Okay sorry there's no way these two pairings are equal. Armstrong is a 3 time top 10 Norris finisher (as well as narrowly missing out on becoming a Post Season All-Star with one 5th place finish), and he played in the same period of Godfrey, who doesn't have any real Norris consideration as far as I know.
As far as Guevremont vs. Roberts, Roberts is defintiely better defensively and always was as far as their career progression. Guevremont in his first three seasons was always top 6 in the NHL in goals on-ice against (part of which has to do with him playing a lot of minutes as a young defenseman, part of which has to do with his defensive inadequacies). He did get better as his career progressed, yes. However, Gordie Roberts has twice as long of a track record of solid defense (Guevremont's shorter career does him no favors here). Roberts by the end of his career was actually more of a defensive defenseman than an offensive guy (check his bio seventies provided for proof). Roberts is also a fair bit more physical than Guevremont. I think Guevremont is better offensively, but I think the difference in their defensive ability and physicality give Roberts the edge here.
Alright, after further investigation, the pairing is perhaps better than mine. I didn't really take Armstrong's voting record into consideration, but Godfrey was fairly underrated for his capabilities, he was renowned as one of the hardest hitters in his day, along with Armstrong. Roberts and Guevremont were at one time equal, but Roberts eventually leapfrogged Guevremont when he became a more complete defenseman. Although Guevremont also became a solid two-way defenseman by the end of his career, and was no longer a defensive liability.
Assists were actually recorded leitimately, and Riley was a brutal playmaker by the numbers. In all likelihood, the guy was more of a passenger on the line than anything. I've never been a big fan and I posted as much when he was taken:
Pay attention to those percentages - they are thoroughly uninspiring. It would be unwise to bring Bob Gracie into a comparison with Riley, because his percentages achieved are much, much better, and he did it with much much weaker linemates, and was always his line's leading scorer.
Riley's linemates outscored him by absolutely obscene amounts. 54-48-16, 32-23-6, 29-16, 30-28 (this was a much better showing, obviously), 24-23-18, and then a year where they were all closer to even (28-27-26)... this is not awe-inspiring.
I have no problems with the PCHA, obviously... Riley just wasn't all that great.
- Golonka has more grit than Gingras and Gracie combined. Don't ignore him as a puck winner.
- riley has size, but where is this defensive ability you speak of? And where is the evidence that he was proficient at using this size? And why not focus on the fact that he had a couple of nice "finishes" in PCHA goal scoring and stop pretending he is any sort of a playmaker?
Chouinard is more offensive talented most likely, but there is no way I would call him a better overall or more desirable player. Chouinard is one of the most one-dimensional players of all-time, with the caveat that he played the point on the PP too. He was called out recently by C1958 as an example of a good offensive player who was poor defensively on a bad team, and better teams went out there with the game plan of playing run and gun, knowing they could win that battle and therefore the game.
I agree, and I hope you're not saying that I thought he was the best LW in the draft. Offensively speaking, he's approximately average for a first liner, and considering his modest (but present) grit and defense, I'd call him about average in intangibles, too... an average 1st liner.
Oh, I'm aware he had great goal finishes in the PCHL, and often outscored Foyston and Morris. But how do you explain 100 goals and 39 assists in
this year of the PCHA? It's not like Riley and Foyston scored off every turnover they got, if that's the case Riley is a much better player than indicated because he generated all those turnovers into goals. I have a very hard time believing that the leader on that team had 9 assists, and we know in pre-NHL era leagues didn't record assists commonly (Sprague Cleghorn, Eddie Gerard) so it's inexplicable that 100 goals were scored, and only 39 assists unless the fact Riley, Foyston and Morris were frequently able to steal the puck without a pass from their teammate, and score on a breakaway. Something is not right about that.
Jim Riley had 50 penalty minutes in 1922-1923, that has to be some indication, second on the team in PIM. Me and Dwight found some quotes we could later not find online, but he had shifted back on defense.
"Jim Riley has been working out on defense with Briden at right wing and it is possible that the white, green, and red sweatered athletes will lineup in that manner today"
If he could play both forward and defense, he'd be a capable physical player. Riley is a better goal-scorer than Gracie, and I think we can establish that.
We're not relying on Chouinard to be a defensive catalyst, he's full-out offensive game is why he is pioneering our first line.
Riley is not the best left winger in the draft, but he at least deserves recognition as an accomplished first line left winger with the numbers he had in Seattle, scoring that many goals in a professional league in 30 games is impressive any way you cut it.
To what are you referring? Sutter and Magnuson were both career Chicago Blackhawks, and their careers overlapped one season, 1979-80, when the two played a combined 11 games.
But how tough was Sutter, really? And what can you tell us about his two-way play? I'm asking because I honestly want to know. His PIM totals are really low and I always suspected he might not be a "typical" Sutter. I'm wondering if we just assume things about him because of his last name.
Sutter did have a good goal scoring season (sub-20th) but it appeared to come at the expense of assists, as he was one of the most goal-biased players of the post-expansion era:
most goals per assist, 150+ goals, 1968-present:
Wendel Clark 1.41
Darryl Sutter 1.36
Blaine Stoughton 1.35
Reggie Leach 1.33
as an overall offensive producer, though, Sutter wasn't that great. His best percentage seasons are 50, 47, 34, and 30. that's not even as good as Darcy Tucker, who is on our 4th line. To put it another way, both averaged 36 adjusted ESPPG per 80 games in their careers, but Tucker averaged that over double the games! yikes.
I like McCourt a lot, but he's out of his league on an MLD 2nd line with his offensive credentials. You know I consider Stumpel a "bargain basement" guy; if that's so, then you got McCourt in the MLD crawlspace. His best offensive seasons have percentages of 66, 65, 59, 55, 50, and 43. Stumpel's are 87, 77, 64, 62, 57, and 50. Stumpel played nearly double the games, but had 51 adjusted ESPPG to McCourt's 41. The only reason their raw percentages are even as close as they are, is because McCourt got to anchor the PP of a brutal Detroit squad, as they threw copious amounts of icetime at him because he was to be their saviour. He got a ton of PK time (with poor results) and I reckon his defensive resume is a little better as a result, but not enough to make him a better player.
inferior leagues? I've never heard anyone describe the NHL that way. Or are you referring to his AHL and international stuff? That's window dressing for his real resume, which includes six top-20s in goals.
Sinisalo had two seasons that could be described as significant from a goalscoring standpoint in the NHL. Like Sutter, he wasn't much of a playmaker either, and his best offensive seasons for percentages are 62, 58, 41, 39, 36, 35. Again, to use 4th liner Tucker as a comparable, he had two more adjusted ESPPG (38) but in significantly fewer games - considering all that a guy like Tucker brings, is Sinisalo even a more desirable player than my 4th liner?
Darryl had a tremendous training camp in 1979-80 with Chicago. The camp was memorable for his multiple run-ins with legendary Hawks tough guy Keith Magnuson. Magnuson had had several famous battles with Darryl's brother, Brian Sutter of the St. Louis Blues, in the previous couple of years, so he decided to test Darryl out. Darryl, in typical Sutter style, never backed down even if he didn't fare quite as well as Brian did. That instantly impressed the coaching staff and Magnuson.
I assume in practice he attempted to rough him up and see if he was up to the physical challenge or not, and he impressed one of the better defensive defensemen of his era.
You can be tough and not warrant a high PIM count, Darryl had some low numbers, but he had as high as 86 one season, look at Dustin Brown, one of the best power forwards in the league today, he's tough and he's never had a flattering PIM count.
He's a 40 goal scorer, and he has a proven playmaker in McCourt on his line, John Ogrodnick benefitted from the likes of McCourt, and McCourt IMO is a better playmaker than Tom Lysiak, so Sutter will be effective. McCourt isn't really "bargain basement", I think he belongs on an MLD second line, he's certainly "bargain basement" on a first line. He didn't really get the opportunity to play with a contending team, but put up consistent respectable numbers on a bottom-feeding team, he never fulfilled his initial expectations, but he was a good player during his career. He was effective on the penalty kill for scoring shorthanded goals, something he'll be relied upon to do against your power play unit.
You can't seriously think I'm referring to the NHL as an inferior league, Warwick certainly didn't score 113 points in the NHL, he did in the OSHL, which is an inferior league to the NHL, right? Sure he could score goals, but so could Sinisalo, he was more clutch as he was a better power play performer and often finished high in game-winning-goals.
see, the thing is, Orest Kindrachuk is the only player with a defensive resume that's special in an way. Which means I could just as easily tell you that Duguay and Saleski are best envisioned as 4th line players. Erixon has more defensive ability than this whole line combined.
The line has the potential to score more. they have career ESP/80 averages of 43, 36, and 31. Regina's post-expansion counterparts have 36 and 27. TBH, Erixon was a more talented offensive player than Saleski, who was a "goon who can play", but Saleski benefitted from playing with an excellent ES producer in Kindrachuk, but since he also has Kindrachuk here, I can't take that away from him. Hinky is the x-factor. In his best ES seasons he might have been the best producer of all six of these players. Regardless, your guys do seem to have the better potential offense. You must remember, though, that this is a difference of perhaps 10 goals in a full season, or perhaps one in a series. Which one works for its intended purpose - a shutdown line? Regina's.
The two first bolded are pretty bush league statements, Kindrachuk and Saleski were part of the Philadelphia Flyers shutdown line which handled some of the best lines of the 70's. The missing piece is Dave Schultz, and he was not the reason they were so effective. Erixon better than the entire line defensively? you grossly overrate him, he's a great defensive player, nothing special offensively, but there's no way his ability is superior to ALL 3 players on the line, let alone even 2, Saleski is better than Erixon offensively, even when Saleski missed more than half the season, he'd score 11 goals, Erixon would score 2... He's good defensively, but it's not worth anyone's time to argue he was good offensively. Nothing implies he's good offensively, just that he's hard-working and tough to get the puck off his stick.
As I demonstrated before, the difference in offensive ability of MLD 4th lines is really negligible, it is so insignificant that one could not even "round up" the difference to one goal in a 7-game series. It's the style that they play, and how effective they are at it, that will make the difference here.
I think Bubnik's presence gives Regina a built-in advantage there, being that I've never seen anything that indicates he was more than just a scorer. I don't want to get into a quote pissing match about which of Tucker, Grier, Irvine, Boutette and Ruutuu have the most intangibles, but if you'd like to, be my guest. (something demonstrating Ruuttu's physicality would be a start)
How is it an advantage for you if we possess a scorer who's dominated at international levels on our fourth line? that makes no sense, he's on the fourth line because he is nothing more than a high-octane offensive player, who will pack a punch on our second power play unit. As my esteemed colleague provided, Ruuttu is a confirmed physical specialist. I think in order of intangibles of the six players it goes.
Ruuttu
Boutette
Tucker
Irvine
Grier
Bubnik
Also, thought I might throw in this tidbit to shed some light on how good Bubnik is offensively.
CZECHOSLOVAKIA all-time top scorers, Winter Olympic Games :
* 39 pts – 24 go – 15 as – 30 ga — Vlastimil BUBNIK
* 29 pts – 17 go – 12 as – 29 ga — Josef GOLONKA
xxx
* 23 pts – 15 go — 8 as – 12 ga — Milan NOVY
xxx
* 20 pts — 9 go – 11 as – 19 ga — Igor LIBA
* 19 pts – 13 go — 6 as – 14 ga — Vladimir MARTINEC
* 18 pts – 13 go — 5 as – 13 ga — Vaclav NEDOMANSKY
He has a better track record than Golonka by 10 points, Golonka is the more desirable all-around player, but you can't subtract the offensive firepower Bubnik will provide as he is a better offensive player than your first line center.
vecens, you are absolutely right. These pairings are definitely not even. Godfrey's claim to fame is lasting in the O6 era for a pretty decent amount of time. But the guy was never a "star" defenseman. Armstrong was. No contest there.
Guevremont and Roberts, however, are closer. I'd say Roberts went from a C to a B defensively throughout his career, and Guevremont went from a D to a C. Offensively they are fairly similar. Guevremont didn't ever receive any recognition as a top player, while Roberts did finish high in norris voting once.
Regardless of what you think of those two, the chasm between Armstrong and Godfrey is tremendous and therefore so is the difference between these two pairings.
I'll change my opinion on the first pairing in my original post, and resume my comparisons tomorrow.
