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Tomkabs and Plabax approved classic tier list


TomKabs93

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Yesterday, Plabax and I were talking about which teams are overrated and which are underrated and whatnot. This prompted me to think about what my current team rankings would look like, as the last time I tried to make one was probably 8 months ago. So I thought of this list and mentioned it to Plabax, and surprisingly he agreed with it. Anyway, here's the list. I strongly think that this is the most accurate grouping of teams posted yet. I know rankings are subjective, but I really believe in this list.

There's no individual rankings within each group, so I just used alphabetical order for sake of simplicity

S - Tier
BUF
CHI
DAL
DET
NYR
A - Tier
BOS
CAL
LA
PHI
VAN
B - Tier
MTL
PIT
QUE
TOR
WPG
EDM
C - Tier
HFD
NJD
NYI
STL
TB
WSH
D - Tier
ANH
FLA
OTT
SJ
Note: I'm not saying that Chicago vs Rangers is 100% even by any means, but I think any matchup within each group is fair enough.
Note 2: I only said the first 13 teams on this list to Plabax, so he possibly doesn't 100% agree with the second half of this list. Knowing him though, he doesn't care much for the lesser skilled teams, so I'm gonna assume he'd agree with that part anyway.
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Since I love giving my opinion (and also ripping on TK).........................

- WTF is "S" Tier stand for? Why not just go, A,B,C, etc or use numbers 1,2,3,4,5 ?

- I think CAL can fit into the top tier

- MTL and WINN can also move up into a higher tier than they are in

- EDM belongs in a lower tier

Everything else looks pretty spot-on.

Edited by Uncle Seth
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Since I love giving my opinion (and also ripping on TK).........................

- WTF is "S" Tier stand for? Why not just go, A,B,C, etc or use numbers 1,2,3,4,5 ?

- I think CAL can fit into the top tier

- MTL and WINN can also move up into a higher tier than they are in

- EDM belongs in a lower tier

Everything else looks pretty spot-on.

Idk I've seen S tier in tons of other game tier lists. Maybe it stands for super or something. It's like god tier basically

Those team placements you mentioned are all very important to this particular list (except EDM). Your opinions on CAL MTL and WINN all align with the more classical way of thinking 94 wise. Calgary has always been thought to be a top team, and even Winnipeg to an extent. Montreal isn't normally considered a fantastic team, but they've always been called good/very good. Here's my thoughts on those 3 teams.

Calgary - Very solid team but they don't have: A - a one man show player, and B - great chemistry. Fleury is great but his shot isn't fantastic and he doesn't have 5 stickhandling. Reichel is solid all around but he's not good enough to be considered a great 2nd best forward. Their only good shot on forward is Roberts, and he's pretty gross being 7 4 4.

MTL - No great shot at all on forward, and no 5 speeders. Muller is often used as the onetimer option but he has a 4 4 shot, not that great, and 9 weight omg so sluggish. Their forwards are mostly all agile without being really fast, so they can be slippery, but the lack of shot makes it hard to capitalize on good dekes.

Winnipeg - Lame forwards other than Selanne, the fake superstar that is so gross to deke with. Selanne is good but not great. Zhamnov is ok but 7 weight and 3 speed means slowwww no matter how agile he is. Davydov does his job but he doesn't help this team's case for being A tier. Housley is whatever, you can say he's great but I don't think so. Even with Coffey on D instead of Housley this team would still be B tier!

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Plabax and I talked about this on AIM to help me with my Original 6 rom.

While I did want 6 even match-ups I also wanted the teams to somewhat reflect what they were in 1967.

I am making some minor tweaks based on this discussion.

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Winnipeg between Edmonton and Toronto?

We understand you hate them TK because of your last classic but cmon now...

Agree totally with Calgary, they have some explosive pieces but terrible chemistry. Also why is Philly in A tier?

And Vancouver isnt in the Slurpy tier ?

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Winnipeg between Edmonton and Toronto?

We understand you hate them TK because of your last classic but cmon now...

Agree totally with Calgary, they have some explosive pieces but terrible chemistry. Also why is Philly in A tier?

And Vancouver isnt in the Slurpy tier ?

I said they're in no individual order within each group. So I just used alphabetical.

Winnipeg is crap, Selanne can only skate in straight lines. He could be useful as a winger but none of the other Wpg forwards can play center well. Davydov would be the best bet.

I would take Toronto over Winnipeg. Yeah I'd rather have Winnipeg over Edmonton, but it's not thattt unfair. Edmonton isn't good but they're better than all of the C tiers bigtime. I would take anyone over Winnipeg in B tier except Edmonton and maybe Quebec. I'm trying to not be biased though, honestly. I really believe that Winnipeg is a step below all of the A tiers.

Philly is better than all of the B tiers I think. Recchi is pretty great (with classic advantage boosts), and Eklund is awesome too. They are a a little bit worse than most of the other A tiers but they belong there I think.

Vancouver has a fake superstar in Bure, awful D, and other talented forwards who sometimes struggle scoring due to weak shots. Bure is a fake superstar imo because he has a lame 4 4 shot, less than 5 stickhandling, and most importantly he skates in a straight line due to higher speed than agility. Non top 10 forward imo.

Edited by TomKabs93
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What makes NYR top tier? I'd take anyone in A over NYR.

Forgot to respond to this.

I think NYR has a very balanced attack with no weaknesses. Gartner is an incredible center who can do it all. Tikkanen is a pleasure to skate with and makes pass shots almost easy. I've never tried Messier but people seem to like him. Amonte is a solid grinder winger who adds some simple character to the line. There's just something about the way Gart Tik and Amonte mesh together that works wonderfully.

I know it's all so subjective, I just feel that Gart and Tik propel NYR into stardom.

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I think Tampa should be in the D tier, it's just Bradley on the team. The rest are awfull, no support at all. There is a clear difference in the players to the other ones in C category, they at least have some tools other than just 1 player. It's a lot closer to SJ than any of the C tier teams. San Jose at least has decent speed and few ok D-men.

I can agree with the rest, but just a mention I myself do like Vancouver more than the Rangers.

Edited by Depch
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Great work cousins.

Philly seems way overrated. I'd definitely put Que, Winn, and Mtl over them in a ny minute.

What is it about Philly that rates them so high? Good G, very good C and meh after that.

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Great work cousins.

Philly seems way overrated. I'd definitely put Que, Winn, and Mtl over them in a ny minute.

What is it about Philly that rates them so high? Good G, very good C and meh after that.

I think many people are underestimating Eklund here then, what is there not to like as a winger? Combined with Recchi it just makes a very good skating offence. Outside of the top teams not many teams can field 2 low weight 5/4 skaters. Offence has the biggest impact on a team and their offence is very solid and above many teams in B. The D with Yuskevich and Hawgood provides a good mobile defence as well and Söderström one of the top goalies in the game. I like it a lot.

Edited by Depch
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I think many people are underestimating Eklund here then, what is there not to like as a winger? Combined with Recchi it just makes a very good skating offence. Outside of the top teams not many teams can field 2 low weight 5/4 skaters. Offence has the biggest impact on a team and their offence is very solid and above many teams in B. The D with Yuskevich and Hawgood provides a good mobile defence as well and Söderström one of the top goalies in the game. I like it a lot.

This just shows the difference in coaches preferences. Raph stated in another thread what a debacle the Philly defense is. Looks like Depch prefers agility and lighter weight over STH and other attributes. Raph mentioned Gary Galley which surprised me since I always prefer Haw/Yusk. I think the CB changed things here too.

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I think VAN should be in the S tier.

EDM is def B tier. EDM has good defense along with one of the best goalies in Ranford. along with a top 3 or top 4 player in Petr Klima. Yeah they have lackluster forwards outside of Klima but they do have a 4/5 shot in Craig Simpson. The C tiers are a clear step below (except NJ -- move them up).

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I know I haven't made an updated tier list so I don't know exactly how similar or different my list would be but I'll just list some things I noticed for better or worse starting from S tier and working down.

-I'd remove Buffalo and Rangers from the "S" and move Vancouver up:

  • Buffalo has chemistry issues that are well documented as well as a lack of offense after Mogilny. A lack of team speed can also make things tough for them because they don't have the shot power or help from the defense to crack teams with a good defense. Even with CB check, their 2nd defender is a weakness.
  • NYR cant shoot, plain and simple. Gartner has to be on to be worthwhile and they labor to bring the puck up ice since Tikkanen and Messier are just huge targets for teams that back check well. Plus their AI can be an absolute tire fire too often and their goalies aren't good enough to bail them out. Too many things have to go right for them to compete with good teams.
  • Vancouver is simply a better Dallas. Bure has 5 stick handle and its simply dishonest to say he isn't a good deke player. Courtnall has the same skate ratings with a worse shot and 3 sth but he's not a problem in the C with his dekes? The support from the rest of the team is comparable enough to call it a wash.
  • Chicago and Detroit are good teams no matter how you slice it.

- "A' tier is a group I don't have much beef with except for Philadelphia and Montreal

  • LA, Boston, and Calgary are the perfect example of weird but skilled teams that can be victimized a bit too often by their AI which tend to short circuit more often then the S teams. Each team also has a clear weakness in which to attack.
  • Montreal is likely an A team because they are a true team that work off each other very well. They can run out a very slick skating group or a more skilled version with a bit of CB ability. Their AI is incredible, especially at home and Roy eliminates a lot of the cheapies that many other goalies give up. Very customizable team, perfect for cerebral players who don't rely on bully tactics.
  • Philly is a nice team but more of a B team due to a lack of speed and scoring ability. Their defense is also very weak and will be victimized by every team in S and A tier. The forwards have to do too much work and just aren't quite talented enough to pull it off. Another team that suffers from a lack of depth, their bad matchups tend to stay bad.

- "B" tier looks pretty good as well, these are teams with talent but even larger flaws then the teams above them. The only team I waffle on is Pittsburgh

  • I like Quebec here, plenty of talent up front but their AI has a real tendency to just s**t all over itself in its own zone. Not enough team speed to run down the breakaway chances they seem to give up.
  • Toronto can pretend their an "A" team from time to time, they matchup well because their team is very balanced on C and CB checkers and their AI is capable of keeping it together a lot of the time. Pretty predictable offense limits them.
  • Winnipeg and Edmonton are surprisingly similar when it comes to end results. Both rely on a superstar with some pretty weak support. Defenses have a bit of a learning curve but can be reigned in enough to be effective. Good counter attacking teams.
  • Can't make up my mind on Pittsburgh, great AI, can CB check, and Lemieux is just a machine if fed the puck appropriately. On the other hand they are terrible at carrying the puck up the ice, the support players have one good skill offset by many poor or average ratings and they have too many unwinnable matchups if playing a manager of equal skill. I'd likely put them down in C not so much because of their roster but because too many other teams above them are designed to kill them.

-I'd probably cut "C" tier in half because I feel some teams overcome their weaknesses better than others.

  • I'd keep NJD, NYI, HFD, and PIT in C because they can fight back very effectively. NYI because of their forwards, NJD & HFD because of their balanced and fairly mobile defenses. These teams can't be completely disregarded by teams ranked higher.
  • I'd give STL and WSH their own tier. They are both functionally broken teams. STL is far too slow and under skilled, Hull has to be spot on and he has to get help for them to be taken serious. Too many teams can blow them up with a basic gameplan. WSH is too busy fighting themselves to worry about the other team. Bondra is an abjectly terrible deke option, Khristich is too slow to create his own offence and Ridley is a support player with no one to support. Beaupre is terrible and the defense isn't good enough to cancel him out. Pure TRAPON team with a terrible counter attack.
  • Tampa should probably be grouped with SJ and OTT as these are functional teams that lack speed and talent.
  • FLA and ANH deserve to be in "F" tier, they have even less speed and talent than the teams above them.
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This is my preferred list, more or less:

DET (no doubt they are the best)
BUF (Say what you will about Chemistry, but Mogs/Laffy,Chuk, Svoboda Bodger Fuhr is killer for me)
CHI (JR)
VAN (I have no problems with Bure, Ronning, Court, Linden)
LA (I'd rather have Gretz, Robitaille, Sandstrom, Granato, Blake, Zhit than anything below)
DAL (Russ and Modano, Gagner)
BOS (so many options, best D pair out there)
NYR (Messier to Gartner)
CGY (chem issues here for me, but love the roster - Fleury, Makarov, Roberts, Reichel, MacInnis)
WPG (Funky team for me, but like Selanne/Davy/Housely)
MTL (I don't know what to do with this team)
QUE (Sakic Kamenksy Sundin!)
TOR (Gilmour show)
PHI (Recchi Eklund great with Dineen, but rather have teams above this)
EDM (Klima show, worse supporting cast than others)

NJ (Richer with some great average wingers in Semak and Zelepukin...Stevens is a beast)

STL (Love emerson Hull combo)
HFD (Verbeek, Sanderson with ZZ, Yake, team is fun)
NYI (Hogue, Turgeon...yikes after that)
PIT (So fat, but can be used)
WSH (sometihng about this team)

TB (Bradley show....slow show)

SJ (ummm, I'm not even sure)
OTW
FLA
ANH

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SJ (ummm, I'm not even sure)

You lit me up with Falloon in our first practice game for the tourney. "I'll pick some slow teams, to warm up" BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES BREAKAWAY FALLOON SCOOOORES

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Has the CB check lost it's lustre in having fatter players? Most of the rankings above seem to disregard it to some extent. I thought Pitt got a bump up due to it?

Raph, you use all fatties upfront for pitt but 3 teams earlier you say Semin/Zelepukin are great average wingers, I'd put Joe Mullen in exact same category, playing him over Kevin Stevens.

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Has the CB check lost it's lustre in having fatter players? Most of the rankings above seem to disregard it to some extent. I thought Pitt got a bump up due to it?

Raph, you use all fatties upfront for pitt but 3 teams earlier you say Semin/Zelepukin are great average wingers, I'd put Joe Mullen in exact same category, playing him over Kevin Stevens.

Could be that I used NJ for one classic already and Scott Stevens is replacing Russ Courtnall as my '94 BFF. But having two 6 weight guys feels better than just Mullen and 4 fatties. Maybe I'll change my tune after this classic, but I put that list quickly and asked myself given these two teams, which would I choose....and kept going. That whole Philly to Pittsburgh group could be flipped around day to day I think.

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People don't like NYR around here.

  • Gartner is a clear top 5 player in the game and he comes equipped with a 5/3 shot. He is also a right-handed player. Right-handed players are better dekers than left-handed players. Good, fast skaters with great shots and stickhandling are easily the most dangerous in the game.
  • There are four different supporting forwards to choose from: Messier, Tikkanen, Turcotte, and Amonte. These guys all have good skating. Tikkanen and Messier have 5 agility, Messier has the 5 stickhandle and 5 pass. Amonte and Turcotte are your textbook wingers at 6/4/4.
  • This team has some of the best defense in the game. Leetch, Patrick and Lowe are all great defenders and Leetch is the standout with an amazing 6 agility and 5 stickhandle. Leetch can kickstart the offense by breaking out of the zone with 99 speed.

Anyway, tier lists are meant for high-level play. You need great deking skill to use NYR. Sure they may be heavy, but good deking combined with great skating will always beat out any weight disadvantage.

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how are RH players better for deking than LH players?

It's a preference thing, i personally like LH better. It's like deciding whether going up or down is more comfortable for someone.

Plab made some good points about NYR and while I don't agree, I'm not going to say he's wrong. I do think he mistyped when speaking about Leetch as he has 99 agility, not speed. Personally, I just can't get pas the fact that I think NYR is a heavier and crummier version of Dallas.

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Lefties can't spinorama. Righties can 360 spin (or 180, 270, whatever you want, it's very controllable) on a dime basically. This means that something is different about the way lefties and righties turn.

We don't understand 100% completely why, but it's definitely more significant than just not being able to spin. Something about the turning difference makes lefties poorer at deking. This is why Gilmour and Recchi feel weird to deke with. Sundin feels a little slicker at moving around than Robitaille and Roberts do. They're all 7 4 4 skaters, it's just that Sundin is a righty while the other two are lefties.

To people who didn't know it already, it's a fact that lefties can't spin. Try it if you don't believe it B)

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so you cant deke with modano like you can with courtnall?

Geoff Courtnall and Modano have the exact same skating attributes and are both lefties. They deke totally the same.

I honestly like deking with Modano a lot, he just feels a little bit less 'free' than Klima and Gartner.

No players let me feel the wind through my hair like KlimaGart

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sorry Russ

Russ is 6 5 6, Modano is 7 5 5. Those are drastically different. Sure Russ is a righty which is a plus for him, but 7 5 5 is wayyy better at deking imo than 6 5 6, so Modano takes the cake deke wise.

Well really, he takes the cake in every way against Russ.

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