If the Top 100 players All-time list is redone today, where does McDavid's career place him?

[ResilientBeast]

i am foreseeing a potvin/fedorov situation where kucherov leads his team in scoring again for the third straight year en route to a third straight cup, but the oilers make the finals so mcdavid wins the conn smythe because a billion points

The Conn Smythe Trophy is an annual award given "to the most valuable player for his team in the playoffs." The winner is selected by the Professional Hockey Writers Association at the conclusion of the last game in the Stanley Cup Final.

NHL Conn Smythe Trophy Winners

The only reason the Oilers have made it this far is McDavid and Drai on one leg.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Let's play: The "What if?" Extreme Scenario Game! Ding ding ding ding!

What if the Oilers go 7 in the next series. McDavid scoops up 14+ points. He's at 40 points, but the Oilers lose game 7. The next non-Oiler scorer is Nikita Kucherov at 15 points, currently. Let's get him five more. So, going into the Final. The best non-Oiler scorer has half as many points as McDavid's 40.

If it's the Blues that advance - they've been back and forth on goalies. Maybe Carolina turns to Freddy Andersen at some point. I guess Vasilevskiy will be high on the ballot if Kucherov only scored so much and they advanced. But anyhow...let's say it all breaks right where no one is doing anything amazing...can you possibly, even a little bit, justify a Conn Smythe to someone who didn't make the Final if he's so, so far ahead of the pack...?

 

[ResilientBeast]

Let's play: The "What if?" Extreme Scenario Game! Ding ding ding ding!

What if the Oilers go 7 in the next series. McDavid scoops up 14+ points. He's at 40 points, but the Oilers lose game 7. The next non-Oiler scorer is Nikita Kucherov at 15 points, currently. Let's get him five more. So, going into the Final. The best non-Oiler scorer has half as many points as McDavid's 40.

If it's the Blues that advance - they've been back and forth on goalies. Maybe Carolina turns to Freddy Andersen at some point. I guess Vasilevskiy will be high on the ballot if Kucherov only scored so much and they advanced. But anyhow...let's say it all breaks right where no one is doing anything amazing...can you possibly, even a little bit, justify a Conn Smythe to someone who didn't make the Final if he's so, so far ahead of the pack...?

I think I saw a TSN article about this....that would be f***ing wild if they did that.

I don't think the voters would be willing to do it unfortunately

 

[geofff]

Let's play: The "What if?" Extreme Scenario Game! Ding ding ding ding!

What if the Oilers go 7 in the next series. McDavid scoops up 14+ points. He's at 40 points, but the Oilers lose game 7. The next non-Oiler scorer is Nikita Kucherov at 15 points, currently. Let's get him five more. So, going into the Final. The best non-Oiler scorer has half as many points as McDavid's 40.

If it's the Blues that advance - they've been back and forth on goalies. Maybe Carolina turns to Freddy Andersen at some point. I guess Vasilevskiy will be high on the ballot if Kucherov only scored so much and they advanced. But anyhow...let's say it all breaks right where no one is doing anything amazing...can you possibly, even a little bit, justify a Conn Smythe to someone who didn't make the Final if he's so, so far ahead of the pack...?

Erik Karlsson got one third-place vote for the Conn Smythe in 2017 when they lost in the conference finals. I think I remember hearing that was the first time that's ever happened. McDavid would certainly get some votes but I don't think he'd get enough to win it.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

The Conn Smythe Trophy is an annual award given "to the most valuable player for his team in the playoffs." The winner is selected by the Professional Hockey Writers Association at the conclusion of the last game in the Stanley Cup Final.

NHL Conn Smythe Trophy Winners

The only reason the Oilers have made it this far is McDavid and Drai on one leg.

i'm not saying it's a bad thing, or that at their current paces exrapolated over four rounds mc or drai wouldn't be good winners, just that i'm foreseeing another year where kuch does exactly what he needs to do at a very high level and still doesn't get his

 

[NyQuil]

I'd say he's proven that he's ahead of Esa Tikkanen.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Well...he tied Tikkanen, right? Because Tikkanen also already ended a Battle of Alberta in overtime...plus, Tikkanen did it without the help of uhhhhh........uhhhh *scans roster* ......derrrrr...Evan...Bouchard...?

 

[VanIslander]

Would Draisaitl crack the top 100 at this point?

Is he greater than a Max Bentley, Dave Keon or even Sergei Fedorov?

... Even if he wins the cup this year he is a couple of years away from the top 100 players in hockey history.

(And I'm the guy saying McDavid is knocking on the door of the top 50, where Forsberg is.)

Note: BOTH are rising. But let's not crown them before they have achieved the merits worthy of the acclaim.

 

[Nadal On Clay]

How do you justify having McDavid out of your top 50 at this point?

 

[MadLuke]

Is there 50 players in the nhl history you would prefer to McDavid in the next round of the playoff coming up ?

Was there really in history 50% of the draft/signing year with a better player than McDavid available ?

 

[JackSlater]

Is there 50 players in the nhl history you would prefer to McDavid in the next round of the playoff coming up ?

Was there really in history 50% of the draft/signing year with a better player than McDavid available ?

He's obviously one of the 50 best players ever, but some want attrition before ranking people where their ability would dictate. I don't think that it's very justifiable to have McDavid all that far behind Lafleur at this point. He can be behind since Lafleur was a noted playoff monster, but it really cannot be that far when McDavid's peak is better (regular season) and Lafleur doesn't add much more historically relevant stuff outside of those six years.

 

[Hockeyholic]

Without ranking goalies and D.

Just skaters I have over McDavid RN. In no particular order:

Gretzky
Lemieux
Howe
H Richard
M Richard
Beliveau
Cournoyer
Lafleur
Jagr
Crosby
Ovechkin
Howe
Bossy
Trottier
Malkin
Bobby Hull
Esposito
Messier
Yzerman
Sakic
Forsberg
B Clarke
Selanne
Lindros
Mikita
Fedorov
Dionne
Datsyuk

 

[GlitchMarner]

What exactly makes Lindros better than McDavid?

Not sure about Datsyuk, either.

 

[MadLuke]

Cournoyer point finish:
6-8

One of those while the Soviet league and WHA had maybe enough talent to push him outside the top 10 (if the Karlamov/Petrov/Hull) was there.

McDavid: 1-1-1-1-2-2

Lindros: 1-6-7 was made during a very competitive time, but is a mile from McDavid track record.

 

[jigglysquishy]

I don't know how you can rank Dionne above McDavid.

Dionne: 2x 1 AS, 2x 2 AS, 1x 3 AS
McDavid: 4x 1 AS, 1x 3 AS (plus whatever he gets this year)

Point finishes
Dionne: 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7
McDavid: 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2

Hart
Dionne: 2, 3, 3
McDavid: 1, 1, 3, 5 (plus a top 3 this year)

Pearson
Dionne: 1, 1
McDavid: 1, 1, 1 (and top 3 this year)

Playoffs
Dionne: 45 points in 49 games
McDavid: 48 points in 33 games


To still list Dionne above McDavid is placing such an extreme emphasis on the years Dionne placed 5-20 in scoring.

Mikita is the closest comparison in resume, and it's getting really hard to rank Mikita over McDavid.

 

[North Cole]

Without ranking goalies and D.

Just skaters I have over McDavid RN. In no particular order:

Gretzky
Lemieux
Howe
H Richard
M Richard
Beliveau
Cournoyer
Lafleur
Jagr
Crosby
Ovechkin
Howe
Bossy
Trottier
Malkin
Bobby Hull
Esposito
Messier
Yzerman
Sakic
Forsberg
B Clarke
Selanne
Lindros
Mikita
Fedorov
Dionne
Datsyuk

Datsyuk? No way.

 

[Nadal On Clay]

Without ranking goalies and D.

Just skaters I have over McDavid RN. In no particular order:

Gretzky
Lemieux
Howe
M Richard
Beliveau
Lafleur
Jagr
Crosby
Ovechkin
Howe
Bossy
Trottier
Bobby Hull
Esposito
Messier
Mikita

Adjusted your list a bit.

Give him another 3 years and he’s passing half of those players.

 

[Weztex]

I'll repost what I wrote into the ridiculous poll on the Stanley Cup Playoffs forum (where more than 50% voters have him in the top-10.

McDavid's peak is comparable with Esposito, Mikita and Lafleur. At this point I'm not sure he has either the longevity or a big enough playoff resume to rank ahead of all 3.

Those are (roughly ranked) the only guys I definitely have above him.

Wayne Gretzky
Gordie Howe
Bobby Orr
Mario Lemieux
Dominik Hasek
Sidney Crosby
Jean Beliveau
Eddie Shore
Alexander Ovechkin
Doug Harvey
Bobby Hull
Patrick Roy
Raymond Bourque
Maurice Richard
Nicklas Lidstrom
Jacques Plante
Jaromir Jagr
Howie Morenz
Denis Potvin
Stan Mikita
Phil Esposito
Glenn Hall
Guy Lafleur
Mark Messier

So between 25-35 would seem appropriate (and incredibly impressive) for a guy who's 7 seasons in his NHL career. He's probably about to shoot up that list in the next few years.

 

[seventieslord]

Cournoyer? On a list of basically the top-28 players of all-time? Surely he meant someone else. Geoffrion maybe? Cournoyer isn't even top-200

 

[Michael Farkas]

Yesterday, I was typing the word "jingoism" into a text message and it autocorrected to "Kingfisher"...so, the trick is, what name autocorrects to Cournoyer...?

 

[bobholly39]

Yesterday, I was typing the word "jingoism" into a text message and it autocorrected to "Kingfisher"...so, the trick is, what name autocorrects to Cournoyer...?

Carey Price?

 

[Sentinel]

I don't know how you can rank Dionne above McDavid.

Dionne: 2x 1 AS, 2x 2 AS, 1x 3 AS
McDavid: 4x 1 AS, 1x 3 AS (plus whatever he gets this year)

Point finishes
Dionne: 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7
McDavid: 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2

Hart
Dionne: 2, 3, 3
McDavid: 1, 1, 3, 5 (plus a top 3 this year)

Pearson
Dionne: 1, 1
McDavid: 1, 1, 1 (and top 3 this year)

Playoffs
Dionne: 45 points in 49 games
McDavid: 48 points in 33 games


To still list Dionne above McDavid is placing such an extreme emphasis on the years Dionne placed 5-20 in scoring.

Mikita is the closest comparison in resume, and it's getting really hard to rank Mikita over McDavid.

Take Gretzky out, and it's a lot closer.

 

[Overrated]

I don't know how you can rank Dionne above McDavid.

Dionne: 2x 1 AS, 2x 2 AS, 1x 3 AS
McDavid: 4x 1 AS, 1x 3 AS (plus whatever he gets this year)

Point finishes
Dionne: 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7
McDavid: 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 2

Hart
Dionne: 2, 3, 3
McDavid: 1, 1, 3, 5 (plus a top 3 this year)

Pearson
Dionne: 1, 1
McDavid: 1, 1, 1 (and top 3 this year)

Playoffs
Dionne: 45 points in 49 games
McDavid: 48 points in 33 games


To still list Dionne above McDavid is placing such an extreme emphasis on the years Dionne placed 5-20 in scoring.

Mikita is the closest comparison in resume, and it's getting really hard to rank Mikita over McDavid.

Dionne was never a top5 player in the world. Not even a single year. McDavid is Jagr/Howe level but below the big 3. He hasn't won much but he has much of his career ahead of him.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Dionne was never a top5 player in the world. Not even a single year. McDavid is Jagr/Howe level but below the big 3. He hasn't won much but he has much of his career ahead of him.

Big 3?

 

[GlitchMarner]

Dionne was never a top5 player in the world. Not even a single year. McDavid is Jagr/Howe level but below the big 3. He hasn't won much but he has much of his career ahead of him.

Are you sure about that? He did win the Pearson in back-to-back years.