Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 15

[quoipourquoi]

Procedure

• You will be presented with 10+ players based on their ranking in the Round 1 aggregate list (10 players plus anyone with 99% of the voting points of the 10th ranked player)
• Players will be listed in alphabetical order to avoid creating bias
• You will submit ten names in a ranked order, #1 through #10, without ties via PM to quoipourquoi
• Results of this vote will be posted after each voting cycle, but the individual ballots themselves will remain secret until the completion of this project
• The top-4 players will be added to The List in Vote 1, while the top-5 players will be added to The List in subsequent voting cycles (#1-4 in Vote 1, #5-9 in Vote 2, #10-14 in Vote 3, #15-19 in Vote 4, #20-24 in Vote 5, #25-29 in Vote 6, #30-34 in Vote 7, #35-39 in Vote 8, #40-44 in Vote 9, #45-49 in Vote 10, #50-54 in Vote 11, #55-59 in Vote 12, #60-64 in Vote 13, #65-69 in Vote 14, #70-74 in Vote 15, #75-79 in Vote 16, #80-84 in Vote 17, #85-89 in Vote 18, #90-94 in Vote 19, #95-99 in Vote 20)
• A 100th player will be added to The List in Vote 21 from an expanded group of 15 candidates

Eligible Voters

• Ballots from voters who have submitted an approved Round 1 ranking of 120 players (which was used to shape the aggregate list) will have their votes tabulated in the History of Hockey ranking
• Art of Sedinery, Batis, BenchBrawl, blogofmike, bobholly39, Canadiens1958, ChiTownPhilly, DannyGallivan, Dennis Bonvie, Dr John Carlson, ehhedler, Hockey Outsider, Iceman, ImporterExporter, Johnny Engine, JoseTheodore2002, kruezer, Kyle McMahon, Mike Farkas, MXD, pappyline, quoipourquoi, ResilientBeast, Sentinel, seventieslord, steve141, ted1971, TheDevilMadeMe, TheGeneral, The Macho Man, tony d, VanIslander

Guidelines

• Respect each other. No horseplay or sophistry!
• Stay on topic and don't get caught up in talking about non-eligible players
• Participate, but retain an open mind throughout the discussion
• Do not speculate who cast any particular ballot. Do not make judgments about the mindset of whoever cast that particular ballot. All individual ballots will be revealed at the end of the project.

House Rules

• Any attempts to derail a discussion thread with disrespect to old-time hockey will be met with frontier justice
• We encourage interpositional discussion (forward vs. defenseman vs. goaltender) as opposed to the safer and somewhat redundant intrapositional debates. Overemphasizing a tired single-position argument like, I don’t know, Harvey/Lidstrom, will only be briefly tolerated before one is asked to move on to a less tedious comparison.
  
• Take a drink when someone mentions the number of hockey registrations in a given era
• Finish your drink when someone mentions that goaltenders cannot be compared to skaters

The actual voting period will open up on Friday, February 22nd at midnight and continue through Sunday, February 24th at 8:59pm. Eastern time zone. I will release the results of the vote on Monday, February 25th.


Vote 15 Candidates

• Anatoli Firsov
• Bill Durnan
• Brett Hull
• Clint Benedict
• Cy Denneny
• Dit Clapper
• Frank Mahovlich
• Jari Kurri
• Joe Malone
• Turk Broda

Click to read more...

 

[wetcoast]

Firsov before Fedorov?

Glad to see Kurri and Brett Hull here at least to give some winger context.

Same with Broda for Durnan.

Should be a very interesting round.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Sigh. Seems we made a collective decision that we as a group were mostly right on our Round 1 lists, so limit the number of players. Anyway, the group made a decision so I'll try to make this my last post on the matter.

First thought - yes to Firsov, no to every other goalie before Gardiner appears.

 

[ResilientBeast]

Oops missed voting last time

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

Firsov+leftovers FTW!

I would have had (un-nominated Goaltender) ahead of nine of the options this Round.

I would have had (un-nominated Center) ahead of nine of the options this Round, as well.

But-- I can't worry about that. I can only compare/contrast players to other nominated players. So... Malone & Benedict look good, in the relevant context.

Oops missed voting last time

Hope you weren't high on Mahovlich and/or Malone. They missed advancement by one and three points, respectively(!)

 

[Captain Bowie]

Give me the cole's notes on why Firsov should go first this round. I'm assuming that's where a handful will have him, considering the comments the last few rounds.

I don't think Hull or Kurri look out of place in the still remaining crop of scoring forwards either. Broda I will need a little more information on to comfortably compare to Durnan and Benedict.

 

[Batis]

Here is an upgraded version of my preliminary discussion post about Firsov.

One player who in my opinion was very underrated during the Wingers project is Anatoly Firsov. During the Non-NHL Europeans project Firsov was finally ranked in the tier where he belongs as he placed in between Kharlamov and Tretiak. In my opinion there is no doubt that Firsov belongs in the same tier as Kharlamov no matter which one of them one prefers. In this post I will give a overview of Firsov and his achiviements. In the coming posts I will go more into detail on some specific parts of his game and his achiviements.

Soviet player of the year voting:

Here is Firsovs voting record.

Anatoly Firsov
67/68: 137/153 = 0.895
68/69: 68/165 = 0.412
69/70: 10/204 = 0.049
70/71: 131/204 = 0.642
71/72: 17/180 = 0.094
3-year: 0.650
5-year: 0.418
7-year: 0.299

Considering that the Soviet player of the year award first was awarded during Firsovs 26-year old season his voting record really is exceptionally strong. This post here below is actually about Starshinov but it really shows how Firsov dominated the Soviet player of the year voting in the years leading up to the Summit Series.

For what its worth here is the top 5 among forwards when it comes to Soviet player of the year voting shares during the 5 seasons leading up to the Summit Series (67/68-71/72).

1. Anatoli Firsov: 209,2
2. Alexander Maltsev: 160,5
3. Valeri Kharlamov: 142,8
4. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 132,0
5. (Undrafted player): 77,2

Other notable forwards.

Alexander Yakushev 23,9
Boris Mikhailov: 20,7
Vladimir Petrov: 2,5

Now the new generation of Kharlamov, Mikhailov, Petrov, Maltsev and Yakushev did not really start to hit their stride until the 68/69 season but on the other hand Starshinov was clearly out of his prime at the time of the 71/72 season. So to make it more of a head to head comparison lets only look at the 68/69-70/71 time frame.

1. Anatoli Firsov: 110,3
2. Alexander Maltsev: 88,3
3. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 77,1
4. Valeri Kharlamov: 70,6
5. (Undrafted player): 57.8

Boris Mikhailov: 20.7
Alexander Yakushev: 13,3
Vladimir Petrov: 2,5

This is how Firsov does when it comes to peak Soviet player of the year voting shares among forwards.

3-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.747
2 Anatoly Firsov 0.650
3 Vladimir Krutov 0.630
4 Valery Kharlamov 0.628
5 Alexander Maltsev 0.592
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.434
7 Vyacheslav Starshinov 0.432
8 Vladimir Petrov 0.411
9 Helmuts Balderis 0.304
10 Vyacheslav Bykov 0.303

It should also be pointed out that the Soviet player of the year award had not yet been created during what arguably was Firsovs strongest season in 66/67. Had the voting been conducted that season I find it likely that Firsov would have rivaled Makarov for having the strongest 3-year average.

International scoring:

Firsovs scoring in major and minor international tournaments is very impressive and along with Makarov, Kharlamov and perhaps Maltsev he definitely belongs to the first tier in that regard.. Here you can get a look at how Firsov compares to Soviet and Czechoslovakian players there.

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1964/65 (WHC, Braun Memorial)
1. Alexander Almetov: 11 gp, 10 g, 7 a, 17 pts
1. Jozef Golonka: 11 gp, 8 g, 9 a, 17 pts
3. Konstantin Loktev: 10 gp, 9 g, 6 a, 15 pts
4. Veniamin Alexandrov: 11 gp, 7 g, 7 a, 14 pts
5. Anatoly Firsov: 9 gp, 9 g, 4 a, 13 pts
5. Jaroslav Jirik: 9 gp, 9 g, 4 a, 13 pts
7. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 10 gp, 9 g, 2 a, 11 pts
7. Josef Cerny: 10 gp, 6 g, 5 a, 11 pts
7. Viktor Yakushev: 10 gp, 5 g, 6 a, 11 pts
10. Vaclav Nedomansky: 11 gp, 6 g, 3 a, 9 pts
10. Frantisek Sevcik: 10 gp, 4 g, 5 a, 9 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1965/66 (WHC, Braun Memorial)
1. Veniamin Alexandrov: 10 gp, 10 g, 8 a, 18 pts
1. Viktor Yakushev: 10 gp, 3 g, 15 a, 18 pts
3. Alexander Almetov: 10 gp, 7 g, 8 a, 15 pts
4. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 9 gp, 13 g, 1 a, 14 pts
5. Vaclav Nedomansky: 10 gp, 9 g, 3 a, 12 pts
6. Stanislav Pryl: 9 gp, 6 g, 5 a, 11 pts
7. Konstantin Loktev: 10 gp, 5 g, 5 a, 10 pts
8. Jozef Golonka: 10 gp, 3 g, 6 a, 9 pts
9. Vladimir Brezhnev: 10 gp, 5 g, 3 a, 8 pts
10. Anatoly Firsov: 8 gp, 4 g, 3 a, 7 pts
10. Boris Mayorov: 9 gp, 3 g, 4 a, 7 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments scoring in 1966/67 (WHC, Centennial Trophy)
1. Anatoly Firsov: 10 gp, 11 g, 12 a, 23 pts
2. Victor Polupanov: 10 gp, 13 g, 9 a, 22 pts
3. Alexander Almetov: 9 gp, 9 g, 7 a, 16 pts
3. Veniamin Alexandrov: 9 gp, 8 g, 8 a, 16 pts
5. Vladimir Vikulov: 10 gp, 7 g, 6 a, 13 pts
6. Jaroslav Holik: 9 gp, 4 g, 8 a, 12 pts
7. Jan Havel: 9 gp, 6 g, 5 a, 11 pts
7. Jozef Golonka: 7 gp, 5 g, 6 a, 11 pts
9. Vaclav Nedomansky: 10 gp, 7 g, 2 a, 9 pts
10. Jaroslav Jirik: 6 gp, 4 g, 4 a, 8 pts
10. Viktor Yakushev: 9 gp, 2 g, 6 a, 8 pts
10. Alexander Ragulin: 10 gp, 2 g, 6 a, 8 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1967/68 (WOG, Izvestia Trophy)
1. Anatoly Firsov: 12 gp, 15 g, 6 a, 21 pts
2. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 11 gp, 10 g, 6 a, 16 pts
3. Vladimir Vikulov: 11 gp, 4 g, 11 a, 15 pts
4. Viktor Polupanov: 11 gp, 8 g, 6 a, 14 pts
5. Jaroslav Jirik: 9 gp, 6 g, 6 a, 12 pts
5. Jozef Golonka: 12 gp, 5 g, 7 a, 12 pts
7. Yevgeny Mishakov: 11 gp, 9 g, 1 a, 10 pts
7. Jan Havel: 12 gp, 7 g, 3 a, 10 pts
7. Viktor Blinov: 12 gp, 6 g, 4 a, 10 pts
7. Jan Hrbaty: 12 gp, 3 g, 7 a, 10 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1968/69 (WHC)
1. Anatoly Firsov 10 gp, 10 g, 4 a, 14 pts
1. Boris Mikhailov 9 gp, 9 g, 5 a, 14 pts
1. Jaroslav Holik 10 gp, 4 g, 10 a, 14 pts
4. Valery Kharlamov 10 gp, 6 g, 7 a, 13 pts
5. Vaclav Nedomansky 10 gp, 9 g, 2 a, 11 pts
5. Alexander Maltsev 10 gp, 5 g, 6 a, 11 pts
7. Jan Suchy 8 gp, 5 g, 4 a, 9 pts
8. Vladimir Petrov 10 gp, 6 g, 2 a, 8 pts
8. Jiri Holik 9 gp, 4 g, 4 a, 8 pts
10. Vyacheslav Starshinov 10 gp, 6 g, 1 a, 7 pts
10. Yevgeny Mishakov 9 gp, 4 g, 3 a, 7 pts
10. Yevgeny Paladyev 10 g, 4 g, 3 a, 7 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1969/70 (WHC, Izvestia Trophy)
1. Alexander Maltsev 14 gp, 17 g, 6 a, 23 pts
2. Vaclav Nedomansky 15 gp, 14 g, 7 a, 21 pts
3. Anatoly Firsov 12 gp, 6 g, 10 a, 16 pts
4. Vladimir Vikulov 14 gp, 10 g, 5 a, 15 pts
4. Jan Suchy 10 gp, 8 g, 7 a, 15 pts
6. Boris Mikhailov 14 gp, 11 g, 3 a, 14 pts
7. Valery Kharlamov 13 gp, 9 g, 3 a, 12 pts
8. Vladimir Petrov 14 gp, 8 g, 3 a, 11 pts
9. Richard Farda 15 gp, 7 g, 3 a, 10 pts
10. Vyacheslav Starshinov 13 gp, 6 g, 3 a, 9 pts
10. Jiri Holik 14 gp, 6 g, 3 a, 9 pts

Major and Minor International Tournaments 1970/71 (WHC, Izvestia Trophy)
1. Anatoly Firsov 14 gp, 14 g, 10 a, 24 pts
2. Valery Kharlamov 13 gp, 7 g, 14 a, 21 pts
3. Alexander Maltsev 14 gp, 12 g, 8 a, 20 pts
4. Vladimir Vikulov 14 gp, 10 g, 7 a, 17 pts
5. Vladimir Petrov 12 gp, 10 g, 3 a, 13 pts
5. Richard Farda 14 gp, 6 g, 7 a, 13 pts
5. Vyacheslav Starshinov 13 gp, 4 g, 9 a, 13 pts
8. Jiri Holik 14 gp, 5 g, 6 a, 11 pts
9. Ivan Hlinka 14 gp, 8 g, 2 a, 10 pts
9. Boris Mikhailov 12 gp, 7 g, 3 a, 10 pts

Since I also wanted to analyze the numbers posted by the the top players I decided to take a look at how they compared to the field (the average score of the 2nd-10th scorer) over their 5 strongest seasons.

5-season Vs2-10 average among Soviet and Czechoslovakian players in Major and Minor International Tournaments during the 64/65-88/89 time frame:

1. Sergey Makarov: 154.4
2. Anatoly Firsov: 153.5
3. Valery Kharlamov: 147.6
4. Vladimir Krutov: 145.6
5. Alexander Maltsev: 144.7
6. Boris Mikhailov: 144.1
7. Vladimir Petrov: 140.7
8. Vyacheslav Fetisov: 119.1
9. Vladimir Vikulov: 118.7
10. Vladimir Martinec: 118.0
11. Vaclav Nedomansky: 115.4
12. Igor Larionov: 105.5
13. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 99.6
14. Alexander Yakushev: 98.7
15. Ivan Hlinka: 98.5

Regular season scoring:

While Firsovs regular season scoring is rather impressive as well it is clearly not on the same very high level as his international scoring. In the Twenty Years of Soviet Hockey thread Sturminator calculated Firsovs 7-year Vs2 score from the 60/61-69/70 time frame to be 96.7. These numbers included the very stingy assist records from the 60's Soviet League which were not part of the official scoring race which was decided by goals only up until the 70/71 season.

Firsov:
138, 100, 100, 94, 92, 83, 70
Total: 677
7-season average: 96.7

One of Firsovs 7 strongest Vs2 scores came during the 72/73 season though were he had a score of 80. So if we include that into the numbers above we can see that Firsovs overall Soviet League 7-year Vs2 is 98.1. When we take into account how stingely awarded the assists were in the Soviet League in the 60's and that Firsov was a clearly superior playmaker than his main threat in the scoring race (Starshinov) during the late 60's I think that we can fairly assume that Firsovs 7-year Vs2 probably would have at least been somewhere in the 100-105 range had assists been awarded more often.

Ability to prevent the opponents from scoring:

During the Top-50 Non-NHL European project it was brought up by VMBM that Firsov not was on the ice for a single goal against during the 1969 WHC and only for one goal against during the 1972 Olympics.

This made me want to look at whether Firsovs ability to prevent goals against would be possible to see during the available games on youtube too. And it turned out that it was. In the available games with Firsov he was only on the ice for 1 goal against at even strenght (against Sweden in 1968) and 1 goal against while penalty killing (against West Germany in 1968). So all in all only 2 goals against during approximately 11 games. As a comparison the Mikhailov, Petrov and Kharlamov line was on the ice for more goals against during these games even if they only played in 4 of them.

If we add the remaining 8 games from the 1969 WHC which are not available on youtube and the 5 games from the 1972 Olympics to the 11 available games we see that Firsov only was on the ice for 3 goals against during a sample size of 24 games. So in my opinion we have a very good reason to believe that Firsov had some abilities which often helped him and his linemates to prevent the other team from scoring while he was on the ice.

Based on watching these games focusing on him I would personally say that one of Firsovs most important qualities when it came to prevent the other teams from scoring was his ability to help out his defencemen with the transition from defence to offence by giving them support along the boards and make great passes from his own zone. Firsov also had the ability to use his stickwork to steal pucks from his opponents and regain puck possession for his team. Firsov was also a player who was not afraid to get his nose dirty. He was a hard worker along the boards both offensively and defensively and he was most of the time very responsible on the backcheck when he had to cover up for when some player had been caught out of position.

To add to what I wrote above I would say that the main reason for Firsovs low goals against numbers is that he could tilt the ice so much in his teams favour with a combination of his ability to keep puck possession for his team and his ability to steal the puck back when his team did not have possession of it. Before someone brings up that Firsov never proved that he could do this against the best the NHL had to offer let us remember that Firsov in these 11 available games on youtube was in on less goals against than the Kharlamov-Petrov-Mikhailov line was in on even if they only played in 4 out of those 11 games. And that line very much showed that they could more than hold their own against the best the NHL had to offer.

Additionally I have worked on looking at Firsovs R ON/R OFF during the available footage and while that post is not quite ready yet I can already say that his results there are extraordinarily strong. Especially his importance to the Soviet team in the games against their two strongest opponents Czechoslovakia and Sweden. In the 6 available games against those two teams Firsov had an 6:1 ratio at even strenght while his team actually was outscored when Firsov not was on the ice with a 8:10 ratio at even strenght. It is also worth noting that 4 out of the 6 available games against Czechoslovakia and Sweden are from the 1969 and 1970 WHCs which means that the Kharlamov-Petrov-Mikhailov line stands for a big part of Firsovs R OFF in those games.

Here is the beforementioned quote from VMBM which suggests that Firsov most likely had exceptional R ON/R OFF numbers even beyond the available footage.

According to a Finnish sports book, the Soviets did not allow a single goal when Firsov was on the ice at the 1969 World Championships (USSR allowed 23 goals in the tournament). And according to the same book, the Vikulov-Firsov-Kharlamov-Tsygankov-Ragulin unit allowed only 1 goal (and scored masses) at the 1972 Olympics, and Firsov had very much a defensive/playmaking kind of role in the tournament.

Penalty killing:

Additionally Firsov was in my opinion one of the 10 best penalty killers among Soviet forwards. Here is the post about Firsov from the Soviet penalty killing study.

4. Anatoly Firsov
Ice time finishes: 1st at the 1967 WHC, 2nd at the 1969 WHC, Tied for 3rd at the 1964 WOG, Tied for 3rd at the 1968 WOG

Overall stats: 1 goal forward, 1 goal against over 17 min, 50 sec

Anatoly Firsov was such a talented, elegant and intelligent player that he at times could make playing shorthanded look like the easiest thing in the world. In this I include both his ability to play keep-away with the puck and his ability to pick the pocket of the opponents. Based on the available sample I would also say that Firsov just like Starshinov probably belongs among the very greatest Soviet forwards of all time when it comes to killing penalties 3 on 5.

Firsovs goal differential stats of 1 goal forward and 1 goal against over 17 minutes and 50 seconds of shorthanded ice time is also impressive and an indication of his ability to frustrate the opponents powerplay units with his combination of skating, stickhandling (both offensively and defensively), creative passing and hard work.

While I do rank Almetov, Loktev and Starshinov ahead of Firsov when it comes to penalty killing he is definitely not far behind them and at his absolute best moments he may very well have been the most outstanding Soviet penalty killer of the 60's.


Brilliant 3 on 5 shift from Firsov against Czechoslovakia at the 1967 WHC where he both plays a strong defensive game, kills off time on the clock with puck possession and even manages to make Nedomansky take a penalty. Yes very cheap penalty call on Nedomansky but still a brilliant shift from Firsov.

Here Firsov almost scores a great shorthanded goal against Czechoslovakia at the 1967 WHC after picking Pospisils pocket.

Another very strong shorthanded shift from Firsov where he on a couple of occasions shows his confidence and skills with the puck. Just look at his trademark move at the end of the shift to skate the puck out of the zone.

If someone wants to get a even deeper look into Firsovs career and his style of play I would recommend this excellent bio from Theokritos Twenty years of Soviet Hockey: 1962 - 1982 (Index of player profiles in OP) as well as my video study of Firsov which is linked to in the first part of that bio.

 

[Batis]

This post goes deeper into why Firsov in my opinion belongs in the same tier as Kharlamov. It contains a more extensive look at his SPOTY voting as well as estimates for how he roughly may have done in a hypothetical voting in his strongest pre-SPOTY seasons. Recently posted in the main thread.

I am also in the Firsov over Kharlamov camp although I would probably agree that it is close enough to be called a toss-up. To me it seems like one reason for why Firsov often gets underrated is that it often seems to get forgotten how close in time the peaks of Firsov and Kharlamov were with the former peaking ca 66/67-70/71 and the latter peaking ca 71/72-75/76. So while their peaks did not overlap they happened right after each other. Yes the 71/72-75/76 timeframe was surely a stronger time for European hockey than the 66/67-70/71 timeframe was but the difference seems to really be blown way out of proportion by some. It is again worth noting that despite being 26-years old during the first season that the Soviet player of the year voting was conducted Firsov still managed to achieve a higher 3-year average in the SPOTY voting than Kharlamov. In the 5- and 7-year averages Firsov falls clearly behind Kharlamov though but that is mainly because of the award being introduced relatively late in his career which means he does not have so many top seasons covered by the voting. Later in this post I will make some estimates for how Firsovs voting record roughly could have looked had the award been around his entire prime. But first here are the actual voting shares number.

Soviet player of the year voting shares (67/68-89/90)

3-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.747
2 Anatoly Firsov 0.650
3 Vladimir Krutov 0.630
4 Valery Kharlamov 0.628
5 Alexander Maltsev 0.592
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.434
7 Vyacheslav Starshinov 0.432
8 Vladimir Petrov 0.411
9 Helmuts Balderis 0.304
10 Vyacheslav Bykov 0.303

5-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.660
2 Valery Kharlamov 0.522
3 Vladimir Krutov 0.516
4 Alexander Maltsev 0.469
5 Anatoly Firsov 0.418
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.358
7 Vladimir Petrov 0.287
8 Vyacheslav Starshinov 0.264 (Only recieved votes in 4 seasons)
9 Helmuts Balderis 0.192
10 Vyacheslav Bykov 0.189

7-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.551
2 Valery Kharlamov 0.440
3 Vladimir Krutov 0.388
4 Alexander Maltsev 0.383
5 Boris Mikhailov 0.316
6 Anatoly Firsov 0.299 (Only recieved votes in 5 seasons)
7 Vladimir Petrov 0.218
8 Vyacheslav Starshinov 0.189 (Only recieved votes in 4 seasons)
9 Igor Larionov 0.144
10 Alexander Yakushev 0.140

Firsovs SPOTY voting record really is very impressive considering that he was 26 years old the first season it was awarded. Now I will make some rough estimates for how I think Firsovs SPOTY voting record would have looked had the award been around during his entire prime.

Let us look at Firsovs strongest pre-SPOTY seasons. First up we have 66/67 when Firsov had a very similar season to in 67/68 where he won the SPOTY with a landslide margin and had the highest voting share of his career with 0.895. Based on a combination of the eye test and comparing the achiviements (which are very similar) I would probably even say that Firsovs 66/67 season appears to have been slightly superior to his 67/68 season. But to be conservative let us estimate that Firsovs 66/67 voting share would be roughly on the average level of his two strongest wins in the voting (67/68 and 70/71). That would give him an estimated 0.769 voting share during the 66/67 season.

In 65/66 Firsov also has a case for having been the top Soviet player of the season (or at the very least one of the top players) as DN28 showed very well in this post. Hockey in Czechoslovakia and Europe from 1968 to 1990 (some awards and stats) To make an estimate for this kind of season where Firsov was among the strongest canditates for winning the award I combined the scores of his less dominant win in the voting (68/69) with his strongest season where he did not win the award (71/72). Doing this gives us an estimated 0.253 score during the 65/66 season.

In 63/64 Firsov also had a rather strong season where he made the Soviet All-Star team. Generally the players who were First Team All-Stars also did well in the SPOTY voting so it seems likely that Firsov would have another rather strong result here. With that said this season does not strike me as any truly dominant season from Firsov and making an estimate I would probably have him somewhere around the score he had in 71/72 which was 0.094.

Adding these estimated scores to his actual voting record would give Firsov this estimated overall SPOTY voting record.

63/64: 0.094 (est)
65/66: 0.253 (est)
66/67: 0.769 (est)
67/68: 137/153 = 0.895
68/69: 68/165 = 0.412
69/70: 10/204 = 0.049
70/71: 131/204 = 0.642
71/72: 17/180 = 0.094
3-year: 0.769 (est)
5-year: 0.594 (est)
7-year: 0.451 (est)

This is how Firsov compares to the other top forwards when it comes to SPOTY voting shares when making these estimates for his pre-SPOTY seasons.

3-year average
1 Anatoly Firsov 0.769 (est)
2 Sergey Makarov 0.747
3 Vladimir Krutov 0.630
4 Valery Kharlamov 0.628
5 Alexander Maltsev 0.592
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.434

5-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.660
2 Anatoly Firsov 0.594 (est)
3 Valery Kharlamov 0.522
4 Vladimir Krutov 0.516
5 Alexander Maltsev 0.469
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.358

7-year average
1 Sergey Makarov 0.551
2 Anatoly Firsov 0.451 (est)
3 Valery Kharlamov 0.440
4 Vladimir Krutov 0.388
5 Alexander Maltsev 0.383
6 Boris Mikhailov 0.316

Before taking strenght of era into account I think that Firsov clearly would have the 2nd strongest SPOTY voting record of all forwards. When it comes to 3-year averages Firsov would probably even rival Makarov for having the strongest peak.

But then we have the difficult task of deciding how much we should adjust Firsovs voting record based on strenght of era. Personally I think that one would have to clearly overrate the difference of strenght between the Soviet hockey of the late 60's and the Soviet hockey of the mid 70's for having much basis in saying that Kharlamovs voting record is more impressive than Firsovs voting record. Especially considering that Firsov had his peak years between 66/67 and 70/71 while Kharlamov had his peak years between 71/72 and 75/76. So I would personally say that Firsov has the strongest case for being the 2nd greatest Soviet forward even if a strong argument of course can be made for Kharlamov as well. But if Kharlamov is ahead it is only by the smallest of margins.

 

[Theokritos]

Only 10 eligible players?

 

[blogofmike]

I am one of the unconverted on Firsov. I will take time to digest the stuff from Batis above.

Coming in, I think the larger issues that need to be addressed for Firsov are the quality of his competition and his shorter career.

For example, in his big Olympics run in 1968, these are the rosters of the competitors: Ice hockey at the 1968 Winter Olympics – Rosters - Wikipedia

 

[BenchBrawl]

I like Benedict and Broda as goalies from dynasties, but Gardiner should really be there at this point...

Also disappointed in the lack of Bill Gadsby in particular, but also Eddie Gerard, Serge Savard, Borje Salming, Zdeno Chara... I'm not sure at all the tier of MacInnis-Seibert-Horton and so on were better than Gadsby.

The fact that there is no center available beyond Malone is... questionable.

Denneny and Kurri are interesting comparables: both wingers played on a dynasty with the best center in the game (albeit of diametrically opposed style), leading to some questioning whether they were a product of the center in question, at least to some extent.On gut feeling I'd give the edge to Kurri for his excellent defensive play, but will be interesting to follow this comparison.

Hull and Denneny are also interesting comparables.

Joe Malone starts as my #1 based on his relative importance in his era.

 

[bobholly39]

Finally an interesting group. I must have been much higher on Broda, Hull and Kurri than most.

I do admit i must have been much lower on Firsov than most in round 1, but looking forward to also considering him with an open mind based on all the talk and ask for him recently

Honestly at this point i expect those guys to be my top 4 in some order.

 

[bobholly39]

The high level 'easy' case for Hull. A bit of tunnel vision in this post, but still:

1. He has the best hart record of anyone here, by far.

2. He won a hart against a 163 point Gretzky by a LOT. Only time in Gretzky's career scoring 150+ and not winning the hart. Maybe it wasn't exactly full peak Gretzky anymore, but it's the closest to peak Gretzky who ever lost a hart.

3. He has one of the greatest peak seasons of all time. Arguably the greateat goal-scoring season of all time.

4. Greatest goal-scorer not yet ranked. (by far? Can't think off hand who else is close)

5. Very long, complete, and consistent career/prime. 8x top 10 goal scoring. To give a comparable, Selanne did so 6x and was just voted in (also had a much weaker playoff resume too).

6. Most career playoff goals from any non-oilers dynasty. 4th all time for playoff goals, 7th for points. Not just a compiler either, 2 cups late in his career and many strong performances throughout, including of course the 99 cup winner.

To be honest i don't understand why he wasn't made available quite a few rounds ago. His case to be at the top seems very easy to me.

 

[Nick Hansen]

Hull has a strong international record as well. If Selänne went last round, Hull should go this round.

 

[sr edler]

He won a hart against a 163 point Gretzky by a LOT. Only time in Gretzky's career scoring 150+ and not winning the hart.

When his center was healthy he also outscored Hull by a 0.20 ratio which is 16 points in a full season.

Can't think off hand who else is close

I can. And Hull was certainly not a better goal scorer than this player by far.

 

[bobholly39]

When his center was healthy he also outscored Hull by a 0.20 ratio which is 16 points in a full season.



I can. And Hull was certainly not a better goal scorer than this player by far.

Id have Hull better than Bure personally though i admittedly didnt think of Bure with my post. Hull has a much more complete career in addition to being a better goal scorer (career, peak, prime - if maybe not "raw talent").

Oates is a good player and he helped Hull but Hull was by no means a product of him as this post implies. A ton of players in their best years had help by linemates too - not sure how this is a negative especially as were ranking in the 70s here - were not exactly in the top 20 anymore.

Im not even sure i want to penalize Kurri for his center anymore in the 70s....so Hull is almost certainly a no

 

[sr edler]

I can buy if you think Brett Hull was a better goal scorer than Bure, although I don’t agree personally, it was the "by far" thing I found a bit exaggerating.

Oates comment was about the Hart, not about anyone being a product. I don't think Hull was a product. He should be thankful Adam Graves hadn’t hit his prime yet though, regarding the Hart voting.

 

[bobholly39]

I can buy if you think Brett Hull was a better goal scorer than Bure, although I don’t agree personally, it was the "by far" thing I found a bit exaggerating.

Oates comment was about the Hart, not about anyone being a product. I don't think Hull was a product. He should be thankful Adam Graves hadn’t hit his prime yet though, regarding the Hart voting.

Yes Brett Hull was a better goal scorer than Bure though maybe not "by far". He's one name that didn't immediately pop into my head when making that post. To be fair his overall career resume is pretty lacking compared to most other top goal-scorers with full careers. I was more thinking of guys with more full career arcs. All of your typical tier 1 and tier 2 top goal-scorers of all times have gone in so far except for Hull - who has a pretty full career on top of it. Bure to me is in the 'half career' category of guys like Lindros/Forsberg who missed a ton of games/season for various reasons.

Also - i admit i don't understand the Adam Graves reference...

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Hart trophy voting record

Player	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th+	Total
Brett Hull	1		2			(1?)		3 (4?)
Bill Durnan		1	1		1			3
Dit Clapper		1	1					2
Frank Mahovlich				1	1			2
Clint Benedict			1					1
Turk Broda				1				1
Cy Denneny								0
Jari Kurri								0
Joe Malone								0
Anatoli Firsov								0

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

I agree with bobbyholly that Hull has the best Hart record of anywhere here, especially when taking quality of competition into account. See post 23 for an explanation of the strange rules used during 1995 (hence the question mark).

As far as I can tell, Kurri only got a single vote for the Hart during his career (a 2nd place vote in 1985). Was that because he didn't deserve it, or because he was in Gretzky's shadow? (I'd say it's the former, but the only thing that gives me pause is he didn't get any consideration during his first few post-Gretzky seasons, which were very strong).

Firsov never played in the NHL, so was never eligible for the Hart trophy (Batis has a great post showing how well he fared in Soviet league MVP voting).

As I indicated last time, Malone played virtually all of his career before the Hart trophy existed (except for his last season, where he only played in ten games). Both Denneny and Benedict played roughly half their careers during the Hart era - so I think it's fair to ask why they didn't do better in the voting.

As for the inevitable WWII question - none of Broda or Clapper's finishes came during the talent vacuum. Durnan's 3rd place finish came during 1946, when the NHL hadn't yet returned to full strength (two Stewarts, Gaye and Jack, placed in the top five in voting, and never again sniffed the Hart in their careers).

 

[Hockey Outsider]

VsX (1927-2018)

Player	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	10th	7YR	10YR
Jari Kurri	100.0	100.0	93.4	92.9	83.9	73.4	73.3	72.1	64.2	58.8	88.1	81.2
Brett Hull	113.9	94.0	87.6	82.3	80.8	79.1	78.2	75.2	73.1	71.4	88.0	83.6
Frank Mahovlich	93.3	90.1	89.4	88.1	87.9	84.5	81.4	81.1	72.9	71.8	87.8	84.1
Dit Clapper	98.4	78.7	78.0	69.8	65.1	63.6	62.5	59.1	59.1	55.6	73.7	69.0

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Kurri, Hull and Mahovlich are remarkably close by this metric. Hull definitely has the best peak season; Kurri really starts falling off towards the end; and Mahovlich is remarkably consistent. But overall, I don't think that regular season offense can be used to distinguish any of them.

Lots of players aren't listed - we have three goalies, one player who never played in the NHL, and two who spent most of their careers before the consolidation of North American professional hockey (which is as far back as I've tracked this). seventieslord calculated the scores for Malone to be 98 over seven years (82 over ten years), and Denneny to be 96 over seven years (88 over ten years).

 

[bobholly39]

Hart trophy voting record

Player	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th+	Total
Brett Hull	1		2					3
Bill Durnan		1	1		1			3
Dit Clapper		1	1					2
Frank Mahovlich				1	1			2
Clint Benedict			1					1
Turk Broda				1				1
Cy Denneny								0
Jari Kurri								0
Joe Malone								0
Anatoli Firsov								0

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

More of a trivia question i suppose than anything of relevance but...

In 1995 on Hockey-reference Brett Hull is listed as placing 6th in hart voting.
When i looked up the results for that year - he has 0 votes, and only 5 players total had hart votes that year.

Is he 6th - tied with every other player in the league to also have 0 votes?
Or does he have a vote that somehow isn't showing?
Or is it simply a mistake by Hockey-Reference to show him as 6th in Hart that year?

 

[VMBM]

Finally you-know-who.

I reckon Firsov will get a good number of first-place votes but there'll also be some no votes for him.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

More of a trivia question i suppose than anything of relevance but...

In 1995 on Hockey-reference Brett Hull is listed as placing 6th in hart voting.
When i looked up the results for that year - he has 0 votes, and only 5 players total had hart votes that year.

Is he 6th - tied with every other player in the league to also have 0 votes?
Or does he have a vote that somehow isn't showing?
Or is it simply a mistake by Hockey-Reference to show him as 6th in Hart that year?

The NHL changed the voting procedure during 1995 (the first lockout year). I'm not sure how, but the awards voters selected three preliminary finalists from each conference (Linros, Jagr and Hasek from the East, and Coffey, Fleury and Hull from the West).

For the final round of Hart, there were only 15 voters. They were only allowed to cast three votes for the pre-selected six players. Hull didn't get a single vote in the final round - so he finished with zero votes, but based on the first leg of voting, he was still officially a finalist.

I didn't show that year in my chart (I use a 5% threshold), but perhaps I should have, since he did well in the first round of voting.

Fortunately the NHL changed the rules back the next year so that they didn't have to deal with this bizarre rules again. (So to answer your question - yes, hockey-reference.com is correct in this case).

 

[Michael Farkas]

Dear Firsov fans,

Today is your long-awaited day. Поздравляю!

Do you have any decent game film on Firsov that you would like to use to pump his tires and show off the competition that he faced? That would be most helpful to an eye test proponent such as myself.

Da svidania.

 

[Batis]

Dear Firsov fans,

Today is your long-awaited day. Поздравляю!

Do you have any decent game film on Firsov that you would like to use to pump his tires and show off the competition that he faced? That would be most helpful to an eye test proponent such as myself.

Da svidania.

My video study of Firsov is a place where you can find many highlights from the available footage of Firsov. The first part of the study focuses on the abilities which I believe made Firsov so good at preventing the opponents from scoring when he was on the ice and later on it gets into different parts of his offensive game.
Anatoli Firsov- A video study

If you want to watch full games of peak Firsov going up against strong opposition I would suggest the games against Czechoslovakia at the 1967 and 1969 WHCs. Both games are really entertaining.