Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 5

[ImporterExporter]

Clarke won 3 Hart Trophies while Orr and Esposito were at their best.

He didn't do it with mirrors.

I'm aware of that. Don't have questions about his regular season resume.

My original questions revolved around his drop in production in the postseason. Kyle answered them.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

The "problem" with Clarke in the postseason is that he never led his team in scoring in any of their 4 trips to the finals, despite being their leading regular season scorer by a wide margin for the years in the 1970s.

His postseason record is still pretty good, but it's not Nighbor or Lafleur (or Sakic).

 

[BenchBrawl]

People keep saying there are many Nighbor fans around, but who exactly is making an aggressive case for him? I know I posted a lot of material on Nighbor last round, but almost all of it was neutral and part of a larger project about the Ottawa Dynasty playoffs.Maybe I just missed it, but I haven't seen a serious push for Nighbor.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Esposito was a better defensive player than Lafleur.

Esposito was pretty good along the boards also.

Esposito had the puck a lot.

Its incredible the perceptions of Esposito. Scored 152 points and 76 goals in 1971. Breaking the record of 126 points (which he held)
and 58 goals (held by Hull). Yet all he did was wait for his teammates to get him the puck.

Okay.

But would you agree that Esposito was a lot less integral to his team's possession game than Mikita or Lafleur?

 

[Nick Hansen]

Denneny was in a class of his own in a time where goals mattered A LOT. I know there is something I miss with regards to this fella as he destroys Nighbor both RS and PO during the same era. I wonder what it is. He was a winger who was bad defensively?

Feel free to educate me, but they played two games for the most part, no? Just a fact.

 

[BenchBrawl]

#1 Denneny was in a class of his own in a time where goals mattered A LOT. I know there is something I miss with regards to this fella as he destroys Nighbor both RS and PO during the same era. I wonder what it is. He was a winger who was bad defensively?

#2 Feel free to educate me, but they played two games for the most part, no? Just a fact.

Go read my posts on page 1, every single playoff games of the dynasty (1920-1927) is covered.

It's almost certain that Nighbor outperformed Denneny in the playoffs based on the reports (not saying Denneny was bad).

They played more than 2 games when they won the four cups.I think they played 5, 7, 8 and 6 games respectively.They don't all appear on hockey reference.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

I think Esposito is a little undervalued some years. In Mikita's 4th Ross year, he had 87 points and was Even. That year Phil Esposito had 84 points and was a +18.

So when you say Esposito doesn't have much outside the 6 125+ point years, it is a little odd to see some say that Mikita is a lock - since Phil in his 8th best season was Mikita's equal offensively in a Top 4 Mikita year, and probably only behind him marginally once other intangibles are accounted for. (Then again, based on my original list, he'd have been in by now too.)

And even then, Mikita's intangibles are a bit too intangible for my liking. The other team was racking up a lot of goals in the playoffs for such a great 2-way player, with Mikita being on-ice for 0.87 minuses per game after 1962, and Esposito being on for 0.90 minuses in the higher scoring expansion era, after being traded (including the 7 minuses in 29 playoff GP during his Chicago tenure artificially lowers his number.)

And that may not be his fault, but he seems to be a clear level below peak Esposito and peak Lafleur offensively, so if he's not knocking opponent goals off the board, and he's the weakest playoff performer, it's tough. I think Mikita can longevity his way past Guy Lafleur. I don't know if he can do the same with Phil Esposito.

Actually, I just came across this post I made in the HOH Centers project (where I was one of the bigger advocates for Esposito)

Phil Esposito's last year in Chicago - 51 even strength points, 8 power play points
Phil Esposito's first year in Boston - 54 even strength points, 28 power play points, 2nd in overall league scoring (only 3 points behind Mikita)

The main thing that changed when Esposito first switched teams was that he was no longer stuck behind Mikita on the powerplay. A year or two later, Bobby Orr exploded and brought Phil Esposito with him.

IMO, Esposito's first year in Boston (1967-68) is the closest we can get to showing what kind of player Esposito really was under normal #1 center circumstances. He was receiving the first unit PP time that he wasn't getting in Chicago, and while Bobby Orr was already becoming a superstar, he wasn't BOBBY ORR quite yet. What kind of player was Esposito under these circumstances? A guy who was capable of winning the Art Ross in any given year (only 3 points behind Mikita), but not someone who was going to destroy the league by ROFLesque margins like he did in the early 70s with prime Bobby Orr behind him.

It kind of corroborates @Hockey Outsider's big post on Espo without Orr.

 

[overpass]

The Final against Montreal (127 point season) might be Clarke's first match-up loss since those same Habs in 1973. Clarke and Lemaire were both -1, while Peter Mahovlich ended up +4 with 3 ES points. Depending who mainly went against Clarke, it's either a saw-off or a loss.

The SI article about the series said Bowman’s preferred matchup against Clarke was Jarvis and then Risebrough for 30 second shifts. Turning the Flyers’ tactic of short shifts back on them.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

#1 Denneny was in a class of his own in a time where goals mattered A LOT. I know there is something I miss with regards to this fella as he destroys Nighbor both RS and PO during the same era. I wonder what it is. He was a winger who was bad defensively?

#2 Feel free to educate me, but they played two games for the most part, no? Just a fact.

The NHL Final was a two game/total goals series in 1918, and 1921-24. In 1920, there were no playoffs as Ottawa won the first half and second half schedule and advanced directly to the Stanley Cup series against the West.

In 1919 specifically, it was a best-of-7 series. This is actually a very interesting series for our purposes. Ottawa was the best defensive club in the league that year, only giving up 53 GA in 18 games. Yet Montreal swamped them by scores of 8-4, 5-3, and 6-3 to take a 3-0 lead. Why's it interesting? Frank Nighbor missed these three games, I believe due to a death in the family. He returned for the fourth game, and Ottawa suddenly turned it around, winning 6-3. They lost 4-2 in the final game to lose the series. Nighbor's effect on his team's performance is obvious. Outscored 19-10 without him...but they outscored Montreal 8-7 with him.

 

[blogofmike]

This is kind of a new take on an old post - how Messier stacked up as an ES scorer in each of the 6 Cup winning playoffs. For reference, Mike Bossy peaked at 15 ES points.

1984
Gretzky 25
Kurri 22
Messier 15

1985
Gretzky 35

Coffey 25​

Kurri 24
Messier 21

1987
Messier 21
Gretzky 21
Anderson 21

1988
Gretzky 18
Kurri 18
Messier 16
Anderson 16
Chabot 16

1990
Messier 20
Simpson 20
Neely 20

1994
Leetch 20
Bure 20
Messier 18


During this time frame, only 2 players scored ES points at a higher rate.

ES PPG Leaders 1984 - 1994 (Playoffs)

Gretzky	1.12
Lemieux	0.88
Messier	0.86
Kurri	0.78
Anderson	0.71

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

This is an 11 year span where he's scoring at a level just below one of the two greatest scorers of all time at Even Strength. But perhaps it's inflated by Lemieux missing the playoffs until 1989, so -

ES PPG Leaders 1989 - 1994 (Playoffs)

Gretzky	0.90
Lemieux	0.88
Messier	0.80
Bure	0.78
Br. Hull	0.75

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

He's still up there, even though he's older. Messier had another gear in the playoffs, and was consistently strong. He had a lot of GP and maintained a high scoring rate in spite of that. He's a playoff warrior who consistently delivered at a high level. In a previous thread, C58 mentioned carpe diem and seizing good opportunities. In spite of the 6 Cups, Messier was bad in that respect. Because he went hard just about every single time.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Question for people who keep VsX Goalscoring tables in their back pockets : Is Bobby Clarke even a better goalscorer than Doug Gilmour?

He is, but not by much. Clarke is ahead 30.7-28.3 over their best seven years, and 27.0-26.4 over their best ten years.

 

[wetcoast]

I'm sure some people did have Cyclone Taylor ahead of him, but based on available evidence, that would be a minority position. Nighbor could be no worse than #25 on the aggregate list based on his availability last round, and he was middle of the pack in the vote, so I'll speculate that he probably didn't just scrape in at #25...probably more like #22 or so. Taylor was at best #31 on the aggregate based on his absence thus far.

I know there wasn't a consensus for anyone in the last vote...that's sort of my point against Lafleur. It was suggested that he was perhaps the consensus best player of his generation. Obviously he wasn't; our panel as a whole rated Potvin higher.

As it stands right now, our panel seems to have declared Nighbor #1 of his era. The same cannot be said of Lafleur. I'm not saying that this in and of itself disqualifies Lafleur from being ranked over Nighbor. It doesn't. But I am saying that if Nighbor slips much lower, we are venturing into the territory of condemning an entire era of hockey. Not having a single pre-Morenz player in our top 24 would be credibility damaging in my opinion.

While I'm not as strongly against Holly39 s comments that he hates this line of approach, it still is problematic.

It would make sense that the sport of hockey would have perhaps not as a refined era at the very beginnings of hockey as a professional sport, as opposed to an outreach and often overlap of rugby clubs among a certain class of the population.

Using the terms of punishing a player of that era or condemning the era are in my mind to strong of an argument.

It's an open question but common sense would tell us that it would be easier to stand out among a smaller group of players and a still developing game of hockey.

Nighbor is alot like Clarke this round in more ways than one.

Both are often spoken about in more glowing terms than their numbers would suggest and both were more 2 way playmakers than scorers.

I'm still open and to which center is better, as Clarke's playoff scoring takes a noticeable dip from the regular season and much like Esposito, I'm not sure that Clarke was more deserving of the Hart against Orr just like I'm sure Orr was more valuable than Big Phil.

Either way I think Mikita is getting a bad wrap the last couple of rounds and it's time to put him in.

Not entirely sure about Messier making it in this round but he should be higher than Nighbor and Clarke.

 

[Canadiens1958]

I looked at Clarke more in depth to see if anything stood out in the playoffs, good or bad.

Offense:

Clarke was a very consistent scorer. He showed up and got his points regardless of the quality of opposition. Incredibly, he only played 12 career playoff games against teams with a losing record. I would have expected that total to be quite a bit higher given Philadelphia's strong regular seasons coupled with a high percentage of teams qualifying for the playoffs from 1975 onwards. The only punching bags Clarke ever saw were in brief preliminary round series against the late 70's Rockies, Canucks, and first-year Oilers. Overall, Clarke played 110 playoff games from 1973-1980, what we would probably consider his prime. 53 of those games came against what I would consider elite Cup-contender opposition.

Broken down by individual series, it's almost uncanny how consistent his production was. In 19 best-of-seven series, he produced between four and seven points on 15 occasions. The closest thing we ever saw to an offensive outburst from Clarke was 8 points in 5 games against the 1980 North Stars. The only dud series was a disastrous 0-point, minus-11 series against the Rangers in 1979 (which is so bad compared to every other series he ever played that I have to suspect he was injured).

Bottom line is, Clarke was never going to steal you a series on the basis of his offense, but he showed up and gave his teams a chance in that regard almost every time. He could be contained offensively, but very rarely shut down.

Defense:

I decided to take a look at what the opposition's #1 center did against the Flyers during Clarke's prime years. This is an inexact science; I don't know how often Clarke was directly matched against the players below, others may be able to chime in here. But whether he was directly matched or not, I think it is fair to say that the job of the #1 center is usually to outplay the opposition's #1 center in a playoff series.

1973

Flyers lost a reasonably close 5-game series to the 120-point eventual champion Canadiens. I'm not sure who of Lemaire, Richard, or Mahovlich he'd have seen the bulk of his ice time against. Clarke scored 3 ES points, but was a -2. Henri Richard had a strong series and may have gotten the better of him. Lemaire's stat line is non-descript, and Mahovlich was bad at -4 with no ES points.

1974

Clarke looks pretty ordinary against the Rangers in the semi final, (4 points, -1), but absolutely buried Jean Ratelle, who went -6 without any ES points. Clear win for Clarke here.

Phil Esposito fares little better in the famous upset in the SC Final. His -3 is directly opposite to Clarke's +3, and Espo only had two ES points in the series, which is one of the worst in his career.

1975

The Flyers washed Toronto in the quarter-final, Darryl Sittler with 0 ES points, -4.

Not sure about the semi-final. Clarke and Denis Potvin both had a good series. The Islanders didn't have any elite centers on their roster at this time.

Neither Clarke nor Perreault gave up much at ES. Clarke did his scoring on the PP, Perreault did little at either ES or PP, but did finish +1 despite the lack of scoring. Both players were better at home than on the road in this series.

1976

Sittler gets his points (5 at ES), but it seems they must have come at somebody else's expense. Clarke scored well too, and was a +6, while Sittler had an ugly -5.

Clarke seems to have dominated Jean Ratelle again, now a Boston Bruin. Just two ES points and a -3 for Ratelle as Philly beat the Bruins easily.

The Final against Montreal (127 point season) might be Clarke's first match-up loss since those same Habs in 1973. Clarke and Lemaire were both -1, while Peter Mahovlich ended up +4 with 3 ES points. Depending who mainly went against Clarke, it's either a saw-off or a loss.

1977

Sittler is again a victim here, -3 despite scoring a good amount of points again. +4 for Clarke.

Ratelle and Boston get their revenge. Clarke is a -4, with Ratelle (5 ES points, +5) appearing to be the benefactor.

1978

Clarke doesn't look great, going -1 against Buffalo. But Perreault is held in check with just 1 ESP and a -3 rating.

Ratelle kills the Flyers for the second year in a row. Clarke is -3.

1979

That awful series I alluded to above. I'm not sure who Clarke was playing against here, but he was -11 in a 5-game loss. Instinctively you'd think Esposito, but Phil was only an Even plus/minus player despite score 6 ES points.

1980

Clarke (+1) appears to have outplayed young Gretzky (-3) in a preliminary round.

He definitely outplayed old Phil Esposito (-2) in this series. +2 despite just two points would indicate a strong defensive effort.

Clarke was good in the Final as well (7 points, +3), and closed the playoffs +10 despite a somewhat modest (for that era) 20 points in 19 games. Trottier and Goring both had a solid series, neither finished a minus player. Hard to say exactly who was playing who in this one.

Conclusion:

Up through 1976, there is little not to like about Clarke in the post-season. It is often remarked that an offensive player did or did not outscore their defensive deficiencies. I think this is a case where we can say the opposite. Clarke's defensive play was so strong that it easily covered for his weak-ish (by standards of the players in this vote) offensive production.

This seems to have stopped quite abruptly in the spring of 1977, however. Clarke all of a sudden has a string of 19 games spread over four playoff series where he's a hideous -19. 13 points in these games is a drop in production, but it's really not a huge step down from where he was at before. Nowhere near big enough to explain that minus-19.

Clarke returned to previous form in 1980 though. He seems to have been no less effective in this almost-Cup win than in 1974-1976. His play remained strong throughout the rest of his career, though the Flyers never went deep in the playoffs again. He had 16 points/+6 in the last 22 games of his playoff career.

Possible Explanation for the "Down Years"?:

It's difficult to look past the fact that Clarke's best playoff series line up so well with years where Bernie Parent was in net. He was there in 1974, 1975, and 1976...but was injured against Boston that year and didn't play most of the semi-final or any of the final. In 1977 he only played three games, and that's right when we see Clarke experience this sudden drop in goal prevention. He was back for all of 1978, however. In 1979 (the year of that awful series), Parent was done for good and didn't play at all in the playoffs. Pete Peeters and then Pelle Lindbergh re-established stability at the goaltender position from 1980 onwards, where Clarke's defensive play seems to have returned to form. The flip side of this argument is, just give Clarke a solid netminder, and he'll do great things...but I must admit, the strong overlap of Clarke's great numbers with years of good/great goaltending is a little concerning for me.

1973 Henri Richard schooled Bobby Clarke, especially the two games in Philly.

1976 Bowman shortshifted Jarvis and Riseborough against Clarke.

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

Let's stay open minded guys.

A LOT of quick judgments being voiced as to ranking. This doesn't help at all. It just makes it depressing. Why argue for a guy when people are deadset against them right away?

"Meta-point" -- consequence of the process at this stage.

With as much variance there was in the previous round's vote-distributions, there will be a significant number of participants who feel as though their choices should have advanced last round. Well... they didn't- and it's understandable that they'll be predisposed to favor them- as (more likely than not) they will tend to believe that the new candidates for advancement are a lesser lot than the ones to whom their choices lost out. If, in the context of that outcome, our first instinct is to admonish them to stay open minded- then I say good luck to you taking that approach.

Know your audience- consider their outlook- adjust accordingly.

The alternative is to risk being less persuasive.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Okay.

But would you agree that Esposito was a lot less integral to his team's possession game than Mikita or Lafleur?

Canadiens possession game was back end driven

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

Another week begins, some good new names available now including Bobby Clarke. My ? to everyone is with Mikita still there, will Mikita go higher than Clarke on the final list or will Clarke place ahead of Mikita. That could be a debate this week.

I've probably typed more negative keystrokes on Mikita than any two posters. Having said that, I've got Clarke eight players in back of Mikita, including seven skaters not currently under discussion.

As I've said, I'm as down on Mikita as anybody. However, worse than Clarke he ain't.

 

[Sentinel]

Still no Makarov. As expected.

 

[wetcoast]

Great Manitoba connection... Clarke to Leach! Flin Flon Bomber teammates.

I often wonder how both players would have done, if the flyers had acquired the Rifle earlier and if Leach hadn't found his way out of a bottle sometime during that time frame.

 

[ted2019]

I didn't say they were everything but they shouldn't be disregarded. Out of curiosity why do you downgrade Mikita? I assume you are not old enough to see him play.

Great player but wasn't the engine that drove the bus ( Hull was). Also, the Hawks were playoff failures and with the talent that they had, that shouldn't have happened. ( which he was a huge part of). At the beginning of this round, I think the following are ahead of Mikita.
Nighbor
Ovechkin
Messier
Fetisov
Lafleur
Haven't looked at Hall/Brodeur, Clarke/Esposito.

 

[wetcoast]

People keep saying there are many Nighbor fans around, but who exactly is making an aggressive case for him? I know I posted a lot of material on Nighbor last round, but almost all of it was neutral and part of a larger project about the Ottawa Dynasty playoffs.Maybe I just missed it, but I haven't seen a serious push for Nighbor.

Considering that Frank finished 95th in the 2008 project, the fact that he is up this early means he has many fans here.

5 years later he finished 8th among centers in that top 60 project.

I think that the pendulum swung too far, will it be swung back to the middle a bit?

BTW, in the same 2 projects Mikita finished 14th and 5th for what it is worth.

 

[wetcoast]

Still no Makarov. As expected.

Still no detailed thoughts, 2 things that are very consistent.

I happen to think that he should be up BTW, but he isn't.

 

[wetcoast]

Okay.

But would you agree that Esposito was a lot less integral to his team's possession game than Mikita or Lafleur?

Sure, and I think Esposito is much too early here but I think Orr would have still been the focus playing with the other 2 guys.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Okay.

But would you agree that Esposito was a lot less integral to his team's possession game than Mikita or Lafleur?

Not really.

He played a lot and had the puck a lot. Of course, Orr had it even more.

When Orr wasn't out with him, who do you think brought the puck up? Hodge? Cashman?

 

[Kyle McMahon]

While I'm not as strongly against Holly39 s comments that he hates this line of approach, it still is problematic.

It would make sense that the sport of hockey would have perhaps not as a refined era at the very beginnings of hockey as a professional sport, as opposed to an outreach and often overlap of rugby clubs among a certain class of the population.

Using the terms of punishing a player of that era or condemning the era are in my mind to strong of an argument.

It's an open question but common sense would tell us that it would be easier to stand out among a smaller group of players and a still developing game of hockey.

Nighbor is alot like Clarke this round in more ways than one.

Both are often spoken about in more glowing terms than their numbers would suggest and both were more 2 way playmakers than scorers.

I'm still open and to which center is better, as Clarke's playoff scoring takes a noticeable dip from the regular season and much like Esposito, I'm not sure that Clarke was more deserving of the Hart against Orr just like I'm sure Orr was more valuable than Big Phil.

Either way I think Mikita is getting a bad wrap the last couple of rounds and it's time to put him in.

Not entirely sure about Messier making it in this round but he should be higher than Nighbor and Clarke.

They are similar, but I think a key difference between the two is their ability as goal-scorers.

In spite of being noted more for playmaking and defensive play, Nighbor was still one of the better goal scorers in the game for the bulk of his career.

His goal scoring finishes in the NHA/PCHA/NHL are: T-1st, 3rd, 3rd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 10th.

Obviously we're going to discount those to a point since talent was split between the East and West in these years. But even if we cut those finishes right in half, he still dwarfs Clarke, who's 12th, 13th, and 16th place finishes are the only ones of any note. (Those came with some WHA dilution and a few European stars not in the league, so they should probably have a slight discount as well, but not to the extent of Nighbor's).

A second advantage I see for Nighbor, though not a huge one, is longevity. Nighbor was an elite player right from the beginning, finishing 4th in the NHA in goal scoring as a 20-year-old in 1912-13, his first major professional season. With a couple of down/injury years sprinkled in there, he was still elite as late as 1925-26, when he led the NHL in assists and finished 3rd place in Hart Trophy balloting. Even two years after that at age 35, despite scoring just 13 points on the season, Hart winner Howie Morenz stated that Nighbor was the true MVP. Probably some hyperbole there, but still. Clarke was retired by that age.

Clarke took a little longer to get going. I think we'd probably agree that his 22-year old season, 1971-72, was his first elite season. He stayed quite consistent, never missing significant time to injury or having any visibly down years through 1977-78. But at that point he was pretty much done as a high end point scorer, putting up mostly 60-70 point seasons the rest of the way while remaining great defensively. Nice Renaisance year in 1982-83, winning the Selke and finishing 5th in the league in assists.

I think these two probably cross the line with a similar amount of great peak seasons, but Nighbor's off-peak years give him an edge. His offensive decline seems less drastic to my eye than Clarke's was.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Sure, and I think Esposito is much too early here but I think Orr would have still been the focus playing with the other 2 guys.

Much too early?