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

[Canadiens1958]

One of the more fascinating revisionist arguments has surfaced about Doug Harvey's outstanding 1960 Playoffs.

Argument seems to be that because Harvey did not register any assists he was taking from the overall offence at ES.

Laughable. Harvey did score 3G in 8 games, including an overtime winner in game 2 of the semis, a record pace of 26G for defencemen over a season. But haters will hate and that is not good enough. Previously arguing that Harvey was not scoring enough during the dynasty years the song changes to not passing enough. Overlooked is the fact that the team was winning more than enough.

In the same post there are comments about the 1957-59 stretch defensively.
Overlooking that with the one goalie system teams were vulnerable in case of ill health(Plante was asthmatic) or injury to playing with unproven amateurs as goalies. Happened, hence the variance.

The 1959-60 Canadiens season was one the ages. Team was winning and Jacques Plante was off to his best start in years. November 1,1959 Jacques Plante introduced the facemask after a devestating facial injury in the first period in New York.
Our blogster totally overlooks this fact and its consequences.

The true narrative is that Plante returned to finish the game winning 3-1, missing only one game "to rest" during the season. Fact remains that the team GA went to 178 from the 158 range the previous three years.

Going into the playoff, the team made a few defensive adjustments that took hold starting with game 3 of the semis. Net result Plante allowed only 11 goals in 8 games, 0.950SV%, 3 shutouts as Harvey dominated defensively. Assists did not matter.

 

[Canadiens1958]

I was struck by the articles seventieslord posted: three of them talk about how he was unpopular with fans in Montreal who booed him. Then another article talks about him not winning any fans with the crowds at MSG when he was a Ranger. There is praise in one article about how well he was playing and in the same breath says if he had put out that kind of effort earlier in the season...

Booed three times?How were you struck?

Harvey and other stars we booed at home. Fans expectations. Play a game that was not the players strength or would harm the team.

Harvey would get booed because he would rush selectively, unlike Kelly and Gadsby. Fans were denied a show.

Harvey was booed because he was the best fighter on the team but would not fight regularly, staying on the ice. The fact that Coach Blake insisted on players standing up for themselves to counter and avoid abuse like Beliveau did in 1955-56 and 1956-57 was part of the reason. NHL not WWF.

Harvey was booed because he would pace the tempo of the game. Going from the show of a shootout to a controlled victory. Fans like entertainment. Teams like wins.

 

[Canadiens1958]

One of the joys of this project is research. Ongoing is a side project Bobby Hull.

A few bumps in the road took time so cannot detail as much as hoped.

Basic issue is that as time allows it is becoming clear that the Hawks - ownership and management mishandled the talent that was Bobby Hull.

Prime example was the move from center after Hull's first two seasons to LW. Did not happen at training camp but in season.

Hull started the 1959-60 season as the center between Ron Murphy and Eric Nesterenko. A few weeks in, he was moved to LW between Bill Hay and Murray Balfour. So training camp the ideal time for new linemates was wasted.

Bobby Hull won the Art Ross that year his first. Short term benefit but long term problem. At LW he was easier to defend, harder to transition to than at center. Confined to a narrow lane, his speed and mobility was harnassed by his team.

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

State of mind- pre-ballot submission, Friday 9 November:

I don't think it's too glib or All-Time-Draft-ish for me to casually say-

Time to fill out the rest of our squad!

The (not particularly close) best LW to ever play his position.
The majority-view best G to ever play his position.
A defensive partner for Orr.

I say that not because I think these slots should be quota-ed, I say that because I legitimately think Bobby Hull, Patrick Roy, and Doug Harvey are the three next best options at this point.

Regarding Hull-Roy, I could say I could be persuaded to flip the order with a good argument-- but really, that's the lazy way out. I'm looking again and again on my own to see if I can find anything that convinces me to flip that order. So far, no.

If you compare regular-season vs. regular season, it's Hull-- and (to use 'Mike' language) 'in-a-walk.' The rest of the comparison defies that season-by-season scorecard that I sometimes like to employ- and the reason I don't lean on that too much here is that Roy throws those playoffs at you- and as résumé enhancements go, they're killer. Young prime Roy is half-a-decade of Cup-theft good. Mid-30s Roy is Smythe-fortress good.

Circling back to Hull, I thought it would be worthwhile to look at his early WHA-years and see if they mattered more than I may have believed. I've concluded that if Hull had played another three years in the NHL, he would have knocked down a couple-three more All-Star team nods in spite of his age. the first WHA year, 1st/2nd NHL AS LW's were Mahovlich & Dennis Hull. Absolutely no doubt in my mind he'd clear that bar. The next year wasn't eye-popping transcendent for Hull, but back in the NHL, the first team LW All-Star was Rick Martin, who seemed to be utterly bereft of defensive conscience that year (-22 on a team that was only 2 games under .500*) and serendipitous passenger Wayne Cashman. Year after that, Rick Martin (who also apparently had been coached up to clean up his defensive act, too) and somebody named Steve Vickers were the AS LW selections.

In summary, if Hull is in a close call with anyone in your comparisons- and you haven't looked into his early WHA years, perusing them takes nothing away from his value- it probably adds to it.

[*fun-fact, on that same Buffalo team, a 44(!) year-old Tim Horton was +4, in spite of playing 23 fewer games...]

 

[Nick Hansen]

The pure, unadulterated HATE I've got for Doug Harvey knows no boundaries...

 

[Johnny Engine]

Found Red Sullivan's HFBoards account.

 

[bobholly39]

I wanted to do a deeper analysis on offense for the forwards in this round. I wanted to take @Art of Sedinery excellent post in post#94 and highlight PPG specifically. I’ll copy paste his exact words in terms of which years he picked and why:

Tables represent how much players outscored their contemporaries (or didn't) by during their primes. Tried to find their best stretch of 5-20 years relative to their peers. For Crosby, I included the entire span of 06/07-16/17, but with and without the injury riddled years of 10/11-12/13 because no other player missed such a number of games right in the middle of what would be their prime/peak.

To me it’s important to look at PPG margin and not just points scored. When we talk offense and when we want to consider how “good” a player was, PPG trumps raw points as it shows a level of dominance. In smaller spurts ppg can be misleading if we think it’s inflated due to games missed (ie within a single season) – but over an overall stretch of 5-10 years I think it’s highly valuable. I sorted the results in terms of PPG margin.

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Bobby Hull	59/60-68/69	679	800	1.18		100.00%
Gordie Howe	59/60-68/69	702	782	1.11	102.30%	106.31%
Stan Mikita	59/60-68/69	694	767	1.11	104.30%	106.31%
Jean Beliveau	59/60-68/69	615	658	1.07	121.60%	110.28%
Norm Ullman	59/60-68/69	695	673	0.97	118.90%	121.65%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Jean Beliveau	54/55-60/61	457	559	1.22		100.00%
Bernie Geoffrion	54/55-60/61	394	459	1.16	121.80%	105.17%
Gordie Howe	54/55-60/61	472	530	1.12	105.50%	108.93%
Andy Bathgate	54/55-60/61	485	500	1.03	111.80%	118.45%
Dickie Moore	54/55-60/61	466	456	0.98	122.60%	124.49%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Gordie Howe	46/47-54/55	572	581	1.02	113.80%	98.04%
Maurice Richard	44/45-54/55	662	661	1		100.00%
Elmer Lach	44/45-53/54	527	471	0.89	140.30%	112.36%
Ted Lindsay	44/45-54/55	656	565	0.86	117.00%	116.28%
Ted Kennedy	44/45-54/55	615	488	0.79	135.50%	126.58%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Sidney Crosby	06/07-09/10, 13/14-16/17	602	766	1.27		100.00%
Evgeni Malkin	06/07-09/10, 13/14-16/17	557	653	1.17	117.30%	108.55%
Alex Ovechkin	06/07-09/10, 13/14-16/17	635	723	1.14	105.90%	111.40%
Joe Thornton	06/07-09/10, 13/14-16/17	646	658	1.02	116.40%	124.51%
Ryan Getzlaf	06/07-09/10, 13/14-16/17	611	593	0.97	129.20%	130.93%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Sidney Crosby	06/07-16/17	701	925	1.32		100.00%
Evgeni Malkin	06/07-16/17	706	832	1.18	111.20%	111.86%
Alex Ovechkin	06/07-16/17	840	929	1.11	99.60%	118.92%
Joe Thornton	06/07-16/17	856	845	0.99	109.50%	133.33%
Henrik Sedin	06/07-16/17	848	799	0.94	115.80%	140.43%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Howie Morenz	24/25-31/32	321	328	1.02		100.00%
Nels Stewart	25/26-31/32	288	253	0.88	129.60%	115.91%
Bill Cook	26/27-31/32	266	232	0.87	141.40%	117.24%
Frank Boucher	26/27-31/32	266	226	0.85	145.10%	120.00%
Aurele Joliat	24/25-31/32	324	248	0.77	132.30%	132.47%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Conclusions drawn:
- Surprised to see Hull end up ahead of Mikita. Gordie Howe factors in too. As expected, Hull’s overall offense is great, but where he likely differentiates himself a lot more is goal-scoring (see post #203).

- Beliveau surprisingly doesn’t look that great himself. Howe is somewhat close, but he’s also barely 5% ahead of his own teammate. Gap over 5th place is 24.5%, not much better than Hull.

- Richard takes a hit by Howe at #1, but still looks decent overall vs #5 for a goal-scorer first, 26.5% ahead of Kennedy. Competition is probably the weakest here of the players posted - certainly weaker than 10 years later, or than Crosby's era.

- If you consider Crosby’s stretch from 06-07 to 16-17 completely, he stands out here with 40% over 5th place (biggest gap) and 11% over 2nd place (also biggest gap). Even if you somehow take out his 2011-2013 seasons (and I don’t think we should) he comes out #1, over gap from 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th place so far. This is impressive especially in his era with so much competition at the top. Crosby also has the most games played from any player - so not only is he #1 for PPG, he's also #1 in more games played (or years) than any others, which is also significant.

- Morenz is certainly in Crosby territory himself, though a tad behind. Looking at PPG alone in this era bothers me a bit because of the smaller sample sizes of games in seasons. Still – no denying his domination over everyone else.

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

The pure, unadulterated HATE I've got for Doug Harvey knows no boundaries...

Fool's errand to try to talk anybody away from their emotions... but boundless hate should be reserved for Graham James. Alan Eagleson. Those kinds of people... not the people we're talking about now.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Thankfully we don't count games played as a determining factor

That is absolutely a precedent we have set to some degree. Gretzky and Howe over Orr and Lemieux...

 

[Sentinel]

Kind of hard to hang those three on the guy who was retired.

Edit: Re-reading this... I dont know if you're referencing Hasek or Mario. Is this structure confusing to anyone else?

It can't be Hasek, because it specifically references 1999, Hasek's greatest playoff run.

My pitch for Hasek as #5 is simple. In 1997-1998 he WAS, unquestionably, the greatest player in the world, for the first time since 99 and 66. The highest peak for a non-Top 4 player ever. He got into opponent's heads more than anybody else before or since. His Nagano performance gave Czech Republic their first Olympic Gold medal ever: not just in hockey, in ALL sports. His playing style left people scratching their heads and his saves left them breathless. His Mastercard commercial is still remembered today ("Having a slinky for a spine? Priceless!"). He didn't have a Mikita, or three other Top 15 players of all time, or even goddamn Damphousse on his team when he took it to the Finals: Buffalo's best player was Jason friggin' Wooley. Star power and charisma to the nth degree. One of the Top Five highlight reels of all time (with Lemieux, Bure, Datsyuk, and Ovechkin). The reason people watched hockey in the DPE outside the Detroit - Colorado rivalry.

"And the only question on everyone's mind is: is this guy human?" (I think, Bill Clement)

 

[Nick Hansen]

Fool's errand to try to talk anybody away from their emotions... but boundless hate should be reserved for Graham James. Alan Eagleson. Those kinds of people... not the people we're talking about now.

I agree. Thus introducing the concept of hate as a factor with regards to Harvey is ridiculous.

 

[bobholly39]

Similar to my last post – I wanted to do a deeper dive on playoff PPG margins over each player’s playoffs. I’m once again piggybacking on @Art of Sedinery excellent post earlier in this thread where he posted all of this data, post#368.

I sorted out the results by PPG margins. There are 2 tables for Beliveau to capture two different dynasties.

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Bobby Hull	60/61-70/71	99	118	1.19		100.00%
Gordie Howe	60/61-70/71	59	68	1.15	173.50%	103.40%
Stan Mikita	60/61-70/71	100	103	1.03	114.60%	115.70%
Jean Beliveau	60/61-70/71	99	98	0.99	120.40%	120.40%
Frank Mahovlich	60/61-70/71	86	72	0.84	163.90%	142.40%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Jean Beliveau	53/54/57/58	52	66	1.27	184.80%	79.40%
Maurice Richard	43/44-57/58	121	122	1.01		100.00%
Bernie Geoffrion	50/51/57/58	87	83	0.95	147.00%	105.70%
Gordie Howe	46/47-57/58	89	84	0.94	145.20%	106.80%
Ted Lindsay	44/45-56/57	116	85	0.73	143.50%	137.60%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Cooney Weiland	28/29/33/34	25	21	0.84	104.80%	70.80%
Charlie Conacher	30/31-33/34	23	16	0.7	137.50%	85.50%
Frank Boucher	26/27-33/34	41	28	0.68	78.60%	87.10%
Howie Morenz	23/24-33/34	37	22	0.59		100.00%
Bill Cook	26/27-33/34	42	21	0.5	104.80%	118.90%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Jean Beliveau	53/54-57/58	52	66	1.27		100.00%
Bernie Geoffrion	53/54-57/58	53	67	1.26	98.50%	100.40%
Gordie Howe	53/54-57/58	42	50	1.19	132.00%	106.60%
Maurice Richard	53/54-57/58	41	43	1.05	153.50%	121.00%
Dickie Moore	53/54-57/58	53	49	0.92	134.70%	137.30%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Bobby Hull	64/65-70/71	63	73	1.16	116.40%	95.30%
Jean Beliveau	64/65-70/71	77	85	1.1		100.00%
Phil Esposito	64/65-70/71	60	66	1.1	128.80%	100.40%
Stan Mikita	64/65-70/71	63	57	0.9	149.10%	122.00%
Yvan Cournoyer	64/65-70/71	79	61	0.77	139.30%	143.00%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Sidney Crosby	07/08-17/18	155	180	1.16		100.00%
Evgeni Malkin	07/08-17/18	153	161	1.05	111.80%	110.40%
Patrick Kane	08/09-16/17	127	123	0.97	146.30%	119.90%
Alex Ovechkin	07/08-17/18	121	117	0.97	153.80%	120.10%
Jonathan Toews	08/09-16/17	128	110	0.86	163.60%	135.10%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Conclusions drawn:
- Bobby Hull looks great, better than expected even at #1. 42% over 5th place, and 3.4% over 2nd place.

- Richard is 37% above Lindsay and approx. 6% over Howe and Geoffrion. Beliveau does look much better than him in this stretch – but in less games & years played.

- Morezn takes a hit here, big time. His out of this world domination of offense in regular season doesn’t hold up come playoff time. He is 4th among peers during those years.

- Beliveau in both stretches looks pretty dominant over 5th place (37% and 43% margins). Still at the very top, he’s practically tied with Geoffrion in the first dynasty years – and is outscored by Hull from 65-71.

- Crosby has by far the largest sample (155 games – even adding both of Beliveau’s stretches he’s at 129 games). All of his contemporaries have large enough sample sizes to be compared to (nothing like Beliveau vs Richard in half the games), and he does very well over all of them. 10% over 2nd place is the largest gap here, as is 19% over 3rd place. At 35% over 5th place he loses ground and is 5th, but it’s still pretty close to most numbers (37%-43%) in a much bigger sample size of games played.

To me Crosby once again comes out ahead in playoffs PPG.

If I had to combine the last 2 posts I made, taking everything into account (competition, games played, domination, etc) I would rank in regular season PPG domination over prime:

1. Crosby
2. Morenz
3. Beliveau
4. Hull
5. Richard

For playoffs it would be:

1. Crosby
2. Beliveau
3. Hull
4. Richard
5. Morenz

I think you could almost inverse Hull and Beliveau at 2 and 3 for playoffs. I ended up giving Beliveau the edge due to more games played, but in terms of %’s Hull actually should be #2.

 

[Canadiens1958]

The pure, unadulterated HATE I've got for Doug Harvey knows no boundaries...

Non-voter, opinion does not matter.

 

[bobholly39]

It can't be Hasek, because it specifically references 1999, Hasek's greatest playoff run.

My pitch for Hasek as #5 is simple. In 1997-1998 he WAS, unquestionably, the greatest player in the world, for the first time since 99 and 66. The highest peak for a non-Top 4 player ever. He got into opponent's heads more than anybody else before or since. His Nagano performance gave Czech Republic their first Olympic Gold medal ever: not just in hockey, in ALL sports. His playing style left people scratching their heads and his saves left them breathless. His Mastercard commercial is still remembered today ("Having a slinky for a spine? Priceless!"). He didn't have a Mikita, or three other Top 15 players of all time, or even goddamn Damphousse on his team when he took it to the Finals: Buffalo's best player was Jason friggin' Wooley. Star power and charisma to the nth degree. One of the Top Five highlight reels of all time (with Lemieux, Bure, Datsyuk, and Ovechkin). The reason people watched hockey in the DPE outside the Detroit - Colorado rivalry.

"And the only question on everyone's mind is: is this guy human?" (I think, Bill Clement)

This seems like a highly emotional plea, more so than grounded in logic. There's nothing wrong with emotions being a part of it - but a lot of this probably doesn't matter as much as it should, nor is it proven.

1. A lot of player have been the greatest player in the world at different points in time. Being the "first since 66 and 99" is more a question of timing than something super significant. And honestly Jagr and him are 1a/1b for some of those years - maybe Hasek comes out ahead (and did so sooner), but it's close.

2. I think Hasek has an argument for top peak outside of the top 4, certainly. But i don't think it's as obvious as that. I'd love for someone to back this up with some data, or do some research. The players I usually consider here are Jagr, Hasek, Lafleur and a few others. One of the best peaks outside big 4? Absolutely. Not convinced he's definitely #1 though, but he could be.

3. Nagano gold medal is incredible. If you want to make the case that this is the best individual performance in hockey in the history of international play by an individual, you might have a case (than again, don't discount Gretzky and a few others). In the large picture though, one Olympic Games shouldn't count for that much in a career of over 1000 NHL games for most of these guys.

4. I don't remember the Mastercard commercial but i like Crosby's current Tim Horton commercials airing in Canada. I give exactly 0 worth to that in my evaluation of Crosby in this round though.

5. His 1999 playoffs are *very* impressive. But does it even rank as a top 5 overall individual playoff performance vs all individual playoff runs of players in this round? Or top 10? Guys like Roy, Richard, Beliveau, even Crosby have a ton of great ones too.

6. Star power might be great - but a LOT of players in this round at LEAST exceed his star power, if not more. Sidney Crosby has been the face of the NHL as the league becomes more popular than ever in north america/globally for the past 13 years. In terms of name recognition he's hard to beat. How about Rocket Richard? Or even Morenz for his era? Maybe Hasek should also rank high in star power, but it's not a differentiating factor vs others, there's no way he's #1. (I don't think star power should be a huge criteria to begin with)

7. For a goalie he might be the #1 all time for highlight reel, no question. How relevant is that though? A goalie should be judged on stopping the puck - not on looking good while doing so. Maybe that's a reason to be a big fan of his, not sure it's a reason to rank him high though. Datsyuk is nowhere near the top of these lists despite you including him in the top 5 in this category.

 

[DitchMarner]

The pure, unadulterated HATE I've got for Doug Harvey knows no boundaries...

Why do you hate him?

 

[Nick Hansen]

One of the more fascinating revisionist arguments has surfaced about Doug Harvey's outstanding 1960 Playoffs.

Argument seems to be that because Harvey did not register any assists he was taking from the overall offence at ES.

Laughable. Harvey did score 3G in 8 games, including an overtime winner in game 2 of the semis, a record pace of 26G for defencemen over a season. But haters will hate and that is not good enough. Previously arguing that Harvey was not scoring enough during the dynasty years the song changes to not passing enough. Overlooked is the fact that the team was winning more than enough.

Hatred is burning within in my chest...

 

[Michael Farkas]

I think he's just being facetious...

The Hasek starring in a credit card commercial stuff though, that's genuine.

Not sure which we should be concerned with more...

 

[Hockey Outsider]

His Mastercard commercial is still remembered today ("Having a slinky for a spine? Priceless!").

Hasek has nothing on Olaf Kolzig's commercial.



Will try to post something that's actually relevant later today...

 

[DannyGallivan]

Yeah, as Vadim said, this comment strikes me as odd, especially as it relates to a player who led NHL in shots 3 times and who still hold the record for the most shots in a game. ... And who is the all-time leader in shots taken.

I guess I just remember him as a shoot from the blueline kind of defenceman.

 

[DannyGallivan]

Just gotta keep looking...libraries too...

Off topic observation: I am amazed at just how well they skated back then on such awful skates. If you even compare skates from the early 70's to today, it's like night and day. Those skates offered zero ankle support and were as heavy as kettleballs.

 

[DannyGallivan]

I'm under no illusions that Hasek is going to be voted in this round. And if you rate reliability above all else, that's fine. I'm just assuming not everybody does, considering that Mario Lemieux just got ranked 4th, even though he directly cost his teams two playoff berths because of his injuries (possibly three, depending on how you assess 1988), and then basically watched his teams get eliminated primarily because of lack of scoring in 1995, 1998, 1999 and 2000. Yet nobody really got into any of that all.

Penguins don't even survive the 80's in Pittsburgh without Lemieux. They don't win any Cups in the early 90's without Mario either. To hint that he was a liability is being... contrarian.

 

[Sentinel]

Similar to my last post – I wanted to do a deeper dive on playoff PPG margins over each player’s playoffs. I’m once again piggybacking on @Art of Sedinery excellent post earlier in this thread where he posted all of this data, post#368.

I sorted out the results by PPG margins. There are 2 tables for Beliveau to capture two different dynasties.

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Bobby Hull	60/61-70/71	99	118	1.19		100.00%
Gordie Howe	60/61-70/71	59	68	1.15	173.50%	103.40%
Stan Mikita	60/61-70/71	100	103	1.03	114.60%	115.70%
Jean Beliveau	60/61-70/71	99	98	0.99	120.40%	120.40%
Frank Mahovlich	60/61-70/71	86	72	0.84	163.90%	142.40%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Jean Beliveau	53/54/57/58	52	66	1.27	184.80%	79.40%
Maurice Richard	43/44-57/58	121	122	1.01		100.00%
Bernie Geoffrion	50/51/57/58	87	83	0.95	147.00%	105.70%
Gordie Howe	46/47-57/58	89	84	0.94	145.20%	106.80%
Ted Lindsay	44/45-56/57	116	85	0.73	143.50%	137.60%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Cooney Weiland	28/29/33/34	25	21	0.84	104.80%	70.80%
Charlie Conacher	30/31-33/34	23	16	0.7	137.50%	85.50%
Frank Boucher	26/27-33/34	41	28	0.68	78.60%	87.10%
Howie Morenz	23/24-33/34	37	22	0.59		100.00%
Bill Cook	26/27-33/34	42	21	0.5	104.80%	118.90%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Jean Beliveau	53/54-57/58	52	66	1.27		100.00%
Bernie Geoffrion	53/54-57/58	53	67	1.26	98.50%	100.40%
Gordie Howe	53/54-57/58	42	50	1.19	132.00%	106.60%
Maurice Richard	53/54-57/58	41	43	1.05	153.50%	121.00%
Dickie Moore	53/54-57/58	53	49	0.92	134.70%	137.30%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Bobby Hull	64/65-70/71	63	73	1.16	116.40%	95.30%
Jean Beliveau	64/65-70/71	77	85	1.1		100.00%
Phil Esposito	64/65-70/71	60	66	1.1	128.80%	100.40%
Stan Mikita	64/65-70/71	63	57	0.9	149.10%	122.00%
Yvan Cournoyer	64/65-70/71	79	61	0.77	139.30%	143.00%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Player	Seasons	Games	Points	PPG	Margin	PPG Margin
Sidney Crosby	07/08-17/18	155	180	1.16		100.00%
Evgeni Malkin	07/08-17/18	153	161	1.05	111.80%	110.40%
Patrick Kane	08/09-16/17	127	123	0.97	146.30%	119.90%
Alex Ovechkin	07/08-17/18	121	117	0.97	153.80%	120.10%
Jonathan Toews	08/09-16/17	128	110	0.86	163.60%	135.10%

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

Conclusions drawn:
- Bobby Hull looks great, better than expected even at #1. 42% over 5th place, and 3.4% over 2nd place.

- Richard is 37% above Lindsay and approx. 6% over Howe and Geoffrion. Beliveau does look much better than him in this stretch – but in less games & years played.

- Morezn takes a hit here, big time. His out of this world domination of offense in regular season doesn’t hold up come playoff time. He is 4th among peers during those years.

- Beliveau in both stretches looks pretty dominant over 5th place (37% and 43% margins). Still at the very top, he’s practically tied with Geoffrion in the first dynasty years – and is outscored by Hull from 65-71.

- Crosby has by far the largest sample (155 games – even adding both of Beliveau’s stretches he’s at 129 games). All of his contemporaries have large enough sample sizes to be compared to (nothing like Beliveau vs Richard in half the games), and he does very well over all of them. 10% over 2nd place is the largest gap here, as is 19% over 3rd place. At 35% over 5th place he loses ground and is 5th, but it’s still pretty close to most numbers (37%-43%) in a much bigger sample size of games played.

To me Crosby once again comes out ahead in playoffs PPG.

If I had to combine the last 2 posts I made, taking everything into account (competition, games played, domination, etc) I would rank in regular season PPG domination over prime:

1. Crosby
2. Morenz
3. Beliveau
4. Hull
5. Richard

For playoffs it would be:

1. Crosby
2. Beliveau
3. Hull
4. Richard
5. Morenz

I think you could almost inverse Hull and Beliveau at 2 and 3 for playoffs. I ended up giving Beliveau the edge due to more games played, but in terms of %’s Hull actually should be #2.

Sorry, dude, Crosby ain't got nothing on Richard in playoffs. Richard had been likely the greatest playoff performer ever until Gretzky came along (although Lafleur has a case). Crosby is not in the same stratosphere.

 

[Michael Farkas]

[MOD]

Big Hasek guy. It's not time for him yet because we're still talking about the very, very best players to ever play...not just the best players to ever play...there's a marked difference.

 

[DannyGallivan]

Booed three times?How were you struck?

Harvey and other stars we booed at home. Fans expectations. Play a game that was not the players strength or would harm the team.

Harvey would get booed because he would rush selectively, unlike Kelly and Gadsby. Fans were denied a show.

Harvey was booed because he was the best fighter on the team but would not fight regularly, staying on the ice. The fact that Coach Blake insisted on players standing up for themselves to counter and avoid abuse like Beliveau did in 1955-56 and 1956-57 was part of the reason. NHL not WWF.

Harvey was booed because he would pace the tempo of the game. Going from the show of a shootout to a controlled victory. Fans like entertainment. Teams like wins.

There has never been a more fickle fan base in the history of the game (or perhaps any sport) than Montreal fans. I remember them booing Ken Dryden in game one of the '79 finals against the Rangers because the Habs lost 4-1 (this is after three straight cups and a massive seven game victory over Boston). Of course, Montreal won the next four games in that series. That's just one of so many examples. As much as it would be an honour to wear the Habs jersey in their glory years, I'd hate to play in Montreal (that is, if I had a choice).

 

[Sentinel]

[MOD]

Big Hasek guy. It's not time for him yet because we're still talking about the very, very best players to ever play...not just the best players to ever play...there's a marked difference.

[MOD]

Hasek's WAS the "very, very." Defined the DPE as much as the Wings-Avs rivalry. Bourque defined the Bruins.

It is a pity Dom didn't play on the Wings from the beginning. They would meet with the Avs every year for a decade and his head-to-head record against Roy would be even more telling.