Which is the more impressive feat: 600 goals or 1000 assists

Which is better?


  • Total voters
    238

bobholly39

Registered User
Mar 10, 2013
22,078
14,589
Make it 2000 assists and I wouldn’t know what to answer

894 goals vs 2000 assists.

Let's take Wayne Gretzky as a guinea pig, with his 20 year career.

For a player to hit 894 goals in a 20 year career - he'd have to average 44.7 goals per game. Let's round up to 45. Aside from Gretzky, in the whole history of the NHL, this has been done 310 times in a season.

In contrast - to hit 2000 assists in 20 years, you'd have to average 100 assists in a season, easy math. Only 2x in the history of the NHL has a player not named Gretzky surpassed 100 assists in a season - and their names were Orr and Lemieux.

Pretty bad statement.
 

Yozhik v tumane

Registered User
Jan 2, 2019
1,797
1,879
On the goal list you have Ciccalerri, Anderchyuk, Selanne, Robitialle, and Shanahan. All very good players, but never an argument at being the best at their position.

Isn’t that just because he competed with Jagr at RW? Selänne was voted 1st and 2nd team all star twice each. I think for his prime, only Jagr is clearly better than Selänne, but he was also the best skater in the league post-Lemieux. Bure and Mogilny had great peak seasons, but Teemu was the better RW.

... Actually, Selänne does seem to have an argument for best RW in the league for a year or two after Brett Hull’s three 70+ goal seasons and before Jagr’s first Art Ross.
 

Varan

Registered User
Nov 27, 2016
6,467
4,771
Toronto, Ontario
For a player to hit 894 goals in a 20 year career - he'd have to average 44.7 goals per game. Let's round up to 45. Aside from Gretzky, in the whole history of the NHL, this has been done 310 times in a season.

In contrast - to hit 2000 assists in 20 years, you'd have to average 100 assists in a season, easy math. Only 2x in the history of the NHL has a player not named Gretzky surpassed 100 assists in a season - and their names were Orr and Lemieux.
Like I said, I wouldn’t know what to pick. They’re both great milestones.

However, scoring 45/season for 15-20 seasons is different than just averaging it for a season. If you’re comparing it in isolation to 100 assists, yeah it’s much easier. But the time period to achieve makes it almost impossible, just like the 100 assists
 

Iapyi

Registered User
Apr 19, 2017
5,072
2,361
Canadian Prairies
It would depend on team success because who cares about individual glory in a team game?

btw - the term compiler = a person who is a casual or surface fan
 

Just doink

Registered User
Mar 28, 2018
190
142
And yet it's hit every single year, how often are 100 assist seasons occurring?

I have been watching hockey from late 80's but i have never seen anything close to 3690 goals in full season from single player.
 

Sky04

Registered User
Jan 8, 2009
28,958
17,899
I have been watching hockey from late 80's but i have never seen anything close to 3690 goals in full season from single player.

You'd think the 80's would have a couple guys hitting 44 goals per game. :laugh:
 

blundluntman

Registered User
Jul 30, 2016
2,548
2,709
Its tough to pick but I go with the 600 goals since I'm being asked this in 2020. Goal scoring is a bit tougher to come across in this era than it was for most of the guys in the 600 club who got to spend a good amount of their career in the high flying 80s and early 90s. I think that should be considered when talking about which one is rarer.

Plus 600 goals seems more like a personal accomplishment than 1000 assists considering you're the one finishing the job. Not to mention most 1000 assist players have a much bigger gap between goals and assists than vice versa, I think that shows its easier to rack up assists than goals if you can stay relatively healthy.
 
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koyvoo

Registered User
Nov 8, 2014
17,244
16,982
Its tough to pick but I go with the 600 goals since I'm being asked this in 2020. Goal scoring is a bit tougher to come across in this era than it was for most of the guys in the 600 club who got to spend a good amount of their career in the high flying 80s and early 90s. I think that should be considered when talking about which one is rarer.

Plus 600 goals seems more like a personal accomplishment than 1000 assists considering you're the one finishing the job. Not to mention most 1000 assist players have a much bigger gap between goals and assists than vice versa, I think that shows its easier to rack up assists than goals if you can stay relatively healthy.
Just break it down to a year long timeline. What do you think we will/would see first and more often going forward, a 60 goal season, or a 100 assist season?
 

blundluntman

Registered User
Jul 30, 2016
2,548
2,709
Just break it down to a year long timeline. What do you think we will/would see first and more often going forward, a 60 goal season, or a 100 assist season?

I'll put it this way, Ovechkin's 60 goal season is more impressive to me than Joe Thornton or Adam Oates' 100 assist seasons even though Stamkos did the same feat 2 years afterwards. Imo you have to create your own luck far more to score goals consistently in the NHL than setting up trigger men like Hull, Kurri, etc.
 

Steven Toast

Registered User
Apr 3, 2019
1,695
2,626
Sol System
Players with 600 goals are: Gretzky, Howe, Jagr, Brett Hull, Dionne, Esposito, Gartner, Ovechkin, Messier, Yzerman, Lemieux, Selanne, Robitaille, Shanahan, Sakic, Iginla, Bobby Hull, Ciccarelli, Kurri. 20 Players.

Players with 1000 assists are: Gretzky, Francis, Messier, Bourque, Jagr, Coffey, Thronton, Oates, Yzerman, Howe, Sakic. 13 Players.

Firstly less players have acheived 1000 assists which points to it being a more impressive feat.

Secondly the 600 club has more "unimpressive" names. Such as Gartner, Shanahan, Ciccarelli.

The 1000 assist club seems much more impressive up and down the list. Thronton or Oates probably being the "worst" in the group.

From this 1000 assists is more impressive.
 

Regal

Registered User
Mar 12, 2010
24,545
13,840
Vancouver
Worded poorly or not that makes no sense call Thornton an outlier in that assist category, he's one of the top playmakers the game as ever seen, not sure why that's so hard to comprehend? His totals are amazing given the era he played in, weird not to say Messier, Howe, or Jagr aren't "compliers" by the same logic, considering they took nearly the same amount of games Thornton did to break 1000 while playing in much more higher scoring years.

All this does is show why 1000 assists is much more impressive, the "bottom tier" players in the 1000 assist group are significantly better than the ones in the 600 goal club.

I agree it doesn't make sense to call him a compiler, but I think he just meant what you said in the 2nd paragraph.
 

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