Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 18

[TheDevilMadeMe]

I'm also in the same boat here. I might be inclined to sneak him in around #100, but this is a couple rounds too early to even be talking about him. I'm not sure how Iginla isn't better.

I agree with you that Iginla and (and Kane!) are clearly better than St. Louis, but IMO, that's more a problem with those two not showing up yet when they should.

I'm as yet undecided on what to do with St. Louis. Did someone examine the effects of the southeast conference on his scoring totals in the wingers project? I'll try to hunt it down later this week if nobody else does.

 

[sr edler]

His whole career he was seen as a top defender in the world and votes as such, repeatedly.

You might have forgotten this but Zdeno Chara came up as a semi goon type of player through the WHL and the AHL. Then he looked like the current version of Rasmus Ristolainen (except perhaps even less prolific) for 3 straight years with the New York Islanders.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Yeah, giving him Risto is too much credit really...Risto is just playing a rung too high...Chara was playing almost a league too high in the 90's...

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Just how good is Bill Cowley's offensive prime?

Really, really good. Top 7-year VsX scores in NHL history:

Wayne Gretzky	155.6
Phil Esposito	130.4
Gordie Howe	125.5
Mario Lemieux	119.8
Bobby Orr	114.8
Jaromir Jagr	114.2
Bobby Hull	108.3
Stan Mikita	107.8
Jean Beliveau	105.7
Guy Lafleur	104.5
Ted Lindsay	104.4
Marcel Dionne	103.3
Sidney Crosby	102.4
Maurice Richard	102.4
Howie Morenz	102.2
Andy Bathgate	101.1
Alex Ovechkin	98.4
Joe Sakic	97.7
Bill Cowley	97.0
Charlie Conacher	96.2
Bill Cook	96.0
Joe Thornton	95.6
Frank Boucher	95.1
Mike Bossy	94.8
Evgeni Malkin	93.7
Bryan Trottier	93.7
Steve Yzerman	93.2
Teemu Selanne	92.7
Martin St. Louis	92.4
Syl Apps Sr	92.4
Sweeney Schriner	91.3
Bobby Clarke	90.4
Max Bentley	90.4
Peter Forsberg	90.3
Nels Stewart	90.3
Adam Oates	90.0
Bernie Geoffrion	89.9

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Bill Cowley's high score is largely affected by 1940-41, when Cowley put up one of the best offensive performances in NHL history, before a single player had left to fight in WW2.

As Hockey Outsider mentioned, Cowley is the only player other than Gretzky who had enough assists to win a scoring title even if he never scored a goal. (But he was 10th in goals that season).

1940-41 NHL Leaders | Hockey-Reference.com

Cowley won the Hart in a landslide that season.

Bill Cowley "made" his wingers:

They used to say that Cowley "made more wings than Boeing."
Tales from the Boston Bruins Locker Room

Of course, he was one hell of a hockey player. He "made" more wingers than anyone I can think of. I can remember talking with Lorne Duguid and I said to him, "If you see Bill Cowley, thank him. He kept me in the league." And Roy Conacher � Cowley made Roy Conacher the scoring champion one year. Cowley was the center-ice man and he'd pass it � he'd be fooling around and he'd get them in position and bang! into the net!

Old Scores, New Goals. The Story Of The OTTAWA SENATORS By Joan Finnigan

Contemporary article giving Bill Cowley full credit for Roy Conacher's goal scoring title in 1938-39. : The Montreal Gazette - Google News Archive Search

Article from Cowley's 2nd Hart win in 1942-43 (Cowley basically carried the Bruins's offense after the Kraut Line left for the war):

Bill Cowley hit the headlines again with six point. The best play-maker in the big time for years, Bill now is making super-man forwards out of Buzz Boll and Art Jackson.

The fellow has been a star on various lines. Wingmen taking passes from Cowley find the path to the goal an open one. He knows how to lay down a pass and Boll and Jackson are just two more wingers who will find their scoring output increasing as members of the Cowley unit.

The Calgary Herald - Google News Archive Search

Random fun fact: Cowley was Scottie Bowman's hero when Bowman was a kid: How to Succeed in the Game of Life (Bowman also quotes the "Cowley made more wingers than Boeing" line).

Bill Cowley ATD bio here: ATD 2019 Bio Thread

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Here's a post by @overpass from the wingers project, on the slight advantage Eastern Conference had over Western Conference scorers when St Louis was in his prime. Also touches on high ice time for Southeast division first liners:

Here's a post/thread that covers why scorers in the East had a slight advantage over scorers in the West in the last decade-plus.

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showthread.php?t=1494673

Based on the numbers presented there, if you are comparing St Louis to Iginla, you can give Iginla a 3-5 point bump per season right away based on Iginla having faced against better defensive teams on average.

There's also the more difficult to quantify factor of the role and ice time that St Louis received in Tampa. My sense is that star forwards in the Eastern conference and especially in the Southeast division have tended to play more shifts and longer shifts than their counterparts out west, which have resulted in additional opportunities for them to score points but haven't led to a lot of team success.

Take the ice time leaders for forwards in the 2007-08 season.

NHL Hockey Players

St Louis led all forwards in overall ice time. Subtract SH ice time and he's still second behind Ovechkin. 7 of the 8 forwards with the longest average shifts played in the Southeast division, and 18 of the 20 forwards with the longest average shifts played in the Eastern conference. Yet the Western conference was considerably stronger. According to h-r's SRS metric - which is basically scoring differential adjusted for strength of schedule - the 10th best team in the West was slightly better than the 3rd best team in the East that year.

So again, what were all those gaudy point totals being scored in the Eastern conference really buying their teams?

Look at the performance of St Louis when he finally went to a structured team that rolled four lines. He went from a point per game in Tampa to half that (23 points in 44 games) with the Rangers.

I think Steve Yzerman and the Team Canada staff agree with this viewpoint to some extent. They left St Louis off Team Canada in 2010 and 2014 and picked several lower scoring forwards from the Western conference. And when they ended up bringing him in 2014 he didn't really look that good.

Of course everyone probably has an opinion on this topic because we've all seen his career, but that's my take. I'm certain there's a small effect related to strength of schedule, and I think but am less certain that the team system/role aspect played a larger role. YMMV.

(I remember Sturminator comparing St Louis to Doug Bentley at some point during ATD discussion in terms of them sharing strengths and weaknesses - both were small, skilled playmaking wingers who were good backcheckers in open ice but didn't have the size to win the puck battles along the boards. You could also question whether Bentley was a guy who put up numbers on bad teams too.)

Nothing about racking up points against the southeast in particular though.

 

[Michael Farkas]

What does Cowley's VsX look like if he just scores, say, 50 points and win the Art Ross comfortably...?

I can't get a feel for him, mostly because I don't see much film on him...but I still don't get him...has some sterling offensive numbers, no question...yeah, there is some War effect in there, but he also led the league in assists twice before the War, was a First-Teamer once as well...so I don't question that he could do it...but why so little fanfare? Because, like Gretzky, he didn't care to backcheck that much? Why has Boston - not shy on retiring numbers - not retired his? Why did it take him 20 years to make the HOF?

I don't know if I'm overthinking it or if I just don't get it...it feels like I'm missing something...it feels like there's not enough contemporary love for him for some reason...he's not just Craig Janney on steroids, right?

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

What does Cowley's VsX look like if he just scores, say, 50 points and win the Art Ross comfortably...?

I can't get a feel for him, mostly because I don't see much film on him...but I still don't get him...has some sterling offensive numbers, no question...yeah, there is some War effect in there, but he also led the league in assists twice before the War, was a First-Teamer once as well...so I don't question that he could do it...but why so little fanfare? Because, like Gretzky, he didn't care to backcheck that much? Why has Boston - not shy on retiring numbers - not retired his? Why did it take him 20 years to make the HOF?

I don't know if I'm overthinking it or if I just don't get it...it feels like I'm missing something...it feels like there's not enough contemporary love for him for some reason...he's not just Craig Janney on steroids, right?

Re: The war:

First, your regularly scheduled reminder that the VsX numbers we currently use already take the war years into account.

Second, note that the first players to leave for the war were the Kraut Line (Cowley's teammates) in 1941-42.

In general, players didn't start to leave until 1942-43.

So Cowley actually had 2 1st Teams and 1 Hart Trophy before a single player left for the war.

_____________

Re: star power, prior to WW2, Cowley looks to have been a big star, frequently mentioned with Milt Schmidt.

But starting in 1941-42, Cowley suffered a series of leg injuries that killed his speed and eventually led to a relatively early retirement, with little accomplished after the war. So it seems to be a case of a player who peaked early in his career, especially from the "eye test."

He also didn't retire in the best way possible:

In Boston he would become a star, leading the league in assists in 1939 (despite missing twelve games with injuries), 1941 and 1943, and helping to lead the Bruins to two Stanley Cups in 1939 and 1941. While World War II ravaged the Bruins' powerful roster thereafter—Boston would not win another Cup during his career—Cowley was the team's sole remaining star. Frequently injured, he was on track to shatter the league record for scoring in 1944 when another injury ended his season two points short.

Cowley finished his career with 195 goals and 353 assists for 548 points in 549 NHL games. On April 5, 1947, at the Bruins annual breakup party, Cowley unexpectedly announced he was leaving hockey because general manager Art Ross had chosen to leave him off of the roster for a post-season exhibition tour of western Canada and the United States. Cowley's wife was from Vancouver and he wanted to use the trip as a honeymoon.[1] At the time of his retirement, he was the NHL's all-time leading point scorer, and the last active player from the St. Louis Eagles roster.

And yes, he was pretty indifferent to backchecking. When Montreal coach Dick Irvin said Lach was better than Cowley because Lach backchecked, Cowley's response was along the lines of "why would I backcheck when I always have the puck?"

 

[wetcoast]

"Lots" of players were available that have been among the worst players in the league for a given stretch? I'm not trying to lawyer you here, but that seems pretty unlikely...

I'm just saying "how much does it really matter though?"

Others didn't even make the NHL until much older.

 

[wetcoast]

This isn't how I live my life. So, no...I've seen the player enough where I don't need to weight them so emphatically. I give all players in the Norris Trophy era the same consideration. Defensemen are kind of my specialty if I do say so myself...YMMV...

So what do you do with Gasbys High Norris finish with a 12 assist season, since both are up this round?

Or put another way how do you compare players with little to no film to others that you might have seen too much of?

 

[Michael Farkas]

It doesn't take much to figure out what player skills are adaptable...you don't need to watch 100 games of a player...most players fall into "player types" anyhow because the mold is rarely broken. There's more than enough film on Gadsby...

Like I said last round, Gadsby didn't play PP at that point because they had five forwards playing it...I'm sure he gets more points with more PP time on a diesel PP on the league's best offense...meanwhile, I don't have "to do" anything with it...it is what it is, it's a good Norris finish, I'll find some more tape to go over from '65 if I have to, or maybe get some newspaper accounts and I'll make a deduction based on what I see and can take away from the time...

 

[sr edler]

Are we ranking best careers or best players?

It seems participants are doing both, individually or at the same time, or how it fits best. Some people also have different opinions on what constitutes a great career. Personally I'm of the opinion that only adding more of the same thing in absurdum isn't necessarily tie-breaking it. I feel it's mostly relevant if a particular player (for some reason) needs to prove he can work outside a different context (not necessarily another team) by piling on some relative statistical meat, or play a different kind of game.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Norris voting records for Gadsby, Leetch, Chara, and Keith

(minimum = 2 top 3 votes)

Bill Gadsby

53-54: 3rd
55-56: 2nd
56-57: 4th
57-58: 2nd
58-59: 2nd
59-60: 6th
60-61: 10th
62-63: 5th
64-65: 3rd
65-66: 11th

Summary: 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 11

Brian Leetch

88-89: 11th
90-91: 4th
91-92: 1st
93-94: 5th
95-96: 3rd
96-97: 1st
98-99: 8th
00-01: 5th
03-04: 11th

Summary: 1, 1, 3, 4, 5, 5, 8, 11, 11

Zdeno Chara

02-03: 7th
03-04: 2nd
05-06: 4th
07-08: 3rd
08-09: 1st
09-10: 8th
10-11: 3rd
11-12: 3rd
12-13: 5th
13-14: 2nd

Summary: 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8

I believe that Chara's 6 Norris finalist nods is the most of any defenseman left.

Duncan Keith

07-08: 11th
08-09: 6th
09-10: 1st
10-11: 9th
12-13: 6th
13-14: 1st
14-15: 7th
15-16: 11th
16-17: 4th

Summary: 1, 1, 4, 6, 6, 7, 9, 11, 11
______________________

IMO, Keith's Norris record underrates him by a little.

Namely because he saw limited PP time in Chicago for a few noteworthy years.

In particular, look at 2008-09. Keith finished 6th in Norris voting, despite being a young defenseman with limited PP time. He was 5th in PP TOI among defensemen on his own team because the Blackhawks had guys like Brian Campbell and Cam Barker: http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?rep....16&filter=gamesPlayed,gte,1&sort=ppTimeOnIce. IMO, no way were Shea Weber and Dan Boyle better than Keith that year.

Overall, Keith's 32 even strength points tied him for 2nd leaguewide but he only had 11 PP points: http://www.nhl.com/stats/player?rep...,gte,1&filter=gamesPlayed,gte,1&sort=evPoints

2009-10 was the first year Keith saw 1st unit PP time.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Martin St. Louis - I had him just outside the top 100, slightly behind contemporaries Iginla and Thornton. Two factors that work in his favour are he was pretty good defensively, and generally a strong playoff performer. But I can't help but feel that his trophy case is a lot better than it "should" be. He has two Art Ross trophies and a runner-up but I think he had some good luck (I've already written before that 2004 was one of the weakest years for top-end talent; in 2011 and 2013 I'm not convinced he was the best player on his own line).

i'm not sure if it's too early for MSL. but some pros and cons...

pro: made other players better. best brad richards? 2004 playoffs on MSL's line. best lecavalier? 2007 and 2008 seasons, on MSL's line. best stamkos? 2010 to 2013 seasons, on MSL's line. and these are good players, HOVG players even without ever having played with MSL. but he pushed them higher, to (briefly) HHOF levels. so he gets major adam oates points there from me. not a doubt in my mind who the best player on his line was in 2011 and 2013.

con: 2004, a weak hart and art ross.

pro: 2004, followed it up with an excellent playoff run.

pro: deserved the 2011 hart trophy over daniel sedin and corey perry. again, not a doubt in my mind. when stamkos (50 in 50 pace in the first 20 games, 40 goals by game 54) hit a goal scoring wall (5 goals, 19 points in the 28 games after game 54), who kept scoring (11 goals, 35 points) to keep TB from falling out of the playoff race? who went 5 goals, 12 points, 2 GWGs in the last 8 games and took TB on a 7-1 run going into the playoffs, where they proceeded to knock off pittsburgh, then washington and came within a game of the finals?

con: like iginla, yes he was a great player, a franchise player. but a lot of gaps in his prime where he didn't make the playoffs. both guys played on shallow teams but they did both miss the playoffs more times than you'd like. for MSL especially, he certainly still had good scoring support on his non-playoff teams, even though they were often one-line teams.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Duncan Keith's importance to the closest thing the league has seen to a dynasty since the 1980s Oilers:

As shown above, Keith's Norris record is the weakest of the 4 defensemen this round. I think that Norris voting underrates him a little, but even so, if he is going to be added to our top 100 at all, it's going to primarily be because of his importance to the 2009-10 to 2014-15 Chicago Blackhawks:

During this 6 year stretch, Keith played 444 regular season games:

• Keith led the team with 20:20 EV TOI/GP. Brian Campbell was next with 19:27 over only 133 games. Then Brent Seabrook with 18:39 over 449 games.
• Keith led the team with 2:30 SH TOI/GP. Next were Niklas Hjalmarsson with 2:25 and Brent Seabrook with 2:21.
• Keith led defensemen with 3:03 PP TOI/GP. Next: Dustin Byfuglien with 2:43 (82 games), Brian Campbell with 2:29 (133 games) and Brent Seabrook with 2:13. 3 forwards saw more PP TOI than Keith, however - Patrick Kane (3:20), Patrick Sharp (3:09), and Jonathan Toews (3:07).
• Overall, Keith averaged 25:54 TOI / GP to 23:12 for Brent Seabrook.

In the playoffs:

• Keith played 2841:54 total minutes in the playoffs over these 6 seasons, a full 21.6% more than 2nd place Brent Seabrook's 2336:11. Next most: Niklas Hjalmarsson 2273:36, Jonathan Toews 2141:46, Patrick Kane 2057:16
• Keith led the team in EV and PP TOI/GP and was a close 2nd to Hjalmarsson in SH TOI/GP
• 2010 Cup: Keith 28:11 TOI/GP. Next highest: Seabrook 24:11
• 2013 Cup: Keith 27:37 TOI/GP. Next highest: Hjalmarsson 23:15
• 2015 Cup: Keith 31:07 TOI/GP. Next highest: Seabrook 26:17
• Keith led all Blackhawks defensemen in scoring in all 3 Cup wins
• Keith won the 2015 Conn Smythe in unanimous fashion
• I don't think anyone would have been surprised if Keith had won either the 2010 or 2013 Conn Smythe

Edit: See also Hockey Outsider's post 7:

Excellent results overall. Surprisingly, the Blackhawks have a (slightly) negative ES goal ratio when Keith is off the ice. When he's on the ice, his ES ratio is in the same range as Pronger, Chara, Coffey and Chelios. (For those curious, his numbers look a lot better than Kane's and Toews').

 

[quoipourquoi]

I wouldn’t necessarily call 2003-04 a weak Hart. His competition was weak with Forsberg’s injury, but he still had that monster ~20 game run at the halfway point that helped Tampa Bay latch on to 1st Place. Probably would have been noticed in any season.

Led assists, points, plus-minus - just 3 back of the lead in goals.

Forsberg may have scored 55 in 39, but St. Louis had a stretch that year of 59 in 39.

 

[Captain Bowie]

Let's get one thing straight... while we often use individual trophy finishes and votes to bolster our cases for certain players (we all do), we need to remember that other than the Art Ross, Maurice Richard and Jennings trophies, they are all subjective.

I've found Chara to be given a tad too much credit, while Savard was essentially taken for granted by the hockey community in the 70's. Savard was Montreal's steadiest d-man, the leader on the blueline, and the best mix of offense and defense. He was never given enough credit when it came to Norris time, while teammate Lapointe's big offensive numbers stole some votes.

Chara, meanwhile, is rightfully admired for his ability to play so well despite a frame that generally produces clunky, awkward skaters. He's big, unbeatable in a fight, and has a massive shot from the point. Does that make him as good of a defenseman as his Norris finishes? He's one of the better defensemen of his era, no doubt. However, I've often found him a lazy vote come Norris time.

Didn't he play alongside Larry Robinson for much of that time?

 

[Batis]

That's why he was underwhelming in it!

Seriously speaking, I think Mikhailov's performance in the 1979 Challenge Cup (tournament MVP) should slightly compensate the fact that he never played in a Canada Cup; I know that some people don't rate the Challenge Cup very high, but it was a star-studded series, and the Soviets did have to come from behind to win it, with Mikhailov scoring a key goal in every game.

Furthermore, whatever it's worth, Mikhailov was still arguably one of the top Soviet forwards in the 1972 Summit Series, especially if we look rather at Richard Bendell's alternative statistics and forget the official ones - which I think we should - ; Mikhailov had 7 points in 8 games. His problem was, though, that he didn't score a single point in the last 3 games. However, in Canada he was terrific IMO, maybe even the 2nd best skater after Kharlamov (Yakushev's heroics truly started in Moscow).

Once again, too bad that Maltsev and Martinec aren't here for comparison's sake, but that doesn't mean that it's not time for Mikhailov to be voted in.

Regarding Mikhailovs performance at the 1972 Summit Series it is perhaps also worth bringing up that beyond his offensive production Mikhailov was an important part of the Soviet penalty kill which during those 8 games only let in 2 powerplay goals while scoring 3 shortanded goals themselves. Here are the shorthanded ice time numbers from that series.

Summit Series 1972

1. Yevgeny Mishakov: 6 gp, 21 min, 0 sec, 1 goal forward, 2 goals against
2. Vladimir Petrov: 8 gp, 13 min, 45 sec, 2 goals forward, 0 goals against
3. Boris Mikhailov: 8 gp, 10 min, 36 sec, 2 goals forward, 0 goals against
4. Vladimir Shadrin: 8 gp, 10 min, 10 sec, 0 goals forward, 0 goals against
5. Valery Kharlamov: 7 gp, 7 min, 40 sec, 1 goal forward, 0 goals against
6. Vyacheslav Starshinov: 1 gp, 4 min, 33 sec, 0 goals forward, 1 goal against
7. Vladimir Vikulov: 6 gp, 3 min, 26 sec, 0 goals forward, 1 goal against
8. Alexander Maltsev: 8 gp, 1 min, 23 sec, 0 goals forward, 0 goals against
9. Alexander Yakushev: 8 gp, 0 min, 33 sec, 0 goals forward, 0 goals against

 

[DannyGallivan]

Didn't he play alongside Larry Robinson for much of that time?

I believe so. It was a Canada Cup-quality blueline, no doubt.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

I wouldn’t necessarily call 2003-04 a weak Hart. His competition was weak with Forsberg’s injury, but he still had that monster ~20 game run at the halfway point that helped Tampa Bay latch on to 1st Place. Probably would have been noticed in any season.

Led assists, points, plus-minus - just 3 back of the lead in goals.

Forsberg may have scored 55 in 39, but St. Louis had a stretch that year of 59 in 39.

St. Louis had a strong year, but 2004 was one of the weakest seasons that I can remember in terms of top end talent - link

Of course, we can't fault him because he peaked during a season that feature relative few really high-end performances, and to his credit he ran away with the Hart trophy, but it goes back to my previous point about how his trophy case seems to be better than you'd expect.

 

[BenchBrawl]

The Boston Bruins from the Chara era were build around him and his identity.He made every player tougher, starting with Lucic, but also Boychuk, Thornton, etc.They were one of the toughest team in recent history and he was the end boss.I understand Chara doesn't look like the strongest playoff performer from the eye-test, but still, the guy was a true franchise defenseman in the sense that a team build around him.I don't think this was true of Duncan Keith, but obviously Keith was a much better playoff performer.

Chara was the greatest free agent signing of the modern era and a colossal loss for Ottawa.Also one of the best maturation arc of all-time.

Closest thing to a Robinson after Pronger.

I don't get the hate to be honest.I agree Chara has limitations, but he also has major strenghts that are hard to quantify.

 

[MXD]

The Boston Bruins from the Chara era were build around him and his identity.He made every player tougher, starting with Lucic, but also Boychuk, Thornton, etc.They were one of the toughest team in recent history and he was the end boss.I understand Chara doesn't look like the strongest playoff performer from the eye-test, but still, the guy was a true franchise defenseman in the sense that a team build around him.I don't think this was true of Duncan Keith, but obviously Keith was a much better playoff performer.

Chara was the greatest free agent signing of the modern era and a colossal loss for Ottawa.Also one of the best maturation arc of all-time.

Closest thing to a Robinson after Pronger.

I don't get the hate to be honest.

All I'd say is : it's a Top-100 list. And there are some very good players in this group, including one who did better both at team awards and individual awards, despite being possibly UNDERRATED at those individual awards (see TDMM post).

 

[BenchBrawl]

All I'd say is : it's a Top-100 list. And there are some very good players in this group.

I'm just far from convinced anyone eligible is clearly ahead of Chara and what he brought to the table on those strong Boston teams in the late 2000s and 2010s.

Very ironic that people were lamenting for the lack of Joe Thornton, when Boston shipped him for three plumbers, signed Chara and never looked back.Does anyone seriously believe they would have been better off keeping Thornton?

 

[MXD]

I'm just far from convinced anyone eligible is clearly ahead of Chara and what he brought to the table on those strong Boston teams in the late 2000s and 2010s.

Very ironic that people were lamenting for the lack of Joe Thornton, when Boston shipped him for three plumbers, signed Chara and never looked back.Does anyone seriously believe they would have been better off keeping Thornton?

I don't think anyone seriously believe the Bruins wouldn't have been a better team had they kept Chara and Thornton (and Bergeron and Krejci).
But they aren't winning a cup without Dennis Seidenberg.

... And I actually don't even dislike Chara here, in this group. All in all, not much difference (in terms of overall value) with Thornton.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

I believe that Chara's 6 Norris finalist nods is the most of any defenseman left.

That's correct. Only a select few defensemen have ever been a Norris finalist 6+ times and they're all long gone aside from Chara (Bourque 15; Lidstrom 11; Orr 9; Harvey 8; Park 7; then Chara, Chelios, Coffey, MacInnis, Pilote, Potvin and Robinson 6).

Gadsby is the sole 5-time Norris finalist in NHL history. After that, the four-time finalists are Kelly (likely a 7-8 finalist had the award been introduced a few years earlier), Horton, Pronger, Salming - and two recent players, Karlsson and Doughty.

Like I said before, Keith only having two seasons as a finalist (and indeed two seasons in the top five) makes him look really out of place here - but I think he's been underrated in Norris voting and a truly stellar playoff resume makes up some ground against Chara (who I still have ahead of Gadsby unless I see a good case otherwise).

 

[BenchBrawl]

That's correct. Only a select few defensemen have ever been a Norris finalist 6+ times and they're all long gone aside from Chara (Bourque 15; Lidstrom 11; Orr 9; Harvey 8; Park 7; then Chara, Chelios, Coffey, MacInnis, Pilote, Potvin and Robinson 6).

Gadsby is the sole 5-time Norris finalist in NHL history. After that, the four-time finalists are Kelly (likely a 7-8 finalist had the award been introduced a few years earlier), Horton, Pronger, Salming - and two recent players, Karlsson and Doughty.

Like I said before, Keith only having two seasons as a finalist (and indeed two seasons in the top five) makes him look really out of place here - but I think he's been underrated in Norris voting and a truly stellar playoff resume makes up some ground against Chara (who I still have ahead of Gadsby unless I see a good case otherwise).

And Chara got his Norris record while scoring less points than other Top 5 usual Norris defensemen.He was almost always the one with the fewest points inside the Top 5.