He's not getting it either because he's just trying to be a disturber or he is just simply incapable of understanding rational thought.
Anyways, its not easy to decide who the greatest forward was. I've seen most of the greats play live since the 60's and most of the others before that on film.
If I want to see how Howie Morenz play, I just have to put in a tape and I can see that he was a superior skater and had greater acceleration than other players at the time. But I haven't seen enough of his whole career to include him.
Gordie Howe's record speaks for itself. Howe was dominant moreso in the 50's of course as those were his prime years. But in studying Howe's career, I find that he didn't elevate his play in the playoffs as Maurice Richard did. To me, greatness means the ability to go beyond the normal limits. Detroit was in the finals 4 out of 6 years in the 1960's and failed to win the Cup each time. Its not fair to single out one player for the failure as Howe probably played well, but he did not elevate his game enough to make a difference. Maurice Richard, though, did elevate his game in the playoffs - sometimes doing superhuman feats that were totally beyond the abilities or thoughts of most players. Richard had numerous playoff overtime goals, Gordie Howe had zero.
As an overall player during the regular season, Howe gets the nod over Richard because of his defensive play But in the playoffs, it was no contest as Richard was the superior player.
If you talk to some of the players who played in the 50's, a few will say that Jean Beliveau was much tougher to defend against over Gordie Howe. Beliveau in his prime was that good. And if you want to add intangibles, Beliveau was a superior leader.
Bobby Hull had more pure skill than any of those players if you talk about skating and shooting and scoring. If Hull had gotten the room that Gordie Howe got, he would have had greater numbers. Hull was the only player that could be as dynamic as Maurice Richard was.
Wayne Gretzky dominated his peers so much in his prime both in the regular season and playoffs that he has to get a lot of consideration as the top forward. Same with Mario Lemieux
So, I don't have an ranking order but my top 6 are Gretzky, Hull, Lemieux, Richard, Beliveau and Howe. I'm not comparing how good Richard was in comparison to Lemieux or Gretzky but rather against his peers.
And finally, as I've mentioned before, a few of the superstar players of the past, given their style of play and if they were given the advantages of the modern players, would still be stars today. Its ridiculous to say otherwise. Bobby Orr played in the 60's and received his early training in the 50's. Is someone going to say that Orr wouldn't make an all-star team if he played today while in his prime?
Ogopogo said:
Read God Bless' post above. As well, did you get anything from our little talk on evolution?
I really don't know why you aren't getting this.