This is just for Bloated and I, but feel free to chime in.
A good read from Jesse Marshall…
“Wayne Gretzky is widely recognized as the greatest player in hockey history. Fans in Pittsburgh and those who watched Mario Lemieux play regularly argue that Lemieux should wear that crown, and would except for a couple of factors out of his control. The argument will rage as long as hockey exists.”
“OK, that’s probably a stretch, but you get the idea. Two of the greatest players to ever step foot on the ice just so happened to overlap their careers by several years, giving us the fruit of these Greatest of All Time arguments. Those of us old enough to remember watching Lemieux and Gretzky play can feel blessed to experience it; it’s almost as if it emboldens the passion of the argument. Those who didn’t live through it do what the rest of the hockey world does: adjust stats for the era and live in an unforgiving world of “what-if’s.”
These big “what-if’s” pretty much boil down to two primary buckets:
Gretzky had his health, and Lemieux did not. Lemieux’s health issues during his prime years skew the results in favor of Gretzky.
Gretzky had a significantly better team than Lemieux for a critical portion of his career and posted better numbers as a result.
These arguments are circular and have no end. You can lose yourself in a mass of era-adjusted statistics, teammate-based data and point totals, as well as projections of what Lemieux’s stat totals would look like if he’d played injury-free from ages 24 to 27, typically the best years of a player’s career.
Are we going to get into some of that today? Absolutely. It wouldn’t be fun if we didn’t. But beyond that, I wanted to do a standard comparison of playing styles. There are a lot of areas where these players have striking similarities and areas where one seems to hold an advantage over the other. Is there anything we can glean from the success of these stars? With the game on pause, now is as good of a time as ever to sink our teeth into the careers of these two players for some old-fashioned performance analysis. If nothing else, we can use this time of social distancing to argue about retired players in the comments section.”
1. The passing
Generational talents know how to parse the game and enhance the capability of their teammates. It’s almost as if they have a remote control they can use to pause or slow the game, laying the puck cross-ice on a teammate’s stick as if they were operating in the Matrix.
Gretzky and Lemieux were no different. Although their approach to distributing the puck was rooted in a different focus, their ability to manipulate time and space was impressive in both accounts. Gretzky racked up some major assist numbers throughout his career, finishing with an astonishing 1,963 assists over his 20-year NHL career, a mark that likely will stand for a long, long time — if it can be broken at all at this point. Gretzky rounds out at 1.32 assist’s per game, unadjusted for era. Lemieux was no slouch in this arena, either. He finished his career with 1,033 assists, putting him at 1.12 assists per game — a respectable total in his own right.
Gretzky seemed to do his best work in transition. His vision and soft hands enabled him to operate at a high level of speed in conjunction with his teammates and send crisp passes across the ice or through defenders in comprised situations. For Lemieux, his best work seemed to come when he took the opportunity to draw attention to himself and slow the game down. As lanes presented themselves, Lemieux pounced, working the puck through the bodies of distracted defensemen and onto the stick of teammates.
In the montage below, you get a good gauge of the approach both of these players took to distributing the puck and the individual skills they exhibited. Pay close attention to the subtle way that Gretzky opens his body up to lay a cross-ice pass and the opportunities Lemieux takes to slow things down and control the play.
This is a category that Gretzky dominates regardless of how you look at it. The sheer volume of assists he boasted throughout his career is simply unprecedented. If you adjust these assists per era, Gretzky still sits atop the pile. Using Hockey-Reference’s era-adjusted assist information, Gretzky’s total still sits at 1,171 career-assists for a 1.15 assist per game average. Lemieux’s total adjusts to 915 assists putting him at an even 1.00 assists per game.
Now, this discussion wouldn’t be complete if we didn’t wade into the waters surrounding the quality of teammates. When you look back at the early career of these two greats, the cast of characters surrounding them couldn’t have been more different. Remember our “what-if” buckets above? This is one of the most crucial buckets in any argument about Lemieux and Gretzky pitted head-to-head.
For instance, take a moment to consider the Penguins’ runner-up in points totals for Lemieux over the first few years of his career:
1984-85: Lemieux – 100, Warren Young – 72, Doug Shedden – 67
1985-86: Lemieux – 141, Mike Bullard – 83, Moe Mantha – 67
1986-87: Lemieux – 107, Dan Quinn – 71, Randy Cunneyworth – 63
1987-88: Lemieux – 168, Dan Quinn – 79, Randy Cunneyworth – 64
1988-89: Lemieux – 199, Rob Brown – 115, Paul Coffey – 113
It wasn’t until five years into Lemieux’s career, his first foray into the NHL postseason, that he found a premier player in the conversation with him as far as points scored is concerned in Paul Coffey, a player that Gretzky had the benefit of playing with for years. We often think of Jaromir Jagr as an electric and formidable teammate for Lemieux, but he didn’t arrive on the scene until Lemieux was well into his career.
Let’s compare this cast of characters with the group that Gretzky entered the league with for a sample of the varying environments for these two players.
1984-85: Gretzky – 137, Blair MacDonald – 94, Stan Weir – 61
1985-86: Gretzky – 164, Jarri Kurri – 75, Mark Messier – 63
1986-87: Gretzky – 212, Glenn Anderson – 105, Paul Coffey – 89
1987-88: Gretzky – 196, Mark Messier – 106, Glenn Anderson – 104
1988-89: Gretzky – 183, Jarri Kurri – 108, Mark Messier – 107
The Oilers were prepared to maximize any return they were going to get for Gretzky, surrounding him with talented players from the onset of his career. There are a lot of Hall of Famers on this list, and that speaks volumes to the differences in the environments of these two players. This doesn’t change the fact that Gretzky had over 1,900 career assists. You don’t accidentally register over one assist per game. Someone had to make those passes, and Gretzky executed them at a higher level than just about anyone could have.
Ultimately, the question of what might’ve happened if these roles were reversed and it was Lemieux with the fruitful linemates is one of the ever-enduring questions that will be a part of this discussion as long as it continues to happen.
2. The goal scoring
Both of these players could make goaltenders lose their minds in their own way.
For Gretzky, it was pure finesse. His shot had accuracy and velocity to it, and there wasn’t an area of the ice he wasn’t eager to use it. Gretzky was not afraid to tee the puck up from range with a slap shot. More often than not, due to the power and placement, he put it in the back of the net. One element of his game that doesn’t get discussed frequently enough is his use of the backhand. Gretzky was not afraid to put the puck on his offside and fool goaltenders with a sneaky release.
The critical piece to Gretzky’s goal-scoring was his penchant for knowing where the critical pre-goal areas would be and when to get to them. Watching him work behind the play and make himself available for a scoring opportunity is to understand his place atop the hockey scoring throne. Gretzky was a technician in every sense of the word, and almost everything he did came at high-speed. When it came to thinking about the game, you could tell he was doing it steps ahead of others.
For Lemieux, his physical prowess played a significantly greater role in his ability to score goals. Lemieux could rush to the net with players draped on his back like a blanket. A master of the individual dangle, Lemieux’s ability to play through hooks, holds and slashes was a hallmark of his game, but it took a toll on him physically. Lemieux’s size and wide skating base made him a difficult player to knock off of the puck. From a skating perspective, he was a solid as a rock and fast on top of that.
From a technical perspective, Lemieux possessed some of the same, subtle techniques to move goaltenders that Gretzky did, and was even slightly more willing to put the puck on net. Lemieux averaged 3.67 shots per game over his career to Gretzky’s 3.45 per game. For Lemieux, much of his success came in subtle hand movements or deceptive pre-shot motions designed to shake goaltenders down. When that didn’t work, he could shift between speeds quickly enough to find time and space for himself.
Consider the variety of goals scored in the below montage and how each player utilized a wide variety of tools to put the puck in the net.
3. The era-adjusted data
This piece wouldn’t be complete if we didn’t sink our teeth into some numbers that attempted to adjust for era. The late 70s and early 80s were not a good time for goaltenders around the National Hockey League. We’re talking about a period of the game where the league-wide goals-against average was 3.80. Make no bones about it, Gretzky made good on that, using his skills to rack up points in a variety of ways like he was an all you can eat buffet. Lemieux did as well, though toward the twilight of that era.
So, to stoke the fires of hockey debate, it’s worth it to dive into an era-adjusted points-per-game discussion and break this down on a level playing field to see what the numbers tell say. There are a few ways to do this, but I’ve chosen the one that is the most fun and manual. This comes courtesy of The Athletic’s own Jonathan Willis.
The approach here is to adjust each season as if there were an average of six goals scored per game while holding player production rates the same. I decided to stick with the six-goal approach Jonathan used, tracking player point rates in this NHL-wide scoring model. This levels the playing field for the players as far as scoring rate adjustment is concerned. I did not add in games for Lemieux given his injury history. This is based on the career games played numbers for both individuals.
Willis’ Era-Adjusted Points-Per-Game
Lemieux: 1.67
Gretzky: 1.61
Bobby Orr: 1.34
Mike Bossy: 1.19
Jean Beliveau: 1.16
Just for fun, I threw in a few other all-time greats on the list as well to see how they stack up to Lemieux and Gretzky. After Bobby Orr, the dropoff is stark. Lemieux does slightly leap over Gretzky in this exercise, giving a lot of fodder to those that believe if our “what-if” buckets were filled with possibilities, it might be Lemieux as king of the hill in the hockey world.
On the flip side, this doesn’t magically erase the fact that Gretzky has a 1,000 career points cushion on Lemieux. Fun era-adjustments don’t erase all those points and the years of dominance he exhibited on the ice. The Oilers surrounded him with a strong supporting cast and a few sheriffs to patrol the ice if anyone dared to mess with him. That isn’t Gretzky’s fault; you just play the hand you’re dealt. He played it masterfully and was the clear-cut best player on the ice for a long time.
But all these scenarios about possibilities are what make the discussion fun. It’s often been said that Gretzky was the owner of the best career while Lemieux was the owner of the most talent. Either way, taking a trip down memory lane to get lost in the overwhelming amount of highlight tape from these two all-time greats is a fantastic way to spend time during the NHL’s pause.
