Greatest Playmakers Of All-Time: #6

[DitchMarner]

Who is the sixth-greatest playmaker of all-time?


Apply your own criteria.


#1. Wayne Gretzky
#2. Mario Lemieux
#3. Bobby Orr
#4. Adam Oates
#5. Joe Thornton

Click to read more...

 

[amnesiac]

Forsberg all day

5th all-time A/GP all in the DPE, many seasons on one foot

wouldve lead the league in assists probably 5 TIMES if he hadnt missed some games

and still managed 708 career GP (more than Orr, a little less than Bossy)

 

[UED]

what? Joe Thornton beat Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid?!

 

[filinski77]

Forsberg all day

5th all-time A/GP all in the DPE, many seasons on one foot

still managed 708 career GP

Kind of contradictory to use career /gp metrics and then cite a (relatively) low career GP total (with most of those games being in his 20’s).

Crosby: 1x leading in assists, 10x top-10
Francis: 2x leading in assists, 12x top-10
Forsberg: 1x leading in assists, 7x top-10
Jagr: 3x leading in assists, 10x top-10​

Crosby: Better actual assist finishes, better career assist total, equal /gp finishes

Francis: Way better actual assist finishes, way better career assist total, slightly worse /gp finishes (which should never trump actual finishes)

Jagr: Way better actual finishes, way better career assist total, equal/slightly worse /gp finishes (same note as above)

(All 3 have way better era adjusted assist totals too).

At the end of the day I see no case for Forsberg over any of those 3 (add Howe etc too). When comparing greatness, total career accumulation does matter, the number of seasons being at the top does matter, and Forsberg doesn’t even handily beat any of them in /gp season finishes anyways. Might be a hot take but Forsberg is closer to Sedin than he is to the above mentioned when discussing “greatness”.

 

[filinski77]

what? Joe Thornton beat Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid?!

Are you serious?

Assist totals: Thornton >> Crosby >>> McDavid

Top-10 assists finishes: Thornton > Crosby >> McDavid

Top-1 assist finishes: Thornton > McDavid > Crosby

Peak season: Thornton > Crosby >= McDavid

 

[nowhereman]

what? Joe Thornton beat Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid?!

I think Thornton and Oates are on this list so early because of their reputation as pure playmaker/passers, as opposed to all-around offensive talents like Sid and Jagr (McDavid's too young). Mind you, it's pretty close between everyone in this tier. Crosby will likely finish ahead of both Thornton and Oates in raw assists, adjusted assists and assists per game (the last probably depends on how long he stretches out his career). McDavid could do the same but shouldn't be in the conversation yet. Jagr is also right there.

 

[amnesiac]

Kind of contradictory to use career /gp metrics and then cite a (relatively) low career GP total (with most of those games being in his 20’s).

Crosby: 1x leading in assists, 10x top-10
Francis: 2x leading in assists, 12x top-10
Forsberg: 1x leading in assists, 7x top-10
Jagr: 3x leading in assists, 10x top-10​

Crosby: Better actual assist finishes, better career assist total, equal /gp finishes

Francis: Way better actual assist finishes, way better career assist total, slightly worse /gp finishes (which should never trump actual finishes)

Jagr: Way better actual finishes, way better career assist total, equal/slightly worse /gp finishes (same note as above)

(All 3 have way better era adjusted assist totals too).

At the end of the day I see no case for Forsberg over any of those 3 (add Howe etc too). When comparing greatness, total career accumulation does matter, the number of seasons being at the top does matter, and Forsberg doesn’t even handily beat any of them in /gp season finishes anyways. Might be a hot take but Forsberg is closer to Sedin than he is to the above mentioned when discussing “greatness”.

Forsberg wouldve lead the league (probably) 5 times if it wasnt for injuries. And other than 03-04, its not as if he had missed that many games (per season) in his prime. It just so happened that he missed enough to not lead the league in assists. And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP.

96-97 (65GP, was on pace to finish one ahead of Gretzky)
97-98 (72GP, was on pace to finish ahead of Jagr)
00-01 (73GP, was on pace to finish one ahead of Oates)
02-03 (blew everyone out of the water)
03-04 (37A in 39GP, league leader was Gomez with 56)

I mean its like youre penalizing him for not playing full seasons consistently. THe difference between him and say Orr (657GP) or Bossy (752GP) is that they played full seasons and retired early. So why do we class them as one of the great playmakers/goalscorers of all-time, but Forsberg we dont? come on. Thats not logical.

 

[filinski77]

Forsberg wouldve lead the league (probably) 5 times if it wasnt for injuries. And other than 03-04, its not as if he had missed that many games (per season) in his prime. It just so happened that he missed enough to not lead the league in assists. And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP.

96-97 (65GP, was on pace to finish one ahead of Gretzky)
97-98 (72GP, was on pace to finish ahead of Jagr)
00-01 (73GP, was on pace to finish one ahead of Oates)
02-03 (blew everyone out of the water)
03-04 (37A in 39GP, league leader was Gomez with 56)

I mean its like youre penalizing him for not playing full seasons consistently. THe difference between him and say Orr (657GP) or Bossy (752GP) is that they played full seasons and retired early. So why do we class them as one of the great playmakers/goalscorers of all-time, but Forsberg we dont? come on. Thats not logical.

"Forsberg wouldve lead the league (probably) 5 times if it wasnt for injuries."
-> Not true. He lead the league in assists/gp 3 times. In 1997 he finished 3rd in assists/gp, and in 2001 he finished 4th in assists/gp. Not fair to only extrapolate Forsbergs /gp numbers in a season.

"And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP. [I mean its like youre penalizing him for not playing full seasons consistently.]"
-> I'm not penalizing him at all, simply not giving him as much credit for "being on pace to do something" as I would for "actually doing something". I don't see what the issue is here. For example, leading the league in assists 3 times > leading the league in assists per game 3 times. It's silly to argue otherwise.

-> Plus, I straight up added in assist per GP finishes in my analysis, and the only player there that Forsberg clearly had better assist/gp finishes was Francis.

"And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP."
-> When comparing "greatness", you have to look at a lot of different things. Career longetivity is one of them, so is your ability to consistently be at the top of the league year-in, year-out. So even though it sucks that Forsbergs career overall and individual seasons were detailed by injuries, it's not fair to give him credit for things he "might have done" over players who actually did it.

"The difference between him and say Orr (657GP) or Bossy (752GP) is that they played full seasons and retired early. So why do we class them as one of the great playmakers/goalscorers of all-time, but Forsberg we dont? come on. Thats not logical."
-> As far as Bossy goes, I'll go on the record and say that I still think he's overrated as hell, and his 5th (?) place ranking on that goal-scorers thread I don't agree with. He has a good peak, but no longetivity to compare to some of the players he beat out. For example, Hull Jr. had more rockets, a better peak, and way more actual goals. The only reason Bossy got in ahead of him is the crowd that oozes over his career/gp numbers. Howe is also better in every way imaginable, but still lost in that poll.

-> For Orr, I'll start with saying this. Even if I think Forsberg is the 9th (just for arguments sake) best playmaker all-time, and Orr is the 3rd, they are both still "one of the greatest playmakers of all-time". It's silly to think that 9th vs. 6th is the difference between being one of the best all-time vs. not. Regardless, here is an analysis for Orr vs. Forsberg. Both had short careers, and similar actual and adjusted assists/gp. That's essentially a wash. The HUGE difference here is the fact that Orr lead the league in assists and assist/gp way more than Forsberg did.

	Orr	Forsberg
Career GP	657	708
Career Assists	645	636
Career Adj. Assists	623	699
# of times leading in assists	5	1
# of times leading in assists/gp	6	3
# of times top-10 in assists	6	7
# of times top-10 in assists/gp	7	9

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I'll also go as far as admitting that it is obviously easier to be top-10 or top-1 when the talent pool and competition is smaller (which is the case in Orr's era where it was 95% Canadians playing. So I went through Forsbergs seasons and removed non-Canadian players. The only difference is that Forsberg adds 1x raw assist lead, 1x top-10 (that he was like 13th in), and 1x top-10 /gp (see bolded below). It doesn't change things much imo.

	Orr	Forsberg
Career GP	657	708
Career Assists	645	636
Career Adj. Assists	623	699
# of times leading in assists	5	2
# of times leading in assists/gp	6	3
# of times top-10 in assists	6	8
# of times top-10 in assists/gp	7	10

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Then we have the biggest kicker in the comparison between these 2: Orr was a defenseman (who inherently do not put up as many assists/points as forwards do). So overall their raw/adjusted production is close, Forsberg has slightly better top-10 finishes (adjusted for non-Canadians), Orr has WAY better top-1 finishes, AND Orr was a defenseman. To me, that justifies the difference between #3 and #9.

 

[pegcity]

This was hard.

I came pretty close to picking Francis/Jagr.

 

[amnesiac]

"Forsberg wouldve lead the league (probably) 5 times if it wasnt for injuries."
-> Not true. He lead the league in assists/gp 3 times. In 1997 he finished 3rd in assists/gp, and in 2001 he finished 4th in assists/gp. Not fair to only extrapolate Forsbergs /gp numbers in a season.

"And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP. [I mean its like youre penalizing him for not playing full seasons consistently.]"
-> I'm not penalizing him at all, simply not giving him as much credit for "being on pace to do something" as I would for "actually doing something". I don't see what the issue is here. For example, leading the league in assists 3 times > leading the league in assists per game 3 times. It's silly to argue otherwise.

-> Plus, I straight up added in assist per GP finishes in my analysis, and the only player there that Forsberg clearly had better assist/gp finishes was Francis.

"And the only reason he didnt have as many top 10 finishes in assists is obviously because the guy only played 8 seasons of 60+ GP."
-> When comparing "greatness", you have to look at a lot of different things. Career longetivity is one of them, so is your ability to consistently be at the top of the league year-in, year-out. So even though it sucks that Forsbergs career overall and individual seasons were detailed by injuries, it's not fair to give him credit for things he "might have done" over players who actually did it.

"The difference between him and say Orr (657GP) or Bossy (752GP) is that they played full seasons and retired early. So why do we class them as one of the great playmakers/goalscorers of all-time, but Forsberg we dont? come on. Thats not logical."
-> As far as Bossy goes, I'll go on the record and say that I still think he's overrated as hell, and his 5th (?) place ranking on that goal-scorers thread I don't agree with. He has a good peak, but no longetivity to compare to some of the players he beat out. For example, Hull Jr. had more rockets, a better peak, and way more actual goals. The only reason Bossy got in ahead of him is the crowd that oozes over his career/gp numbers. Howe is also better in every way imaginable, but still lost in that poll.

-> For Orr, I'll start with saying this. Even if I think Forsberg is the 9th (just for arguments sake) best playmaker all-time, and Orr is the 3rd, they are both still "one of the greatest playmakers of all-time". It's silly to think that 9th vs. 6th is the difference between being one of the best all-time vs. not. Regardless, here is an analysis for Orr vs. Forsberg. Both had short careers, and similar actual and adjusted assists/gp. That's essentially a wash. The HUGE difference here is the fact that Orr lead the league in assists and assist/gp way more than Forsberg did.

	Orr	Forsberg
Career GP	657	708
Career Assists	645	636
Career Adj. Assists	623	699
# of times leading in assists	5	1
# of times leading in assists/gp	6	3
# of times top-10 in assists	6	7
# of times top-10 in assists/gp	7	9

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I'll also go as far as admitting that it is obviously easier to be top-10 or top-1 when the talent pool and competition is smaller (which is the case in Orr's era where it was 95% Canadians playing. So I went through Forsbergs seasons and removed non-Canadian players. The only difference is that Forsberg adds 1x raw assist lead, 1x top-10 (that he was like 13th in), and 1x top-10 /gp (see bolded below). It doesn't change things much imo.

	Orr	Forsberg
Career GP	657	708
Career Assists	645	636
Career Adj. Assists	623	699
# of times leading in assists	5	2
# of times leading in assists/gp	6	3
# of times top-10 in assists	6	8
# of times top-10 in assists/gp	7	10

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Then we have the biggest kicker in the comparison between these 2: Orr was a defenseman (who inherently do not put up as many assists/points as forwards do). So overall their raw/adjusted production is close, Forsberg has slightly better top-10 finishes (adjusted for non-Canadians), Orr has WAY better top-1 finishes, AND Orr was a defenseman. To me, that justifies the difference between #3 and #9.

I guess its all in the definition of what we define "greatness" as..... I agree that longevity is a big of it, and Forsberg A/GP numbers are somewhat boosted by the fact that he only has 708GP compared to a Howe, Thornton, Jagr, etc.... But something has to be said about him playing his whole career is the lowest scoring era ever compared to most others we're listing, and hes STILL 5th all-time. Thats pretty remarkable imo, the point where it makes up for his somewhat low GP.

10x top 10 in A/GP in 11 career seasons (including his rookie!) is quite something, and hes probably up there is top 5 A/GP too. I think this is the stat that puts him in the top 5-6 imo. I have the feeling Howe, Jagr, and Thornton dont have as many top 5/10 finishes in A/GP in their first 11 seasons. That being said, theyre all close.