What I recall about Messier was that after the Rangers' Cup win, he became God-like to the media. Writers were conjecturing that Messier was a greater factor in team success than Gretzky. After all, the Oilers won a Cup without the great one and Messier won with another team while Gretzky hadn't. He could do know wrong. It got to the point that whenever Messier didn't play well (especially in the playoffs) it was because he had an injury that would debilitate normal humans but Mess played through it (even though he would say he wasn't hurt).
I've heard more than a few fans say that Messier was even better than Gretzky because of that argument. It's that kind of crazy talk which leads a great player like Messier to be labeled overrated. I think it was last year when ESPN was listing their 10 greatest players of all time and Linda Cohen (a supposedly big hockey fan) said something like, "no Messier?" after the list was shown. The way that some media and the NHL talk about him, you'd think he was on the level of Gretzky, Orr, Howe and Lemieux. Like I said, obviously great player, but tends to be overrated by the media and especially the casual hockey fan (kind of like Pete Rose in baseball).
Hasek or Lidstrom.
Firstly, I disagree with that premise. Secondly, if skill does not translate to results, it is worthless.
Gretzky, Howe and Orr had the greatest career results in NHL history. Lemieux is a distant #4.
Truthfully, though, the only people I've ever heard make that argument are the people who for whatever bizarre reason are desperately trying to discredit Gretzky.
And this is the response I was eventually expecting. No fact, no numbers to back anything up. Just, 'Messier was a cancer, he hated Saint Linden, and he ruined the team'. This has become dogma in Vancouver and no amount of objective fact will ever change some minds.
The team standings you posted seem to show that the Canucks had their best year in five with Messier do they not? Not to mention the fact that Vancouver's record with Mess was far better than when he was injured and out of the lineup. AND those two terrible years coincide with Bure holding out and Linden and MacLean completely losing their games. Its disingenous to point to that say, 'see! Messier! Cancer!'
And I'll take those player quotes at face value since they coincide more with what we know about Messier everywhere else he played than the unsubstantiated Vancouver-based Messier was a cancer mythos.
The next step in this debate will be Nuck fans resorting to, 'whatever, man, you don't know what it was like to watch that team' and, 'you don't know what Linden meant to this city'.
Ranking Messier in the 20-40 all time group (depending on how you try to sort them) seems right to me. he has an incredible resume but it tails away dramatically (although longevity is a trait of its own).
Except none of this actually happened. This is an internet myth, and has been debunked time and time again.
Was Messier a declining player in Vancouver? Yes. Was he a cancer who didn't care and half-assed it? No. Did he come into Vancouver and dismantle a powerhouse team that had just made it to game seven of the SCF? No, that team already sucked. And if Messier is going to be blamed for dismantling this mythical Linden-led powerhouse (which, again, never actually existed) then he's probably the best GM Vancouver ever had because Bertuzzi, Naslund and Jovanovski were all brought in during his time there. And all those players credited Messier with having a postive effect on his development. But again, this is all irrelevant because there's no evidence that Messier exerted that kind of influence over Canck personnel moves.
And if he did... Well, Lemieux has been blamed for the Pens moving Zubov and Naslund in terrible deals. Its kind of funny that thats never brought up as 'tarnishing' his legacy while Messier's resume has been repeatedly attacked over GOOD trades that he may or may nt have had anything to do with.
His return to the Rangers was a nice PR story at the time but no one expected Messier to turn them around at that point. So he guaranteed the playoffs and it didnt happen. So what? What was he supposed to say? The Rangers were a mess before he got there, and remained a mess for about another decade. I fail to see how not being able to turn around that train-wreck at age 40 is a knock against one of the great careers in hockey. I watched a largely useless Yzerman captain Detroit to one of the great playoff upsets against Edmonton at a simar age. No one brings that up as tarnishing his legacy. All players decline with age. Strange that its only held against Messier.
Its really sad to see how some braying internet fanboys have managed to largely impact how a lot of people view one of the absolutely premier players of his or any era. If anything, Messier has become underrated by people buying into this Vancouver myth.
And this is the response I was eventually expecting. No fact, no numbers to back anything up. Just, 'Messier was a cancer, he hated Saint Linden, and he ruined the team'. This has become dogma in Vancouver and no amount of objective fact will ever change some minds.
The team standings you posted seem to show that the Canucks had their best year in five with Messier do they not? Not to mention the fact that Vancouver's record with Mess was far better than when he was injured and out of the lineup. AND those two terrible years coincide with Bure holding out and Linden and MacLean completely losing their games. Its disingenous to point to that say, 'see! Messier! Cancer!'
And I'll take those player quotes at face value since they coincide more with what we know about Messier everywhere else he played than the unsubstantiated Vancouver-based Messier was a cancer mythos.
The next step in this debate will be Nuck fans resorting to, 'whatever, man, you don't know what it was like to watch that team' and, 'you don't know what Linden meant to this city'.
We saw how the team did even worse with Moose then in year 3 with the emergence of Naslund, Bert, Jovo and Ohlund becoming the focal point of the team the Canucks started their rise.
No facts? No numbers?
1999-2000 Canucks
With Messier: 27-21-11-7; 90-point pace
Without Messier: 3-8-4-1; 57-point pace
Points-per-Game
Messier: .82
Mogilny: .81
Naslund: .79
Cassels: .78
Bertuzzi: .63
It's the objective measurements which can be looked at subjectively. Brodeur is overrated by those that look at wins, Cups and records, but underrated by those who focus on SV%.
No facts? No numbers?
1999-2000 Canucks
With Messier: 27-21-11-7; 90-point pace
Without Messier: 3-8-4-1; 57-point pace
Points-per-Game
Messier: .82
Mogilny: .81
Naslund: .79
Cassels: .78
Bertuzzi: .63
distant? please! has same amount of cups as orr, more mvps that him. Mario dominated like no other played on some terrible teams during his career, most of it with a bad back. came back from cancer to win the scoring title. is it really all about numbers? and ill say it again put them all side by side and nobody had more skill that mario lemieux and you saw it every shift, and you make it sound like he had skill but did nothing with it?
now im not saying who is better than who, because i believe that when you get into that skill level its up to whom you prefer, but to say mario is a distant 4th? its laughable
And if you look at the 98-99 season as well, you'll see that the Canucks went a grand total of 7-23-8-1 in the 39 games Messier missed during his tenure in Vancouver. Over the course of the three seasons there:
Points % with Messier: .440
Points % without Messier: .295
Whether or not Canucks fans want to admit it, their team was significantly worse with Messier out of the lineup. If Messier truly was "awful in every respect" as many suggest, the numbers certainly don't bear it out.
yeah, but what does that really prove?
when we say cancer, we don't mean it's better if he's not on the ice/bench. we mean it's better when he's not on the team. it's not like he's out there on the ice shooting pucks at his own goalie or intentionally firing off suicide passes to his wingers.
and yes, obviously an old, lazy, disruptive messier is still a better player on the ice than brian noonan or peter zezel or, lower down the roster, the garbage AHLers that the '98-'00 teams were icing. when messier is out of the lineup, brandon convery enters the lineup. dave scatchard or mike sillinger become your number one center.
he's mark messier. two time MVP, six time cup winner, one of the 30 greatest players of all time (and, for the record, someone who i don't consider overrated). of course a garbage team is better with him in the lineup than without him. we're still pissed after all these years and call him a cancer because there was some actual talent on the roster, and yet he got the worst from bure, from mogilny, and from linden and gelinas for the brief spell they were still there. the funk that surrounded that team didn't magically disappear when messier was eating baked lays in the press box.
marty gelinas, guy should have retired a canuck. just like if there's any justice, alex burrows will retire a canuck. gelinas would be a big part of two cup runs before he retired, and in one of them scored 3 (4?) series winning OT goals, including the one that knocked our team out of the playoffs. other than a goalie and a first line center, what were the naslund/bertuzzi canucks' most in need of? a gritty, playoff tested two-way winger who could score big goals when bertuzzi and naslund started squeezing their sticks. but no, gelinas had to go because he was one of "quinn's boys." lottery team superstar geoff sanderson was so awesome, by the way, that we traded him for frickin' brad may a month later.
and as for the claim, made above, that naslund and bertuzzi credited messier with their development, i have two responses:
1. they are lying. naslund himself has equivocated on messier's leadership, and its divisiveness, in the past.
2. even if it's true, who cares? would any of us really want to thank mark messier for turning naslund and bertuzzi into the disappointing, chokey losers that they became? for taking naslund under his wing and grooming him into a captain who couldn't right the ship, fire up the team, or control the loose cannons when things were going bad? or for taking bertuzzi under his wing and presumably grooming him into the moody, lazy, p.o.s. he was in '04 between when he ended his holdout and when he did what he did to steve moore (incidentally, very similar to the moody, lazy, p.o.s. that messier was when he was here)?
yet he got the worst from bure, from mogilny, and from linden and gelinas for the brief spell they were still there.
Was he supposed to stop pucks for Kirk McLean and Sean Burke too? The team scored just seven fewer goals than the division winning Colorado Avalanche in 1997-98. The problem was that they had two goaltenders with save percentages in the .870s. They had a winning record when Irbe (.907) was in net, but that was only 31 decisions.
If the team had a "cancer," it was in the crease.
EDIT: And for the record, that was Bure's first point-per-game season in four years, so I don't know what you're talking about when you say "he got the worst from Bure."
most will tell you that was the laziest, most selfish, most gunning-for-50-goals-to-hit-a-contract-bonus-with-no-regard-for-the-team that bure ever played.
Was he supposed to stop pucks for Kirk McLean and Sean Burke too?
Please provide some evidence for the bolded statement.
Having cancer does not make a player great. Are you trying to say that Lemieux is great because of games not played?
If Mario actually played a full career, he might be closer to the top 3 but, by missing so much time, he didn't accomplish nearly as much as Gretzky, Howe and Orr.
Gretzky's got a bullet-proof argument as the greatest player ever.
As far as the thread goes....