14	51%	0.93
Filip Kuba	836	14	51%	0.89
Brent Burns	813	20	51%	1.06
Joe Corvo	708	17	51%	0.94
Randy Manery	582	14	51%	0.93
Barry Beck	615	15	51%	1.00
Willie Huber	655	11	51%	0.82
Mike O'Connell	860	13	50%	1.02
Brian Campbell	1082	16	50%	0.94
Alex Goligoski	644	16	50%	0.89
Jim Mckenny	558	16	50%	0.94
Janne Niinimaa	741	17	50%	0.99
Mike Mcewen	716	17	50%	1.00
Jacques Laperriere	691	14	50%	1.09
Wade Redden	1023	16	50%	1.05
Larry Robinson	1384	15	49%	1.14

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Penalty Kill

-Again, Pittsburgh is built to dominate special teams. And I think they clearly do here as well:

Don Luce and Ed Westfall are neck and neck here on the top units. Both are elite, all time great penalty killers who could play a lot there and impact their teams very positively. Luce is better than Kennedy on the kill looking at C but Kennedy was very good, used heavily there by Hap Day and produced a lot of SH points while helping make Toronto a premier defensive franchise during his day. Westfall is clearly better than Bailey, who to be fair, was quite good himself as a PK'er but like Luce to Kennedy, is a notch below Ed.

Where the first unit is decided is on the blue line. As I've said before, the Bankers might have the best pure PK tandem in the entire draft, with Laperriere and White. See graph below:

Not only are Lappy and White's usage insanely high, they were both productive in keeping other teams power play off the board. 1.00 being league average again, this time you want to see a number LOWER than 1.00, which both of them area, by a decent margin.

Look at Salming below. His usage is pretty good for a #1 but he bled goals against when on the kill. Now, that's not all his fault but historically speaking he's nowhere remotely close to either of my defensemen in ability and production on the kill. I certainly think Goldman is better than Salming at killing penalties and being a rock defensively but I'm not willing to concede he's on the all time elite level of either Laperriere or White.

So while I think the F's are a wash up top, Pittsburgh clearly has superior defensemen which gives us an advantage on the top kill unit IMO.

Also, who your top PK unit is going to handle Nels Stewart inside? Salming didn't play the kind of game to do it. Bob Goldham reads as an amazing shot blocker but not somebody who was very physical. I think Stewart is going to have a field day below the dots as he is an elite physical presence and goal scorer from that area.

As for the 2nd units, again Pittsburgh looks superior to me.

Bob Bourne was a very good PK'er in his day (from my bio in 2014) http://hfboards.mandatory.com/threads/atd-2014-the-bios-thread.1587243/page-5#post-81586631

Complete Handbook of Pro Hockey 1980 said:

Call him "Jets"...He has them for skates...One of swiftest skaters in the league...Used mostly at left wing but played all three forward positions..Plays on power play...Kills penalties...​

​

Complete Handbook of Pro Hockey 1981 said:

May be fastest skater in league and he knows how to use his speed...Has emerged as devastating penalty killer due to speed and long reach...Versatile guy who played all three forward position...​

​

Complete Handbook of Pro Hockey 1983 said:

One of hockey's swiftest, most graceful skaters...Always a threat to penetrate behind opposing defensemen with his quick, clever moves...Used either at center or left wing...Excels in defensive part of game as checker and penalty killer...A versatile player...Receives and delivers passes well while in full speed...Uses his speed effectively to create two-one-one rushes and breakaways...​

​

Complete Handbook of Pro Hockey 1984 said:

One of the fastest skaters in the game...Always a breakway threat...Important cog in Islanders' great penalty-killing unit...Usually a left wing but has played all three forward positions...Underrated defensive player...Can play point on power play...​

​

Complete Handbook of Pro Hockey 1985 said:

Islanders missed his speed in losing Stanley Cup final to swift skating Edmonton...Sidelined with ankle injury during most of playoffs..Has exceptional skating speed...Always a threat to make solo fast-break rush from one end of ice to the other...Can play all three forward positions...Excels as penalty-killer...Good forechecker and backchecker...Has winning touch when taking faceoffs...Normally plays wing...​

Bourne will play on the 2nd unit when the Bankers are tied or protecting a lead. His speed and long reach will be invaluable to harassing the Americans PP point men and there is nobody going to catch him going the other way if he gets loose with the puck: (check the video below)

Gretzky, if the Bankers are down in a game would come on to the 2nd PK unit. He's the all time leader in SH points and his presence alone will keep the opposing PP honest and a bit on edge and Martinec is, after getting a slew of information from our HoH brother Batis, is probably a 1st line killer here and as a 2nd unit guy is certainly very good.

Brad Park is a very average PK'er, at best which is one of the reasons I think he's been overrated all these years (just a little bit mind you). He was used sparingly as a PK'er throughout his career. Notice he doesn't even show up on overpasses chart below for regular season usage. Other than Paul Coffey I can't think of a top 20 defensemen all time who was used so little on the kill.

I'll take Stapleton and Clapper over Siebert and Park for 2nd unit pairs. And I don't see any way Kopitar and Balon can be ahead of Bourne/Gretzky and Martinec either.

Penalty Kill - Defencemen

Player	GP	SH%	TmSH+	$SHP/82
Jacques Laperriere	691	76%	0.90	2
J.C. Tremblay	796	66%	0.94	1
Marcel Pronovost	636	66%	0.96	1
Bill White	604	65%	0.88	1
Bobby Orr	657	62%	0.78	6
Francois Beauchemin	836	60%	1.08	1
Jay Bouwmeester	1071	59%	0.95	1
Serge Savard	1040	58%	0.82	2
Ray Bourque	1612	58%	0.88	2
Bill Hajt	854	57%	0.77	1
Chris Chelios	1651	57%	0.85	2
Barry Beck	615	57%	1.01	1
Tim Horton	1010	57%	0.92	2
Jim Schoenfeld	719	56%	0.77	1
Scott Stevens	1635	56%	0.88	1
Zdeno Chara	1350	56%	0.90	2
Willie Mitchell	907	56%	0.90	1
Derian Hatcher	1045	56%	0.89	1
Alex Pietrangelo	539	55%	0.84	1
Borje Salming	1148	55%	1.09	1
Rob Scuderi	783	55%	0.91	1
Chris Pronger	1167	55%	0.91	1
Bob Stewart	575	54%	1.19	1
Bob Plager	644	54%	1.00	1
Denis Potvin	1060	53%	0.82	2
Harry Howell	932	53%	1.05	1
Rod Langway	994	53%	0.83	1
Adam Foote	1154	53%	0.99	1
Dave Burrows	724	53%	1.05	1
Dan Hamhuis	951	53%	0.93	1
Carol Vadnais	1087	53%	0.98	1
Moose Vasko	600	53%	1.00	1
Niklas Hjalmarsson	623	53%	0.97	2
Guy Lapointe	884	53%	0.76	1
Tom Laidlaw	705	52%	0.98	1
Duncan Keith	913	52%	0.95	2
Richard Matvichuk	796	52%	0.86	1
Dan Girardi	788	52%	0.84	2
Nicklas Lidstrom	1564	52%	0.81	2
Bert Marshall	868	51%	0.97	1
Craig Ludwig	1256	51%	0.93	0
Karlis Skrastins	832	51%	1.00	1
Barry Gibbs	792	51%	1.10	1
Marc-Edouard Vlasic	812	51%	0.95	1
Kevin Hatcher	1157	51%	0.92	1
Barclay Plager	614	51%	1.03	2
Gilles Marotte	808	51%	1.01	1
Tracy Pratt	580	51%	1.07	0
John Carlson	526	51%	1.01	1
Jamie Macoun	1128	50%	0.96	1
Hal Gill	1108	50%	0.97	1
Tom Reid	701	50%	1.21	1
Robyn Regehr	1086	50%	1.03	1
Rick Green	845	50%	1.04	1
Rob Blake	1270	50%	0.99	1
Harold Snepsts	1033	49%	1.08	1
Ron Stackhouse	889	49%	1.07	1
Mattias Norstrom	903	49%	1.01	1
Brian Leetch	1205	49%	1.03	1
Bryan Watson	877	49%	1.07	1
Kjell Samuelsson	813	49%	0.92	0
Terry Harper	1066	49%	0.90	0
Mike Milbury	754	49%	0.83	1
Mike Rathje	768	49%	0.97	1
Mike Ramsey	1070	49%	0.88	1
Brad Marsh	1086	49%	0.90	1
Alexei Gusarov	607	49%	0.94	1
Bryce Salvador	786	48%	0.81	1
Bob Baun	826	48%	1.03	0
Jan Hejda	627	48%	0.99	1
Fred Barrett	745	48%	1.11	0
Zbynek Michalek	784	48%	1.03	1
Leo Boivin	728	48%	1.01	1
Ken Morrow	550	48%	0.87	0
Josh Gorges	749	48%	0.93	0
Bob Murdoch	757	48%	0.88	1
Mark Tinordi	663	48%	0.90	1
Karl Alzner	591	48%	0.99	0
Richard Smehlik	644	48%	0.82	1
Marc Staal	689	47%	0.84	2
Niclas Havelid	628	47%	1.10	1
Andy Greene	707	47%	0.84	1
Brad Stuart	1056	47%	0.94	1
Jay Mckee	802	47%	0.86	1
Anton Volchenkov	696	47%	0.71	2
Toni Lydman	847	47%	0.99	1
Gary Bergman	838	47%	1.08	2
Allan Stanley	627	47%	0.96	2
Jerry Korab	825	47%	0.83	1
Scott Hannan	1055	47%	1.00	1
Brendan Witt	890	47%	1.04	1
Pierre Pilote	660	47%	0.97	2
Eric Desjardins	1143	46%	0.94	1
Paul Martin	856	46%	0.88	0
Bob Lorimer	529	46%	1.06	1
Dale Rolfe	509	46%	1.01	1
Teppo Numminen	1372	46%	0.94	1
Joel Quenneville	803	46%	0.99	1
Dimitri Yushkevich	786	46%	1.06	1
Ed Van Impe	700	46%	0.83	1
Barret Jackman	876	46%	0.89	1
Eric Brewer	1009	45%	1.01	1
Mattias Ohlund	899	45%	1.02	1
Reed Larson	904	45%	1.10	1
Uwe Krupp	729	45%	0.94	1
Rod Seiling	979	45%	0.95	1
Mario Marois	955	45%	0.94	1
Jason Smith	1008	45%	0.94	1
Johnny Boychuk	529	45%	0.85	1
Sami Salo	878	45%	0.92	1
Bill Houlder	846	45%	0.96	1
Calle Johansson	1109	45%	0.88	1
Matt Greene	615	45%	0.91	0
Filip Kuba	836	45%	0.93	1
Larry Robinson	1384	45%	0.86	1
Mike Weaver	633	45%	1.04	0
Ed Jovanovski	1128	24%	1.10	1
Petr Svoboda	1047	24%	0.95	1
Brad Maxwell	612	24%	0.90	0
Randy Hillier	543	24%	1.10	1
Jiri Slegr	622	24%	1.09	1
Oleg Tverdovsky	713	24%	1.04	0
Shane O'Brien	537	23%	0.95	1
J.J. Daigneault	899	23%	1.06	0
Christian Ehrhoff	789	23%	0.92	1
Gary Doak	789	23%	0.97	0
Brian Benning	568	23%	1.00	0
Dennis Kearns	677	23%	1.26	0
Ian White	503	23%	1.29	0
Yves Racine	508	22%	1.09	0
Doug Houda	561	22%	0.99	0
Brian Rafalski	833	22%	0.91	0
Jason Demers	504	21%	0.87	1
Fredrik Olausson	1022	21%	0.94	1
Drake Berehowsky	549	21%	1.03	0
Jean Potvin	613	21%	1.03	1
John Van Boxmeer	588	21%	0.99	0
Mathieu Dandenault	599	21%	0.81	0
Jason Strudwick	674	21%	1.14	0
Sergei Gonchar	1301	21%	0.98	1
Bob Mcgill	705	20%	1.06	0
Tomas Jonsson	552	20%	0.92	1
Erik Karlsson	556	20%	1.02	1
Sandis Ozolinsh	875	19%	1.11	1
Matt Carle	730	19%	0.94	0
Larry Playfair	688	18%	0.82	0
Red Kelly	520	17%	1.00	1
Dustin Byfuglien	521	17%	1.08	1
Dan Boyle	1093	17%	1.00	0
Bryan Berard	619	16%	1.10	0
Tom Kurvers	659	16%	1.12	1
Risto Siltanen	562	16%	1.01	0
Joe Corvo	708	16%	1.04	0
Brian Campbell	1082	16%	1.13	0
Chris Joseph	510	16%	1.07	0
Mark Streit	784	15%	1.08	0
Norm Maciver	500	15%	1.20	1
Mike Mcewen	716	15%	0.99	0
Pierre Bouchard	595	15%	0.95	0
Shane Hnidy	550	14%	0.97	0
Cody Franson	527	14%	1.08	0
Kris Russell	641	13%	1.04	0
Steve Montador	571	13%	1.05	0
Paul Laus	530	12%	1.06	0
Jim Benning	605	12%	1.14	0
Phil Housley	1495	11%	0.96	0
John-Michael Liles	836	10%	0.93	0
Keith Yandle	743	9%	0.89	0
Mike Green	721	9%	1.05	0
Lubomir Visnovsky	883	8%	1.17	0
Jason Woolley	718	2%	0.83	0

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

 

[jarek]

A sort of philosophical note on Steward being "stereotyped" in the ATD.

What we're doing in this game is playing out a (ostensibly 82-game) season, using players' (anywhere from 3 to 32-season) careers as the measuring stick for how they'll perform. So, since every player in this league aside from Nikita Kucherov and Herb Gardiner is neither young nor old, everyone's characteristics need to be at least distilled, if not stereotyped.

It would be a stereotype to suggest that Stewart is going to coast through every single shift like a pre-game warmup. It's in keeping with the point of the ATD that there will be shifts where he engages in no puck pursuit whatsoever, and that on balance he's either the slowest or second-slowest centre in the series (and Kennedy will at least move his feet no matter what).

It's a balance we have to strike in the ATD. When we make hyperbolic claims, and call certain players literally unbeatable, or unable to execute very basic hockey skills in the ATD, we're stereotyping. However, I think insisting that every ATD player can be shown to be at least average at everything fails to distill what we know about those players into usable game pieces.

Was I trying to paint any other picture? I don't blame IE for trying to push his work on Stewart as hard as he has been, but it is neither realistic nor sane to say that he was so good in Montreal and we therefore should see him as such. Ignoring the rest of his career makes no sense whatsoever, and that "rest of career" is probably what drags his reputation down a fair bit.. including with his contemporaries that had an opinion on him. If he played like he did in Montreal for his entire career, I sincerely doubt there would be so many people talking about him as negatively as they have.

So, to see him as below average as a skater and defensive player in the ATD I feel is not only more than fair, but a balanced approach to consolidating what he did his entire career. There will be games where he coasts, and there will be games where he's the hardest working guy out there. If this isn't fair to him, then I honestly have no idea what so say.