George Armstrong Is he really a HHOF player?

[Hardyvan123]

I'm not someone who wants to induct every good player from the 1960s, so I sympathize with your general point.

But Armstrong was not a marginal HHOF induction. He was named to the Hall in 1975, 4 years after he retired. Andy Bathgate and Marcel Pronovost were both eligible, yet were passed over in favor of Armstrong. Contemporaries Bert Olmstead, Allan Stanley, Fern Flaman, and Leo Boivin were all passed over for years before being inducted in the 80s and 90s.

Looking at players a few years younger than Armstrong, Bob Pulford and Dick Duff had to wait decades to get into the Hall. From players a few years older, Bill Quackenbush, Edgar Laprade, Woody Dumart, Bobby Bauer, and Roy Conacher all had to wait until after Armstrong was selected.

I just don't think Armstrong was a borderline selection at all. If you don't think Armstrong belongs, it would follow that quite a few honoured members from the 50s and 60s shouldn't be in the Hall (assuming the selection committee could reasonably assess Armstrong as a player in 1975).

To your last point, that's the Pandora's box here if Armstrong belongs then it becomes the Hall of the pretty good not the great and it opens up the debate that there should be many more modern players in the Hall to compensate and make things equal.

The current practice of only allowing around 4 players in a year in a 21-30 team league from 1980 to present eligible players make the bar go much higher than a George Armstrong or many of those players named in this post from the same time era.

The bottom line is that players from the past are definitely over represented in the HHOF. Alot of this is due to the smaller size of the league and the less difficulty of being in the top 5 or 10 of any stat as well as only 6 teams competing for the Stanely cup every year.

Armstrong would need to have a better playoff record to make up for his lack of any time of ever placing in the top 10 in any offensive stat in his 14 full seasons in the 06 era.

He was never in the top 8.33% of scorers in the league during his playing time which is the what the top 10 would be in a 120 player league.

Once he was 7th in PP goals.

Compared to today that would mean never being in the top 50 in scoring EVER in his career.

Was he really that good of a leader and defensive player to make up for that?

I never saw him play but I find nothing in the record to indicate that he is really worthy of getting into the Hall.

 

[seventieslord]

To make the top-50 in points nowadays takes about 63 points. 63 points is about 63% of what the average #2-4 scorer gets nowadays. So to determine the validity of your statement, all we need to look at is whether Armstrong ever had 63% as many points as the #4 scorer in the league:

He did in 1956, 1960, 1962, and 1966.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

honestly, if we all agree that armstrong is in the hall for intangibles, this is one of those situations where stats sheets, numbers crunching, and projecting for competition sample doesn't work and you'd have to have seen the guy play to really know. (hard to question the legitimacy of the captain and top playoff scorer of a dynasty though.)

i'm not nearly old enough, so i take the word of the HHOF committee who, as overpass noted, inducted him ahead of guys like bathgate and pronovost, who i've never heard anyone ever question as HHOFers. there was seemingly no question that he belonged, and obviously those guys all saw him play as they inducted him right away.

 

[Hardyvan123]

honestly, if we all agree that armstrong is in the hall for intangibles, this is one of those situations where stats sheets, numbers crunching, and projecting for competition sample doesn't work and you'd have to have seen the guy play to really know. (hard to question the legitimacy of the captain and top playoff scorer of a dynasty though.)

i'm not nearly old enough, so i take the word of the HHOF committee who, as overpass noted, inducted him ahead of guys like bathgate and pronovost, who i've never heard anyone ever question as HHOFers. there was seemingly no question that he belonged, and obviously those guys all saw him play as they inducted him right away.

And we all know that the Hall never makes any mistakes right?

Sorry, I'm not trying to flood or whatever it's called.

It just seems to me that trying to look at Armstrong objectively, it's pretty hard to call him one of the all time greats, which is the type of player who should be in the Hall IMO.

 

[Hardyvan123]

To make the top-50 in points nowadays takes about 63 points. 63 points is about 63% of what the average #2-4 scorer gets nowadays. So to determine the validity of your statement, all we need to look at is whether Armstrong ever had 63% as many points as the #4 scorer in the league:

He did in 1956, 1960, 1962, and 1966.

I think I know what you are trying to say here but does it take into account 6 teams versus say 30 teams today or am I misunderstanding your point?

Never placing in the top 10 during the original 6 in any season really tells us alot about his offensive deficiencies.

I'm curious as to the guys that think that armstrong is a legit HHOF.

Do these people also think that Francis and Gilmour or Butch Goring or Adam Oates (who was a completely different type of player I know) are as well?

I know Francis is in but under valued in this section IMO.

Francis and Gilmour are clearly head and shoulders above Armstrong and I would make a very strong argument that goring was a better player than Armstrong as well.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Your Comparisons

I think I know what you are trying to say here but does it take into account 6 teams versus say 30 teams today or am I misunderstanding your point?

Never placing in the top 10 during the original 6 in any season really tells us alot about his offensive deficiencies.

I'm curious as to the guys that think that armstrong is a legit HHOF.

Do these people also think that Francis and Gilmour or Butch Goring or Adam Oates (who was a completely different type of player I know) are as well?

I know Francis is in but under valued in this section IMO.

Francis and Gilmour are clearly head and shoulders above Armstrong and I would make a very strong argument that goring was a better player than Armstrong as well.

SL's point holds regardless of whether you have a 6 or 30 team NHL. Even in the O6 era you had the equivalent of a 30 team NHL - the AHL,WHL, EPHL,CHL,QSHL,QHL. These leagues were populated with lifers who at best would have a cup of coffee in the NHL. None will come close to the HHOF but some are recognized at the league level - AHL HOF. Today you have about the same number of elite players 100-120 but the talent is spread over 30 teams as opposed to a concentration amongst 6 teams. You will always have stratification and concentrations that are a function of team style as opposed to individual talent. Certain teams defined roles, line combinations and playing time according to offensive objectives while others defined the same attributes according to team defensive objectives.

Defining talent or HHOF worthiness by offensive stats is a great disservice to the players in question and the success they attained during their career.

Armstrong is a legit HHOF. Came to play every shift of every game during the length of his career, never wore out his welcome.Solid defensively, underrated offensively, playing on a team - the Leafs who focused on defense, rarely played with a playmaking center.

Gilmour and Oates = short shelf life with a team, would wear out their welcome. Little long term contribution. Goring was basically a support player, perhaps a 1970's/1980's Ralph Backstrom.Francis is a legit HHOF although it took him a few years to find the HHOF level of consistency.

 

[Nalyd Psycho]

And we all know that the Hall never makes any mistakes right?

Sorry, I'm not trying to flood or whatever it's called.

It just seems to me that trying to look at Armstrong objectively, it's pretty hard to call him one of the all time greats, which is the type of player who should be in the Hall IMO.

It's actually pretty easy to call him one of the all-time great leaders. Is he an all-time great scorer? No. But there's more to hockey than scoring. There's more to winning than scoring. But is there more to greatness than winning?

 

[seventieslord]

It's actually pretty easy to call him one of the all-time great leaders. Is he an all-time great scorer? No. But there's more to hockey than scoring. There's more to winning than scoring. But is there more to greatness than winning?

Yes. But your point still stands.

 

[Hardyvan123]

SL's point holds regardless of whether you have a 6 or 30 team NHL. Even in the O6 era you had the equivalent of a 30 team NHL - the AHL,WHL, EPHL,CHL,QSHL,QHL. These leagues were populated with lifers who at best would have a cup of coffee in the NHL. None will come close to the HHOF but some are recognized at the league level - AHL HOF. Today you have about the same number of elite players 100-120 but the talent is spread over 30 teams as opposed to a concentration amongst 6 teams. You will always have stratification and concentrations that are a function of team style as opposed to individual talent. Certain teams defined roles, line combinations and playing time according to offensive objectives while others defined the same attributes according to team defensive objectives.

Defining talent or HHOF worthiness by offensive stats is a great disservice to the players in question and the success they attained during their career.

Armstrong is a legit HHOF. Came to play every shift of every game during the length of his career, never wore out his welcome.Solid defensively, underrated offensively, playing on a team - the Leafs who focused on defense, rarely played with a playmaking center.

Gilmour and Oates = short shelf life with a team, would wear out their welcome. Little long term contribution. Goring was basically a support player, perhaps a 1970's/1980's Ralph Backstrom.Francis is a legit HHOF although it took him a few years to find the HHOF level of consistency.

I'm not sure were to start here, are you really saying that the 120 players in the 06 NHL are on par with todays best 120? Or that after maybe the top 10, 15 or 20 players that any of the 06 players would be more than fringe players in todays NHL?

As for Armstrong being better than Gilmour and Oates and even Goring as your post seems to imply, I guess that's why I find your logic puzzling most of the time as Gilmour was for a period of time one of the best two way forwards in the world (and in a greatly expanded world compared to Armstrong) and Oates is probably one of the best 10 play makers ever.

Funny that you are calling Goring a support player which is exactly what Armstrong was IMO a support player. Goring was a better offensive player and not too shabby on the defensive side of things either.

Goring was definitely a support player when he joined the NYI but he really stepped it up both ways in the 1st 4 of 5 years they went to the finals that included 4 Cups and his Conn Smythe in 81.

 

[Chili]

HHOF criteria:

Player : Playing ability, sportsmanship, character and their contribution to the team or teams and to the game of hockey in general.

Definitely Chief in my opinion.

Great quote from Conn Smythe: "(Armstrong is) the best captain, as a captain, the Leafs have ever had."

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

And we all know that the Hall never makes any mistakes right?

Sorry, I'm not trying to flood or whatever it's called.

It just seems to me that trying to look at Armstrong objectively, it's pretty hard to call him one of the all time greats, which is the type of player who should be in the Hall IMO.

of course the HHOF makes mistakes. but from my vantage point, most of those mistakes are due to a misreading of numbers: ciccarelli, gartner, and i would argue larry murphy. we see the same numbers as the HHOF committee and we can also see that, in the case of dino or gartner, those guys were rarely if ever truly elite if you look at top 10 placements.

with armstrong, the claims for his greatness are all the things that can't be captured by numbers. my point is, in the case of a guy like that, whose greatness is very hard for us to verify if we can't see it with our own eyes, we have to take the committee's (and many many others') word for it. if no crunching of numbers (presumably) can account for what makes armstrong a HHOFer, then why are we crunching numbers?

 

[Hardyvan123]

of course the HHOF makes mistakes. but from my vantage point, most of those mistakes are due to a misreading of numbers: ciccarelli, gartner, and i would argue larry murphy. we see the same numbers as the HHOF committee and we can also see that, in the case of dino or gartner, those guys were rarely if ever truly elite if you look at top 10 placements.

with armstrong, the claims for his greatness are all the things that can't be captured by numbers. my point is, in the case of a guy like that, whose greatness is very hard for us to verify if we can't see it with our own eyes, we have to take the committee's (and many many others') word for it. if no crunching of numbers (presumably) can account for what makes armstrong a HHOFer, then why are we crunching numbers?

I think here on the HF Boards and in the history section in particular , we are trying to look at players objectively and investigating and analyzing whether some things are true, ie. HHOF selections.

In my opinion, and especially for forwards, numbers have to make up a large amount of a players resume, as the other things like leadership, defensive play being the captain ect are all very subjective and should make up a smaller portion of a successful HHOF resume.

As I stated above I believe that Btuch Goring had better numbers and has the icing that Armstrong has as well.

Armstrong had a longer career but no one is ever talking about goring getting into the hall and that's the part that is puzzling because one can make a very strong case that Goring was a "better" or "greater" player in his career, numbers and intangibles.

 

[Rants Mulliniks]

If your stuck on "objectively" assessing his numbers, consider the following:

When it matters (i.e. the playoffs), over the course of the Maple Leafs 4 Stanley Cups in the 60's (when he was between 32 and 37 years old) he was second on the team in goal scoring and second in points.

Goals Per Game Played

Keon 0.46
Armstrong 0.38
Pulford 0.31
Mahovolich 0.28
Kelly 0.21
Horton 0.15

Points Per Game Played

Mahovolich 0.83
Armstrong 0.82
Keon 0.77
Kelly 0.75
Pulford 0.71
Horton 0.67

 

[Hardyvan123]

If your stuck on "objectively" assessing his numbers, consider the following:

When it matters (i.e. the playoffs), over the course of the Maple Leafs 4 Stanley Cups in the 60's (when he was between 32 and 37 years old) he was second on the team in goal scoring and second in points.

Goals Per Game Played

Keon 0.46
Armstrong 0.38
Pulford 0.31
Mahovolich 0.28
Kelly 0.21
Horton 0.15

Points Per Game Played

Mahovolich 0.83
Armstrong 0.82
Keon 0.77
Kelly 0.75
Pulford 0.71
Horton 0.67

Sure he did okay there but it's 55 games not a career, best he ever did was tie Pulford one year in goal scoring in the playoffs as well.

I'm sure I could find a dozen guys who did better in the small sampling you gave, and had better careers overall as well.

I tend to judge a guy on his total career and Armstrong comes up short IMO and it's by quite a bit too.

 

[Rants Mulliniks]

Sure he did okay there but it's 55 games not a career, best he ever did was tie Pulford one year in goal scoring in the playoffs as well.

I'm sure I could find a dozen guys who did better in the small sampling you gave, and had better careers overall as well.

I tend to judge a guy on his total career and Armstrong comes up short IMO and it's by quite a bit too.

You claimed to want to "objectively" assess his career and one of your complaints is his point totals. I just showed you how he essentially lead a team en route to four Stanley Cups. That's without factoring in all his intangibles.

You then go on to compare him to Butch Goring, who you describe as complimentary yet better than Armstrong. How about we analyze Goring's "objective" contributions to those 4 Stanley Cups in comparison to Armstrong's.

Goals Per Game Played

Mike Bossy 0.85
Bryan Trottier 0.49
Bob Bourne 0.42
Bob Nystrom 0.37
Denis Potvin 0.35
Butch Goring 0.35
John Tonelli 0.33
Clark Gillies 0.30
Wayne Merrick 0.19
Stefan Persson 0.12

Points Per Game Played

Mike Bossy 1.54
Bryan Trottier 1.43
Denis Potvin 1.09
Bob Bourne 1.00
John Tonelli 0.83
"Butch" Goring 0.79
Bob Nystrom 0.73
Clark Gillies 0.71
Stefan Persson 0.69
Wayne Merrick 0.52

The entire objective of playing in the NHL is to win the Stanley Cup. I'd be very interested in seeing you provide me with the following list (in the interest of only judging objectively):

How many players can you name in the history of the NHL who have won 4 or more Stanley Cups and in doing so, were top 2 on their team for goals and points? Heck, I'll be nice and lower the bar to top 5.

 

[overpass]

I think here on the HF Boards and in the history section in particular , we are trying to look at players objectively and investigating and analyzing whether some things are true, ie. HHOF selections.

In my opinion, and especially for forwards, numbers have to make up a large amount of a players resume, as the other things like leadership, defensive play being the captain ect are all very subjective and should make up a smaller portion of a successful HHOF resume.

The problem with being "objective" and going entirely by the numbers is that the numbers for Armstrong's career are very limited. It's basically games played, goals, assists, and points. So if you choose your HOF players from that era "objectively", you'll end up with a HOF that's biased towards offensive value, and undervalues other contributions. Just because certain parts of hockey are "subjective" and are more difficult to quantify doesn't mean they aren't important to winning and losing.

The HHOF voters had seen most or all of Armstrong's career in 1975 when they voted Armstrong into the HHOF soon after his retirement. We don't have any more information than they had, and most of us have much less information. How do you propose to investigate and analyze his HHOF selection and come to a better conclusion? Clearly they gave a lot of weight to his leadership and defensive play. Were they wrong to do so? How do you know?

 

[Canadiens1958]

The Comparison

I'm not sure were to start here, are you really saying that the 120 players in the 06 NHL are on par with todays best 120? Or that after maybe the top 10, 15 or 20 players that any of the 06 players would be more than fringe players in todays NHL?

As for Armstrong being better than Gilmour and Oates and even Goring as your post seems to imply, I guess that's why I find your logic puzzling most of the time as Gilmour was for a period of time one of the best two way forwards in the world (and in a greatly expanded world compared to Armstrong) and Oates is probably one of the best 10 play makers ever.

Funny that you are calling Goring a support player which is exactly what Armstrong was IMO a support player. Goring was a better offensive player and not too shabby on the defensive side of things either.

Goring was definitely a support player when he joined the NYI but he really stepped it up both ways in the 1st 4 of 5 years they went to the finals that included 4 Cups and his Conn Smythe in 81.

I tend to recognize that the top 120 players of the O6 season for any given season had clearly defined roles which impacted their offensive numbers. Example the Canadiens had three quality centers Jean Beliveau, Henri Richard, Ralph Backstrom. Could not have all three playing first line minutes with the best RW or LW while enjoying #1 PP unit time. Rather obvious. Today the top 120 NHL players are spread amongst all thirty teams so the top forwards get to play on the #1 line with the top linemates and get #1 PP unit time.Very rare that you will see a team with depth - 2 #1 quality players at the same position. So overall their offensive stats of the top 120 will be higher. Also rather obvioius.

Comparing Armstrong out of context to where he would fit offensively with modern players - top 120 removes any semblance of historic context. Today such a player could simply concentrate on his offensive skills and put up nice numbers that would impress those that are impressed by things that glitter but could not aprreciate a complete hockey player.

Oates is far from a top 10 playmaker all time. He was a RHS at center, who had the good fortune to play with snipers at right wing - Brett Hull, Cam Neely,Peter Bondra. Ask the rather obvious question how did his LWs do? The answer will give you an idea about his overall playmaking skill. He could make a good pass to the RW while an elite playmaker has more varied passing skills, evidenced by some of the great centers who could feed RW and LW equally well - see Lemaire with Shutt and Lafleur,Abel with Lindsay and Howe,Boucher with the two Cooks, Larionov with Krutov and Makarov, etc plus feed the point.

Gilmour was not that solid defensively. Compare the job Guy Carbonneau did on Gretzky in 1993 to Gilmour in 1993.

The fundemental issue with your comparison besides the cross era comparison which puts everything out of context is that you are also comparing across positions. Goring, Oates, Gilmour were centers. Armstrong was primarily a RW - different roles, responsibilities and expectations.Comparing Armstrong to modern RWs would at least have a semblance of apples to apples.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Oates is far from a top 10 playmaker all time. He was a RHS at center, who had the good fortune to play with snipers at right wing - Brett Hull, Cam Neely,Peter Bondra. Ask the rather obvious question how did his LWs do? The answer will give you an idea about his overall playmaking skill. He could make a good pass to the RW while an elite playmaker has more varied passing skills, evidenced by some of the great centers who could feed RW and LW equally well - see Lemaire with Shutt and Lafleur,Abel with Lindsay and Howe,Boucher with the two Cooks, Larionov with Krutov and Makarov, etc plus feed the point.

this is off-topic, but can you explain why oates, with his RHS, would be more predisposed to pass to his right side? i would think that he would favour the left side, which is his "facing" side. isn't this why right wingers are historically the higher scoring wing, because a higher percentage of centers are LHS?

re: his left wingers, joe juneau had a monster year on oates' left side. chris simon is another guy who had an uncharacteristically high-scoring career year on oates' left wing (a year when bondra was hurt and ineffective). to my eyes, the discrepancy between these guys and hull, neely, and bondra is likely due more to a discrepancy in talent than to a deficiency in oates' passing ability, which was among the very best i've ever seen.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

this is off-topic, but can you explain why oates, with his RHS, would be more predisposed to pass to his right side? i would think that he would favour the left side, which is his "facing" side. isn't this why right wingers are historically the higher scoring wing, because a higher percentage of centers are LHS?
.

I had the same question.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Quirks

this is off-topic, but can you explain why oates, with his RHS, would be more predisposed to pass to his right side? i would think that he would favour the left side, which is his "facing" side. isn't this why right wingers are historically the higher scoring wing, because a higher percentage of centers are LHS?

re: his left wingers, joe juneau had a monster year on oates' left side. chris simon is another guy who had an uncharacteristically high-scoring career year on oates' left wing (a year when bondra was hurt and ineffective). to my eyes, the discrepancy between these guys and hull, neely, and bondra is likely due more to a discrepancy in talent than to a deficiency in oates' passing ability, which was among the very best i've ever seen.

Quirks of hockey. Maurice Richard a LHS could not play LW. Simon's goals were mostly crash the net type goals. Juneau was a natural center who played some left wing, played like a center, not staying wide.

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

Quirks of hockey. Maurice Richard a LHS could not play LW. Simon's goals were mostly crash the net type goals. Juneau was a natural center who played some left wing, played like a center, not staying wide.

This explains the second part of the question, but not the first, which is what I was really interested in.

Wouldn't it be easier for a RHS center to pass to his left? Passing to his left would be on the forehand, and to his right would be on the backhand.

(Especially in Oates' era...by this time curved sticks had been around for a while and the role/art of the backhand had diminished from what it was in the straight blade days)

 

[BraveCanadian]

This explains the second part of the question, but not the first, which is what I was really interested in.

Wouldn't it be easier for a RHS center to pass to his left? Passing to his left would be on the forehand, and to his right would be on the backhand.

(Especially in Oates' era...by this time curved sticks had been around for a while and the role/art of the backhand had diminished from what it was in the straight blade days)

Maybe if he played with Bobby Hull instead of Brett we wouldn't even be questioning it.

Who is to say he couldn't pass even better to the left side but just never had a top shelf finisher of the same level to do it with over there?

 

[habsjunkie2*]

Maybe if he played with Bobby Hull instead of Brett we wouldn't even be questioning it.

Who is to say he couldn't pass even better to the left side but just never had a top shelf finisher of the same level to do it with over there?

Exactly.

BTW. Oates is easily a top 10 play maker of all time. I'm not sure where Canadiens1958 was trying to go with this.

 

[habsjunkie2*]

Maybe if he played with Bobby Hull instead of Brett we wouldn't even be questioning it.

Who is to say he couldn't pass even better to the left side but just never had a top shelf finisher of the same level to do it with over there?

Exactly.

BTW. Oates is easily a top 10 play maker of all time. I'm not sure where Canadiens1958 was trying to go with this. If he was trying to suggest Adam Oates couldn't pass to the left wing because he was a right handed shot, he'll have to do better than that.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Other Centers

Exactly.

BTW. Oates is easily a top 10 play maker of all time. I'm not sure where Canadiens1958 was trying to go with this. If he was trying to suggest Adam Oates couldn't pass to the left wing because he was a right handed shot, he'll have to do better than that.

Just provided a short list of centers, RHS and LHS that showed during their career that they could feed LWs and RWs equally well.

Oates regardless of the reason never showed that he could while many others besides the ones listed in the sampling clearly showed that they could. Hockey like other sports has a "Show Me" aspect - you have to actually do it.