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The Hockey News "Great Debates"


Snyder

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The other day I managed to find my copy of The Hockey News Great Debates magazine.I was just wondering if I was to post any of the articles here, would anybody be interested in taking a look at these and voicing their opinons?

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I don't know of this article but heres a debate to start with-

Best players by position of all time-

LW Bobby Hull

C Mario Lemieux

RW Gordie Howe

D Bobby Orr

G Terry Sawchuk

Um....where's Gretzky?

This is one of my pet peeves, I will argue til I die that Wayne is clearly better than Mario. It is not even a contest.

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only one d-man? why not a LD and a RD? not the "best," but I'd like:

LW Esa Tikkanen

C Patrice Bergeron

RW Gordie Howe

LD Ray Bourque

RD Bobby Orr

G Tim Thomas

anyway, you can't prove that any netminder is/was better than Timmy Tommy.

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Um....where's Gretzky?

This is one of my pet peeves, I will argue til I die that Wayne is clearly better than Mario. It is not even a contest.

I dunno, doesn't even Gretzky say Lemieux would have broken many of his records had he been healthy? You could argue one way or the other, but to say it's not even a contest... :unsure:

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Thomas over all of them or you are blinded by historical intrigue and the likes.

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Timmy finally got his chance to shine toward the end of his career. he has battled injuries, too. yes, Chara helps to keep the shots to the outside, but it's like trying to say that Tom Brady isn't the best ever because he's still playing. bygone delirium, I figure. fabled mystique. forest for the trees.

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Um....where's Gretzky?

This is one of my pet peeves, I will argue til I die that Wayne is clearly better than Mario. It is not even a contest.

lol @ not even a contest. even a Philly fan can't claim that...

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Hasek started late, too (although not nearly as late), and played for an average team. He was stuck behind Belfour in Chicago.

Thomas has had just 3 great seasons, for a good team.. and he just wasn't that good until recently (so i wouldn't say he finally got his chance.. he just didn't deserve a chance until lately).

Give it a couple more years so he can put his name on this page a couple more times (Hasek's there 7 times -- 5 in the top 13). Or this page (single season column).

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Alright I'll take a shot at this:

LW: Bobby Hull (easiest to pick of any position, imo)

C: Mario Lemieux

RW: Rocket Richard

D: Scott Stevens

D: Bobby Orr

G: Ken Dryden

Edited by PRoBob38
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Gretzky: 44.7 goals per season, 98.2 assists per season, 142.9 points per season

Lemieux: 40.6, 60.8, 101.4

If you still wanna argue that Lemieux played less games per season (which he did), I did the math and if he'd have played in the same average amount of games per season as Gretzky, his points per season would have been 140.2

It is a contest, but Gretzky still comes out on top.

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142.9 and 140.2? that's about the same in my view. now, in NinetyFlow, however, there was no contest. Gretzky sucks in NHL '94, unless the Genesis fails turn him into an unstoppable force of failure.

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When Bobby Orr was on the ice it was like the Boston Bruins were playing with a man advantage. Bobby was not a defenceman, he was spectacular. A good defender is like an extra forward and Bobby Orr was the invisible defender who played forward because he didn't have to play defence.

That's what happens when you start with the puck in the back of your net, cross the blue line, cross the red line, cross their blue line and put the puck in their net.

Spectacular.

Bobby Orr was born on March 20, 1948, in the town of Parry Sound, Ontario, Canada. He caught the eye of a Boston Bruin scout in 1960 as a 12 year old defenseman playing in a bantam tournament. At age 14 the Bruins had already signed him to a junior contract that saw him begin play with the Oshawa Generals. Orr would go on to set a new record for points by a defenseman in the Ontario League. He played in Oshawa until he was 18, when he signed with the Bruins to play in the National Hockey League. Orr's first season saw him score 41 points, win the Calder trophy and be named as a Second Team All-Star.

At the beginning of the 1971-72 season, Orr signed a contract that guaranteed him $200,000 per season over five years. It was the first $1 million deal in hockey and Orr's agent, Alan Eagleson, predicted at the time that Orr would someday own part of the team if he continued to star for Boston. As it turned out, when it came time to negotiate a new contract prior to the 1976-77 season, the Bruins did offer Orr a piece of the ownership but the star player said his agent never informed him of the proposed deal. Orr, who had struggled with his left knee and played only 10 games in 1975-76, felt as though Boston no longer wanted him and signed instead with the Chicago Black Hawks. Once considered the saviour and then the hero of the rejuvenated Bruins, Orr left the team that had been a part of his career since he was a teen in Parry Sound.

Bobby Orr had an enormous impact on the game of hockey, pioneering the "mobile" or "rushing defenseman". His blazing speed, quickness, and a knack for scoring changed the face of hockey by bringing offense from the defense. Orr won the Norris Trophy as best defenseman for eight straight years, and added two Art Ross trophies for scoring titles. His first Art Ross was in 1970 as he became the only defenseman to lead the league in scoring, and he would repeat the feat in 1975. Orr also led the Boston Bruins to their first Stanley Cup in 29 years when they won the championship in 1970. The followin season saw him score 33 goals and 102 assists for 139 points, one of six seasons where the Bruin defenseman scored over 100 points. His record for goals by a defenseman stood until 1986 when Paul Coffey scored 48 goals with the 1985-86 Edmonton Oilers.

Knee injuries which began soon after Bobby Orr entered the NHL forced him to miss numerous games, require several surgeries, and severely shortened his career. He underwent five knee operations between 1968 and 1975 before leaving the Bruins for the Chicago Blackhawks. But even with his bad knees, Orr was by far the best Canadian player in the 1976 Canada Cup series. At Chicago, he only played 20 games in 1976-77 and missed the entire 1977-78 season. His final NHL season was in Chicago in 1978-79 where Bobby Orr played in just 6 games before retiring at the young age of 31. Orr is still involved in hockey in his current capacity as a player agent.

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Hows this for stats???-

Orr's Plus/Minus numbers are from another world. His numbers are more than twice that of Gretzky's, and three times more than Lemieux's ! You have to be a student of the game to even comprehend those numbers.....Orr was on the ice for more goals per shift than any other player---ever. He was also on the ice for the fewest number of goals scored per game against his Team. How do you measure such a mind blowing stat ?

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How do u not include Mark Messier in this discussion? Easily the greatest leader of all time, plus He's the 2nd all time leading scorer. Played both ends of the ice as good as anyone. Won 5, count them, 5 Cups.

You can say without a doubt Mario and Wayne were better offensively, but all around player? Not even close. And this is the all time best players right? Doesn't that mean all around? Not just offense right?

messier!

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Gretzky: 44.7 goals per season, 98.2 assists per season, 142.9 points per season

Lemieux: 40.6, 60.8, 101.4

If you still wanna argue that Lemieux played less games per season (which he did), I did the math and if he'd have played in the same average amount of games per season as Gretzky, his points per season would have been 140.2

It is a contest, but Gretzky still comes out on top.

When deciding who's better based on stats, I'd also take into account their teammates. Check out Lemieux's teammates for the first like 6 years he played... It's an hilarious "who the $@#^ ARE these guys??" experience. Even his last 4 injury-shortened seasons were with a brutal Penguins team. I'd have give it to Lemieux. I'm sure most defenders in the league would have rather played against Gretzky than Lemieux.

But give Lemieux's body to Gretzky's brain, and Gretzmieux would have had a 300 point season.

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Just stumbled across this today, a rating for goalies, independent of their defense. http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970204479504576635272501531268-lMyQjAxMTAxMDEwNzExNDcyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email_bot

Funny, I was just thinking of doing something similar last week (except I don't have the kind of stats background to do it so in-depth!).

Thomas comes out on top last year, but he faced the 8th-easiest set of shots, so his relative save percentage is 'only' .931.

A couple more detailed pages:

http://www.insidescience.org/current-affairs/new-statistic-aims-to-answer-question-how-good-is-that-goalie

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How about Paul Kariya as a great LW? He's maybe the best I've ever seen. If he hadn't had injury problems and played for awful Anaheim Ducks teams, he could have put up huge numbers. Thankfully he at least had Selanne for awhile there, but those teams had no depth whatsoever. Put him on the 1980s Oilers and he would have had 100 goals a season.

Ovechkin is another great LW. If you're choosing players based on pure talent it's hard to beat his combination of skill, speed, and strength.

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