Top-200 Hockey Players of All-Time - Round 2, Vote 1

[quoipourquoi]

Procedure

• You will be presented with ~15 players based on their ranking in the Round 1 aggregate list
• Players will be listed in alphabetical order to avoid creating bias
• You will submit ten names in a ranked order, #1 through #10, without ties via PM to quoipourquoi
• Results of this vote will be posted after each voting cycle, but the individual ballots themselves will remain secret until the completion of this project
• The top-5 players will be added to The List

Eligible Voters

• Ballots from voters who have submitted an approved Round 1 ranking of 220 players (which was used to shape the aggregate list) will have their votes tabulated in the History of Hockey ranking
• Batis, BenchBrawl, bobholly39, buffalowing88, Dennis Bonvie, DN28, Dr John Carlson, Hockey Outsider, MXD, Professor What, ResilientBeast, seventieslord, tarheelhockey, ted2019, TheDevilMadeMe, Vilica, Weztex

Guidelines

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

House Rules

• Any attempts to derail a discussion thread with disrespect to old-time hockey will be met with frontier justice
• We encourage interpositional discussion (forward vs. defenseman vs. goaltender) as opposed to the safer and somewhat redundant intrapositional debates
  
• Take a drink when someone mentions the number of hockey registrations in a given era
• Finish your drink when someone mentions that goaltenders cannot be compared to skaters

The actual voting period will open up on Friday, January 15th at midnight and continue through Sunday, January 17th at 8:59pm. Eastern time zone. I will release the results of the vote on Monday, January 18th..


Vote 1 Candidates

• Alexander Maltsev
• Bill Quackenbush
• Doug Gilmour
• Drew Doughty
• Eddie Gerard
• Erik Karlsson
• Jarome Iginla
• Norm Ullman
• Peter Stastny
• Russell Bowie
• Serge Savard
• Toe Blake
• Valeri Vasiliev
• Vladimir Martinec

Click to read more...

 

[ResilientBeast]

 

[MXD]

15 players. No Goalies. Boo-hoo.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

Glad to see Russell Bowie here.

He's my Number 1 at the moment.

 

[ResilientBeast]

Glad to see Russell Bowie here.

He's my Number 1 at the moment.

That was kinda my immediate first thought as well.

Also this has to be the only round without a goalie right?

 

[MXD]

Glad to see Russell Bowie here.

He's my Number 1 at the moment.

That was kinda my immediate first thought as well.

Also this has to be the only round without a goalie right?

In that group, he is clearly the player that ended up the highest in the "pecking order" of his days. In fact, Bowie has a claim (and, frankly, it's closer to a right than to a claim) to be called the best player in the world, and he's in the only one with such a "Right" in that group. That is probably not controversial. The only controversy here is how much is that worth.

The other player in that group that possibly have claim to be called the best player in the world (as opposed to the best player in a single season) would be Erik Karlsson. (That's mostly an opinion)

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

15 players. No Goalies. Boo-hoo.

Are there 15 players?

 

[Professor What]

Blake, Iginla, Karlsson, and Vasiliev all made my top 100.

Bowie would be on the outside of the top 10 looking in for me based on my initial ballot, but I feel like he's the one with the most movement potential for me. I found him very difficult to place to begin with.

 

[Professor What]

Are there 15 players?

I counted 14, but the original post did say "~15," so I'm guessing there might have been a noticeable dropoff creating a neat cutoff

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

7 year VsX records (for post-1926 NHL players):

Norm Ullman 89.5
Peter Stastny 88.4
Jarome Iginla 86.7
Toe Blake 86.3
Doug Gilmour 82.0
Erik Karlsson 74.3 (a rare defenseman to make the threshold to be included)

10 year VsX records for post-expansion players (remember 10 year VsX is likely unfair to pre-expansion players who had, on average, shorter primes/careers)

Norm Ullman 84.7
Jarome Iginla 81.5
Toe Blake 81.4
Peter Stastny 80.8
Doug Gilmour 77.1
Erik Karlsson 62.5


Norris Trophy/All-Star Trophy records of post-1926 NHL Defensemen:

Bill Quackenbush: 1, 1, 2, 3, 3, 5, 7, 10*
Drew Doughty: 1, 2, 2, 3, 6, 6, 9
Erik Karlsson: 1, 1, 2, 2, 7
Serge Savard: 4, 5, 5, 5, 6, 8

*war year

I used Norris records for the three Norris-era defensemen. See this thread for an explanation of what I consider a "nontrivial Norris finish:" Norris trophy voting: complete record

I used Quackenbush's All-Star record. See this thread for how I calculated All-Star records for pre-Norris defensemen: All-Star voting records for defensemen (1930-31 to 1967-68)

 

[bobholly39]

Iginla vs Gilmour is an interesting comparison. Both have tremendous longevity, and very strong prime/career numbers.

Does Iginla get the overall edge offensively on Gilmour? Because without it - I don't see a case for him above Gilmour. Gilmour has:

- Better peak (Iginla may have done better vs peers, but Gilmour had tougher competition at peak)
- Better playoffs (clearly)
- Better defensively (clearly)

I know Iginla is clearly better goal-scorer, but to me that's a component of overall offense.

 

[Dennis Bonvie]

I counted 14, but the original post did say "~15," so I'm guessing there might have been a noticeable dropoff creating a neat cutoff

Thanks, didn't realize that was an option.

 

[MXD]

Are there 15 players?

I can only count to potato.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

First impressions:

• Norm Ullman and Jarome Iginla are probably my top 2 NHL players this round.
• Ullman has the best offensive record available, he scored most of his points at even strength without a ton of offensive help (he played with Gordie Howe for 2 seasons, but usually played on Detroit's 2nd line with relative scrubs or on a defensive Toronto team), and he was solid defensively.
• Iginla was the defining "power forward" of his era. His goal differential compared to his teammates is almost unreal - the kind of thing you'd expect to see from a superstar defensemen, let alone a forward - IMO, this is likely a result of his ability to win puck battles all over the ice.
• After Ullman and Iginla, I like the available defensemen better than the rest of the NHL forwards, except Serge Savard. Serge is, of course, the exact same type of player whose Norris record doesn't capture how good he was. That said, he's SO far behind the rest in that regards. To put it another way: Drew Doughty (perhaps a similar "type" defenseman to Serge) has to rank higher among his peers than Serge did, right?
• Martinec and Maltsev are the next non-NHL Euros who should be added, and both will be high on my list. There has to be some gap between them and Vasiliev, right?
• I have no idea what to do with Bowie, but first impression is to make him wait a couple of rounds until we add some of the true stars of stronger eras.

 

[bobholly39]

Glad to see Russell Bowie here.

He's my Number 1 at the moment.

Among players listed I actually had him last. But I'm not nearly as familiar with his era - will look to read more to re-assess

 

[MXD]

Iginla vs Gilmour is an interesting comparison. Both have tremendous longevity, and very strong prime/career numbers.

Does Iginla get the overall edge offensively on Gilmour? Because without it - I don't see a case for him above Gilmour. Gilmour has:

- Better peak (Iginla may have done better vs peers, but Gilmour had tougher competition at peak)
- Better playoffs (clearly)
- Better defensively (clearly)

I know Iginla is clearly better goal-scorer, but to me that's a component of overall offense.

Iginla has better "filler" (non-pejorative) seasons, unless I'm getting things wrong.

Iginla isn't just the better goalscorer : Gilmour will end up somewhere between the 2nd or 6th worse goalscorer (amongst forwards) whose career will get reviewed in this project (depending on who gets available), and most of these "suspects" at least did something better than Gilmour.

 

[MXD]

First impressions:

• After Ullman and Iginla, I like the available defensemen better than the rest of the NHL forwards, except Serge Savard. Serge is, of course, the exact same type of player whose Norris record doesn't capture how good he was. That said, he's SO far behind the rest in that regards. To put it another way: Drew Doughty (perhaps a similar "type" defenseman to Serge) has to rank higher among his peers than Serge did, right?

I can't quite see such similitude. Doughty got numbers and got to feature as the main man offensively (amongst other things) on an elite (or at least, a multi cup winning) team. If Doughty and Savard were 100% equal players, Doughty would get better Norris support due to his game and his situation.

(This was more an observation on their likeliness to get Norris support than on Doughty and Savard's cases).

 

[Professor What]

Iginla vs Gilmour is an interesting comparison. Both have tremendous longevity, and very strong prime/career numbers.

Does Iginla get the overall edge offensively on Gilmour? Because without it - I don't see a case for him above Gilmour. Gilmour has:

- Better peak (Iginla may have done better vs peers, but Gilmour had tougher competition at peak)
- Better playoffs (clearly)
- Better defensively (clearly)

I know Iginla is clearly better goal-scorer, but to me that's a component of overall offense.

My gut said that Iginla would fare significantly better offensively, but I found that an interesting question and didn't want to just take it for granted, so I did some era adjustment number crunching. With that, I got Iginla at 0.906 ppg and Gilmour at 0.870 ppg. So, it was closer than I expected. That said, I generally give goals a higher weight than assists when doing any statistical look at offense, so Iginla's very clearly better goal scoring record pads his margin. That really was a "weakness" for Gilmour. And also keep in mind that Iginla played on some pathetic teams and still put up the stats.

 

[Professor What]

I can't quite such similitude. Doughty got numbers and got to feature as the main man offensively (amongst other things) on an elite (or at least, a multi cup winning) team. If Doughty and Savard were 100% equal players, Doughty would get better Norris support due to his game and his situation.

(This was more an observation on their likeliness to get Norris support than on Doughty and Savard's cases).

I agree with this. I think the two of them are pretty close honestly. I won't hash it out again in here since I know I've talked about it a good bit elsewhere, but I simply can't agree with Doughty's Norris win, and I think Savard fared too poorly in balloting. I don't think an apples to apples Norris comparison works very well for the two of them.

 

[ted2019]

YEAH!!! I'll get involved later today.

 

[ted2019]

• Alexander Maltsev
• Bill Quackenbush
• Doug Gilmour
• Drew Doughty
• Eddie Gerard
• Erik Karlsson
• Jarome Iginla
• Norm Ullman
• Peter Stastny
• Russell Bowie
• Serge Savard
• Toe Blake
• Valeri Vasiliev
• Vladimir Martinec

Ullman, Gerard, Blake were in my original top 100.
Maltsev, Iginla, Martinec, Stastny, Quackenbush, Karlsson, Savard are in my next tier.
Sell me on Gilmour, Doughty, Bowie, Vasiliev with Doughty being lowest on my list.

 

[ResilientBeast]

• Alexander Maltsev
• Bill Quackenbush
• Doug Gilmour
• Drew Doughty
• Eddie Gerard
• Erik Karlsson
• Jarome Iginla
• Norm Ullman
• Peter Stastny
• Russell Bowie
• Serge Savard
• Toe Blake
• Valeri Vasiliev
• Vladimir Martinec

Ullman, Gerard, Blake were in my original top 100.
Maltsev, Iginla, Martinec, Stastny, Quackenbush, Karlsson, Savard are in my next tier.
Sell me on Gilmour, Doughty, Bowie, Vasiliev with Doughty being lowest on my list.

Bowie is one of maybe 2 players on that list that was "the greatest" player of his time. Successor Fred Taylor has been ranked, Taylor's successor in Nighbor etc have all made the list.

In a project ranking the top 200 players of all time that carries a lot of weight for me. His competition for the time was Tommy Phillips, Frank McGee and Hod Stuart, none of which are on the top 100 list. And possibly all 3 will make this list (McGee is the closest to not making it IMO). We have no representation for the amateur era as of yet, which is fair since it's difficult to work out the hot mess that was hockey at the time.

But to me, his status and production almost speak for themselves.

Edit: My bio from ATD 2017

 

[ted2019]

I agree with this. I think the two of them are pretty close honestly. I won't hash it out again in here since I know I've talked about it a good bit elsewhere, but I simply can't agree with Doughty's Norris win, and I think Savard fared too poorly in balloting. I don't think an apples to apples Norris comparison works very well for the two of them.

I see Doughty as being overrated. I find it interesting that his Norris win doesn't come in any of the 2 Kings cup seasons.

 

[ResilientBeast]

I see Doughty as being overrated. I find it interesting that his Norris win doesn't come in any of the 2 Kings cup seasons.

The counter there is he probably could've won either of the Conn Smythe's if I recall the playoff runs accurately.

 

[quoipourquoi]

Bill Quackenbush and Drew Doughty interest me here. They are the only two candidates of this group of 14 that was not eligible in the final round of the previous project (which had 21 names). So they did some leapfrogging with this group of voters.