Top ten players all time, going only on prime

[livewell68]

Again you are being selective with your data.

Goaltenders. I'll spot you Grant Fuhr but beyond that Jagr faced Roy, Brodeur, Hasek who are definite HHOFers and two strong possibilities Belfour and Joseph. Prime or career the names do not change.

Phil Esposito faced almost twice as many, including the possibles, recognized HHOFers - Giacomin, Parent, Plante, T.Esposito,Bower,Hall, Worsley,Dryden, Sawchuk, Smith, Cheevers.

Now let's compare responsible defensive left wingers that Jagr faced to responsible defensive centers that Esposito faced.

During Jaromir Jagr's entire career not one left winger won the Selke Trophy.Previously you had Bob Gainey and Craig Ramsey. During Phil Esposito's career he had to face the following elite defensive centers - just a short list, no particular order Jean Beliveau, Henri Richard, Doug Jarvis, Dave Keon, Red Kelly,Darryl Sittler,Stan Mikita, Walt Tkaczuk,Don Luce,Bobby Clarke,Alex Delvecchio, Bryan Trottier, amongst others.

Tougher to score against HHOF level opponents. Esposito faced such opponents in greater numbers and more often head to head.

Not a question of liking or disliking Jagr just not seeing top 10 prime credentials or top 10 career credentials while being bombarded with data that is very easy to overturn.

Apparently the 90's sucked. The level of competition was weak, the talent pool was watered down.

The NHL was lacking two-way players, Selke caliber forwards, the defensemen were weak.

Because the NHL sucked so bad in the 90's, Lemieux' and Gretzky's accomplishments that decade should not count as Roy's accomplishments shouldn't count either.

Two-way players like Lehtinen, Brind'amour, Yzerman, Modanno, Forsberg, Sakic, Federov aren't Hall of Fame worthy.

Defensemen like Lidstrom, Leetch, MacInnis, Bourque, Chelios, Pronger, Niedermayer. Stevens, Blake aren't Hall of Fame worthy.

Goalies like Roy, Hasek, Brodeur, Belfour, Vernon, Cujo don't belong in the Hall of Fame.

Offensive players like Bure, Selanne, Fleury, Sakic, Forsberg, Leclair don't belong in the Hall of Fame. Those guys were just not Hall of Fame caliber.



Jagr was dominant in the worst decade in NHL history, he was just skating in a league full peewee hockey players that weren't true athletes and they weren't big and strong and still skilled.

Apparently the influx of young European players didn't help the overall game in the 90's. It seems the 70's was not influenced by the watering down of the league due to expansion and due to the fact that only a few teams (namely Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Montreal, New York) remained good and competitive while teams like Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Oakland, Cleveland, Los Angelos were stuck with minor league players and left to fend for the bottom of the NHL.

It seems the Europeans really made the NHL take a turn for the worst in the 90's.

I guess I was watching another league, not in the NHL in the 90's.

I didn't see suddenly a more equal league, better overall goaltending, stronger, bigger, faster, more skilled players, I guess my eyes were just playing tricks on me.

You know the truth is the reason why the 70's had so many Hall of Fame type players is because of the new expansion teams making it easier on certain players to feast on them.

When Jagr was winning those Art Ross trophies he was in the same division as the Devils and Flyers and was going up against Brodeur, Stevens, Holik, Langenbrunner, Niedermayer quite frequently. He was also playing against one of the biggest, toughest teams in the league in the Flyers (do Leclair, Primeau, Desjardins, Lindros ring a bell?) I guess that means nothing for competition right?

Don't you think the reason why the 90's and beyond featured less "dominant hockey players" is because the equality of the game had improved vastly? The young Europeans really helped spread the talent level, even Americans were becoming more prominent stars such as Roenick, Leclair, Modano, Chelios and Leetch.

As well goalies had become much more atheltic, stronger, faster and had bigger and more flexible equipment and actually had much more of an advantage over shooters than in the 80's and 70's.

When guys like Howe, Clarke and Esposito were the rare kind in the 70's and 60's, they had become much more frequent in the 90's when big, strong powerfowards ruled the NHL.

Don't you think the reason why players started to use so much trapping and illegal strick infractions is because forwards were becoming stronger, faster, smarter and more skilled than ever?

Jagr couldn't even be stopped with all that stifling defense. He was a part of that generation that were true athletes, players that would train not only hard on the ice but also in the gym to condition themselves. That was a European element that was brought into the league (since the USSR used it to win all those International tournaments) and made the game better and would eventually become the norm in the NHL.

Why do you think guys like Crosby and Ovechkin exist now? It's because of players like Jagr (guys that were not only very skilled but were also athletes that would jog, run, swim, lift weights, play cross sports) in order to make them stronger, give them more endurance and therefor make them better hockey players.

The game was much more simple in the 70's. You could just win off of talent alone.

Guys like Lecavalier, Iginla would be just average players if they relied on talent alone these days. It requires you to be very fit and super tough to survive in the league now.

Esposito was fat, out of shape and used to smoke, he wouldn't last in the league in the 90's.

The reason why Coffey, Orr, Lafleur seemed so fast and could skate pylons on people is because back then the rest of the NHL was lagging in skill, it was rather a mirage (only Orr, Gretzky, Howe and Lemieux in my opinion get a pass in this since they transcended eras and generations). Starting in the 90's and beyond even 3rd and 4th line players would be strong, big, fast players.

Even with the matchstick goalies of the 70's Esposito had to take his 400 shots a year to score his goals. I don't think he would be near 50 goals in today's game or the 90's with how talented goalies have become.

Clarke in today's game (or the 90's) would be just another Peca or Holik or Brind'amour in his prime.

Esposito would have been a poor man's Bertuzzi. Yes there I said, I'm showing no respect for the 70's players.

This would be my top 10.

1. Gretzky
2. Orr
3. Lemieux
4. Hasek
5. Howe
6. Richard
7. Jagr
8. Hull
9. Lafleur
10. Bossy

Come to think of it now I wouldn't even include Esposito in my top 10. Of anyone among the history's greatest players, he's the only one that needed another top 10 player to be dominant. He never accomplished anything on his own and had his numbers inflated more than any other player in history due to playing with Orr and dominating during the beginning of the expansion era when the league was 100% watered down.

Lemieux, Gretzky, Orr, Lafleur, Bossy, Mikita, Howe, Hull, Jagr, Richard, Beliveau were all players capable of creating their own offense, they could change the pace of the game either with two-way play on most cases or based purely on their offense in the case of Jagr, Gretzky, Lemieux and Lafleur. Esposito was never capable of that.

 

[charliolemieux]

Wow this is an interesting thread. Very informative.

Now I want to bring up a player, who I know full well does not belong in any top 10 all time discussion, but for 2 seasons this player played some of the most complete hockey I have ever seen.

Doug Gilmour

The two years he led the Leafs, he chased both the Art Ross and Selke!

I am not saying he belongs on a top 10 Prime list or anything, but if people are bringing up Forsberg's one great season then Gilmour's time in Toronto deserves to be mentioned.

Add into the mix the guy was about 5'9" and 170lbs and it is just more impressive.


As I said I am not saying that for those two seasons he belongs in the top 10 or anything, but from my own personal experience that was about the best total game from a player I have been lucky enough to watch.

 

[Czech Your Math]

1997-98 without Lemieux, after adjustments for games played Jagr's numbers dropped app 12.5% somewhat more than your claimed 10% for Esposito's drop without Orr. The ultimate test is that every team that Phil Esposito played on made the Stanley Cup finals. Chicago and New York did so without Orr. Same cannot be said for Jaromir Jagr since Washington and New York did not leaving you grasping for straws and introducing the Michael Nylander achievement factor into the discussion.

Espo's first year w/ Orr in '68 was his worst point year in Boston, coincidentally Orr missed almost 40% of the season. The 10% you are referring to is the '73 season when Orr only missed about 20% of the season. Once Espo was without Orr, his points immediately dropped by about 1/3 and stayed at that level the rest of his career.

Jagr's drop from '96 to '97 is not surprising after the best season to that point in his career and drop of more than 7% in league scoring. Lemieux dropped from 161 points in 70 games (2.30 ppg) in '96 to 122 in 76 games (1.61) in '97, a drop of 30%.

In the season Espo went to SCF with Chicago, he was their 4th leading scorer during season and their 6th leading scorer in playoffs. He had points on over 24% of their regular season goals and 17% of their playoff goals. Are you trying to say that Espo led a team with Hull, Mikita, Pilote and Hall to the SCF? That's hard to believe, considering he scored 8 points in 29 playoff games there. He deserves credit for helping the Rangers to SCF in '79, but still find it odd that you are touting Espo's playoff heroics without Orr, when he scored 35 points in 59 playoff games outside Boston, won one playoff series in four years in Chicago (who had been in SCF 2 of previous 3 seasons before he arrived), needed three seasons to get the Rangers to the playoffs and four to win a playoff series.

With Lemieux,Jagr winning the Art Ross numerous times and other awards would be even more impressive but that did not happen.Which is why Jagr's achievements have to be viewed with a critical eye.

No one ever beat Gretzky or Lemieux in their primes, except each other. The closest to them in terms of prime production were probably Jagr and Howe. Jagr was within five points of Lemieux in '96 with ten games left and in '97 at 2/3 mark before injury. That's still very impressive, considering he didn't win either of his five Rosses those seasons.

I don't see how it's grasping at straws to say that Nylander is listed as the ppg leader for the '07 playoffs. It shows that at age 35 and after major shoulder surgery, Jagr could elevate his line to be as productive as any in the playoffs.

So what is the point of comparing the results of a healthy player to one that is not? Going the other way, showing that an injured player managed more while playing fewer games puts talent in perspective.

You originally wanted to extrapolate Lemieux's '96 point total to 82 games, yet Lemieux's 70 games in '96 were his most since '89.

The problem with extrapolating ppg is that it rewards players for sitting out and penalizes players for playing through injury. It's one thing if a normally healthy player misses 15-20 games, but you want to gauge his talent/value when healthy. It's another when you try to play "what if" with a player like Lemieux or Lindros who missed significant portions of most/all seasons during their prime, even entire seasons.

The Howe list covering 20 seasons is interesting from the standpoint of what is does not say. 13 of the 16 players are HHOF caliber players and you had to cover 20 season to come up with 16.

Despite what you previously said, Jagr did beat a top 4 player (Gretzky) to win a scoring title. I don't think anyone was trying to exclude Gordie Howe from the list, so not sure of your point.

How many players who are not HHOF caliber would make a similar list if the methodology were applied to Jaromir Jagr's NHL career which did not cover twenty years or even if we look at just his post Pittsburgh career?

Anything can happen in a single season, especially as Jagr was not really in his "prime" and in a less than ideal situation with Caps.

During his post-Pittsburgh career, the only player to have more points in that span was Thornton.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Check Your Math

Espo's first year w/ Orr in '68 was his worst point year in Boston, coincidentally Orr missed almost 40% of the season. The 10% you are referring to is the '73 season when Orr only missed about 20% of the season. Once Espo was without Orr, his points immediately dropped by about 1/3 and stayed at that level the rest of his career.

Jagr's drop from '96 to '97 is not surprising after the best season to that point in his career and drop of more than 7% in league scoring. Lemieux dropped from 161 points in 70 games (2.30 ppg) in '96 to 122 in 76 games (1.61) in '97, a drop of 30%.

In the season Espo went to SCF with Chicago, he was their 4th leading scorer during season and their 6th leading scorer in playoffs. He had points on over 24% of their regular season goals and 17% of their playoff goals. Are you trying to say that Espo led a team with Hull, Mikita, Pilote and Hall to the SCF? That's hard to believe, considering he scored 8 points in 29 playoff games there. He deserves credit for helping the Rangers to SCF in '79, but still find it odd that you are touting Espo's playoff heroics without Orr, when he scored 35 points in 59 playoff games outside Boston, won one playoff series in four years in Chicago (who had been in SCF 2 of previous 3 seasons before he arrived), needed three seasons to get the Rangers to the playoffs and four to win a playoff series.



No one ever beat Gretzky or Lemieux in their primes, except each other. The closest to them in terms of prime production were probably Jagr and Howe. Jagr was within five points of Lemieux in '96 with ten games left and in '97 at 2/3 mark before injury. That's still very impressive, considering he didn't win either of his five Rosses those seasons.

I don't see how it's grasping at straws to say that Nylander is listed as the ppg leader for the '07 playoffs. It shows that at age 35 and after major shoulder surgery, Jagr could elevate his line to be as productive as any in the playoffs.



You originally wanted to extrapolate Lemieux's '96 point total to 82 games, yet Lemieux's 70 games in '96 were his most since '89.

The problem with extrapolating ppg is that it rewards players for sitting out and penalizes players for playing through injury. It's one thing if a normally healthy player misses 15-20 games, but you want to gauge his talent/value when healthy. It's another when you try to play "what if" with a player like Lemieux or Lindros who missed significant portions of most/all seasons during their prime, even entire seasons.



Despite what you previously said, Jagr did beat a top 4 player (Gretzky) to win a scoring title. I don't think anyone was trying to exclude Gordie Howe from the list, so not sure of your point.



Anything can happen in a single season, especially as Jagr was not really in his "prime" and in a less than ideal situation with Caps.

During his post-Pittsburgh career, the only player to have more points in that span was Thornton.

Bolded - so Phil Esposito actually stepped up when Orr was injured.

Usually a team is led by its top six players. So Esposito was included in the group with Chicago and the Rangers. Conversely Jaromir Jagr NEVER led, or was part of a core of six,a team to the SCF without Lemieux.

My point about the Gordie Howe comparison is rather simple. A list was produced of 16 players that beat Gordie Howe in scoring over a 20 year period or the period between his 21- 40th birthday. Jagr has yet to reach 40.On the list of those that beat Howe over a twenty year period, there were only 3 non HHOFers.

Take Jagr at 30 with Washington during the 2002-03 season. in scoring he was beaten by at least 10 non-HHOFers:

http://www.hockey-reference.com/leagues/NHL_2003_leaders.html

Thats 10 non HHOFers who Beat Jagr in one season as opposed to Howe who was beaten by 3 non-HHOFers in 20 seasons.Conversely Howe regularly beat his top two contemporaries - M.Richard, Beliveau, in scoring -at least ten times.Yet you make an issue about Jagr managing to beat an aging Gretzky once.

The Capitals acquired Jagr to turnaround a situation that was not ideal and he did not come thru - whereas Phil Esposito did come thru with the Rangers.

BTW - note about athletes in hockey. Significant number of the hockey greats between 1893 and 1920 were outstanding lacrosse players in Canada. Well into the 1980's from Lionel Conacher to Pierre Turgeon hockey players excelled in other sports - some playing two professionally. Included in the group would be Golden Gloves champions, players who also played in the CFL, players who were offered pro baseball try-outs and contracts,summer Olympic caliber athletes.

 

[Czech Your Math]

Bolded - so Phil Esposito actually stepped up when Orr was injured.

His production was much lower before he went to Boston, lower in the seasons Orr was injured than his other seasons in Boston, and much lower after he left Boston. How that translates into him stepping up when Orr was injured I am not sure.

Even assuming he did, many great players step up when another star is injured. In Jagr's case, he stepped up to:

- help Pens win playoff games during '92 Cup run, even when Lemieux was injured
- help Pens win game 4 in first round in '96... when they were down 2 games to 1, down 2-0 with 2 minutes left in second period, had pulled their goalie due to injury... and after Jagr scored a short-handed goal to cut deficit to 2-1, Lemieux was kicked out.
- help mediocre Pens teams make playoffs without Lemieux and win some playoff series, including upsetting 1 & 2 seeds

Usually a team is led by its top six players. So Esposito was included in the group with Chicago and the Rangers. Conversely Jaromir Jagr NEVER led, or was part of a core of six,a team to the SCF without Lemieux.

Espo never won a Cup without Orr, Orr never won a Cup without Espo, Jagr never won a Cup without Lemieux, Lemieux never won a Cup without Lemieux.

It takes more than one great player to win a Cup, usually a few, on this I hope we can agree.

My point about the Gordie Howe comparison is rather simple. A list was produced of 16 players that beat Gordie Howe in scoring over a 20 year period or the period between his 21- 40th birthday. Jagr has yet to reach 40.On the list of those that beat Howe over a twenty year period, there were only 3 non HHOFers.

Take Jagr at 30 with Washington during the 2002-03 season. in scoring he was beaten by at least 10 non-HHOFers:

http://www.hockey-reference.com/leagues/NHL_2003_leaders.html

Thats 10 non HHOFers who Beat Jagr in one season as opposed to Howe who was beaten by 3 non-HHOFers in 20 seasons.Conversely Howe regularly beat his top two contemporaries - M.Richard, Beliveau, in scoring -at least ten times.Yet you make an issue about Jagr managing to beat an aging Gretzky once.

The Capitals acquired Jagr to turnaround a situation that was not ideal and he did not come thru - whereas Phil Esposito did come thru with the Rangers.

I didn't think we were comparing Howe and Jagr directly.

The depth of talent and competition is much different over the past 20 years than in O6 days.

Jagr's prime was with the Pens, not the Caps (although he was top 5 in points and 3rd in ppg his first year there).

Jowe didn't have to compete with Lemieux, nor with Europeans and Russians. Without that additional competition, Gretzky would have finished 1st in '98 and 2nd in '97 (to Kariya, who actually finished behind Selanne, without whose help he might have finished behind Gretzky).

Most points from '94 to '99:

Jagr 642
Gretzky 529
Lindros 525
Selanne 512
Sakic 507

Looking at scoring finish each year (without Euros in parentheses)

'94- Gretzky 1st, Jagr 9(7)... Jagr 2nd in even strength points (over Gretzky)
'95- Gretzky 19(14), Jagr 1st
'96- Gretzky 12(7), Jagr 2nd (to Lemieux)
'97- Gretzky 4(3), Jagr 6(5)... both behind Lemieux, Jagr +.33 in ppg
'98- Gretzky 3(1), Jagr 1st
'99- Gretzky ?, Jagr 1st

Gretzky wasn't much competition in '99, his last year, but in '95 he was coming off a '94 Ross win (and would finish top 5 twice after), and in '98 he was 3rd and finished behind only Euros. Gretzky had three top 5 finishes in points from '94-99, during which time he was second only to Jagr in total points. I don't know how you can say he wasn't legitimate competition, just because he wasn't the '80s Gretzky.

 

[Canadiens1958]

1972-73 Bruins

His production was much lower before he went to Boston, lower in the seasons Orr was injured than his other seasons in Boston, and much lower after he left Boston. How that translates into him stepping up when Orr was injured I am not sure.

Even assuming he did, many great players step up when another star is injured. In Jagr's case, he stepped up to:

- help Pens win playoff games during '92 Cup run, even when Lemieux was injured
- help Pens win game 4 in first round in '96... when they were down 2 games to 1, down 2-0 with 2 minutes left in second period, had pulled their goalie due to injury... and after Jagr scored a short-handed goal to cut deficit to 2-1, Lemieux was kicked out.
- help mediocre Pens teams make playoffs without Lemieux and win some playoff series, including upsetting 1 & 2 seeds



Espo never won a Cup without Orr, Orr never won a Cup without Espo, Jagr never won a Cup without Lemieux, Lemieux never won a Cup without Lemieux.

It takes more than one great player to win a Cup, usually a few, on this I hope we can agree.



I didn't think we were comparing Howe and Jagr directly.

The depth of talent and competition is much different over the past 20 years than in O6 days.

Jagr's prime was with the Pens, not the Caps (although he was top 5 in points and 3rd in ppg his first year there).

Jowe didn't have to compete with Lemieux, nor with Europeans and Russians. Without that additional competition, Gretzky would have finished 1st in '98 and 2nd in '97 (to Kariya, who actually finished behind Selanne, without whose help he might have finished behind Gretzky).

Most points from '94 to '99:

Jagr 642
Gretzky 529
Lindros 525
Selanne 512
Sakic 507

Looking at scoring finish each year (without Euros in parentheses)

'94- Gretzky 1st, Jagr 9(7)... Jagr 2nd in even strength points (over Gretzky)
'95- Gretzky 19(14), Jagr 1st
'96- Gretzky 12(7), Jagr 2nd (to Lemieux)
'97- Gretzky 4(3), Jagr 6(5)... both behind Lemieux, Jagr +.33 in ppg
'98- Gretzky 3(1), Jagr 1st
'99- Gretzky ?, Jagr 1st

Gretzky wasn't much competition in '99, his last year, but in '95 he was coming off a '94 Ross win (and would finish top 5 twice after), and in '98 he was 3rd and finished behind only Euros. Gretzky had three top 5 finishes in points from '94-99, during which time he was second only to Jagr in total points. I don't know how you can say he wasn't legitimate competition, just because he wasn't the '80s Gretzky.

Bolded - look at the 1972-73 season:

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/

Orr missed almost 20%(15 of the 78 games) and the Bruins lost their number one goalie Gerry Cheevers to the WHA.

Compared to the 1971-72 season team point total dropped from 119 to 107 ~10%. Esposito's point total dropped from 133 to 130 ~ 2%. Trust this is sufficient to show that Esposito stepped-up and was NOT a product of Bobby Orr.

Bolded - Howe did not have to compete with Lemieux nor with Europeans and Russians. Conversely neither Lemieux nor Europeans and Russians had to compete with Howe in his prime or pre age 40.Rather obvious deduction that you managed to miss.

The Howe/Lemieux hypothetical is interesting but we will not speculate on such encounters since there is not actual foundation for such speculation.

On the other hand in 1974 a mid forties Gordie Howe played against the Russians as part of the WHA team and in his mid forties Gordie Howe managed to keep pace scoring wise with the top Russians:

http://www.chidlovski.net/1974/74_statsform.asp

Gordie Howe - old enough to be the father of Russian greats like Kharlamov, Mikhailov, Petrov ,etc matching them in scoring.We have a foundation to compare in terms of scoring.

Now looking at the relative rankings of the elite Russian players from the seventies to Russian hockey players from the 1950's and 1960's or other Europeans from the same era it would not have mattered to a prime Gordie Howe and would not have impacted on his scoring or overall performance. After all he did not play against the top AHL / WHL / CHL / EPHL / QHL or QSHL players of the era who managed better numbers than Tumba Johansson or Ulf Sterner - great Swedish players did in their brief efforts in various North American hockey leagues.

As for Jagr with Washington. Let's compare Euro to Euro. The season I previously cited clearly showed Jagr being outscored by a number of average to very good Euros so the point can be made that players the caliber of Prospal, Hejduk and Demitra were outscoring Jagr at the age of ~ 30. Conversely Wayne Gretzky at the age of approximately 30 never was beaten in scoring by average to very good Canadian or American players nor was he beaten by any elite Euros.

 

[livewell68]

Bolded - look at the 1972-73 season:

http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/

Orr missed almost 20%(15 of the 78 games) and the Bruins lost their number one goalie Gerry Cheevers to the WHA.

Compared to the 1971-72 season team point total dropped from 119 to 107 ~10%. Esposito's point total dropped from 133 to 130 ~ 2%. Trust this is sufficient to show that Esposito stepped-up and was NOT a product of Bobby Orr.

Bolded - Howe did not have to compete with Lemieux nor with Europeans and Russians. Conversely neither Lemieux nor Europeans and Russians had to compete with Howe in his prime or pre age 40.Rather obvious deduction that you managed to miss.

The Howe/Lemieux hypothetical is interesting but we will not speculate on such encounters since there is not actual foundation for such speculation.

On the other hand in 1974 a mid forties Gordie Howe played against the Russians as part of the WHA team and in his mid forties Gordie Howe managed to keep pace scoring wise with the top Russians:

http://www.chidlovski.net/1974/74_statsform.asp

Gordie Howe - old enough to be the father of Russian greats like Kharlamov, Mikhailov, Petrov ,etc matching them in scoring.We have a foundation to compare in terms of scoring.

Now looking at the relative rankings of the elite Russian players from the seventies to Russian hockey players from the 1950's and 1960's or other Europeans from the same era it would not have mattered to a prime Gordie Howe and would not have impacted on his scoring or overall performance. After all he did not play against the top AHL / WHL / CHL / EPHL / QHL or QSHL players of the era who managed better numbers than Tumba Johansson or Ulf Sterner - great Swedish players did in their brief efforts in various North American hockey leagues.

As for Jagr with Washington. Let's compare Euro to Euro. The season I previously cited clearly showed Jagr being outscored by a number of average to very good Euros so the point can be made that players the caliber of Prospal, Hejduk and Demitra were outscoring Jagr at the age of ~ 30. Conversely Wayne Gretzky at the age of approximately 30 never was beaten in scoring by average to very good Canadian or American players nor was he beaten by any elite Euros.

In Jagr's first year with washington only Naslund and Sundin had more points than Jagr did and Jagr missed 13 games with an injury. He was 3rd that year in PPG behind Bertuzzi and Iginla.

After that Jagr wasn't playing like himself. it had nothing to do with players being better than him, it's just that Jagr was playing half assed.

You still just want to nitpick Jagr's Washington years but even then he was still a PPG player.

Consider this between 1994 and 2005 no one scored more points than Jagr did in the NHL, not even Sakic.

For 11 years he was the NHL's consistent/dominant forward.

Again you will find more useless things to say esposito was more dominant than Jagr was (but the truth is Jagr was dominant without Lemieux) (Esposito was never dominant without Orr).

 

[unknown33]

Without order

#1 - #5: Wayne Gretzky, Dominik Hasek, Gordie Howe, Mario Lemieux, Bobby Orr
#6 - #10: Doug Harvey, Bobby Hull, Guy Lafleur, Jaromir Jagr, Terry Sawchuk

 

[Dark Shadows]

Espo's first year w/ Orr in '68 was his worst point year in Boston, coincidentally Orr missed almost 40% of the season. The 10% you are referring to is the '73 season when Orr only missed about 20% of the season. Once Espo was without Orr, his points immediately dropped by about 1/3 and stayed at that level the rest of his career.

Espo's first year with Orr, Boston had not yet adapted their firewagon fire all cylinders offensive style. A style they built upon every year during that time. A style built largely on Esposito's game in front of the net, and his chemistry with Cashman and Hodge.

Reposting this again.
In 1968-69, before the Bruins had fully ironed out their firewagon style that would become their staple in the next few years, Orr re-injured his knee on Jan 30th against the Kings, finished the game and then sat out 9 straight games.

Ill just take a quick look at Hockey Summary Project's data for those 9 games.

During those 9 games he sat out, Esposito scored 5 goals and 10 assists, for 15 points for 1.66ppg. Over a 76 game season, that is on pace for 126.6 points. Which is exactly what he scored that season(126 points).

After looking at the 1972-73 year where Orr missed 15 games(Missed First 4 of the season, then played 1 on Oct 25th, then off for 9 straight, then missed March 4th), Esposito had 13 goals, 12 assists and 25 points while Orr was out, on pace for 130 points(Which is exactly what he got anyways)

Hodge and Cashman generally were more integral to, and factored into more goals with Esposito's style. Granted Orr's transition game was a large part of that teams success.

This "Esposito needed Orr" talk is getting out of hand.

 

[NOTENOUGHJTCGOALS]

Come to think of it now I wouldn't even include Esposito in my top 10. Of anyone among the history's greatest players, he's the only one that needed another top 10 player to be dominant. He never accomplished anything on his own and had his numbers inflated more than any other player in history due to playing with Orr and dominating during the beginning of the expansion era when the league was 100% watered down.

I know your whole post was tongue in cheek, or at least hope it was, but Bobby Orr dominated during that watered down league and never accomplished anything when Phil Esposito wasnt a Bruin either.

 

[lextune]

Espo's first year with Orr, Boston had not yet adapted their firewagon fire all cylinders offensive style. A style they built upon every year during that time. A style built largely on Esposito's game in front of the net, and his chemistry with Cashman and Hodge.

Reposting this again.
In 1968-69, before the Bruins had fully ironed out their firewagon style that would become their staple in the next few years, Orr re-injured his knee on Jan 30th against the Kings, finished the game and then sat out 9 straight games.

Ill just take a quick look at Hockey Summary Project's data for those 9 games.

During those 9 games he sat out, Esposito scored 5 goals and 10 assists, for 15 points for 1.66ppg. Over a 76 game season, that is on pace for 126.6 points. Which is exactly what he scored that season(126 points).

After looking at the 1972-73 year where Orr missed 15 games(Missed First 4 of the season, then played 1 on Oct 25th, then off for 9 straight, then missed March 4th), Esposito had 13 goals, 12 assists and 25 points while Orr was out, on pace for 130 points(Which is exactly what he got anyways)

Hodge and Cashman generally were more integral to, and factored into more goals with Esposito's style. Granted Orr's transition game was a large part of that teams success.

This "Esposito needed Orr" talk is getting out of hand.

Thank you.

 

[livewell68]

I know your whole post was tongue in cheek, or at least hope it was, but Bobby Orr dominated during that watered down league and never accomplished anything when Phil Esposito wasnt a Bruin either.

That's because Orr's career was very short and his dominant years were as a Bruin. He also did win the Calder.

It's not that he needed Esposito, in fact Esposito needed Orr not the other way around.

It was Orr's team and Esposito was the team's second best player.

Jagr on the other hand has been his teams best player for his entire time as a Washington Capital and a Ranger and also the Lemieux-less Penguins teams. That's a total of 10 years as his team's clear best player.

How do you take away from Jagr's dominance as a Penguin with or without Lemieux?

The guy scored 149 Pts regardless if he got beat by Lemieux or not, he still scored 149 Pts which is a record by a winger and he didn't even play on Lemieux' line except for on the powerplay (as his evenstrength points show he didn't need Lemieux) it helped to have Lemieux but Jagr was the clear 2nd best player in the league.

In fact most can argue he started his ascent to stardom in 1994-95 when he won his first Art Ross.

Since 1994-95 until 2000-01 he was always either the best, second best or sometimes 3rd best (1996-97 due to injuries) forward in the league.

People forget really how good Jagr was in 1996-97. He was leading the league in scoring by a good 9 Pts over Lemieux mind you in the first 41 games of the season. It was looking like he could challenge for 60 + goals again but got injured and missed 19 games with a groin injury and never really got that dominance back that year. He still got 95 Pts (47 goals) in just 63 games and would have been on pace for 60 + goals and 123 + Pts. He would have most definitely finished 2nd in scoring or even won the Art Ross that season if not for injuries.

Between 1994 and 2002 he was 1st, 2nd, 5th, 1st, 1st, 1st, 1st and 5th in scoring.

The two times he finished 5th he was 2nd and 3rd respectively in PPG but injuries stopped him from finishing higher in scoring. The 2001-02 season being with Washington despite people claiming he sucked completely in Washington. I would think 79 Pts in 69 games (the leader only had 96) is pretty darn good especially when you're the new player on the team and Washington already had established stars in Bondra and Oates.

That's a count of 8 straight seasons as at least the 5th highest scorer in the league.

Those 8 seasons are his prime years.

How that's not meriting a top 10 most dominant player in his prime spot is beyond me.

Technically the "dead puck era" spanned the 1996-97 to 2003-04 seasons.

In those seasons Jagr was 5th, 1st, 1st, 1st, 1st, 5th, 19th and 15th in scoring.

So out of 8 seasons namely in the "dead puck era" he was a top 5 player or better 6 times. He was also 19th in 2002-03 but was 17th in PPG.

So really it was his 2003-04 that was sub-par eventhough he was 15th in scoring. For all the talk of Jagr sucking in Washington he was 5th, 19th and then 20th in scoring. Not necessarily up to Jagr's standards he had set for himself in Pittsburgh but still good.

Over the last 20 years (outside of Lemieux and Gretzky) only Sakic compares to Jagr in terms of consistent scoring and top 10 finishes.

Then you include the 1993-94 season (Jagr was 10th) just in his prime years alone Jagr was top 10 in scoring or better 9 times, a total of 9 out of 11 seasons within the top 10.

Most of those seasons were also accomplished without Lemieux as Lemieux was either injured, retired or Jagr was no longer a Penguin.

When scoring was very hard to come by Jagr was still scoring at a 100 Pts clip in the regular season and in the playoffs (going on PPG).

Jagr's 3 year stretch with Washington was the worst of his career next to his first 3 seasons in the league and yet he had 230 Pts in 219 games. Considering those 3 seasons were the lowest scoring 3 seasons since the 50's and Jagr makes a case that he was still among the league's elite in those seasons.

They had another thread in the History section from a few months ago about the top 20, top 10 and top 5 finishes in their career and only Howe, Gretzky and Lemieux had more top 20, top 10 and top 5 finishes than Jagr did. Yes those 3 guys I mentioned are among the Big 4.

Jagr's stats and accolades always place him amongst the NHL's greats namely Howe, Gretzky, Orr and Lemieux and yet some want to argue that someone like Lafleur, Clarke and Esposito were more dominant? That's funny.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Context

I went back and looked at Jagr, and in his "prime" he doesn't appear to have a poor SPCT compared to his peers with similair accomplishments...

From 94'-95' to 00'-01' there were 17 players that scored 200 goals or more. Jagr has the 7th highest SPCT of that group. Certianly not the best, but in the upper half and Jagr's 15.4% is above the group average of 14.6%. This doesn't seem too bad to me, and considering he has over 100 more assists than the next closest guy on the list it doesn't seem like he was "wasting" that many opportunities.

(I checked 100 goal scorers over that time period just to see if there was a difference, and Jagr looks even better there...18th out of 115 and still first in assists)

Context of the thread is top 10 primes. Mario Lemieux had a S% that topped 20% lifetime or 33% more efficient than Jagr. The assists - expectation with a lower S% is more rebound assists reflecting on playmaking. Mike Bossy during his career(prime) had a S% that topped 21% - as a goal scorer significantly more efficient while Lafleur during his prime was regularly in the upper teens with high assist totals and Ross wins. Both combined prime totals with Stanley Cups.

Again your numbers, 7th, 18th when you factor in defensemen and goalies into the prime discussion serve only to move Jagr outside the top 10.

 

[Infinite Vision*]

Context of the thread is top 10 primes. Mario Lemieux had a S% that topped 20% lifetime or 33% more efficient than Jagr. The assists - expectation with a lower S% is more rebound assists reflecting on playmaking. Mike Bossy during his career(prime) had a S% that topped 21% - as a goal scorer significantly more efficient while Lafleur during his prime was regularly in the upper teens with high assist totals and Ross wins. Both combined prime totals with Stanley Cups.

Again your numbers, 7th, 18th when you factor in defensemen and goalies into the prime discussion serve only to move Jagr outside the top 10.

Goalies had much worse save percentages in their day than in Jagr's. Do you think possibly this has any contribution at all?

 

[Canadiens1958]

Goalies

Goalies had much worse save percentages in their day than in Jagr's. Do you think possibly this has any contribution at all?

Same goalies held players like Bill Barber, Bobby Clarke, Marcel Dionne to save percentages in the 13.5-14.5 range while Bossy topped 21%. While the same goalies that Jagr faced also faced Mario Lemieux yet the S% gap was significant.

Even today against the same goalies Stamkos and Crosby have a significantly better S%, ~ 25% more efficient than Ovechkin.

 

[Hawkey Town 18]

Context of the thread is top 10 primes. Mario Lemieux had a S% that topped 20% lifetime or 33% more efficient than Jagr. The assists - expectation with a lower S% is more rebound assists reflecting on playmaking. Mike Bossy during his career(prime) had a S% that topped 21% - as a goal scorer significantly more efficient while Lafleur during his prime was regularly in the upper teens with high assist totals and Ross wins. Both combined prime totals with Stanley Cups.

Again your numbers, 7th, 18th when you factor in defensemen and goalies into the prime discussion serve only to move Jagr outside the top 10.

Think you're on the wrong thread here.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

Think you're on the wrong thread here.

Agreed. Consequently, I have moved these posts here.

 

[livewell68]

It's ok for Esposito to never have been better than Orr but he automatically belongs in the top 10 but because Jagr wasn't better than Lemieux he doesn't belong in the top 10?

That makes no sense to me.

Guys that had similar peaks to Jagr were Esposito, Lafleur, Dionne and Bossy and none of them were as dominant as Jagr was for as long or as consistent as Jagr was for as long.

Those guys (Dionne maybe not) belong in the top 10 so if Jagr was better than them in their primes then how is he not in the top 10?

Canadians guy you please answer me on this?

I can see you throwing some useless shooting percentage stats or whatever it is in trying to show that Jagr doesn't belong on there.

Ok so you're convinced that Bossy, Lafleur, Clarke, Esposito are top 10 material right?

Then tell me how come they pale in great comparison to Lemieux? Does that mean they get bumped out of the top 10 simply because Lemieux was better than them?

So why doesn't Jagr get the same benefit of the doubt?

 

[JackSlater]

Top 10:
Orr
Gretzky
Lemieux
Howe
Hasek
Lafleur
Shore
Sawchuk
Hull (Bobby)
Jagr

 

[Canadiens1958]

Simple

It's ok for Esposito to never have been better than Orr but he automatically belongs in the top 10 but because Jagr wasn't better than Lemieux he doesn't belong in the top 10?

That makes no sense to me.

Guys that had similar peaks to Jagr were Esposito, Lafleur, Dionne and Bossy and none of them were as dominant as Jagr was for as long or as consistent as Jagr was for as long.

Those guys (Dionne maybe not) belong in the top 10 so if Jagr was better than them in their primes then how is he not in the top 10?

Canadians guy you please answer me on this?

I can see you throwing some useless shooting percentage stats or whatever it is in trying to show that Jagr doesn't belong on there.

Ok so you're convinced that Bossy, Lafleur, Clarke, Esposito are top 10 material right?

Then tell me how come they pale in great comparison to Lemieux? Does that mean they get bumped out of the top 10 simply because Lemieux was better than them?

So why doesn't Jagr get the same benefit of the doubt?

Will start with the basics. Top 4 in any order (alphabetical) Gretzky, Howe, Lemieux, Orr. Individual achievements plus a minimum of two Stanley Cups indicating team contributions and success.

Next tier skaters -Beliveau,Bourque, Bossy,Clarke,Esposito, Harvey,Bobby Hull, Keon, Kurri,Lafleur, Lidstrom,Mikita, Potvin,Shore, Trottier(alphabetical order) again long list of individual honours and a minimum of one Stanley Cup indicating team contributions and success.

Then you have the goalies - Durnan, Dryden,Hasek,Plante, Sawchuk, perhaps Broda, Roy (again in alphabetical order) all with individual honours and with the exception of Hasek at least two Stanley Cups in their prime indicating two team contributions and success.

Where does Jagr fit with zero Stanley Cups during his prime? Upper teens to early twenties is where he ranks.Benefit of doubt is not an entitlement but it is up to the player to erase doubt.Basically Jagr did not do anything to erase doubt whereas the others did by going head to head with other top 10 prime candidates and coming out ahead on a regular basis. The minute overall game and winning is introduced into the prime discussion Jagr fades

 

[livewell68]

Will start with the basics. Top 4 in any order (alphabetical) Gretzky, Howe, Lemieux, Orr. Individual achievements plus a minimum of two Stanley Cups indicating team contributions and success.

Next tier skaters -Beliveau,Bourque, Bossy,Clarke,Esposito, Harvey,Bobby Hull, Keon, Kurri,Lafleur, Lidstrom,Mikita, Potvin,Shore, Trottier(alphabetical order) again long list of individual honours and a minimum of one Stanley Cup indicating team contributions and success.

Then you have the goalies - Durnan, Dryden,Hasek,Plante, Sawchuk, perhaps Broda, Roy (again in alphabetical order) all with individual honours and with the exception of Hasek at least two Stanley Cups in their prime indicating two team contributions and success.

Where does Jagr fit with zero Stanley Cups during his prime? Upper teens to early twenties is where he ranks.Benefit of doubt is not an entitlement but it is up to the player to erase doubt.Basically Jagr did not do anything to erase doubt whereas the others did by going head to head with other top 10 prime candidates and coming out ahead on a regular basis. The minute overall game and winning is introduced into the prime discussion Jagr fades

Lemieux won 2 Stanley Cups in his prime but it took a team of Jagr, Francis, Coffey, Barasso to win them.

Lemieux in his prime missed more playoffs than he made.

Jagr in his Pittsburgh years never ever missed the playoffs.

You speak of winning well last time I remembered it took an entire team to win a Stanley Cup.

How many Cups did Gretzky win without Messier? None.

How many Cups did Esposito win without Orr or vice versa? None

How many Cups did Lemieux win without Jagr? None.

Jagr was still well over a PPG in the playoffs during the "dead puck era" when scoring was very hard to come by.

I guess winning 4 Art Ross trophies (without Lemieux) and one with Lemieux is not much of an accomplishment eh?

Only 4 players in the history of the game have won as many or more Art Ross trophies than Jagr has and those are Lemieux, Gretzky, Howe and Esposito.

By the way how did Gretzky and Lemieux change their game to win Cups? They didn't, they just kept scoring and that's how they won. The difference is in their primes they were surrounded by much better supporting casts than Jagr ever had in his prime.

You keep throwing winning as the deterrent notion that Jagr shouldn't belong in the top 10 as apparently you put it he never did anything on his own without Lemieux.

Then you say he never led upsets when obviously that argument was completely shut down as people have shown Jagr led Pittsburgh (either 7th or 8th ranked team) to upsets over Washington and New Jersey.

Are you telling me that Lafleur, Esposito, Clarke were the only players on their teams when they won the Cups? Obviously not.

We agree that Jagr's prime years were between 1994-95 and 2001-02 right?

Lets look at his playoff statistics during his prime (since you seem to think his playoff resume stops him from being in the top 10)


Seasons GP G A PTS PPG


1994-95 12 10 5 15 1.25
1995-96 18 11 12 23 1.28
1996-97 5 4 4 8 1.60
1997-98 6 4 5 9 1.50
1998-99 9 5 7 12 1.33
1999-00 11 8 8 16 1.45
2000-01 16 2 10 12 0.75

Totals 77 44 51 95 1.23

Apparently those are horrible numbers. When scoring was so low he was still averaging a PPG of 1.23 (over 82 games that's 101 Pts) during his prime and yet Canadians says he did nothing.

Jagr did his best and made Pittsburgh win a few series and was always the reason why they never got swept in series and why they even made the playoffs to begin with.

Forsberg and Sakic (the only players that played during Jagr's time that have better PPG in the playoffs than Jagr does) don't even have such a great PPG in their primes.

You can say Jagr did the most he could with the teams he was given.

No one will ever make this argument but how come Lemieux struggled to make the playoffs before Jagr joined the NHL but then suddenly wins 2 Stanley Cups the moment Jagr gets drafted?

Fosberg won his first Cup in second season, compare that to Jagr who had a better rookie and sophomore playoff run than Forsberg did.

Jagr is second all time in game winning goals in the regular season.

He's tied for first in regular season overtime goals.

He's top 5 in playoff game winners and playoff overtime winners.

He finished top 3 in goals and assists in the same season (during his prime not including 2005-06) 4 times namely 1995-96, 1998-99, 1999-00 and 2000-01. He was also 2nd in goals three times namely 1994-95, 1995-96 and 1998-99 and was 5th in 1996-97 despite missing 19 games.

Jagr was also 1st in assists 3 times and 3rd in assists two times.

Will you please stop comparing him to players from the 60's and 70's when clearly scoring was much easier to do than anytime in the 90's.

Won't you just realize Jagr dominated the 90's plain and simple? It doesn't matter if Lemieux was there or not. Even with Lemieux there Jagr would still have at least 1 Art Ross trophy and quite possibly 2 others (his 1998-99 and 1999-00 seasons were flat out dominant) and would still finish 2nd in scoring if you consider Lemieux the clear no. 1.

Guys from the past had to go up against matchstick goalies.

Jagr had to go up against Michelin Tire goalies.

 

[pluppe]

Will start with the basics. Top 4 in any order (alphabetical) Gretzky, Howe, Lemieux, Orr. Individual achievements plus a minimum of two Stanley Cups indicating team contributions and success.

Next tier skaters -Beliveau,Bourque, Bossy,Clarke,Esposito, Harvey,Bobby Hull, Keon, Kurri,Lafleur, Lidstrom,Mikita, Potvin,Shore, Trottier(alphabetical order) again long list of individual honours and a minimum of one Stanley Cup indicating team contributions and success.

Then you have the goalies - Durnan, Dryden,Hasek,Plante, Sawchuk, perhaps Broda, Roy (again in alphabetical order) all with individual honours and with the exception of Hasek at least two Stanley Cups in their prime indicating two team contributions and success.

Where does Jagr fit with zero Stanley Cups during his prime? Upper teens to early twenties is where he ranks.Benefit of doubt is not an entitlement but it is up to the player to erase doubt.Basically Jagr did not do anything to erase doubt whereas the others did by going head to head with other top 10 prime candidates and coming out ahead on a regular basis. The minute overall game and winning is introduced into the prime discussion Jagr fades

I know Bourque had crazy longevity but would you really say he had a Stanley during his prime? I would also say that Mikitas lone Stanley came at about the same point in his career as Jagrs.

Not saying he belongs top-10. Hard to say. But I think he belongs on your list of "Next tier skaters".

 

[livewell68]

I know Bourque had crazy longevity but would you really say he had a Stanley during his prime? I would also say that Mikitas lone Stanley came at about the same point in his career as Jagrs.

Not saying he belongs top-10. Hard to say. But I think he belongs on your list of "Next tier skaters".

For him Jagr is just average hockey player I guess.

Here's the thing though, Gretzky, Lemieux, Howe and Orr are definitely top 4 and well the rest of the list is hard to make up because obviously the 70's and 80's players have an advantage in terms of offensive stats because of the inflated era they played in.

 

[Canadiens1958]

Hilarious

Lemieux won 2 Stanley Cups in his prime but it took a team of Jagr, Francis, Coffey, Barasso to win them.

Lemieux in his prime missed more playoffs than he made.

Jagr in his Pittsburgh years never ever missed the playoffs.

You speak of winning well last time I remembered it took an entire team to win a Stanley Cup.

How many Cups did Gretzky win without Messier? None.

How many Cups did Esposito win without Orr or vice versa? None

How many Cups did Lemieux win without Jagr? None.

Jagr was still well over a PPG in the playoffs during the "dead puck era" when scoring was very hard to come by.

I guess winning 4 Art Ross trophies (without Lemieux) and one with Lemieux is not much of an accomplishment eh?

Only 4 players in the history of the game have won as many or more Art Ross trophies than Jagr has and those are Lemieux, Gretzky, Howe and Esposito.

They didn't, they just kept scoring and that's how they won. The difference is in their primes they were surrounded by much better supporting casts than Jagr ever had in his prime.

You keep throwing winning as the deterrent notion that Jagr shouldn't belong in the top 10 as apparently you put it he never did anything on his own without Lemieux.

Then you say he never led upsets when obviously that argument was completely shut down as people have shown Jagr led Pittsburgh (either 7th or 8th ranked team) to upsets over Washington and New Jersey.

Are you telling me that Lafleur, Esposito, Clarke were the only players on their teams when they won the Cups? Obviously not.

We agree that Jagr's prime years were between 1994-95 and 2001-02 right?

Lets look at his playoff statistics during his prime (since you seem to think his playoff resume stops him from being in the top 10)


Seasons GP G A PTS PPG


1994-95 12 10 5 15 1.25
1995-96 18 11 12 23 1.28
1996-97 5 4 4 8 1.60
1997-98 6 4 5 9 1.50
1998-99 9 5 7 12 1.33
1999-00 11 8 8 16 1.45
2000-01 16 2 10 12 0.75

Totals 77 44 51 95 1.23

Apparently those are horrible numbers. When scoring was so low he was still averaging a PPG of 1.23 (over 82 games that's 101 Pts) during his prime and yet Canadians says he did nothing.

Jagr did his best and made Pittsburgh win a few series and was always the reason why they never got swept in series and why they even made the playoffs to begin with.

Forsberg and Sakic (the only players that played during Jagr's time that have better PPG in the playoffs than Jagr does) don't even have such a great PPG in their primes.

You can say Jagr did the most he could with the teams he was given.

No one will ever make this argument but how come Lemieux struggled to make the playoffs before Jagr joined the NHL but then suddenly wins 2 Stanley Cups the moment Jagr gets drafted?

Fosberg won his first Cup in second season, compare that to Jagr who had a better rookie and sophomore playoff run than Forsberg did.

Jagr is second all time in game winning goals in the regular season.

He's tied for first in regular season overtime goals.

He's top 5 in playoff game winners and playoff overtime winners.

He finished top 3 in goals and assists in the same season (during his prime not including 2005-06) 4 times namely 1995-96, 1998-99, 1999-00 and 2000-01. He was also 2nd in goals three times namely 1994-95, 1995-96 and 1998-99 and was 5th in 1996-97 despite missing 19 games.

Jagr was also 1st in assists 3 times and 3rd in assists two times.

Will you please stop comparing him to players from the 60's and 70's when clearly scoring was much easier to do than anytime in the 90's.

Won't you just realize Jagr dominated the 90's plain and simple? It doesn't matter if Lemieux was there or not. Even with Lemieux there Jagr would still have at least 1 Art Ross trophy and quite possibly 2 others (his 1998-99 and 1999-00 seasons were flat out dominant) and would still finish 2nd in scoring if you consider Lemieux the clear no. 1.

Guys from the past had to go up against matchstick goalies.

Jagr had to go up against Michelin Tire goalies.

Actually your points are quite contradictory and hilarious. But before we settle down for some popcorn and liquid refreshment I have a request. Kindly refer to me as Canadiens1958 or C1958 not Canadians.

Jagr had to go up against Michelin Tire goalies. Rather interesting observation. So the logical conclusion is that you view Dominik Hasek as a Michelin Tire goalie.I guess we have to revise downwards Hasek's prime since you have clearly proven that it was the equipment and not talent.

With Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr would have at least one Art Ross.Gladly grant you this point but then how does this impact on top 10 primes? The following have two consecutive Art Ross Trophies - Dickie Moore, Max Bentley, Sweeny Schriner, Charlie Conacher yet they are not even being considered in the discussion for top 10 primes. So the Art Ross Trophy or scoring championship is not sufficient as a stand alone criteria for consideration for top 10 prime. Again you have always avoided discussing the merits of a player's other attributes when it comes to prime unless you can spin it back to scoring.

Comparing Jagr to players from the 1960's and 1970's. Why not? Your mischaracterizations of the eras - 1960's, 1970's and 1990's are quite frankly in need of serious review. Jaromir Jagr entered the NHL at the start of the 1990-91 season.The TG/G ranged mainly downward from 6.91/6.96/ 7.25/6.48/5.97/6.29/5,83/5.28/5.27/5.49,
thru the 1999-2000 season. Taking similar blocks of ten seasons from 1960-61 we see TG/G ranging 6.00/6.02/5.95/5.55/5.75/6.08/5.96/5.58/5.96/5.81.Easier to score in six of the ten 1990's season's. Now you have already qualified the sixties goalies as match stick men yet amazingly they were giving up fewer TG/G while playing against stronger competition game after game. Perhaps the 1960's goalies simply had more talent?

The 1970's/1990's comparison sees a range of 6.13 - 7.03 TG/G versus 5.27 - 7.25, seasonally 4 to 6. Again the goalies actually had talent in the 1970's as well.

What did the others do that Jaromir Jagr did not do? Primarily they bought into various team concepts and made defensive contributions as well as sustaining a more than acceptable level of offensive excellence. This is basically the Jagr Paradox - he saw first hand what the team and defensive requirements were playing for great coaches like Bob Johnson and Scotty Bowman but when he was on his own these basics were never applied. The Mario Lemieux influence is very interesting. Trust that you are aware that Mario Lemieux was the owner of the Penguins when Jaromir Jagr was traded to Washington for the player equivalent of a few pucks, sticks and rolls of tape. Simply Mario Lemieux had decided that the Penguins were not going to win with Jagr. The same Mario Lemieux mentored Sidney Crosby to a Stanley Cup.

So again you have moved Jaromir Jagr further away from top 10 prime consideration.