Most Overrated Player by The Hockey Media?

[Bustedprospect]

Cam
Scottie
Big E
Nash
Vinny

 

[mrhockey193195]

Can it be someone that was super overrated for a short period of time rather than their whole career, like Bill Ranford for the first half of the 90's?

He wins a Cup and a Conn Smythe as a 23YO. Some less than stellar years with the Oilers that followed were supplemented by good looking international appearances for team Canada, which led the hockey media to become convinced that he was a top goalie being held back by a bad Oilers team.

In his last couple of years in Edmonton, anytime it's reported or speculated a team might need a starting goalie, Ranford is always rumored to be the #1 target with a value that should net some kings ransom for the Oilers (IIRC Shanahan AND Joseph from the Blues, a huge package from the Wings that would contain both Primeau AND Osgood, a package with Redden and Muller from the Islanders, a package around Owen Nolan and Thibault from Colorado, something huge from the Flyers, etc. etc.)

I was reading some old articles from around then and stumbled upon some of the Ranford hype:

-An article about how Mike Vernon is the Wings Achilles heel going into the 1995 Finals. The article mentioned something about how Vernon isn't anywhere near the level of the top goalies in the league which it lists as Hasek, Roy, Belfour, Ranford, Felix Potvin, and now Brodeur.

-Another one touched on Ranford's arbitration award given in the '95 offseason, where a 1 year $3M deal made him the 2nd highest paid goalie behind Roy. The article actually makes mention that statistically he was the 40th or 41st best goalie in the NHL the previous season, but then makes sure to point out that it was 100% the rest of the Oilers fault.

I also looked up some articles about his trade to Tampa and was surprised to find the hype train was still alive at that point. He was acquired for a 2nd and 3rd and pitched as a legit #1 goalie to finally replace the perpetually injured Daren Puppa. His tenure as a back up with the Caps the previous year was explained away as simply a couple of Ranford injuries allowing Kolzig to go on a hot streak that lasted the whole season.

Another candidate for overrated for a short period might be Jim Carey.

As someone who grew up and fell in love with hockey in the mid-to-late 90s, I never, EVER understood why Ranford was in the conversation for top goalies in the league.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Cam
Scottie
Big E
Nash
Vinny

Cam Neely?

How do you figure?

 

[Czech Your Math]

I would say Fuhr was a little over-rated... but not a lot. I mean, if you end up with a Canada Cup and four Stanley Cups, you probably deserve quite a lot of credit.

The media hype over him in 1987-88 did go a bit out of control, though.

I would have liked to have seen Fuhr's stat-results if he had played basically ANY of his career on defence-first clubs. He played on nothing but firewagon teams until 1995-96 with St. Louis, when he suddenly looked great again.

What about Buffalo in '94 as a back-up?

It seems like he was pretty bad in Buffalo, at least compared to Hasek's other back-ups.

 

[frisco]

Patrice Bergeron. He's a great defensive center but never 35 goals or 80 points. To the point though, the media treats him as if he's incapable of a bad game/series/season and refers to him in solemn, hushed tones. He literally gets no bad press whatsoever. Not that he deserves a whole lot, but guys like Crosby and Matthews get thrown under the bus every so often if they don't produce so don't see why Bergeron is immune.

If we're talking HF boards all-time, it is Peter Forsberg.

My Best-Carey

 

[VanIslander]

Crosby.

As usual.

 

[The Panther]

If we're talking HF boards all-time, it is Peter Forsberg.

Bear in mind this very forum ranked Henri Richard above Peter Forsberg. I do not understand that at all.

 

[frisco]

Bear in mind this very forum ranked Henri Richard above Peter Forsberg. I do not understand that at all.

Well, those rankings aren't perfect and are only representative of a 15 or so opinions. Any ranking system people are going to find flaws and probably rightly so. It is a good list. Also, I'm not the biggest Henri Richard fan so it is tough for me to really take a stand on that one.

It just seems the average poster here, maybe due to demographics or recency bias, just is over the top in its love for Forsberg. I mean the guy had one top-5 Hart finish, a short career, and yeah, he did some pretty terrific things when he was in there. But to use the Top 200 list to have him ahead of Ron Francis seems odd.

Adjusted points via Hockey Reference:
100 Point seasons--Forsberg 4, Francis 3
90 Point seasons--Forsberg 1, Francis 1.
80 Point seasons--Forsberg 2, Francis 4.
60 Point seasons--Forsberg 2, Francis 10.

I mean Forsberg maybe had a slightly higher scoring peak but Francis is pretty damn close. Defensively, I don't see how Forsberg can rank ahead of Francis with his Selke and multiple high voting finishes plus faceoff acumen. Forsberg is thought to be a physical beast but really he wasn't very big and didn't strike fear into anyone. He had that reverse hit thing that he did every 5-6 games, I guess. Forsberg was gold in the playoffs but Francis was no slouch.

Then we get to the fact that Francis scored about 900 more points and got the #120 rank vs. #51 for Forsberg and I just don't see it. There might be other factors and the eye test and some people value different things more than others and so on. And I'm not arguing Forsberg was not a great player. Just around here he's thought a lot higher of than I personally think he should be.

My Best-Carey

 

[Czech Your Math]

Well, those rankings aren't perfect and are only representative of a 15 or so opinions. Any ranking system people are going to find flaws and probably rightly so. It is a good list. Also, I'm not the biggest Henri Richard fan so it is tough for me to really take a stand on that one.

It just seems the average poster here, maybe due to demographics or recency bias, just is over the top in its love for Forsberg. I mean the guy had one top-5 Hart finish, a short career, and yeah, he did some pretty terrific things when he was in there. But to use the Top 200 list to have him ahead of Ron Francis seems odd.

Adjusted points via Hockey Reference:
100 Point seasons--Forsberg 4, Francis 3
90 Point seasons--Forsberg 1, Francis 1.
80 Point seasons--Forsberg 2, Francis 4.
60 Point seasons--Forsberg 2, Francis 10.

I mean Forsberg maybe had a slightly higher scoring peak but Francis is pretty damn close. Defensively, I don't see how Forsberg can rank ahead of Francis with his Selke and multiple high voting finishes plus faceoff acumen. Forsberg is thought to be a physical beast but really he wasn't very big and didn't strike fear into anyone. He had that reverse hit thing that he did every 5-6 games, I guess. Forsberg was gold in the playoffs but Francis was no slouch.

Then we get to the fact that Francis scored about 900 more points and got the #120 rank vs. #51 for Forsberg and I just don't see it. There might be other factors and the eye test and some people value different things more than others and so on. And I'm not arguing Forsberg was not a great player. Just around here he's thought a lot higher of than I personally think he should be.

My Best-Carey

Forsberg had the higher scoring peak. Maybe Francis was the better defender, but Forsberg had a much better possession game and so was much more effective at creating an even strength advantage. Forsberg was also much better in the playoffs. The only times these things are close is when Francis played with Jagr. If anything, Forsberg could be higher, more like top 30-40 IMO.

 

[frisco]

Forsberg had the higher scoring peak.

When your number one argument is Forsberg had the higher scoring peak when he averaged 98.6 points in his best five years vs. 101.2 for Francis, well...

My Best-Carey

 

[VanIslander]

Us Canucks fans hate Petr Forsberg with a passion.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

When your number one argument is Forsberg had the higher scoring peak when he averaged 98.6 points in his best five years vs. 101.2 for Francis, well...

My Best-Carey

I think you already know the answer to this, but...

When we compare their top five seasons in raw points, both of them set their career high in 1996. But Francis's other four best years (1987, 1990, 1993 and 1994) were from a much higher-scoring era compared to Forsberg's other four best years (1998, 1999, 2001, 2003). In those five years, Francis finished 11th, 12th, 20th, 15th, and 4th in scoring; Forsberg finished 5th, 2nd, 4th, 9th and 1st. High-end competition was a bit tougher during Francis's prime, but that's a massive gap to overcome.

Bernie Nicholls averaged more points over his five highest-scoring seasons than Sidney Crosby (110.8 vs 107.6). Who had the higher scoring peak?

(EDIT - not to mention, Francis was a top ten scorer five times in his 23 year career. Four of those five seasons were from ages 31 to 34, well past most players' offensive peaks, due to playing next to Jagr).

 

[The Panther]

It just seems the average poster here, maybe due to demographics or recency bias, just is over the top in its love for Forsberg. I mean the guy had one top-5 Hart finish, a short career, and yeah, he did some pretty terrific things when he was in there. But to use the Top 200 list to have him ahead of Ron Francis seems odd.

It's funny you mention, of all things, that example, because to me Francis is way over-rated and Forsberg would be ahead of him in probably every category (of playing ability), 10 times out of 10.

I care very little for career point-totals or how many 60+ point seasons someone had. Means nothing to me. My preference is to consider the player at his consistent prime level, for six to ten seasons, or whatever his prime years consisted of. The one area Francis has over Forsberg is longevity and ability to stay in the line-up, game after game, with few injuries. Of course, Francis deserves credit for that and, likewise, Forsberg's "ranking" (in theory -- I don't really partake in player rankings) drops a little bit because of his missed games.

But here's the clincher, for me: Forsberg, at one point, was widely considered the best player in the world. At worst, he was in the conversation for sure, and around 2003, he was probably the favorite choice as "best player in the world". Was Ron Francis EVER considered a top-10 player in the world? A top-10 forward, even? (Maybe the latter for one season or so.) So, to me, that clinches it.

Francis had one of the stranger "player legacy" narratives I can remember. On the Whalers, he was generally considered the best player on a quite bad team. Then, after one good-not-great playoff and Cup win for Pittsburgh, followed by an "okay" regular season and one great Cup run and win, he suddenly could do no wrong and was lauded disproportionately. He racked up a couple 100-point seasons on the power-play with Lemieux and Jagr, and then this Francis-legacy started where he was suddenly ranked way higher than he had even been during his prime. He averaged a modest +11 per season with Pittsburgh, was a huge "minus" with Carolina, and yet in his old-age he became rewritten as this great "two way player" (thanks to one arbitrary Selke win, I guess).

(Needless to say, Lindros also would rank way higher than Francis, but I'll stop for now...)

 

[Czech Your Math]

It's funny you mention, of all things, that example, because to me Francis is way over-rated and Forsberg would be ahead of him in probably every category (of playing ability), 10 times out of 10.

I care very little for career point-totals or how many 60+ point seasons someone had. Means nothing to me. My preference is to consider the player at his consistent prime level, for six to ten seasons, or whatever his prime years consisted of. The one area Francis has over Forsberg is longevity and ability to stay in the line-up, game after game, with few injuries. Of course, Francis deserves credit for that and, likewise, Forsberg's "ranking" (in theory -- I don't really partake in player rankings) drops a little bit because of his missed games.

But here's the clincher, for me: Forsberg, at one point, was widely considered the best player in the world. At worst, he was in the conversation for sure, and around 2003, he was probably the favorite choice as "best player in the world". Was Ron Francis EVER considered a top-10 player in the world? A top-10 forward, even? (Maybe the latter for one season or so.) So, to me, that clinches it.

Francis had one of the stranger "player legacy" narratives I can remember. On the Whalers, he was generally considered the best player on a quite bad team. Then, after one good-not-great playoff and Cup win for Pittsburgh, followed by an "okay" regular season and one great Cup run and win, he suddenly could do no wrong and was lauded disproportionately. He racked up a couple 100-point seasons on the power-play with Lemieux and Jagr, and then this Francis-legacy started where he was suddenly ranked way higher than he had even been during his prime. He averaged a modest +11 per season with Pittsburgh, was a huge "minus" with Carolina, and yet in his old-age he became rewritten as this great "two way player" (thanks to one arbitrary Selke win, I guess).

(Needless to say, Lindros also would rank way higher than Francis, but I'll stop for now...)

I think you nailed it. He played with one of the very best even strength players on his line, then played with that same player and perhaps the GOAT PP player on the power play. That tends to help your numbers. I mean, he aged well, but there aren't many top players putting up their best seasons in their 30s.

Messier won his Harts at ages 28/29 & 30/31, but his best four scoring seasons were probably at ages 28/29, 25/26, 30/31 & 26/27. Esposito's peak/prime scoring seasons were at ages 25/26 to 32/33, but he was playing with Orr in WOAT era for parity, and his ES plus-minus data deteriorated after ages 29/30. Meanwhile, Francis' best four seasons were at ages 31/32 to 34/35, which is highly unusual. Aside from late bloomers like St. Louis or the Sedins, the only other top forward I can think of that may have been better in their 30s than their 20s was Sakic and if he was, the difference still isn't nearly as stark.

 

[frisco]

I care very little for career point-totals or how many 60+ point seasons someone had. Means nothing to me. My preference is to consider the player at his consistent prime level, for six to ten seasons, or whatever his prime years consisted of. The one area Francis has over Forsberg is longevity and ability to stay in the line-up, game after game, with few injuries. Of course, Francis deserves credit for that and, likewise, Forsberg's "ranking" (in theory -- I don't really partake in player rankings) drops a little bit because of his missed games.

I don't know why 6-7 year peak is the ONLY criteria. Even off of that, Francis is still pretty close. He had 8 80+ point adjusted seasons to Forsberg's 7.

To completely ignore the dozen or so years where Francis was better is almost preposterous in a sense. Those 12+ years Francis was a high end player contributing great value to his team. Why throw that value out the window? We don't do that in other sports. Nobody says Nolan Ryan wasn't better than Dwight Gooden although Gooden's best five seasons were probably better than Ryan's and then ignore the 18 other years where Ryan was superior.

Just different philosophies, I guess. Which all goes to the point where in my mind Forsberg is overrated.

My Best-Carey

 

[frisco]

I think you already know the answer to this, but...

When we compare their top five seasons in raw points, both of them set their career high in 1996. But Francis's other four best years (1987, 1990, 1993 and 1994) were from a much higher-scoring era compared to Forsberg's other four best years (1998, 1999, 2001, 2003). In those five years, Francis finished 11th, 12th, 20th, 15th, and 4th in scoring; Forsberg finished 5th, 2nd, 4th, 9th and 1st. High-end competition was a bit tougher during Francis's prime, but that's a massive gap to overcome.

I know. I was just using the raw numbers to show that Forsberg's huge peak was technically less than Francis. My overreaching point is more about the above post.

BTW, Francis five best scoring finishes were 4-5-5-8-9 vs. Forsberg's 1-2-4-5-9. It's advantage Forsberg but hardly a massive gap. They both had the five years where they finished in the top ten.

My Best-Carey

 

[User9992]

Toews AINEC. Followed by Crosby.

 

[daver]

I know. I was just using the raw numbers to show that Forsberg's huge peak was technically less than Francis. My overreaching point is more about the above post.

BTW, Francis five best scoring finishes were 4-5-5-8-9 vs. Forsberg's 1-2-4-5-9. It's advantage Forsberg but hardly a massive gap. They both had the five years where they finished in the top ten.

My Best-Carey

The gap is bigger when you realize Francis was #2 or #3 on his team in scoring in those five best.

 

[K Fleur]

Best thing to happen to Lecavalier from a media standpoint is that he never went to Montreal. Tide would have turned quick.

 

[cole von cole]

PK Subban

 

[K Fleur]

Media specifically then Messier is not a bad pick. Obviously he is one of the best players ever but hockey's media was always tripping over themselves to slobber over everything he did.

Oh Mess just blew a players head off with an elbow!? That's LEADERSHIP! Oh Mess just has to have a dead player's unofficially retired number? Those are the kind of INTANGIBLES that build WINNERS! That's the kind of player I want in my FOXHOLE!

Yeah well hockey isn't war and it's not played in foxholes.

 

[DeysArena]

Best thing to happen to Lecavalier from a media standpoint is that he never went to Montreal. Tide would have turned quick.

I think he knew that. He never showed the slightest interest in playing for the Habs.

 

[86Habs]

It's funny you mention, of all things, that example, because to me Francis is way over-rated and Forsberg would be ahead of him in probably every category (of playing ability), 10 times out of 10.

I care very little for career point-totals or how many 60+ point seasons someone had. Means nothing to me. My preference is to consider the player at his consistent prime level, for six to ten seasons, or whatever his prime years consisted of. The one area Francis has over Forsberg is longevity and ability to stay in the line-up, game after game, with few injuries. Of course, Francis deserves credit for that and, likewise, Forsberg's "ranking" (in theory -- I don't really partake in player rankings) drops a little bit because of his missed games.

But here's the clincher, for me: Forsberg, at one point, was widely considered the best player in the world. At worst, he was in the conversation for sure, and around 2003, he was probably the favorite choice as "best player in the world". Was Ron Francis EVER considered a top-10 player in the world? A top-10 forward, even? (Maybe the latter for one season or so.) So, to me, that clinches it.

Francis had one of the stranger "player legacy" narratives I can remember. On the Whalers, he was generally considered the best player on a quite bad team. Then, after one good-not-great playoff and Cup win for Pittsburgh, followed by an "okay" regular season and one great Cup run and win, he suddenly could do no wrong and was lauded disproportionately. He racked up a couple 100-point seasons on the power-play with Lemieux and Jagr, and then this Francis-legacy started where he was suddenly ranked way higher than he had even been during his prime. He averaged a modest +11 per season with Pittsburgh, was a huge "minus" with Carolina, and yet in his old-age he became rewritten as this great "two way player" (thanks to one arbitrary Selke win, I guess).

(Needless to say, Lindros also would rank way higher than Francis, but I'll stop for now...)

I think you're underrating Francis here, honestly - not vs. Forsberg, who I agree was better - but just generally speaking. The acclaim he deservedly received during his higher-scoring years in Pittsburgh was, I believe, the result of fans/the majority of hockey people finally realizing how under-appreciated and good this guy had been in his Hartford days. I mean, he played in Hartford. Craig Patrick goes out and gets him and Ulf in exchange for Cullen (who would probably had ended up as Pittsburgh's top scorer in the RS) and Zalapski, which puts them over the top in 1991. That kind of stuff is telling to me. Cullen was in the midst of a short run as a top ~10 center in the game (and who had developed great line chemistry with Recchi + Stevens), but was jettisoned because Patrick believed Francis would help them more in winning a Cup - and he did. And of course Francis had the monster playoff run in 1992, stepping up in Mario's absence, which you mentioned.

I get that he wasn't the flashiest or sexiest player at the time, but the consistent point production was always there until he finally tailed-off in his late 30s with Carolina (and it's also noteworthy that he led the Canes in regular season + playoff scoring in 2002 as their #1 center at the age of 38). He was also a really good 2-way player his entire career. He was drafted out of SSM as a 2-way center. His Selke record is quite strong in the 1990s (his 5th place finish in 1990 is notable to me, as that was around the time when "true" defensive players were getting Selke recognition...Meagher won it that year), but he was good before then too. In Hartford he was more or less a smoother/less robust version of Toews or Kopitar without the Cup runs, playing in a tough division on a mediocre team as their clear best player and top-line center for his entire stretch there.

I just think he's underrated. He gets labelled a compiler with a very long career and a short peak alongside Jagr + Mario, but he was a consistent force and difference-maker his entire career. Not on the Forsberg/Sakic/Yzerman level obviously, but certainly in the tier below that when compared to his contemporaries.

 

[frisco]

He racked up a couple 100-point seasons on the power-play with Lemieux and Jagr, and then this Francis-legacy started where he was suddenly ranked way higher than he had even been during his prime.

Yes, those (yawn) 100-point seasons he casually racked up (not including a 1994-95 strike-shortened year which adjusts to 102 points via hockey reference). Big deal. I mean Francis and his 119 points in 1995-96 has already been surpassed by five players in the mere 25 years since then by the likes sub standard muckers like Mario, Jagr, Kucherov, Thornton, and Crosby. Hardly worth mentioning.

My Best-Carey

 

[The Panther]

Just to clarify, I like Francis. I'm merely pointing out that to rank him higher than a guy who was briefly the best player in the world is over-rating him.