TheAthletic NHL99 Analysis

Published in

The Bench Connection

11 min readMar 14, 2023

Intro

TheAthletic concluded their NHL99 project a few weeks ago, also meaning the conclusion of their top lists for each of the four major sports. Hockey fans were in desperate need of such a list. The prior two reference points were the NHL’s formal Top 100 list during the league’s centennial season in 2017, however lacking of any ranking of players within it (much like the NBA Top 50 & 75). The most recent ranked list by a display of writers was The Hockey News’, in 1999.

The NBA of course has The Book of Basketball to refer to (plus continual updates from Simmons), SLAM Magazine’s Top 500 Players of All-Time (2011), and many other avenues of discussions. ESPN published a list for the 75th anniversary that actually wasn’t too bad. The NFL did a television series in 2010 documenting their Top 100. They also of course do yearly active player rankings. The MLB of course has endless resources from the storied 140+ years of baseball.

Unsurprisingly, hockey fans were starved of such delight and debate. Like every other sport, its hard to understand how to contextualize old players to new ones. We’re taught to be deferential to the greats of the past. But really, how many players have actually been better than Crosby? Less than you think. Joe Sakic was THE guy to me growing up, but was my childlike wonder of him bigger than reality? Is he really a notch below the all-time greats? Brodeur rewrote the record books, but is the best goalie ever? I hear legend of Darry Sittler — and every Leafs fan is taught about his 10 point game — but was he ever as good as Auston Matthews right now? Is , How good was he really? Is Auston Matthews already the best (not the greatest) Leaf ever? For myself, its been hard to parse these life-altering philosophical questions.

That’s why it was so exciting to get this sort of thing. I support the NHL’s decision to not rank within their 2017 list. There’s a time and a place. But debate is inevitable, and it was hard for me to respect the list after Evgeni Malkin was left off it. Before you scroll — he is #26 on TheAthletic’s list. 3-time Norris Trophy winner Pierre Pilote — in the conversation for second greatest Blackhawk ever — also has ground to stand on in the conversation for biggest snub on the league’s 2017 list. I digress.

What made this list even more intriguing, is the spin that it is the Top 100 modern players, i.e. post-1967 expansion — what is considered the modern NHL, in the way that the Super Bowl era, or early-1980s are considered the beginning for the NBA. You’ve heard the term The Original Six I’m sure. The league doubled in 1967, adding 6 new teams. With the WHA merger in 1979 (after Gretzky’s rookie season there), the NHL reached 21 teams (in 13 years), and has slowly increased to 32 teams since. Anyway, hockey might be the most difficult to sport to compare across eras pre-1960s. Baseball is no question the easiest to measure. The forward pass makes it difficult to compare NFL players to their counterparts 100 years ago. Bob Cousy is hard to measure against any modern guard. But the combination of technology, strategy, playstyle, and just about everything else, makes hockey perhaps the most confusing. You might disagree, but it’s in the conversation for hardest to measure. Having a modern list of players was exciting, getting to see a ranking without Dit Clapper, Newsy Lalonde, and a list of other incredible names, that are impossible to measure against the likes of a Nathan MacKinnon, when I’m 45% sure that the technology I have access to might make me a more effective player on an NHL sheet of ice today than say, Toe Blake would be in his gear.

The List

With ALL OF THAT prelude out of the way, here is the list, before I get to some random thoughts.

#100 — Marc-Andre Fleury
#99 — Kris Letang
#98 — Guy Lapointe
#97 — Henrik Zetterbeg
#96 — Johnny Bucyk
#95 — Sergei Zubov
#94 — Pat LaFontaine
#93 — Mark Howe
#92 — Bob Gainey
#91 — Mark Recchi
#90 — Shea Weber
#89 — Alexander Mogilny
#88 — Carey Price
#87 — Rob Blake
#86 — Billy Smith
#85 — Denis Savard
#84 — Serge Savard
#83 — Marian Hossa
#82 — Darryl Sittler
#81 — Ed Belfour
#80 — Joe Nieuwendyk
#79 — Andrei Vasilevskiy
#78 — Duncan Keith
#77 — Henrik Sedin
#76 — Daniel Sedin
# 75 — Steven Stamkos
#74 — Nathan MacKinnon
#73 — Drew Doughty
#72 — Nikita Kucherov
#71 — Grant Fuhr
#70 — Jean Ratelle
#69 — Adam Oates
#68 — Gilbert Perrault
#67 — Mike Gartner
#66 — Doug Gilmour
#65 — Jonathan Toews
#64 — Auston Matthews
#63 — Roberto Luongo
#62 — Martin St. Louis
#61 — Mats Sundin
#60 — Erik Karlsson
#59 — Brendan Shanahan
#58 — Paul Kariya
#57 — Zdeno Chara
#56 — Peter Stastny
#55 — Dale Hawerchuk
#54 — Borje Salming
#53 — Brad Park
#52 — Victor Hedman
#51 — Mike Modano
#50 — Henrik Lundqvist
#49 — Scott Stevens
#48 — Bernie Parent
#47 — Stan Mikita
#46 — Patrice Bergeron
#45 — Scott Niedermayer
#44 — Tony Esposito
#43 — Pavel Datsyuk
#42 -Ron Francis
#41 — Patrick Kane
#40 — Luc Robitaille
#39 — Jari Kurri
#38 — Eric Lindros
#37 — Al MacInnis
#36 — Pavel Bure
#35 — Chris Pronger
#34 — Jarome Iginla
#33 — Sergei Federov
#32 — Joe Thornton
#31 — Bobby Clarke
#30 — Brian Leetch
#29 — Chris Chelios
#28 — Bryan Trottier
#27 — Peter Forsberg
#26 — Evgeni Malkin
#25 — Ken Dryden
#24 — Larry Robinson
#23 — Teemu Selanne
#22 — Brett Hull
#21 — Martin Brodeur
#20 — Marcel Dionne
#19 — Denis Potvin
#18 — Paul Coffey
#17 — Mark Messier
#16 — Connor McDavid
#15 — Steve Yzerman
#14 — Guy Lafleur
#13 — Joe Sakic
#12 — Mike Bossy
#11 — Patrick Roy
#10 — Ray Bourque
#9 — Phil Esposito
#8 — Niklas Lidstrom
#7 -Dominik Hasek
#6 — Alex Ovechkin
#5 — Jaromir Jagr
#4 — Sidney Crosby
#3 — Bobby Orr
#2 — Mario Lemieux
#1 — Wayne Gretzky

Comparing Eras

I suppose that my biggest knee jerk reaction would be that it still feels like current players don’t entirely get their due. You might scoff at that notion with McDavid at #16 and Matthews at #64, however there are many other greats of the past 10 years, who aren’t terribly high on the rankings.

There are 18 active players (bolded) on the list. There’s also 13 guys (italicized) who played the bulk of their careers in the post-lockout era, and have retired (basically) in the last five years, enough for me to include mentioning them as having played a fairly identical game to the one today. Even if offence has sky-rocketed since the league low in 2015 — where Jamie Benn won the Art Ross with 87 points. About 1/5 of the list sounds about right for the 10-ish years that equates to about 1/5 of the post-1967 era.

But if you look at the names, the bulk of them land in the bottom half of the top 100. Only 6/18 land in the top-50.

There could be a few reasons for this. Parity has certainly been a story, and as the league has settled into its 30-team format post-lockout, competition, skill, and technology and science, has gone way up. So it’s harder than ever to separate yourself from the pack. That’s before we mention the realities of the salary cap.

Era adjustments will always be tough. Analytics have come a long way recently, but have a long way to go, especially in hockey. I know that TheAthletic’s writers put in the work adjusting for eras.

Still, I just can’t shake the hold the perception of (more goals = better) , that can naturally overtake our beliefs. The scoring in the 80s and 90s was soo much higher. How can we tell what is a more impressive season, even if fairly rudimentary statistics models can spit out goals per-game that’re era adjusted? And as I mentioned with the salary cap, how do we reward the dynasties of the past, without knocking the modern ones who had many good players traded away after Cup runs, thus taking away future opportunities?

The Blackhawks and Kings collapsed, the Penguins have had two separate runs that couldn’t be fully tied together in between, ditto for the Bruins. The Canucks couldn’t keep everyone together. The window of opportunity is smaller nowadays, and that not only changes a player’s playoff resume, but good players leaving good situations, means there’s less good players to play alongside, less good players to take attention off oneself, and better competition elsewhere. Much like the NBA, the smart teams of the 80s dominated because they were lightyears ahead, able to shred the disaster teams. That era is no longer.

#Snubs

The lack of active players in the top fifty is not a complete blunder, but something to think about as I dissected the list. I thought players like Stamkos, Price, Keith, and Toews, all could have been notched up. Plenty of the younger guys still have the legs to climb a lot higher. MacKinnon, Kucherov, Hedman, Vasilevskiy, have plenty of tread left on the tire. There are plenty of bubble guys with many good years under their belt who fit that bill as well (that we’ll get to shortly).

In terms of snubs, TheAthletic writers were very quick to recognize their mistake in leaving Leon Draisatl off the list. They ironically wrote plenty about how they value peak over longevity, and failed to recognize his already impressive 5-year peak, that he will only continue to improve on.

As far as players who received votes from at least 1 of the 9 writers who voted, that list is 31 names long:

Dave Keon, Yvan Cournoyer, Jacques Lemaire, Kent Nilsson, Michel Goulet, Larry Murphy, Cam Neely, Glenn Anderson, Pat Lafontaine, Rick Tocchet, Markus Naslund, Phil Housley, John LeClair, Peter Bondra, Dino Ciccarelli, Keith Tkachuk, Daniel Alfredsson, Pierre Turgeon, Sergei Gonchar, Doug Wilson, Patrick Elias, Ryan Getzlaf, Corey Perry, Jonathan Quick, Anze Kopitar, Mark Giordano, Brad Marchand, Roman Josi, Leon Draisaitl.

Not snubs per se , but in their own unique category is a list of a few big names who straddled the line between pre and post-expansion, thus hurting their chances of making it on. They include:

Andy Bathgate, Dave Keon, Henri Richard, Frank Mahovlich, Bobby Hull, Jean Beliveau.
Every name save Bathgate are big wigs, and are (rightly) thought of as pre-expansion players, even if they were excellent for a period aftewards. For what it’s worth, whatever conversation was had about guys like this, I think it was wise to leave them off.

And then finally, I had made a long list of potential names as the list was announced, having very little idea of what separates the names in contention. To me, it seemed at least mildly conceivable that any of these guys could have received votes. Maybe I’m way off. They include:

Bernie Nicholls, Jeremy Roenick, Igor Larionov, Dave Andreychuk,Jose Theodore, Dany Heatley, Patrick Marleau, Ryan Miller, Rick Nash, John Tavares, Tuuka Rask, PK Subban, Alex Pietrangelo, Ryan Suter, Taylor Hall, Mitch Marner, among many others who I had on a long list of names who could potentially receive votes.

The last caveat worth mentioning is TheAthletic implemented a 400 game minimum threshold, eliminating any chance Cale Makar had. I’m not sure anyone else historically could be eliminated with this criteria. Eric Lindros has always felt like the Gale Sayers of hockey, but he played much longer. I guess I could now mention the many great Soviet Union players who either never got to play in the NHL, or only played for a short period of time.

#JustMyThoughts

(https://twitter.com/KingJames/status/564281844271947777)

Lets bounce around a bit:

I do think McDavid deserves to be #16. I could have him a couple spots behind Messier, Potvin, Dionne, Brodeur and Coffey, but really not any lower than that. He is firmly in that tier. Which is insane. Crosby is not unlike LeBron in fully living up to his promise. The best player for 15+ years, and three Cups to boot. But somehow McDavid’s ceiling is still higher. Crosby is firmly behind the big three modern guys (and probably still behind Howe for 5th all-time). If McDavid wins two Cups, and continues to have this must separation from his peers, he might enter that 1B territory with Lemieux and Orr.
For the record. If you’re stretching to the full NHL list; I think the Tier 1 players are 1A: Gretzky, 1B: Lemieux, Orr, 1C: Crosby, Howe, Richard (in some order). Basically the only players with GOAT cases, that span the history of the league, in the same way that Russell-Kareem-MJ-LeBron do the same for the NBA. It’s ridiculous to say McDavid’s floor already feels like 1C. I think he’s been good enough that as long as he performs well in the playoffs, he could never win a Cup, and still crack 1C.
If you’re gawking over Matthews placement, I agree in that I probably wouldn’t have him over MacKinnon and Stamkos quite yet. The articles TheAthletic wrote about these players greatly vary, from statistical to human interest. Matthews’ article is firmly in the statistical camp. It is about just how impressive he has been in his career, basically matching the pace of the short list of greatest goals scorers ever; being Bossy, Ovi, Lemieux, Gretzky, and Espo. Matthews is right in the thick with them. That’s the list. So as premature as #64 feels, I’m also willing to concede it might not be.
I want to give kudos to this list again. I think I’d have Bourque over Lidstrom. But Orr, Lidstrom, Bourque, Coffey, Potvin, Robinson, Chelios, Leetch, Pronger is a list of top end D-men. I would have put Pronger over Chelly and Leetch. I would have put McInnis a bit farther back. I also would’ve moved Niedermayer and Chara up a bit. But overall, those names in the top-50 seem pretty bang on. Much like basketball, defensive impact in hockey is still hard to measure, and year-to-year there are many D-men who are overrated because of strong offensive production. None of these players fit that bill.
I think it is a lot more difficult to sift through forwards rankings. Scoring, versus impact, versus two-way play, longevity vs. peak, I would bet the standard deviation is a lot larger amongst the voters.
- How do you rank Forsberg and Federov?
- Do Russians get some small extra credit for missing some of their career while playing in the USSR?
- Do we subconsciously credit some players who’ve excelled internationally, given it’s clearly hockey’s international play is clearly the most important amongst the four big sports?
-How do we weight different eras? Much like basketball (again), the post-expansion 70s were a rollicking time for the league, with many “underrated” players — like Jean Ratelle — who might actually be properly rated given the watered down competition they faced.
These are the questions that keep me up at night.

I could dissect more of the list, but part of this was simply an ode to praise Connor McDavid for how special he is. And to pretentiously say here instead of yelling it at parties; “don’t take this list for granted,” because it might be another 20 years beforer we get a ranking from hockey experts again.