Your expectations of Crosby after 2007

[Fantomas]

This was the PPG

Repeat after me: PPG is a trash stat.

 

[Zuluss]

So this is how I look at their careers, basically evenly split from 2005-'10 and that was as close of a consensus as possible.

Crosby and Ovechkin were not close at all in 2005-2010 other than in hockey media trying to create a rivalry out of nowhere. A better rivalry would be Ovechkin vs. Malkin, at least it was really on in 07/08 and 08/09, they even had some bad blood between them back then, but alas, "two Russians duking it out for the best player in the league" title just does not sell in North America (and of course "a Russian owns the NHL" does not sell either).
So everything was tried to make it look as if Crosby and Ovechkin were close, though Crosby was better only once in those five years (and if you want to call 09/10 a tie, then 12/13 is also a tie, you can't have it both ways).
Even on HFBoards in 10/11 and 11/12 "Crosby is better, but Ovechkin has had a better career" was a consensus opinion, and the first part was largely the recency bias, because nothing Crosby did back then (or actually ever) compares to Ovechkin's 07/08, let alone 2007-2010 (and yep, Ovechkin's start of 09/10 was better than Crosby's start of 10/11).

So that's more or less the end of it, actually. To be better than Mike Tyson, you have to beat the peak form Tyson, not the Hangover version of Tyson. Crosby and Ovechkin entered the league the same year, and when Ovechkin was at his peak, Crosby could not catch up. And he never caught up - what two consecutive seasons by Crosby would match Ovechkin's 07/08 and 08/09? You want to pitch 36 games in 12/13 against the huge full season in 08/09 with better leads in points and goals over the field? You want to oversell the importance of beating Getzlaf for Art Ross by 17 points vs. beating peak Malkin by 6 points while posting a historical goal-scoring season? Come on.

Then the next group is 2014-today. Their point totals have looked like this:
Crosby - 84, 85, 89, 89,
Ovechkin - 81, 71, 69, 87

That's Exhibit A for how point totals in Ovechkin vs. Crosby comparison (and in general "a goal-scoring winger vs. a center comparison) are useless.
Yes, Crosby had 3 more points in 14/15, but everyone could see that Ovechkin was way better, and the Hart voting comfirmed that (Ovechkin got 56.6% of the votes, Crosby got 8.8%).
Similarly last year, Crosby had 2 more points, but quite a few Hart voters had Ovechkin as a top5 player in the league, and Crosby got 1 single fifth place vote, probably from a Pittsburgh beat writer.
Even more, if you combine Crosby's and Ovechkin's Hart votes in 14/15 and 15/16, Ovechkin had more - despite Crosby having 17 more points over the two seasons.
So points are not telling you much, in fact the last four years Crosby and Ovechkin have been pretty even, unless you press too hard on 16/17, when Ovechkin played through a wrist injury.

In 2011-2014, Crosby was indeed better, but he had some serious catching up to do after 2005-2010, and he missed half of the games during the 2011-2014 period. Bad luck, I know, but judging from what Crosby actually did (apart from padding his ppg) in this time period, he did not close the gap Ovechkin opened in 2007-2010.

Remember that 12 month run where Crosby won two Cups, two Smythes and a World Cup and World Cup MVP? That was literally just two years ago. Ovechkin winning his Cup in 2018 was nice, but all it does is make the playoff gap less gaudy for Crosby.

That's the only argument I can live with: if one places huge weight on the post-season, then Crosby can be viewed as being better than Ovechkin or having had a better career. I think this "coming up big when it matters the most" card is hard to play in Crosby's case, because his gaudy PO stats come primarily from the 1st round, and his SCF numbers are pretty meh (4 goals in 25 games, Jesus H. Christ!), but maybe, probably if someone's #5 and #6 all-time are Richard and Beliveau, and if someone thinks Bossy/Trottier should be top20 all-time because well, 4 Cups in a row, then I can see how such a person can consistently and honestly rank Crosby over Ovechkin.

I am not that kind of a guy, I care more about peak play, I value goals higher than assists, and I think historical significance is bigger than team awards, so for me Ovechkin > Crosby is rather clear.

 

[wetcoast]

Repeat after me: PPG is a trash stat.

How is it a trash stat?

It measures exactly what it stands for points per game which put another way is offensive impact per game.

This is a pretty important stat if you ask me.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

That's the only argument I can live with: if one places huge weight on the post-season, then Crosby can be viewed as being better than Ovechkin or having had a better career. I think this "coming up big when it matters the most" card is hard to play in Crosby's case, because his gaudy PO stats come primarily from the 1st round, and his SCF numbers are pretty meh (4 goals in 25 games, Jesus H. Christ!), but maybe, probably if someone's #5 and #6 all-time are Richard and Beliveau, and if someone thinks Bossy/Trottier should be top20 all-time because well, 4 Cups in a row, then I can see how such a person can consistently and honestly rank Crosby over Ovechkin.

I am not that kind of a guy, I care more about peak play, I value goals higher than assists, and I think historical significance is bigger than team awards, so for me Ovechkin > Crosby is rather clear.

It’s refreshing to see someone acknowledge their opponent’s argument. You seem to genuinely understand their point of view (even though you personally disagree with it) and the parameters under which it needs to operate.

I shouldn’t have to highlight this as rare or commendable - but nowadays it is, in fact, rare and commendable in this section (and certainly outside of it). It would be nice to see honest acknowledgments like this more often.

 

[daver]

I am not that kind of a guy, I care more about peak play, I value goals higher than assists, and I think historical significance is bigger than team awards, so for me Ovechkin > Crosby is rather clear.

The hockey world, including the players, clearly disagrees with this line of thinking. The participants in the HOH Top 100 project clearly disagree with this line of thinking.

Their respective Hart and Lindsay wins, nominations, and placings all point to Crosby's point production being given similar value to OV's goal production.

One only has to look at the best player ever to see that he was just as effective as a playmaker as he was a goalscorer.

Why do you value goalscoring more than overall offensive production when this means devaluing a player who helps his team score more goals? That Crosby has done this with lower depth players for most of his career only adds to this value.

 

[BehindTheTimes]

I don't have either one ahead at this point. I've never been on the Crosby is >>> Ovy wagon though, I think when all is said and done Ovy may very well be on top. The greatest goal scorer ever means something to me.

 

[daver]

Another reason why their ppg is different is the nature of their injuries. If you line up their most productive seasons, Ovechkin has slightly higher ppg in three most productive ones and slightly lower ppg in seven and even nine most productive ones.
The difference in career ppg comes exclusively from the fact that Ovechkin plyed through his wrist injuries, and his ppg these seasons was awful, and Crosby had to sit after his head injuries, and his ppg looked great. Different kinds of bad luck, that's all.

Care to show some numbers on this.

Crosby was putting up a 1.60 PPG when missed his most time. What was OV's PPG before his wrist injuries, which were when exactly?

BTW, your talk of lining up their most productive seasons with no consideration for scoring levels is obviously biased towards OV.

Crosby's PPG from 10 to 13 was 1.60

The next best PPGs are:

Malkin - 1.20
Stamkos - 1.16
Sedin - 1.05
Giroux - 1.05

OV's PPG from 07 to 10 was 1.42

The next best PPGs are:

Crosby - 1.35
Malkin - 1.28
Gaborik - 1.13
Kovalchuk - 1.12
Thornton - 1.12

Crosby is clearly more dominant.

 

[Big Phil]

Crosby and Ovechkin were not close at all in 2005-2010 other than in hockey media trying to create a rivalry out of nowhere. A better rivalry would be Ovechkin vs. Malkin, at least it was really on in 07/08 and 08/09, they even had some bad blood between them back then, but alas, "two Russians duking it out for the best player in the league" title just does not sell in North America (and of course "a Russian owns the NHL" does not sell either).
So everything was tried to make it look as if Crosby and Ovechkin were close, though Crosby was better only once in those five years (and if you want to call 09/10 a tie, then 12/13 is also a tie, you can't have it both ways).
Even on HFBoards in 10/11 and 11/12 "Crosby is better, but Ovechkin has had a better career" was a consensus opinion, and the first part was largely the recency bias, because nothing Crosby did back then (or actually ever) compares to Ovechkin's 07/08, let alone 2007-2010 (and yep, Ovechkin's start of 09/10 was better than Crosby's start of 10/11).

I don't think it was merely a selling point for the NHL to create that rivalry. Yes, the media pushes things that don't deserve it, we all know this. That being said, there was some truth to the Crosby/Ovechkin rivalry and there always has been. I think the league wanted it to be Gretzky/Lemieux type of thing and it wasn't, but try to find a better player vs. player rivalry in the last generation in the NHL. You can't. Malkin vs. Ovechkin did have some merit too of course. The problem was Malkin didn't have the season to season success that Crosby has. Crosby also started his career the exact same season that Ovechkin did. Malkin, while he did have a good rookie year in 2007 he really didn't hit the same neighbourhood as either of them until 2008. So you've got a couple NHL seasons of Crosby and Ovechkin, and they went back to the World Juniors with that as well.

Ovechkin outpointed Crosby by 4 points in 2006. He wins the Calder fair and square. But the gap in 2007 in favour of Crosby was bigger. In 2008 Crosby was tied for the NHL lead in points when he went down to injury and while Ovechkin did have the better overall season he was bounced out in the first round of the playoffs while Crosby and co. got to the final. 2009 there isn't a huge gap at all. I mean, honestly we are talking about 7 points here and a 0.05 PPG difference in favour of Ovechkin. Throw in the much better postseason by Crosby - at Ovechkin's expense and 2009 is more or less a wash. 2010 Ovechkin probably wins the Hart if he doesn't miss 10 games. He had the edge over Crosby. Not the sort of edge Crosby had on Ovie in 2007, but an edge regardless. However, Ovechkin faltered in the Olympics and Crosby won the Gold while Crosby got a round further in the postseason.

Honestly, what is the difference you are seeing from 2005-'10 here? Everyone had their own preference, but you were hardly worse off if you picked either player. I always prefer the centers who are better playmakers, but like I said these two were about as close over 5 years as they could be. Malkin had a couple years where he was with both of them too.

Hart finishes looked like this:
Crosby - 1, 3, 6, 17, 24
Ovechkin - 1, 1, 2, 6, 22

What is the difference here? Literally the difference is Crosby's injury in 2008 where he finished 17th. Had he played a full season they are virtually the same, and Crosby still had Malkin taking some votes too.

I really don't see how they aren't virtually even their first 5 years in the NHL. I know you don't, but does my analysis change anything for you?

You were asking when did Crosby have two seasons back to back comparable to Ovechkin's 2008 and 2009? I'd say 2013 and 2014 are similar. The highest point total by either of them in their careers is Crosby in 2007. He just got hurt the next year.

The reason I give Crosby the edge from 2010-'14 and why I think he started to create a gap then is because despite him being hurt it coincided with some suspect seasons by Ovechkin. Crosby finished with 66 points in 41 games in 2011, while Ovechkin had a full season and had just 85 and an uncharacteristic 32 goals. In 2012 Crosby played 22 games and had 37 points. Ovechkin had the most bizarre season of his career with 65 points over a full season. Neither got a single Hart vote in 2012, but only one played a full season. 2013 and 2014 it turned into being Crosby's league again. Here are head to head comparisons for those years:

Hart:
Crosby - 1, 2, 20
Ovechkin - 1, 14, 23

Points:
Crosby - 66, 37, 56, 104
Ovechkin - 85, 65, 56, 79

Points per game:
Crosby - 1.61, 1.68, 1.56, 1.30
Ovechkin - 1.08, 0.83, 1.17, 1.01

That's pretty significant isn't it? In those 4 years, despite a TON of missed time about an entire season and a half full, Crosby had just 22 less points. The PPG explains the difference.

Since 2014 there is no way Ovechkin has been the better player. The stats show this to be untrue. The play on the ice does, the success, the Cups, etc. Like I said, in a 12 month span Crosby captured a ton of hardware with two Conn Smythes, two Cups a World Cup MVP and a World Cup. For me, I would say if Ovechkin is to have the better career he has a lot of catching up to do. Not a ton, but at least some.

That's the only argument I can live with: if one places huge weight on the post-season, then Crosby can be viewed as being better than Ovechkin or having had a better career. I think this "coming up big when it matters the most" card is hard to play in Crosby's case, because his gaudy PO stats come primarily from the 1st round, and his SCF numbers are pretty meh (4 goals in 25 games, Jesus H. Christ!), but maybe, probably if someone's #5 and #6 all-time are Richard and Beliveau, and if someone thinks Bossy/Trottier should be top20 all-time because well, 4 Cups in a row, then I can see how such a person can consistently and honestly rank Crosby over Ovechkin.

I would say it is pretty important. All-time rankings suggest this too. The playoffs may not have the same appeal as, say, in the NFL, but it is significantly more important than in baseball for instance. This is why Dionne is lower on most lists. Or Joe Thornton. Or why Yzerman was so revered the second half of his career. Or why Patrick Roy is considered by many to be the best goalie ever. Only the 5 big Oilers, Jagr, Sakic, Hull, Yzerman and Gilmour have more career playoff points than Crosby. If you are a betting man in 5-6 months it will only be Anderson, Kurri, Gretzky and Messier. By the end of his career it is probably only Messier and Gretzky. I think that is pretty significant. This was done much at the expense of Ovechkin, but there were so many other times when Ovechkin didn't play the Pens either.

 

[Fantomas]

How is it a trash stat?

Zuluss has explained why.

 

[Fantomas]

Reasonable people: "points and ppg do not accurately represent a player's offensive contribution because they award the same value to primary and secondary efforts, not to mention goals and assists. Goal scoring wingers always get fewer secondary assists."

Crosby adherents: "But look at Crosby's ppg, it is amazing! Look at it! It's better! You can't look away!"

Ad nauseam.

 

[Michael Farkas]

To fundamentally throw out or greatly reduce the importance of passes that lead directly to goals is a red flag for conceptual understanding and knowledge of the game being adjudged...

 

[Fantomas]

To fundamentally throw out or greatly reduce the importance of passes that lead directly to goals is a red flag for conceptual understanding and knowledge of the game being adjudged...

Assigning passes fair - rather than unfair - value is paramount to our understanding of production.

 

[Big Phil]

Reasonable people: "points and ppg do not accurately represent a player's offensive contribution because they award the same value to primary and secondary efforts, not to mention goals and assists. Goal scoring wingers always get fewer secondary assists."

Crosby adherents: "But look at Crosby's ppg, it is amazing! Look at it! It's better! You can't look away!"

Ad nauseam.

I can think of a ton of excellent secondary assists that great players have done time and time again. How many times has a secondary assist been the driving force behind a goal? Lots of times, more than we think. It still has the same value. Ovechkin can benefit from secondary assists just as well as any other player in NHL history. My point is that this is why I think Crosby is the more valuable offensive player in history. Not that I would call him a "one trick pony" but from an offensive standpoint Ovechkin is a lot closer to it than Crosby.

 

[Michael Farkas]

Passing, in and of itself, has more value in the game than will ever show on a scoresheet. Only passes that lead directly to goals are ever tabulated for public consumption. A shot only has one function and that function is 100% documented. Passing is multi-faceted, done in all three zones, and is tabulated a much, much smaller amount of time. With goals, you already have the full scope, there's no fog of war to it. So by weighting it even further, when it's already tabulated at max capacity really overshadows the rest of the game to a degree that's so disagreeable.

 

[Fantomas]

I can think of a ton of excellent secondary assists that great players have done time and time again. How many times has a secondary assist been the driving force behind a goal? Lots of times, more than we think. It still has the same value. Ovechkin can benefit from secondary assists just as well as any other player in NHL history. My point is that this is why I think Crosby is the more valuable offensive player in history. Not that I would call him a "one trick pony" but from an offensive standpoint Ovechkin is a lot closer to it than Crosby.

No one doubts that secondary assists are important or that they can be "driving forces" behind goals. I've had this conversation before and as I have said then that even though you can find particular examples of secondary assists seeming like the most important contribution to a goal, on average they are much less important than primary contributions. Much of the time a secondary assist is just a generously awarded point, something that never can be said about the act of scoring.

My main point here is not to downplay playmaking, but rather to point out that "points" as a statistical category makes much less sense than most people think, and that we shouldn't take it so seriously. Nevertheless it is clear that many "very serious" rankings are made largely going off it.

 

[wetcoast]

Reasonable people: "points and ppg do not accurately represent a player's offensive contribution because they award the same value to primary and secondary efforts, not to mention goals and assists. Goal scoring wingers always get fewer secondary assists."

Crosby adherents: "But look at Crosby's ppg, it is amazing! Look at it! It's better! You can't look away!"

Ad nauseam.

Still that doesn't address the comment that PPG is a junk stat, it clearly describes points per game impact.

You seem to be throwing out secondary assists without even looking at them.

It is intellectually dishonest to say that the goal scorer always does the most work for each goal a team scores.

To do so suggests a strong bias towards goals.

Sorta like your double counting of goals and goals created.

 

[Fantomas]

Still that doesn't address the comment that PPG is a junk stat, it clearly describes points per game impact.

This is a tautology.

You seem to be throwing out secondary assists without even looking at them.

It is intellectually dishonest to say that the goal scorer always does the most work for each goal a team scores.

Not all work is productive work. Why does it matter who does the most work?

 

[wetcoast]

This is a tautology.

Well it seemed to be lost on you and this response means what exactly?

Using your definition all stats must be junk stats then.

Not all work is productive work. Why does it matter who does the most work?

I'm not sure waht you mean by this.

Is all work resulting in goals, well then no that is true.

But work is just like SOG, if you do enough of it a player is going to get rewarded.

 

[solidmotion]

(and yep, Ovechkin's start of 09/10 was better than Crosby's start of 10/11).

i've seen people say this before and never checked up on it. but i just did, and it's wrong. they're about even. after 41 games in 09-10 (having missed 8 because of suspension, iirc) ovechkin had 65 pts (30 g, 35 a). crosby in 2011 had 66 pts (32 + 34).

 

[Fantomas]

Well it seemed to be lost on you and this response means what exactly?

Using your definition all stats must be junk stats then.

Do you know what a tautology is? What you said is it.

I'm not sure waht you mean by this.

Is all work resulting in goals, well then no that is true.

But work is just like SOG, if you do enough of it a player is going to get rewarded.

By default, it makes sense to assume that everyone's hard work leads to a goal. For reason of convenience moreso than fairness, the league believes that only up to three players deserve credit, each receiving a point.

I see the act of scoring as the most important on average, while acts that lead to the goal have value which declines the further it is from the act of scoring. It is quite logical and also very true based on observation. You want to have stats which, even if imperfect, account for this.

 

[Zuluss]

i've seen people say this before and never checked up on it. but i just did, and it's wrong. they're about even. after 41 games in 09-10 (having missed 8 because of suspension, iirc) ovechkin had 65 pts (30 g, 35 a). crosby in 2011 had 66 pts (32 + 34).

And then after the first 53 games in 09/10 Ovechkin had 42g+47a, which is a higher ppg, a bit higher gpg, and lasted longer.
So in 10/11 Crosby had to actually speed up for the next 12 games to catch 09/10 version of Ovechkin.
Of course, the media pitched it differently.

 

[Zuluss]

In 2008 Crosby was tied for the NHL lead in points when he went down to injury and while Ovechkin did have the better overall season he was bounced out in the first round of the playoffs while Crosby and co. got to the final.

In 2008 Ovechkin was simply better, and clearly so. The rest is the grasping at straws, which was used to fuel the "rivalry" by media and fans at the time and ever since then.
Here is a very similar example: did you think that Kane was as good as Crosby in 14/15? They had similar ppg, Kane missed a quarter of the season, but then got the Cup and led PO in points, while Crosby folded in the first round. I can't remember anyone saying back then "look, Kane is at the same level as Crosby this season", it just did not register. Even after 15/16 was well underway and Kane was beating Crosby by a country mile, folks were still saying "nah, just one season, never happened before".

2009 there isn't a huge gap at all. I mean, honestly we are talking about 7 points here and a 0.05 PPG difference in favour of Ovechkin. Throw in the much better postseason by Crosby - at Ovechkin's expense and 2009 is more or less a wash.

Look at the Hart voting, look at Lindsay/Pearson nominations. In 2009, Ovechkin ran away with both, Crosby is not nominated for either. Just another example that points are not everything, a wrecking ball type of a player who scores goals at will has a lot of value beyond points.
And then again, if you are bringing up ppg, in 2009 the playoff ppg went Ovechkin's way by a lot, 1.5 vs. 1.29. "Much better postseason by Crosby" is just trying to attribute team success to one player and tag on OV the lack of Caps defense that year and a rookie between the pipes.

Hart finishes looked like this:
Crosby - 1, 3, 6, 17, 24
Ovechkin - 1, 1, 2, 6, 22

What is the difference here? Literally the difference is Crosby's injury in 2008 where he finished 17th.

Again, you cannot ask for forgiveness for Crosby's 17th place in 2008 unless you grant forgiveness to Ovechkin in 2010. Then the difference becomes 3 Harts vs. 1 Hart. That's a ton of a difference.
Also, their 6th places are different. The only reason Oveckin was 6th in 2006 is that Caps were a horrible team and missed the playoffs. He was nominated for Lindsay in 2006, but snubbed in Hart voting almost the same way McDavid was last season.
Crosby, however, lost his nomination to Malkin and Datsyuk fair and square, both Lindsay nominations and all-star team votes confirm that. So we have 4 MVP nominations vs. 2 MVP nominations. That is not close.
And also we have 4 seasons out of 5 in that time span when Ovechkin was better. Crosby got a ton of praise later on in his career for being consistently great season after season. Let's give similar credit to Ovechkin for consistently beating Crosby in 2005-2010.

 

[wetcoast]

Reasonable people: "points and ppg do not accurately represent a player's offensive contribution because they award the same value to primary and secondary efforts, not to mention goals and assists. Goal scoring wingers always get fewer secondary assists."

Crosby adherents: "But look at Crosby's ppg, it is amazing! Look at it! It's better! You can't look away!"

Ad nauseam.

That's a bit of a straw man though.

Counting points measures all points in all games and healthy players, ie ones that play all 82 games or near it are more likely to be leaders at the end of the season than say an equal player who plays in only 60 games.

PPG clearly measures a different metric of how any players per game impact is rather than counting raw stats which give a seasonal impact at the end of the season.

In this example of Ovy and Crosby this is how they shake out

Points 1167 -1159

At first glance this looks really close but then add games played

1039-898

PPG is 1.29 - 1.12

You, or anyone can have the opinion that goals should count more but the statical fact is that Crosby has had more impact offensively per game and it's quite substantial.

At some point going forward, assuming full health to both players Crosby is going to pass Ovechkin in points and will stay that way as he is younger.

Nameless has a good post in the another thread that shows that the assists leaders all time are referred to as better overall players than the goal scorers of all time.

Ovechkin doesn't bring extra to his game in terms of 2 way play ect to counter that general trend.

 

[solidmotion]

And then after the first 53 games in 09/10 Ovechkin had 42g+47a, which is a higher ppg, a bit higher gpg, and lasted longer.

idk, if you go that far why not mention that he only got 20 pts in the last 19 games of 09-10?

 

[Fantomas]

You, or anyone can have the opinion that goals should count more but the statical fact is that Crosby has had more impact offensively per game and it's quite substantial.

No, that's not a fact at all.

It is a fact that Crosby has more points per game. But I don't think it's a terribly important fact if we want to know which player is more offensively productive.