Top-100 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 9

[wetcoast]

Can't see how Chelios can be a lock and Park near the bottom.

Seems Chelios has the edge in longevity (though Park played 17 years) and Cups. Park was the better offensive player. Defensively too close to call.

Through 15 seasons, Park was +411. Then he went to Detroit. Ended at +363.
Through 15 seasons, Chelios was +199. Then he went to Detroit. Ended at +351.

We see the biggest swings in plus minus during the 70's though so not sure that is a fair way to compare them really.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Wwe see the biggest swings in plus minus during the 70's though so not sure that is a fair way to compare them really.

Fair point.

 

[ResilientBeast]

I missed voting my apologies for not being around much

 

[MXD]

I missed voting my apologies for not being around much

Unless I missed something, you didn't miss at thing.
Deadline was postponed due to people not being around much.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Can't see how Chelios can be a lock and Park near the bottom.

Seems Chelios has the edge in longevity (though Park played 17 years) and Cups. Park was the better offensive player. Defensively too close to call.

Through 15 seasons, Park was +411. Then he went to Detroit. Ended at +363.
Through 15 seasons, Chelios was +199. Then he went to Detroit. Ended at +351.

That's nuts. Chelios was trading "best defensive defensemen" votes with Ray Bourque in the early 90s.

As far as I can tell, Park never received a vote for "best defensive defenseman" in the league, and his prime was very well covered by such polls.

Also, statistically Chelios is probably the most prolific penalty killer of the modern era.

 

[Sentinel]

That's nuts. Chelios was trading "best defensive defensemen" votes with Ray Bourque in the early 90s.

As far as I can tell, Park never received a vote for "best defensive defenseman" in the league, and his prime was very well covered by such polls.

Also, statistically Chelios is probably the most prolific penalty killer of the modern era.

Yeah, that struck me as odd. Chelios is clearly superior to Park as defensive defensemen and overall.

 

[ResilientBeast]

Unless I missed something, you didn't miss at thing.
Deadline was postponed due to people not being around much.

That's what I get for not reading the OP and just assuming

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

i have chelios as the best defensive player between langway and lidstrom. and i am a huge admirer of scott stevens.

 

[wetcoast]

i have chelios as the best defensive player between langway and lidstrom. and i am a huge admirer of scott stevens.

Fair enough, although I think Langway can get over rated at times.

I think if these boards existed at the time people might have been comparing to him to Robinson, which he wasn't.

 

[DannyGallivan]

Dryden/Kharlamov/Tretiak I am fairly confident on. All 3 will be near the bottom. To me there needs to be a fairly big gap between Sawchuk and the next goalie

I like that Tretiak and Dryden are both here, since I think they are both somewhat overrated yet have been linked to some lofty accomplishments. I think Kharlamov should have already been in, so he's likely at the top of my list this time around.

 

[overg]

Actually would love to see the distribution by NHL award voting by city. This would answer a number of points raised.

Would be especially interesting to see what, if any, effect era had on this. And I don't necessarily mean typical hockey eras so much as media eras.

We've got, what, newspaper, radio, network television, cable, and internet eras? Has the change from one medium to another influenced whether or not certain markets get over-represented in the voting? The ability of voters to gather information about players, and be influenced by non-voters (most particularly fans) has massively changed over the course of NHL awards voting history. What, if any, influence this has had on who is winning those awards would be pretty damned interesting to see.

 

[wetcoast]

Would be especially interesting to see what, if any, effect era had on this. And I don't necessarily mean typical hockey eras so much as media eras.

We've got, what, newspaper, radio, network television, cable, and internet eras? Has the change from one medium to another influenced whether or not certain markets get over-represented in the voting? The ability of voters to gather information about players, and be influenced by non-voters (most particularly fans) has massively changed over the course of NHL awards voting history. What, if any, influence this has had on who is winning those awards would be pretty damned interesting to see.

It would be very interesting.

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

Monday Musings:

Working on that Apps-Conacher chestnut...

Upon further review, I think Apps was what I thought he was- which is, of course, a helluva player- but I'm still not convinced it's enough, this go-round. I have a caveat, though- if we're not properly accounting for his time-loss for Wartime Service, then he's MORE than we think he was.

As I relayed before, Apps stepped away from Hockey to take that Marketing gig at Simpson's. Given what we know of hockey compensation at that time, I wouldn't be surprised if signing on with that retailer was a pay-raise. If he had been a modern player, I could easily see someone giving him ten million reasons to stick around for a while longer. Since the anecdotal evidence suggests that he was Honus Wagner-esque in his personal habits (no smoking, drinking...). I could easily see him having productive longevity in our alternate scenario. Let me be clear- I don't think this should influence our decision concerning his placement- it's just an interesting "what-if." Guy must've been a joy to Coach.

Conacher, though- I still believe he's MORE than what I thought he was. I'll get into this a little more deeply further down-the-line. Some keystrokes have been struck indicating that his 2nd team All-Star placement in 1932-33 was questionable. However, I believe that to be more than offset by other award consideration where he was judged a bit short. [Some of this, to be sure, owes to the nature in which All-Star & Hart voting was conducted in those days- but point remains.]

At the risk of putting one of my blind-spots on display, I'd like to ask The Panel this general question, before I continue with this issue: What in the Actual Hell happened with league-wide goal-totals between 1934-35 and 1935-36, to make the League scoring go down .7 goals-per-game? Okay, (to address the obvious) there was a one-team contraction [and it was an Almightily Awful Team (St Louis Eagles)], but there's gotta be more to it than that.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

That's nuts. Chelios was trading "best defensive defensemen" votes with Ray Bourque in the early 90s.

As far as I can tell, Park never received a vote for "best defensive defenseman" in the league, and his prime was very well covered by such polls.

Also, statistically Chelios is probably the most prolific penalty killer of the modern era.

Just wondering, how is that determined?

 

[pappyline]

I like Charlie Conacher this round, He had star power and was nicknamed the "Big Bomber". Short peak but what the Hell so did Orr & Lafleur.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Just wondering, how is that determined?

I was just reporting the result of polls of NHL players and coaches.

 

[canucks4ever]

I would take Park over Chelios because I think he is better suited to being the alpha of a team. Chelios style is more complimentary, you can't expect him to drive an offense.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

I would take Park over Chelios because I think he is better suited to being the alpha of a team. Chelios style is more complimentary, you can't expect him to drive an offense.

they each led their teams in scoring in the regular season once: park in 1974 (his team was 5th in the league) and chelios in '96 (his team was 6th in the league).

park led the rangers in scoring in the '74 playoffs (two rounds) and the bruins' 78 finals run (one point ahead of peter mcnab).

chelios led the habs in scoring in the '89 finals run (tied with bobby smith), the '91 playoffs (eight points in six games), and was one point behind roenick in the '92 finals run.

imo, 1992 chelios was as alpha as any playoff performance by a defenseman of his generation, including bourque.

 

[canucks4ever]

they each led their teams in scoring in the regular season once: park in 1974 (his team was 5th in the league) and chelios in '96 (his team was 6th in the league).

park led the rangers in scoring in the '74 playoffs (two rounds) and the bruins' 78 finals run (one point ahead of peter mcnab).

chelios led the habs in scoring in the '89 finals run (tied with bobby smith), the '91 playoffs (eight points in six games), and was one point behind roenick in the '92 finals run.

imo, 1992 chelios was as alpha as any playoff performance by a defenseman of his generation, including bourque.

Park has the edge in hart trophy voting.

 

[Pominville Knows]

Park has the edge in hart trophy voting.

[MOD: The level of discourse here is a bit higher than that. Actual arguments are welcome.]

On my mantle however i can claim to have rattled Chelios once when i went in on him from a dead angle just as he was to enter one of those hotel carousel entries.
He got more sensory input at that moment than he had bargained for and a while later i continued my agitation of him by putting a foot to his elevator becouse his earlier autograph had been sloppy, due to the subpar pen i then had provided.
Real beauty of a personality all things considered the greek from Chicago. I got him right where i want him.

 

[ChiTownPhilly]

I like Charlie Conacher this round, He had star power and was nicknamed the "Big Bomber". Short peak but what the Hell so did Orr & Lafleur.

Agree with the support- but some distinctions need to be drawn, based on a clarification of our terms. C. Conacher had a Surface-of-Sun Hot Peak, an excellent, six year (not five year- more on that later) Prime, and little of consequence to a 'Top-of-All-Time' discussion outside of that. Ultimately, that last doesn't matter to me so much at this stage of the project. He's worthy.

Let's start with some background. First thing we need to know about All-Star and Hart voting in the Depression era is- ballots had a single entry. There was no '1st-2nd-3rd' etc. for the Hart, you voted for ONE guy. Likewise with the All-Star Team. 1st Team Center- you voted for ONE guy. 2nd Team Center- ONE guy. Led to some results that look kind of peculiar when viewed in contrast to modern Hart/All-Star ballots.

Second thing we need to know, limned by a perspective from our Case History...
For years, a lot of us thought that Eddie Shore was superior to Doug Harvey, because- well, you know, because Four Harts. Then, we got some illumination, by way of a demonstration that in Shore's day, voters were considerably more likely to support Defensemen for the Hart than in Harvey's era. This was shown to the satisfaction of the majority of us- clear enough that the judgement of Harvey over Shore is now the Orthodox viewpoint here.

Thing that I thought recently was- we've developed that picture well enough, but what would happen if we examined the negative of that particular film? That is to say- if the voters who voted for Shore instead voted in a manner consistent with modern voters, who would receive (a couple of) his Harts, instead? More to the immediate point, where would the voters place their votes if they were as disinclined to vote for Defensemen generally as they were (are) in later Eras? It's the starting point to an inquiry that leads to some interesting discoveries-- and I'll share some of mine, soon.

 

[MXD]

Thing that I thought recently was- we've developed that picture well enough, but what would happen if we examined the negative of that particular film? That is to say- if the voters who voted for Shore instead voted in a manner consistent with modern voters, who would receive (a couple of) his Harts, instead? More to the immediate point, where would the voters place their votes if they were as disinclined to vote for Defensemen generally as they were (are) in later Eras? It's the starting point to an inquiry that leads to some interesting discoveries-- and I'll share some of mine, soon.

Do you have a clue as to why Frank Brimsek and Dave Kerr received no Hart support whatsoever in 1939 and 1940, respectively?

(I know, it's a bit post-Shore, but it's relevant to this round due to the availability of Syl Apps)

 

[DannyGallivan]

[MOD: The level of discourse here is a bit higher than that. Actual arguments are welcome.]

On my mantle however i can claim to have rattled Chelios once when i went in on him from a dead angle just as he was to enter one of those hotel carousel entries.
He got more sensory input at that moment than he had bargained for and a while later i continued my agitation of him by putting a foot to his elevator becouse his earlier autograph had been sloppy, due to the subpar pen i then had provided.
Real beauty of a personality all things considered the greek from Chicago. I got him right where i want him.

We have Chelios-rattling in common. I took his drink (accidentally) in a night club in Winnipeg after a game. I gave it back when I discovered it was water (he must have been the only guy in the club drinking water on a Saturday night).

 

[Canadiens1958]

Do you have a clue as to why Frank Brimsek and Dave Kerr received no Hart support whatsoever in 1939 and 1940, respectively?

(I know, it's a bit post-Shore, but it's relevant to this round due to the availability of Syl Apps)

Probably viewed as a reflection of the team's success not the cause.

 

[MXD]

Probably viewed as a reflection of the team's success not the cause.

This theory does make sense for Brimsek (it's not like the Bruins absolutely needed him to be that good in 1939), but it does seem like sorcellery to me as far as 1940 is concerned.

(My claim here is : there's no way Syl Apps was the 2nd best player in the NHL that season. He MIGHT have been thesecond best per-game player in the NHL, but that's Worth only so much when you're playing 60% or so of the total games; Dave Kerr also had the best goaltending season in litterally ages and it's not totally unheard of to see netminders go on a tear... it's definitely likelier than seeing A WHOLE TEAM go on a tear and play better collective defense worth something like .75 goals per game)