They were VERY different styles of player!...wouldnt pick Fedorov since Forsberg was just a better version of him.
OMG,... Post #28. I'm the only one to choose Joe Sakic & Steve Yzerman.
- Evgeni Malkin
- Steve Yzerman
- Peter Forsberg
- Sidney Crosby
- Joe Sakic
- Sergei Fedorov
Personally I split these players up into two categories - The leaders and the skill players. While some fit into both, I view the leaders as Yzerman, Crosby, and Sakic, while the skill players where therefore be Malkin, Forsberg, and Fedorov. I think this involves a bit of recency bias, but I'm going to take Crosby and Malkin. IMO the other tandems had better teams around them when they won their cups. Yzerman/Fedorov had Larionov, Fetisov, Kozlov, Shanahan, Lidstrom, Hull, Robataille, Chelios, and Datsyuk. Sakic/Forsberg had Kamensky, Foote, Roy, Hejduk, Tanguay, Bourque and Blake.
The only players of similar calibre Crosby/Malkin had on their cup wining teams were Fleury, Kessel, and Letang. That's pretty much the reason why my pick is Crosby/Malkin.
I'll take Crosby and Yzerman, assuming they're healthy, and if injuries are a factor, give me Malkin in Crosby's place.
But Crosby/Malkin are also beating weaker teams than those teams played against. There aren't any really stacked teams anymore.
Accordingly the other duos had much better supporting casts.
The Avs duo contributed as much or more of their teams offense. Wings were clearly deeper and rolled lines to a larger degree.
Your team will be playing third line centermen an awful lot. LTIR.
I pick Yzerman and Fedorov but with a different coach. Somebody more offensively minded than Scotty.
Huh?
They missed a lot of games (LTIR: long term injured reserve)
Crosby: With a 100+ point Selke winning best skater (maybe in the history of hockey)
The amount of offense contributed respectively by each duo has nothing to do with what I said. Sakic and Forsberg were not carrying an underdog Avs team all those years.
They were in fact one of the stacked teams that the other poster was referring to. Whether one thinks the teams are or are not more evenly matched in the Cap era should not affect how each player is measured.
But on the topic of scoring distribution, where I see a difference between the Avs duo and the Pens duo is the PPG of the next best scorers on their teams.
From 96 to 04, the other Top Ten scorers on the AVs had an average PPG of 0.74.
http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?agg...mesPlayed,gte,1&sort=points,goals,gamesPlayed
From 07 to 17, the other Top Ten scorers on the Pens had an average PPG of 0.58
http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?agg...mesPlayed,gte,1&sort=points,goals,gamesPlayed
That shows a clear difference in the level of support each duo had although the 96-04 period was slightly lower scoring so it's closer to .74 to .60.