(Son of) Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 1

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

I don't deny that Lemieux probably benefits the most in an alternate reality where Wayne Gretzky doesn't exist. But I just needed to point out that the statement "Lemieux won awards against an 180-point Gretzky" is factually incorrect.

What I meant by an 180 point Gretzky. Was he scored 164 points in 49 games (186 in 80) and folks this is Gretzky so we can pro rate him as such. We know Wayne was at least scored 180. And then in the playoffs scored 43 points in 19 games.... so this is the player that entered 88-89. And got outscored by 31 points. That’s my point. I have always said just because most say Gretzky is better than Lemieux... doesn’t mean Orr and Howe are better. Because Lemieux did great against Gretzky. As good as one can do. I really doubt the other two would have the same success.

 

[MXD]

...Gordie Howe outscored his closest non-teammate by 55% in 1953. Said closest non-teammate was not exactly chopped liver. If that's not dominant...

(55% is an approximate number because I made it through mental calculation. It might be 53% or 57%. I don't see this difference as being super relevant in the grand scheme of things)

 

[Captain Bowie]

What I meant by an 180 point Gretzky. Was he scored 164 points in 49 games (186 in 80) and folks this is Gretzky so we can pro rate him as such. We know Wayne was at least scored 180. And then in the playoffs scored 43 points in 19 games.... so this is the player that entered 88-89. And got outscored by 31 points. That’s my point. I have always said just because most say Gretzky is better than Lemieux... doesn’t mean Orr and Howe are better. Because Lemieux did great against Gretzky. As good as one can do. I really doubt the other two would have the same success.

But if you want to pro-rate Gretzky to 180 points, Lemieux doesn't win against him, at least not the Art Ross for sure, and a good chance not the Hart as well. Yes, Gretzky was still a 180-point level player, but since he missed a number of games that year, it opened the door for Lemieux to win the awards he did.

 

[The Macho King]

...Gordie Howe outscored his closest non-teammate by 55% in 1953. Said closest non-teammate was not exactly chopped liver. If that's not dominant...

Yeah I feel like most of the Mario arguments rely 100% on raw points rather than context of the eras scoring. Howes peak is still getting underrated.

 

[Captain Bowie]

...Gordie Howe outscored his closest non-teammate by 55% in 1953. Said closest non-teammate was not exactly chopped liver. If that's not dominant...

Exactly.

From 51-54 combined, Howe outscored the #2 scoring by 33% (teammate Lindsay) and next closest non-teammate by 46% (Richard), and that's over a 4-year span.

 

[Captain Bowie]

88-93, Lemieux outscores the next closest non-Gretzky competition by 13% (Yzerman), 30% (Robitaille), and 35% (LaFontaine).

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

But if you want to pro-rate Gretzky to 180 points, Lemieux doesn't win against him, at least not the Art Ross for sure, and a good chance not the Hart as well. Yes, Gretzky was still a 180-point level player, but since he missed a number of games that year, it opened the door for Lemieux to win the awards he did.

Which just shows you my point

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

The entire top 4 played with other top 20ish players (Orr-Espo, Wayne-Messier, Howe-Kelly, Mario-Jagr). Ots a factor but not a dispositive one.

the entire presumptive top four also won fewer cups than they probably should have.

we are lucky none of them played on the habs between 1956 and 1973. can you imagine the cup counting debates?

 

[Sentinel]

Has the cheese slid entirely off his cracker at this point? He even favors playoff players and still thinks Hasek belongs here...he doesn't. And he's not.

At this point, I secretly (now not so secretly) hope Hasek doesn't make the top 100 at all at this point haha

Hasek took his team farther into playoffs than Lemieux ever did without an all-star support cast. So don't even.

Your last sentence is just ridiculous.

 

[Captain Bowie]

Which just shows you my point

I don't think it does. You were saying he beat a 180-point Gretzky for awards, but in fact he needed Gretzky to not be a factor in the awards to win them.

 

[MXD]

the entire presumptive top four also won fewer cups than they probably should have.

we are lucky none of them played on the habs between 1956 and 1973. can you imagine the cup counting debates?

... They'd be lesser players because they'd have been teammates of Beliveau, Harvey, Maurice and Plante.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

... They'd be lesser players because they'd have been teammates of Beliveau, Harvey, Maurice and Plante.

exactly

i feel all murdery just imagining it

 

[Canadiens1958]

the entire presumptive top four also won fewer cups than they probably should have.

we are lucky none of them played on the habs between 1956 and 1973. can you imagine the cup counting debates?

So Bobby Orr replaces Bob Turner?

Gretzky and Lemieux replace Marshall and Leclair/Goyette?

Howe replaces Curry/Bonin?

 

[The Panther]

Yeah I feel like most of the Mario arguments rely 100% on raw points rather than context of the eras scoring. Howes peak is still getting underrated.

I think so. I think, in the "What-would-Lemieux's-legacy-be-without-Gretzky?" question, too much emphasis is on points. I don't think points (in themselves) is what made Gretzky great.

We have a poster earlier referring to 1981-82 and 1985-86 as Gretzky's two best seasons. I don't think those were his two best seasons. I'd say his two best regular seasons are 1983-84 and 1984-85 (in both of which, his team did win the Cup). There's no way to argue that one season is better than another because Wayne scored 4 more points. There are other factors besides points.

Anyway, I suppose Lemieux would more clearly be looked at as the greatest offensive talent in the game's history if Gretzky had never existed. But I think many people already look at him that way. He would more clearly have the four (?) highest scoring seasons in history, and he'd be the only guy to get 2.0 PPG over full, modern-era seasons. He's probably have got the '86 Hart and certainly the '89 Hart. That would further his legacy.

But, he'd still have missed the playoffs five of his first six seasons. He'd still have never put together a full and dominant regular season with a dominant playoffs.

My questions would be: Would Mario be seen as having elevated his teammates as much as Gretzky did? Would he have answered the bell at international competition, and dominated scoring every time, as much as Gretzky did? I'm not sure about those matters.

I suspect, in a non-Gretzky world, we'd have more of a three-way tie for #1 in these polls, but I'm not sure if Mario wouldn't more often be #3.

 

[TheEye]

I agree that Orr's playoffs don't match Gretzky's MXD. The Bruins met some hot goalies along the way and the WHA took away some key pieces. For sure Gretzky and Howe have the better careers, but if you ask the heavyweights like Lafleur, Hull, Clarke, Bowman, Park, Serve Savard, they just say Orr was the best, peak vs peak, good enough for me.

In that case, maybe you should consider Maurice Richard's take on Gretzky. From SI:

Along the way this nearly anemic wunderkind-next-door shattered Rocket Richard's mark of 50 goals in 50 games, probably the most hallowed record in hockey. It had stood since 1945 and had been equaled only once, by Bossy in 1980-81. Gretzky, who sets up many more goals than he scores, many more than Richard or Bossy ever set up, got his 50th goal last season in his 39th game. Afterward, Richard, who seldom praises modern players, said, "I have now seen Gretzky enough to say that in whatever decade he played, he would've been the scoring champion."

Source:

GREATNESS CONFIRMED

 

[seventieslord]

This is well-written and I'd like to respond more eloquently now, but it's after 4 AM so I'll try to answer as many of the points as I can.

I'm still not sold on a 4-2 win being better than 6-4. Highly unscientific, but when I skim goal differentials, teams with the same GD totals are all over the place. Sometimes a high GF/GA team has better records, sometimes a low GF/GA team does. I see a goal differential of +82 as having 82 points to sprinkle over your games. If it's a 300/218 or a 322/240, I wouldn't think either is better positioned to win more games. I picked 25 because it's round and the 82 game sets seem random enough: Team Game Finder | Hockey-Reference.com

I know that this can break down at the margins (teams that have extremely high/low goal differentials don't have the extremely high or low win percentages that the pythagorean theorem says they should, but for most normal results, it holds true. If you are averaging 4 goals a game and 2 against, then you're scoring 2/3 of the goals and should win more games than if you are scoring 60% of the goals.

I don't remember saying that PK quote with the rankings, so I'll skip that bit. Possibly a misquote?

must have been. I was pulling this from the old thread. Sorry about that.

And +158/+5 or whatever the numbers are is just figuring out what Orr's plus minus is (left number), and then the team's, and then the difference is off-plus/minus (right number). There are no ratios available as GF/GA stats are nly searchable on the season not game-by-game basis (that I know of).

I'm still not 100% clear on this. I'm probably just not wired to get this in the way you're saying it. If there's a point to be made in how it relates to Orr overachieving against bad teams, feel free to go ahead with that and I'll probably understand when it's all filled out... if you still care, which you may not with the voting deadline passed.

+/- measures how many goals a player is on ice for vs against.

If an offensive forward like Gretzky or Lemieux is often cheating in the offensive zone to create offense because that's their deployment strategy - it would make sense that a lot of the goals scored against their team when they were on the ice are a result of mistakes made in the play behind them. Plays they weren't directly responsible for, nor had any hope of individually stopping. So I think the minuses in that calculation hurts those guys a lot, and therefore +/- isn't necessarily representative of a player's ability nor the results they are directly responsible for - but often can be representative of teammates more, and team itself. Or in short +/- is worthless.

Some people in this project disagree and apparently weight it a LOT and were trying to draw conclusions to a player's overall impact based on their +/-. If you're going to do that - at least take into account the extra 100 some powerplay goals Lemieux or Gretzky might have been on the ice for in many years. That starts to paint you a better overall picture of their impact on goal differential.

Not sold. For example, this gives points for getting a "plus" on the power play (i.e. just being on the ice for your team when they score a power play goal) and the same for a shorthanded point (i.e. having a direct influence on your team scoring a goal while a man down). It seems that one achievement is much more rare and impressive than the other, yet they are rewarded the same. That's why this "stat" looks so random to me. I join C1958 on this one in failing to see its value.

Obviously they took a few minutes off the first period and added it to the 2nd and 3rd.

This is disappointing.

I've interacted with you in this forum for nearly ten years now, and I know you are capable of better than this. Contribute to the discussion in a positive way or just don't bother. A person who just wanders into an ongoing discussion with a silly little snipe like this, just looks small.

As far as the subject at hand is concerned, the data that was selected was a one season sample of one team, destined to be full of statistical noise.

From 1968 through 1975, here are the "original 12" franchises based on their goals for and against by period:

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

	GF1	GF2	GF3	GA1	GA2	GA3	TGF	TGA	Total	TG1	TG2	TG3	G%1	G%2	G%3	diff
Boston	816	907	869	546	642	577	2592	1765	4357	1362	1549	1446	31.3	35.6	33.2	4.3
Montreal	763	804	778	491	545	574	2345	1610	3955	1254	1349	1352	31.7	34.1	34.2	2.5
NYR	691	758	746	527	571	574	2195	1672	3867	1218	1329	1320	31.5	34.4	34.1	2.9
Chicago	642	771	686	519	531	568	2099	1618	3717	1161	1302	1254	31.2	35.0	33.7	3.8
Philly	609	616	588	528	601	562	1813	1691	3504	1137	1217	1150	32.4	34.7	32.8	2.3
Toronto	592	669	662	602	646	624	1923	1872	3795	1194	1315	1286	31.5	34.7	33.9	3.2
Pitts	578	636	618	654	711	666	1832	2031	3863	1232	1347	1284	31.9	34.9	33.2	3.0
Detroit	571	716	692	661	739	744	1979	2144	4123	1232	1455	1436	29.9	35.3	34.8	5.4
StLouis	568	597	579	569	598	581	1744	1748	3492	1137	1195	1160	32.6	34.2	33.2	1.7
Minnesota	546	565	588	653	689	671	1699	2013	3712	1199	1254	1259	32.3	33.8	33.9	1.6
LA	497	607	628	644	705	694	1732	2043	3775	1141	1312	1322	30.2	34.8	35.0	4.8
Cali	491	546	539	700	810	792	1576	2302	3878	1191	1356	1331	30.7	35.0	34.3	4.3
Totals	7364	8192	7973	7094	7788	7627	23529	22509	46038	14458	15980	15600	31.4	34.7	33.9	3.3

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I don't see anything particularly anomalous here. Every team sees about the same amount of goals scored in each period. The idea about slush time is a red herring for a number of reasons:

1. While it's entirely plausible (and has been observed in real life) that teams will play their marginal players more in meaningless times in the game (which tend to be later in the game), the opposite is also true - when it's late and the game is tight, you will rely even more heavily on your best players than you already do. Therefore, over time, there's no reason to believe that any player on the roster will be used more or less in the 3rd than they are in other periods
2. There's no reason to believe that one team has significantly more "slush time" in the long run than another. A very dominant team will be on the positive side of that ledger frequently, and rarely/never on the negative side. A terrible team the opposite team. A team closer to average will sometimes be the windshield, sometimes the bug.
3. There's no data showing that "slush time" has significantly lower or higher scoring per minute - which would throw TOI estimates off for players who play a much greater or much lower than average proportion of their time in slush time. We see times when the goalie gets pulled in a blowout and the shitshow just continues. We've also seen teams chase a goalie at 5-0 early in the 2nd... and win 5-0.
4. Every single team follows the exact same trend: most goals in the 2nd, fewest in the 1st, in-between in the 3rd. The differences vary but it's the same principle in every case. Boston is not an outlier.

For the idea of slush time having a big impact on the accuracy of Boston's defensemen's TOI estimates to have any legs, we would have to establish that:

- The total number of GF/GA per minute of slush time was drastically different from prime time
- They played a huge amount of slush time compared to most/all of the other teams
- They stapled Orr to the bench with the score run up and the game out of reach, and played the likes of Sims, Edestrand and Doak almost exclusively

Then, you might be able to say that Sims, Edestrand and Doak played an inordinate amount of minutes of garbage time when scoring drastically went up, and Orr played more of his time earlier on, during prime time, when they were running up the score to begin with

The problem is, the first of those things is demonstrably untrue, the second is almost certainly untrue, and the 3rd is impossible to prove with any reliability even if it is true, and if it is, it's counterintuitive, because it presupposes Orr was playing a lot during a time when a lot of goals went in to put the game out of reach (but... then, more goals were scored in slush time with him on the bench?)

It just doesn't make sense. If you want to go back to what I wrote last night, and really take a look at it, and explain how Orr could have been a 35-40 minute player and have him and everyone else still end up at the same GF/GA figures, be my guest. I don't see any way to get there without making Orr a low-event player - and he wasn't.

Right? He wasn't a low event player. Right? We at least agree on that, don't we?

I get the bolded. I would just like to see this list - Team Game Finder | Hockey-Reference.com - show higher win % teams near the bottom, instead of looking random.

The teams with higher GDs tend to have higher win %. I think we all agree.

But if you've got a +5 GD, I don't know if it is worse if you were 285/280 vs 252/247.

Well sure, in the example you gave, that's a GF% of 50.4% and 50.5%. That's basically the same thing.

15/10 and 25/20, those are two different teams, despite them both being only +5. Those translate to win percentages of .692 and .610.

A team on the margins, let's go crazy and say 6/1, would not actually get a win% of .973. That would be a case of the theorem breaking at the margins.

 

[TheEye]

Also, from the same article:

"He doesn't try to be a one-man show," says Kasper, "and he doesn't have to carry the puck to be effective. It only takes him an instant to do what he wants with it. The main thing I try to do is keep him on the outside of the ice and nudge him early to get him off his stride, like a bump and run in football. It's no good trying to line him up for a hard check; he's too mobile. If you start lunging at him, he'll make you look ridiculous. One thing I'll never call him is a floater. He wants the puck and he'll check to get it. Gretzky's a complete player."

"Gretzky's very underrated defensively," says Esposito during a break. "These people who say he can't play defense don't know what they're talking about. He knows when he has to be back deep in his zone and when he doesn't. He knows when his defenseman's going to be beat before his defenseman knows it."

Source:

GREATNESS CONFIRMED

 

[Canadiens1958]

I know that this can break down at the margins (teams that have extremely high/low goal differentials don't have the extremely high or low win percentages that the pythagorean theorem says they should, but for most normal results, it holds true. If you are averaging 4 goals a game and 2 against, then you're scoring 2/3 of the goals and should win more games than if you are scoring 60% of the goals.



must have been. I was pulling this from the old thread. Sorry about that.



I'm still not 100% clear on this. I'm probably just not wired to get this in the way you're saying it. If there's a point to be made in how it relates to Orr overachieving against bad teams, feel free to go ahead with that and I'll probably understand when it's all filled out... if you still care, which you may not with the voting deadline passed.



Not sold. For example, this gives points for getting a "plus" on the power play (i.e. just being on the ice for your team when they score a power play goal) and the same for a shorthanded point (i.e. having a direct influence on your team scoring a goal while a man down). It seems that one achievement is much more rare and impressive than the other, yet they are rewarded the same. That's why this "stat" looks so random to me. I join C1958 on this one in failing to see its value.



This is disappointing.

I've interacted with you in this forum for nearly ten years now, and I know you are capable of better than this. Contribute to the discussion in a positive way or just don't bother. A person who just wanders into an ongoing discussion with a silly little snipe like this, just looks small.

As far as the subject at hand is concerned, the data that was selected was a one season sample of one team, destined to be full of statistical noise.

From 1968 through 1975, here are the "original 12" franchises based on their goals for and against by period:

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

	GF1	GF2	GF3	GA1	GA2	GA3	TGF	TGA	Total	TG1	TG2	TG3	G%1	G%2	G%3	diff
Boston	816	907	869	546	642	577	2592	1765	4357	1362	1549	1446	31.3	35.6	33.2	4.3
Montreal	763	804	778	491	545	574	2345	1610	3955	1254	1349	1352	31.7	34.1	34.2	2.5
NYR	691	758	746	527	571	574	2195	1672	3867	1218	1329	1320	31.5	34.4	34.1	2.9
Chicago	642	771	686	519	531	568	2099	1618	3717	1161	1302	1254	31.2	35.0	33.7	3.8
Philly	609	616	588	528	601	562	1813	1691	3504	1137	1217	1150	32.4	34.7	32.8	2.3
Toronto	592	669	662	602	646	624	1923	1872	3795	1194	1315	1286	31.5	34.7	33.9	3.2
Pitts	578	636	618	654	711	666	1832	2031	3863	1232	1347	1284	31.9	34.9	33.2	3.0
Detroit	571	716	692	661	739	744	1979	2144	4123	1232	1455	1436	29.9	35.3	34.8	5.4
StLouis	568	597	579	569	598	581	1744	1748	3492	1137	1195	1160	32.6	34.2	33.2	1.7
Minnesota	546	565	588	653	689	671	1699	2013	3712	1199	1254	1259	32.3	33.8	33.9	1.6
LA	497	607	628	644	705	694	1732	2043	3775	1141	1312	1322	30.2	34.8	35.0	4.8
Cali	491	546	539	700	810	792	1576	2302	3878	1191	1356	1331	30.7	35.0	34.3	4.3
Totals	7364	8192	7973	7094	7788	7627	23529	22509	46038	14458	15980	15600	31.4	34.7	33.9	3.3

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I don't see anything particularly anomalous here. Every team sees about the same amount of goals scored in each period. The idea about slush time is a red herring for a number of reasons:

1. While it's entirely plausible (and has been observed in real life) that teams will play their marginal players more in meaningless times in the game (which tend to be later in the game), the opposite is also true - when it's late and the game is tight, you will rely even more heavily on your best players than you already do. Therefore, over time, there's no reason to believe that any player on the roster will be used more or less in the 3rd than they are in other periods
2. There's no reason to believe that one team has significantly more "slush time" in the long run than another. A very dominant team will be on the positive side of that ledger frequently, and rarely/never on the negative side. A terrible team the opposite team. A team closer to average will sometimes be the windshield, sometimes the bug.
3. There's no data showing that "slush time" has significantly lower or higher scoring per minute - which would throw TOI estimates off for players who play a much greater or much lower than average proportion of their time in slush time. We see times when the goalie gets pulled in a blowout and the ****show just continues. We've also seen teams chase a goalie at 5-0 early in the 2nd... and win 5-0.
4. Every single team follows the exact same trend: most goals in the 2nd, fewest in the 1st, in-between in the 3rd. The differences vary but it's the same principle in every case. Boston is not an outlier.

For the idea of slush time having a big impact on the accuracy of Boston's defensemen's TOI estimates to have any legs, we would have to establish that:

- The total number of GF/GA per minute of slush time was drastically different from prime time
- They played a huge amount of slush time compared to most/all of the other teams
- They stapled Orr to the bench with the score run up and the game out of reach, and played the likes of Sims, Edestrand and Doak almost exclusively

Then, you might be able to say that Sims, Edestrand and Doak played an inordinate amount of minutes of garbage time when scoring drastically went up, and Orr played more of his time earlier on, during prime time, when they were running up the score to begin with

The problem is, the first of those things is demonstrably untrue, the second is almost certainly untrue, and the 3rd is impossible to prove with any reliability even if it is true, and if it is, it's counterintuitive, because it presupposes Orr was playing a lot during a time when a lot of goals went in to put the game out of reach (but... then, more goals were scored in slush time with him on the bench?)

It just doesn't make sense. If you want to go back to what I wrote last night, and really take a look at it, and explain how Orr could have been a 35-40 minute player and have him and everyone else still end up at the same GF/GA figures, be my guest. I don't see any way to get there without making Orr a low-event player - and he wasn't.

Right? He wasn't a low event player. Right? We at least agree on that, don't we?



Well sure, in the example you gave, that's a GF% of 50.4% and 50.5%. That's basically the same thing.

15/10 and 25/20, those are two different teams, despite them both being only +5. Those translate to win percentages of .692 and .610.

A team on the margins, let's go crazy and say 6/1, would not actually get a win% of .973. That would be a case of the theorem breaking at the margins.

Except you are conflating team TOI with individual TOI.

All this shows is that the sum of individual TOI should approximate total team TOI with the necessary PIM and situational adjustments.

Just like pulling a goalie, slush time is not fixed but fluid. The sum of individual goalie minutes plus situationaltime- 6th attacker, still has to equal total game time regardless of goalie deployment.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

I think what it comes down to is that Lemieux and Gretzky completely decimated the league in a way that nobody before nor after did - in a way that seemed unimaginable.

Even in 2001 upon his return, if you look at PPG for that year, even at 35 years old it's ridiculous what he did vs everyone else.

In a way I agree, in another I think Gretzky's performances from other seasons immediately prior broke the scale for Lemieux. A 160-point season and even a 199-point year is far less impressive than it would have been in a world where Gretzky hadn't racked up so many of them.

I think that what blogofmike suggests is that Lemieux is unconsciously victim of what happened to Terry Sawchuk when he wasn't anymore the league leader in wins. Back then, his status was, seemingly, much higher than it is now, and the drop seems to have been contemporaneous with Roy and (and then) Brodeur passing him for wins and shutouts.

The Lemieux situation is different, due to being younger than Gretzky, so his big seasons came after Gretzky's. But Lemieux would have the four best seasons (in terms of points) if Gretzky simply vanished.

Now, this doesn't make Lemieux seasons (and career) better in and of themselves, but it would certainly make it a bit harder to rank him below Howe and Orr, like (most) people seem to do.

EDIT : I WAS ALREADY DRINKING

I have no problem getting behind the idea that Lemieux would look more impressive at a glance had Gretzky never come along. But I'll reiterate that this is only rudimentary analysis. The deeper dive, which is what this project is about, should result in the same conclusions regarding the standing of Howe/Orr/Lemieux in relation to each other regardless of whether or not Gretzky is thrown in there. Would the likes of TSN or the Hockey News be more inclined to rank Mario #1? Probably. But I don't think it changes things for people who conduct the amount of research this board has done over the years and continues to do.

 

[blogofmike]

I'm still not 100% clear on this. I'm probably just not wired to get this in the way you're saying it. If there's a point to be made in how it relates to Orr overachieving against bad teams, feel free to go ahead with that and I'll probably understand when it's all filled out... if you still care, which you may not with the voting deadline passed.

I may try again later. It's basically presented as PM-on/PM-off instead of ratio-on/ratio-off, as the PM data is available.

Well sure, in the example you gave, that's a GF% of 50.4% and 50.5%. That's basically the same thing.

15/10 and 25/20, those are two different teams, despite them both being only +5. Those translate to win percentages of .692 and .610.

A team on the margins, let's go crazy and say 6/1, would not actually get a win% of .973. That would be a case of the theorem breaking at the margins.

I get the theory, really I do. (I think...) How about we add 100 or so goals to my last search and look at these guys? Team Game Finder | Hockey-Reference.com

The tiers look random by GF/GA, and well-ordered by GD. The .706 win % guys all have similar GDs, and the ratios are between 1.48 and 1.62. By eyeballing it, there seems to be a clearer correlation in real world results between the GD than the GF/GA ratios. But that's just eyeballing, which is tricky given I don't know how to filter to get teams with the same GP count.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

There are 3 players in the games history of 100 years that stood head and shoulders above their peers. It just so happens that one of those players prime colluded with another’s prime. It was the end I will concede. Nevertheless Gretzky was still taking care of business. This player had no peers and he is shown lack of respect, who the hell actually thinks Lemieux was not better than friggin Gordie Howe. I’m sorry but get real

 

[BenchBrawl]

There are 3 players in the games history of 100 years that stood head and shoulders above their peers. It just so happens that one of those players prime colluded with another’s prime. It was the end I will concede. Nevertheless Gretzky was still taking care of business. This player had no peers and he is shown lack of respect, who the hell actually thinks Lemieux was not better than friggin Gordie Howe. I’m sorry but get real

Me

Howe was a complete player and he remained healthy despite playing a physical game in a tough era.

Lemieux was great and insanely talented but he had his warts.I know you love him, but you're the one disrespecting Howe.I don't see much disrespect for Lemieux here.We all saw him play, we know what he was.

 

[blogofmike]

There are 3 players in the games history of 100 years that stood head and shoulders above their peers. It just so happens that one of those players prime colluded with another’s prime. It was the end I will concede. Nevertheless Gretzky was still taking care of business. This player had no peers and he is shown lack of respect, who the hell actually thinks Lemieux was not better than friggin Gordie Howe. I’m sorry but get real

I had Howe #2. His raw numbers don't look great for single season point totals, but he was well above his peers. It is possible he was born at the perfect time to be head and shoulders above shorter peers. But he stood tall for a very long time and brought a solid playoff resume that actually still looks good even by raw numbers. 20 points in 11 games, for instance, with 12 points in the Finals is a hell of a run.

 

[BenchBrawl]

If by better you mean having more soft skills then of course Lemieux was better than Howe, and probably better than Gretzky and Orr too for that matter.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Not sold. For example, this gives points for getting a "plus" on the power play (i.e. just being on the ice for your team when they score a power play goal) and the same for a shorthanded point (i.e. having a direct influence on your team scoring a goal while a man down). It seems that one achievement is much more rare and impressive than the other, yet they are rewarded the same. That's why this "stat" looks so random to me. I join C1958 on this one in failing to see its value.



As far as the subject at hand is concerned, the data that was selected was a one season sample of one team, destined to be full of statistical noise.

From 1968 through 1975, here are the "original 12" franchises based on their goals for and against by period:

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

	GF1	GF2	GF3	GA1	GA2	GA3	TGF	TGA	Total	TG1	TG2	TG3	G%1	G%2	G%3	diff
Boston	816	907	869	546	642	577	2592	1765	4357	1362	1549	1446	31.3	35.6	33.2	4.3
Montreal	763	804	778	491	545	574	2345	1610	3955	1254	1349	1352	31.7	34.1	34.2	2.5
NYR	691	758	746	527	571	574	2195	1672	3867	1218	1329	1320	31.5	34.4	34.1	2.9
Chicago	642	771	686	519	531	568	2099	1618	3717	1161	1302	1254	31.2	35.0	33.7	3.8
Philly	609	616	588	528	601	562	1813	1691	3504	1137	1217	1150	32.4	34.7	32.8	2.3
Toronto	592	669	662	602	646	624	1923	1872	3795	1194	1315	1286	31.5	34.7	33.9	3.2
Pitts	578	636	618	654	711	666	1832	2031	3863	1232	1347	1284	31.9	34.9	33.2	3.0
Detroit	571	716	692	661	739	744	1979	2144	4123	1232	1455	1436	29.9	35.3	34.8	5.4
StLouis	568	597	579	569	598	581	1744	1748	3492	1137	1195	1160	32.6	34.2	33.2	1.7
Minnesota	546	565	588	653	689	671	1699	2013	3712	1199	1254	1259	32.3	33.8	33.9	1.6
LA	497	607	628	644	705	694	1732	2043	3775	1141	1312	1322	30.2	34.8	35.0	4.8
Cali	491	546	539	700	810	792	1576	2302	3878	1191	1356	1331	30.7	35.0	34.3	4.3
Totals	7364	8192	7973	7094	7788	7627	23529	22509	46038	14458	15980	15600	31.4	34.7	33.9	3.3

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I don't see anything particularly anomalous here. Every team sees about the same amount of goals scored in each period. The idea about slush time is a red herring for a number of reasons:

1. While it's entirely plausible (and has been observed in real life) that teams will play their marginal players more in meaningless times in the game (which tend to be later in the game), the opposite is also true - when it's late and the game is tight, you will rely even more heavily on your best players than you already do. Therefore, over time, there's no reason to believe that any player on the roster will be used more or less in the 3rd than they are in other periods
2. There's no reason to believe that one team has significantly more "slush time" in the long run than another. A very dominant team will be on the positive side of that ledger frequently, and rarely/never on the negative side. A terrible team the opposite team. A team closer to average will sometimes be the windshield, sometimes the bug.
3. There's no data showing that "slush time" has significantly lower or higher scoring per minute - which would throw TOI estimates off for players who play a much greater or much lower than average proportion of their time in slush time. We see times when the goalie gets pulled in a blowout and the ****show just continues. We've also seen teams chase a goalie at 5-0 early in the 2nd... and win 5-0.
4. Every single team follows the exact same trend: most goals in the 2nd, fewest in the 1st, in-between in the 3rd. The differences vary but it's the same principle in every case. Boston is not an outlier.

For the idea of slush time having a big impact on the accuracy of Boston's defensemen's TOI estimates to have any legs, we would have to establish that:

- The total number of GF/GA per minute of slush time was drastically different from prime time
- They played a huge amount of slush time compared to most/all of the other teams
- They stapled Orr to the bench with the score run up and the game out of reach, and played the likes of Sims, Edestrand and Doak almost exclusively

Then, you might be able to say that Sims, Edestrand and Doak played an inordinate amount of minutes of garbage time when scoring drastically went up, and Orr played more of his time earlier on, during prime time, when they were running up the score to begin with

The problem is, the first of those things is demonstrably untrue, the second is almost certainly untrue, and the 3rd is impossible to prove with any reliability even if it is true, and if it is, it's counterintuitive, because it presupposes Orr was playing a lot during a time when a lot of goals went in to put the game out of reach (but... then, more goals were scored in slush time with him on the bench?)

It just doesn't make sense. If you want to go back to what I wrote last night, and really take a look at it, and explain how Orr could have been a 35-40 minute player and have him and everyone else still end up at the same GF/GA figures, be my guest. I don't see any way to get there without making Orr a low-event player - and he wasn't.

Right? He wasn't a low event player. Right? We at least agree on that, don't we?



Well sure, in the example you gave, that's a GF% of 50.4% and 50.5%. That's basically the same thing.

15/10 and 25/20, those are two different teams, despite them both being only +5. Those translate to win percentages of .692 and .610.

A team on the margins, let's go crazy and say 6/1, would not actually get a win% of .973. That would be a case of the theorem breaking at the margins.

What is disappointing is the rebuttal is purely abstraction.

Given that the discussion stems from the manually timed Orr TOI from two games, the first step would be looking at the manually timed TOI for the remaining Bruins in each game to check the degree of overall ETOI validation.

The obvious seems to be avoided.