ive always considered him slightly less than Kopitar and Zetterberg, a full step behind Bergeron and Datsyuk, and no better than O’Rielly/Kesler/Koivu except that he played at that level for longer than any of those three.
Exactly. I am a wings fan(a little biased) but having watched datsyuk play since I was 10(2002) for the wings, I can’t think of a better player in my lifetime with what HE brought offensively and defensively.
id actually have to agree, as you can basically eliminate the Red Wing Duo due to the, being older. However, the overlap allows me to be confident that they were better than Toews. I also think Marty St. Louis was better all around from that previous half generation.
I think all the comparisons to Crosby in his prime were obviously not right and he wasn’t that level of player. But I think the fact that he was overrated so much has caused people to underrate how good he actually was in his prime.
There is really no justification for that claim. Even if you believe Toews was better, cups are about a lot more than one player.
The impacts of deployment discrepancies are wildly exaggerated, and while the on-ice unit Toews was on tended to do well, that was only partially due to Toews himself. Toews fans tend to steal the credit from the other players and give it all to him.
Holy exaggeration Batman.
That's not really true. What he doesn't have is the same defensive insulation.
Best defense and best two-way are different things, and gee, sure is weird that all of these supposedly best two-way forwards played with some of the best defensemen of the generation, eh?
Not when you're replacing them with a similar quality player. To suggest that Chicago would not have cups with that swap is essentially suggesting that Chicago barely deserved to win any of their cups...
I'm not invalidating individual contributions. I'm just recognizing the individual contributions of players besides Toews on that team. You seem to want to give all of the credit for everything to Toews, and hyperbolize his contributions, while dismissing the impact of others on his on-ice results, especially defensively.
That's not what I said. We're talking about similar quality players here. We're not talking about the difference between Crosby and Duchene. Crosby is better than Toews, and Matthews is better than Duchene.
I know Toews had a disappointing Finals stats wise in 2010 against Philadelphia, however he did win the Conn Smythe for everything he did in the first three rounds. So obviously his impact was a huge reason why Chicago got that far.
So what you're seeing here is that Keith, Kane, and Hossa as well as Toews are all better than Matthews. Got it!
In 2008-2012 though, it is. Because there is a thread then about Kane vs Toews that Toews handily won. And thats the prime Toews era this is talking about though.
Im talking about Matthews, all four of those guys had much greater on-ice value in their prime (Kane still does to this day.) I also never agreed that Toews was the best player on those teams, IMO he's #3 or 4 with Hossa, Id probably pick Toews just because he's a C and seems to be a "better" leader.
Besides being elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame and having a 100 point season in 06-07, during his career Hossa never won any major individual awards and that's something Matthews can still add to his resume.
What if Matthews wins at least 2-3 Rocket Richard Trophy's, does he still need to win at least 1 Hart or Art Ross to be in the conservation compared to the career Keith had?
