Conn Smythe Winners - Tiers (1980-Present)

[PK]

I can’t imagine not winning the Cup and being average in the final can ever make you a tier 1 Conn Smythe winner. No matter how good you were in the previous rounds.

 

[LightningStorm]

I can’t imagine not winning the Cup and being average in the final can ever make you a tier 1 Conn Smythe winner. No matter how good you were in the previous rounds.

That's based on the flawed logic of the final being the toughest round with the toughest opponent, which is the issue I take with the NBA postseason MVP award being only for the finals. How tough it is relative to other rounds changes year to year. In fact, the finals IMO should hold less weight when factoring in the performances of Sakic, Yzerman and Vasilevskiy in 1996, 1998, and 2021, respectively.

 

[Oheao]

Bumping this thread as I'm curious where people think Makar and Marchessault would rank.

 

[solidmotion]

makar probably tier 2. similar to leetch. marchessault probably tier 3. deserving but unremarkable historically. mcdavid the last couple years has shown what a tier 1 run would look like if he and the oilers could finish the job.

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

Bumping this thread as I'm curious where people think Makar and Marchessault would rank.

Agreed with @solidmotion. Marchessault was a good candidate on a “committee win” with other good candidates. Had Florida somehow won the series, Tkachuk, Bobrovsky, maybe even Montour would likely have been stronger Conn Smythe recipients. But Vegas took it home handily, and Marchessault was a strong contributor, I’m probably placing him with O’Reilly in the 3rd tier.

Makar was awesome, the best finals/cup run by a defenseman since Duncan Keith. Strong 2nd tier performance.

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

I didn't see a description of the tiers, but I think there needs to be a 5th tier created where it clearly went to the wrong person (inspired by Justin Williams, but there may be others). To me the tiers go like this:

1. Out of this world amazing
2. All time great playoff, clear winner
3. Very good performance, the favorite, but not a no brainer. Maybe also include times where there are 2 great performances that blow the rest away, but it's a tough choice between those two.
4. Committee win as referenced above, where it could have gone to 2/3 players and everyone would've been fine with it
5. They gave it to the wrong guy

I would put Makar in 2 and Marchessault in 4

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

5. They gave it to the wrong guy

I do think there’s a difference between the time they gave it to Williams over Kopitar/Doughty etc, and the time they gave it to Ovechkin over Kuznetsov. Ovechkin was still awesome his run.

 

[Michael Farkas]

5. Gave it to the wrong guy (acceptable)
6. Gave it to the wrong guy (unacceptable)

:?:

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

I do think there’s a difference between the time they gave it to Williams over Kopitar/Doughty etc, and the time they gave it to Ovechkin over Kuznetsov. Ovechkin was still awesome his run.

I think for that specific example I'd be fine with Ovechkin in Tier 4 (he was committed to defense, much more physical than Kuznetsov and much more of a team leader, so there's at least an argument there), but I do see what you're getting at.

It also feels strange to put Ovechkin in a lower tier than Marchessault when I think he had a better playoff (equivalent at worst), but I guess the focus of this exercise is supposed to be about how deserving the winner was compared to other candidates that particular year.


Also, not sure how I missed this before, but for the record there is a description of the tiers given in the OP, which is as follows:
+++
I'm using four tiers, which can roughly be categorized as Godlike; strong victory; solid victory; and undeserving.
+++

 

[Hockey Outsider]

If I can criticize my own article for a minute, I struggled with defining what's "deserving". I think there's two ways to approach it. First, how objectively good was the performance (comparing that player to other Conn Smythe winners)? Second, how good was the player relative to the other candidates that year? Arguably, players should be evaluated on both dimensions.

Using that approach, for how objectively good a performance is, you might have these four tiers: all-time great, strong, average, and weak. And for how good they are relative to the other candidates that spring, you might have these categories: clearly the most deserving, probably the most deserving, one of several good candidates, and someone else got robbed.

In many years, the evaluation would be the same on both dimensions. I can think of several examples where players will be one tier apart. For example, take 2016. I think most of us would evaluate Crosby's first Smythe as 4th tier for how objectively good the performance was, but 3rd tier for how deserving it was.

Are there any examples where a player might be two tiers apart?

 

[Michael Farkas]

I don't want to beat a dead horse, but I immediately go to Justin Williams...I mean, he was - what - the 5th best LA King? Kopitar was no question better. Williams turned the puck over more in space and created much less than Gaborik. And Carter was more effectively offensively and defensively. Then you have Doughty. So...if he gets "objective" points for scoring well-timed goals (which I'm not against), he creates that distance on the "relative" dimension certainly...

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

.

Are there any examples where a player might be two tiers apart?

First one that came to mind was Hextall. Gretzky got robbed, so that’s tier 4. I wasn’t old enough to have any memory of this, could he have been put in the “strong” tier?

 

[LightningStorm]

If I can criticize my own article for a minute, I struggled with defining what's "deserving". I think there's two ways to approach it. First, how objectively good was the performance (comparing that player to other Conn Smythe winners)? Second, how good was the player relative to the other candidates that year? Arguably, players should be evaluated on both dimensions.

This is an important point, and why I think Crosby's 2016 CS has had arguably the most contentious debate. On the one hand, his performance in a vacuum was among the weakest since 1980, which adds to the theory of him winning it due to name recognition. On the other hand, the 2016 Pens were such a team effort that no single player really stood out, therefore no player was legitimately robbed. I wouldn't even say Letang, who was my choice that year, was robbed of the CS for how by committee that team was. The reason I think Goring ranks at the very bottom is because he ranks towards the bottom in performance, and at the very bottom when it comes to other candidates because he had TWO (Potvin and Bossy) who were better than him, while usually an underserved winner is at least 2nd best.

These 2 different elements are why I think 1984 Messier was a worse selection than 1999 Nieuwendyk, in spite of Messier clearly having the better postseason of the 2. IMO Messier was clearly behind Gretzky, while as a fan of the Dallas team of that era, I thought Nieuwendyk and Belfour were 50/50 and thought either would've been the right choice.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Here's an example of what I was talking about before (looking at the Smythe using two different parameters):

I filled in the names in about 10 minutes. Not looking to get into debates about who belongs where - just trying to show how this framework might be used, based on the (approximate) HOH consensus.

 

[LDX]

Here's an example of what I was talking about before (looking at the Smythe using two different parameters):

View attachment 727752

I filled in the names in about 10 minutes. Not looking to get into debates about who belongs where - just trying to show how this framework might be used, based on the (approximate) HOH consensus.

Is the Conn Smythe a sandwich!?

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Here's an example of what I was talking about before (looking at the Smythe using two different parameters):

View attachment 727752

I filled in the names in about 10 minutes. Not looking to get into debates about who belongs where - just trying to show how this framework might be used, based on the (approximate) HOH consensus.

goring wouldn’t be alone in the bottom right but this is a good way of visualizing the two overlapping conversations that are being had here

 

[LightningStorm]

Here's an example of what I was talking about before (looking at the Smythe using two different parameters):

View attachment 727752

I filled in the names in about 10 minutes. Not looking to get into debates about who belongs where - just trying to show how this framework might be used, based on the (approximate) HOH consensus.

Good chart that does capture the essence well of the 2 parts of the argument. For good argument, do you mean the favorite, just not the clear cut favorite like the category to the left of it?

goring wouldn’t be alone in the bottom right but this is a good way of visualizing the two overlapping conversations that are being had here

Which other CS winner do you believe also had a below average Smythe run while also robbing a teammate (let alone 2 in Goring's case) of the Smythe? Though I guess you could argue there were some unworthy winners that also had weak performances but who's teammate who should've won wasn't robbed as much as Potvin and Bossy in 1981.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Which other CS winner do you believe also had a below average Smythe run while also robbing a teammate (let alone 2 in Goring's case) of the Smythe? Though I guess you could argue there were some unworthy winners that also had weak performances but who's teammate who should've won wasn't robbed as much as Potvin and Bossy in 1981.

justin williams, easy

in lowest rung of smythe performances

meanwhile, doughty and kopitar were completely robbed and i argue gaborik was probably more important, and carter was close to him

i wasn’t around to watch the 1981 playoffs but from what i’ve read there’s no reason to suggest that goring’s run was worse than most of the ones in the “average” tier. but i think most of them should be marked below average, if we take the word average literally.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Good chart that does capture the essence well of the 2 parts of the argument. For good argument, do you mean the favorite, just not the clear cut favorite like the category to the left of it?

Yes, exactly. In the first column, in my opinion, nobody else has a reasonable argument over Gretzky in 1985, or Lemieux in 1991, or (even though it's a lower level of performance) Makar in 2002 (he won the Conn Smythe unanimously). Maybe Duncan Keith in 2015 belong in this category too.

In the 2nd column, the Smythe probably went to the most deserving player, but it's not entirely clear. For example, Sakic was probably the most deserving in 1996, but Roy had a reasonable case. (Then the reverse was true in 2001). Leetch was probably the most deserving in 1994, but Messier had a decent case. Thomas was probably the best pick in 2011, but Chara had a good case. (Lemieux in 1992 is probably the most questionable player in this category, but he missed almost 30% of the games, so maybe Barrasso or someone else could have snuck in).

 

[LightningStorm]

justin williams, easy

in lowest rung of smythe performances

meanwhile, doughty and kopitar were completely robbed and i argue gaborik was probably more important, and carter was close to him

i wasn’t around to watch the 1981 playoffs but from what i’ve read there’s no reason to suggest that goring’s run was worse than most of the ones in the “average” tier. but i think most of them should be marked below average, if we take the word average literally.

2014 is a good selection and does fit what I said in my previous reply, in that Williams was a below average performance and Kopitar was robbed, though not to the same degree as Potvin and Bossy in 1981. The 2014 Kings were a team effort, but Kopitar was my clear pick, as he played Selke level defense while leading the team in scoring. What I think ultimately happened was Williams' "Mr. Game 7" meme got taken too seriously. On a list I made on my opinion of how right the voters got the CS winners, 1981, 1987, and 2014 were years where I thought they were dead wrong. I might add 1997 (Vernon) to that list too.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

2014 is a good selection and does fit what I said in my previous reply, in that Williams was a below average performance and Kopitar was robbed, though not to the same degree as Potvin and Bossy in 1981. The 2014 Kings were a team effort, but Kopitar was my clear pick, as he played Selke level defense while leading the team in scoring. What I think ultimately happened was Williams' "Mr. Game 7" meme got taken too seriously. On a list I made on my opinion of how right the voters got the CS winners, 1981, 1987, and 2014 were years where I thought they were dead wrong. I might add 1997 (Vernon) to that list too.

imo doughty was the easy cs winner all run and lost it because of a couple ugly turnovers in the deciding game

but yeah that year the kings had the best defensive dman in the world (who also was a B+ offensively) and best two way center in the world. j will had a great run but that was a laughable decision that we here on HOH all lambasted in real time.

i do think it was just as bad potvin/bossy/trottier getting snubbed for goring

 

[LightningStorm]

Yes, exactly. In the first column, in my opinion, nobody else has a reasonable argument over Gretzky in 1985, or Lemieux in 1991, or (even though it's a lower level of performance) Makar in 2002 (he won the Conn Smythe unanimously). Maybe Duncan Keith in 2015 belong in this category too.

In the 2nd column, the Smythe probably went to the most deserving player, but it's not entirely clear. For example, Sakic was probably the most deserving in 1996, but Roy had a reasonable case. (Then the reverse was true in 2001). Leetch was probably the most deserving in 1994, but Messier had a decent case. Thomas was probably the best pick in 2011, but Chara had a good case. (Lemieux in 1992 is probably the most questionable player in this category, but he missed almost 30% of the games, so maybe Barrasso or someone else could have snuck in).

Sakic and Roy in 1996 and 2001 reminds me of how I grouped the CS winners in terms of how right or wrong I thought the voters got it. The 4 groups I had were:

1. Right winner, where I thought the winner was, at bare minimum, the favorite. Often an easy choice.
2. 50/50 winner, where the winner was one of 2 right choices, and were I'd be perfectly fine with either winning.
3. Wrong, but not unreasonable choice, where I don't think they got it right, but could understand where they were coming from.
4. Dead wrong.

Sakic and Roy were definitely the top 2 in the Avs 2 cup wins (in each individual run, not just collectively). Sakic winning in 1996 was category #1 for me, as I thought he was quite dominant scoring those playoffs, and few have been as dominant goal scoring wise. If Roy won it, I think it would go in category 3 on my list, and give Messier company in his section of your grid. A strong, above average performance, but a teammate was even better. In 2001, I thought it was 50/50 between them, with me leaning slightly towards Roy. Sakic was slowed down with injuries in the first 2 rounds, but really came alive against their 2 toughest opponents in the later half when Forsberg was out, so I don't think it would've been wrong if he won it. But Roy was consistent across all 4 rounds, and great in the finals. Not sure where I'd put 2001 Sakic on your grid though had he won. Probably the same as 2001 Roy.

 

[Staniowski]

Putting Roy '86 and Roy '93 in the same category as Gretzky and Lemieux is crazy.

Roy '86 is without a doubt the most over-rated Conn Smythe win of all-time. First of all, Carbonneau deserved to win it. Roy played well and was probably the Habs' 3rd or 4th or 5th most important player in the '86 playoffs. Lemieux, McPhee, Chelios were also excellent (and several others - Skrudland, Naslund, Robinson, Green - were very good). And if you compare Roy '86 to other Smythe winners in the '80s, Trottier '80, Bossy '82, Messier '84, Gretzky '85, Gretzky '88, MacInnis '89 were all better....i.e. Roy '86 was one of the weaker Smythes of the 1980s.

MacInnis '89 was better than Roy '89, and Roy '89 was better than Roy '86.

I don't have a problem with Roy '93 winning the award, but it's still nowhere near Gretzky and Lemieux level.

 

[tabness]

Putting Roy '86 and Roy '93 in the same category as Gretzky and Lemieux is crazy.

Roy '86 is without a doubt the most over-rated Conn Smythe win of all-time. First of all, Carbonneau deserved to win it. Roy played well and was probably the Habs' 3rd or 4th or 5th most important player in the '86 playoffs. Lemieux, McPhee, Chelios were also excellent (and several others - Skrudland, Naslund, Robinson, Green - were very good). And if you compare Roy '86 to other Smythe winners in the '80s, Trottier '80, Bossy '82, Messier '84, Gretzky '85, Gretzky '88, MacInnis '89 were all better....i.e. Roy '86 was one of the weaker Smythes of the 1980s.

MacInnis '89 was better than Roy '89, and Roy '89 was better than Roy '86.

I don't have a problem with Roy '93 winning the award, but it's still nowhere near Gretzky and Lemieux level.

It was very interesting to look back and see how contemporary opinion of the eighties Conn Smythe winners was compared to what they've sort of been remembered as much later at least on this board:

Potvin really didn't get much love for any Conn Smythes during the Isles dynasty
Goring 1981 was a firm choice and underscored by the North Stars
Gretzky 1984 wasn't really even in the running but Kevin Lowe certainly was
Fuhr generally got a lot of love in the Oilers dynasty
Roy 1986 probably the biggest dissonance with an opposing player and his own coach kinda questioning/caveating it
Vernon 1989 got a lot of love and had a real good chance

Maybe with Roy, it's a bit of his future performances especially in 1993 solidifying his reputation. I think it would be interesting to see what would have happened if Vernon won in 1989 or if the Flames won in 1986 where he was a frontrunner, maybe his 1997 win wouldn't be questioned like it is today.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Putting Roy '86 and Roy '93 in the same category as Gretzky and Lemieux is crazy.

Roy '86 is without a doubt the most over-rated Conn Smythe win of all-time. First of all, Carbonneau deserved to win it. Roy played well and was probably the Habs' 3rd or 4th or 5th most important player in the '86 playoffs. Lemieux, McPhee, Chelios were also excellent (and several others - Skrudland, Naslund, Robinson, Green - were very good). And if you compare Roy '86 to other Smythe winners in the '80s, Trottier '80, Bossy '82, Messier '84, Gretzky '85, Gretzky '88, MacInnis '89 were all better....i.e. Roy '86 was one of the weaker Smythes of the 1980s.

MacInnis '89 was better than Roy '89, and Roy '89 was better than Roy '86.

I don't have a problem with Roy '93 winning the award, but it's still nowhere near Gretzky and Lemieux level.

This really stands out because you rarely criticize Patrick Roy, and clearly don't have an axe to grind with him.