I unabashedly love Hall of Fame debates. Always have. Years ago I had an editor tell me that HHOF stuff always bombs with readers, and maybe that’s true, but there are a few times a year when I decide to be selfish and do it anyway.
This week is one of those times, because the Hall will celebrate the class of 2023 over the weekend in the lead-up to Monday’s induction ceremony. On Wednesday, we looked at a half-dozen of the toughest calls among active players, with the help of Paul Pidutti from Adjusted Hockey. But some of you wanted to know about other guys, or complain about some of the players who are already in. So today, let’s open up the mailbag and see what else is on your mind.
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Note: Submitted questions have been edited for clarity and style.
What about Anze Kopitar? How important is it for him to get to 400 goals? (I think if he stays healthy he’ll get to 800 assists and probably gets to 1,200 points, but without getting 400 goals.) — Sam
Kopitar is interesting because he’s going to be heavily linked with Patrice Bergeron and Jonathan Toews as the trio of 200-foot centers who really made us rethink how we viewed two-way forwards during the dawn of the analytics era.
Bergeron is a slam dunk at this point, and while the case for Toews is much weaker, he’s probably also a lock because of how much respect he got during the Hawks’ peak. (Remember, he was named to the NHL’s Top 100 players of all time list, when fellow active players like Joe Thornton and Evgeni Malkin weren’t.)
Does that leave Kopitar as the odd man out? It could, but it shouldn’t. He’s the leading scorer among the three right now, and it would be a surprise if he didn’t end his career ahead of both, maybe by a lot. He has the two Cups and a pair of Selkes. He doesn’t have the international resume, but that’s because he’s Slovenian and I’m not sure how you hold that against him. I think his resume is Hall-worthy already, and if he tacks on another two or three solid years then I’m not sure how you keep him out.
It will be fascinating to see what happens if all three of the Bergeron/Toews/Kopitar trinity are eligible at the same time; it would be cool to see them all go in together, but we could also be in for some hard feelings over who ends up having to wait. But I think they all end up being in at some point.
I asked Paul what his model says about Kopitar, and here’s what he has:
That’s a bit of a weird one because it has Kopitar as being in despite a surprisingly low “high noon” rating, which is to say the model doesn’t think his peak was all that high. Still, he’s already done enough to be a worthy candidate.
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I’ve asked Paul to check if his model thinks the Kings should be allowed to build Kopitar a statue but he hasn’t gotten back to me.
You’ve often spoken about how stingy the committee has been with inducting goalies in the past 30 or so years. What currently active goalies do you think are locks to get in? Which ones are borderline cases? — Adam S.
I keep hearing you and others say that there aren’t enough goalies in the HHOF, but then when individual guys get discussed like Osgood, Miller, Joseph, etc., the consensus always seems to be that those guys still aren’t good enough to make it. So what goalies do you think actually should be in the Hall of Fame but aren’t? — Ian P.
Ian and Adam are covering similar ground on their questions, and yes, this has been a hobby horse of mine for years. I’ll break out my stat again: If you started watching the NHL in 1972, you’ve only seen the debut of six future Hall of Fame goalies in five decades. Grant Fuhr, Patrick Roy, Ed Belfour, Dominik Hasek, Martin Brodeur and Roberto Luongo.
That’s ridiculous, especially when we often call goaltending the most important position in the sport. But as much as I love that stat, it may start to feel out of date soon. I’ve already had to update it from five to six thanks to Luongo. Henrik Lundqvist is another sure thing, as is Marc-Andre Fleury. Pekka Rinne and Tuukka Rask would both be worthy candidates. Ryan Miller wouldn’t make the cut on my ballot, but he’s close. And of course, there’s a backlog of candidates from the 80s and 90s. I would vote for Curtis Joseph and could be convinced on Tom Barrasso, and there are cases to be made for others. Maybe the Hall starts revisiting that list at some point, in the same way it took them forever to get around to Rogie Vachon.
In other words, by the time today’s candidates are ready for consideration, that goalie glut may not exist anymore. But of the guys who are still active today, I think Fleury is in for sure, Carey Price is more likely than not because everyone loves the guy, and Andrei Vasilevskiy is getting close to “already done enough” territory before he even hits 30. Jonathan Quick will get some consideration, while Sergei Bobrovsky might need one more solid season if he doesn’t crack 400 wins. And of course, there will be other guys who are active now but are early enough in their careers that we can’t really evaluate their cases yet.
Speaking of goalie debates …
Mike Vernon – 5' 9" | 175 lb:
2 Stanley Cups + 1 Conn Smythe + 1 Jennings + 5 time All Star + 385 Regular Season Wins + 8th All Time in Playoff Wins + 7th All Time in PIMs + 5th All Time in Points = 1 #HHOF induction.
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— Mike Vernon Fan Club (@MikeVernonNHL) November 9, 2022
I found Duhatschek’s burner account.
I’ll be honest, I didn’t have Vernon especially high on my list until I saw Eric lay out the case a few years ago and realized it was stronger than I’d thought. Eric leans heavily on Vernon’s playoff success, especially against Fuhr, and correctly points out that the 1980s are badly underrepresented among goalies in the Hall.
That said, our neutral Twitter friend here is making a decidedly dicey argument. To start with, I’m not sure what Vernon’s height and weight have to do with anything, unless we’re supposed to give extra credit to smaller goalies under some sort of Allan Bester exception. Same with his career points and penalty minutes, since I’m pretty sure Vernon is a goaltender. And for the record, he wasn’t a five-time All-Star, at least not in the way we mean when we talk about Hall of Fame cases. We want postseason All-Star selections that are voted on, not the midseason exhibition game version where it was up to some random coach to fill out a roster with whoever was healthy and available. (For the record, Vernon had one second-team All-Star honor, and that’s it.)
Still, I don’t hate the case for Vernon. And he does pass an important if impossible-to-quantify test, in that if you’d told any hockey fan during his peak that Vernon would be in the Hall of Fame someday, they’d have believed you. (This is called passing the Ciccarelli Test, because that is the name I made up for it just now.)
Here’s what the Adjusted Hockey model says:
That feels a little harsh to me. At his peak, I’m pretty sure Vernon was better than the seventh-best goalie of his era. But he’d still be a no for me.
Also, the Allan Bester Exception would be a great name for an indie band.
I’m curious about Joel Quenneville. I’d say the ignominious way his coaching career ended keeps him out, but he has 1,090 wins (second all-time) to go with three Stanley Cups.
Personally, I hope he doesn’t get in, but what do you think? — Baron W.
Really no way to tell. We’re into mostly uncharted waters here, because purely in terms of the numbers, Quenneville is an absolute lock. That won’t be all the committee looks at, and it obviously shouldn’t be, but we’re really not sure how they’ll approach the debate.
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It’s tempting to use this question as an opportunity to point out the weakness of the HHOF system, where 18 old-timers get in a room and debate the candidates without any sort of public scrutiny. If Quenneville has a friend or two on the committee willing to really go to bat for him, that could sway enough votes his way, and the rest of us would never even know who to credit or blame.
Maybe it plays out that way, but I don’t think it happens any time soon. We still don’t even know if Quenneville might coach again, and obviously there’s time for him to either hurt or redeem his public perception. It wouldn’t shock me if he gets in someday, but it could be a very long wait.
Why don’t the records Kessel and Marleau hold make them automatic inductees? — Paul B.
Well, we don’t know whether they do or not because neither guy is eligible yet. But I hope they don’t. They shouldn’t.
Games played records are nice. Ironman records are cool. You can’t get close to a record like that unless you’re a great player, with the talent to stay in a lineup mixed in with work ethic (and of course lots of luck). Any time you’re breaking a record that belongs to Gordie Howe, you know you’ve done something.
That said, should it make anyone a sure thing? Of course not. In Kessel’s case, the record that he broke belonged to Doug Jarvis for decades, and nobody ever pushed Jarvis as a serious candidate. We wouldn’t with Keith Yandle either. As for Marleau, his career games played mark is more impressive, and everyone else in the all-time top 15 is either in the Hall or will be soon. It’s a huge boost to his candidacy. Honestly, it’s probably the only real argument that he has. And maybe it’s enough.
Right now, I’d be willing to bet that Marleau gets in while Kessel falls short. Both are borderline cases, and both deserve to have their games-played records entered into evidence. But enough to make them automatic? No way.
Is Henrik Zetterberg a HOFer? He’s got the team accolades (one Cup, Olympic gold, World Championship), he won the Conn Smythe when Detroit won in 2008, was a finalist for a Selke, and he has the longevity (playing for only one team). Has that one defining moment in his Conn Smythe shift.
But he didn’t reach 1,000 points, was probably never the best player on his team unless you count the later years on a young but bad Red Wings team, only finished top 10 in scoring once, doesn’t have any individual awards outside of the Conn Smythe (which is a pretty big one but a lot of non-HHOFers have won that one), and was only a finalist for one once.
I think his case is interesting. He might get in but the question is if he should. — Mikael H.
Zetterberg is one of those weird ones where there are lots of fans on both sides of the argument but most of them seem to be 100 percent convinced it’s an easy call. Red Wings fans love the guy and think he’s a slam dunk, which is exactly what you’d expect from a fan base that watched a player for 15 years. Others look at a guy who played that long without even cracking 1,000 points or winning any regular-season awards and wonder why he’s even up for discussion.
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Personally, he’s a no for me. He was really good in 2007-08, but even in that year he only finished 10th in Hart voting, so I don’t feel like he ever cracked that really elite level. With Nicklas Lidstrom already in and Pavel Datsyuk close to a lock, the committee might figure that covers the post-Yzerman Red Wings well enough. That said, Zetterberg’s Hockey-Reference comparables include some very Hall-worthy names, so maybe it’s a better case than I think.
Here’s Paul’s chart. His numbers like Zetterberg’s case more than I do.
Let’s close with a lightning round via Twitter, before it mercifully ceases to exist:
Alexander Mogilny
— Barkeater (@Bark_eater) November 9, 2022
Yes, of course. That case was made here, and went into more depth here. Mogilny might be the single biggest head-scratcher among all of the snubs.
Esa Tikkanen?
— Anssi Tapio (@anssita) November 9, 2022
I sure hope not. Tikkanen was a very useful player, and one of the first truly great shadows back when that was a thing. But he had 600 points while playing his peak years in the 80s, so I’m not sure how you can make the case for him. Sure, he had five Cups, but that can’t be enough to get you in. If Tikkanen makes it, who’s next, Kevin Lowe?
Chris Osgood
— Blair Fitzgerald (@19Wings91) November 9, 2022
Nope. I get the case for him. He won games and Cups, and he was better than he sometimes gets credit for. But he had just one year as a Vezina finalist, and a long career of being good on a great team shouldn’t get you into the Hall. His three top Hockey-Reference comparables are Don Beaupre, Mike Vernon and Jaroslav Halak, and while I think Osgood was clearly better than two of those guys, he was never in the elite tier for long.
Getzlaf/Perry
— apathyduck (@apathyduck07) November 9, 2022
I’m an unenthusiastic yes for Getzlaf and a reasonably firm no on Perry. I realize there aren’t many Hart winners who aren’t in, but there are a few — thank you, Jose Theodore — and Perry won’t get all that close to 1,000 points. Yes, he won a bunch, including a Cup and gold medals and all those recent runs to the Final, but was he even one of the five most important players on a single one of those teams? I’ll take Getzlaf’s better career numbers at a more important position and one year as a Hart runner-up if I have to pick between the two.
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And finally …
Paul frickin' Henderson.
— Michael Schatz (@TheRealSchatzie) November 9, 2022
No frickin’ way. Take my Canadian passport if you have to, but the push to put Henderson in the Hall of Fame has always struck me as ridiculous. Yes, he scored arguably the biggest goal in international hockey history. That’s great, and it should absolutely give him a place in the Hall — specifically, in the part of the Hall where they talk about the 1972 series. Play the video, hang up his jersey, build him a statue if you want. But don’t put a guy with just 477 NHL points (and 283 more in the WHA) into the honored players category alongside the game’s true greats.
I’d love Rob Zamuner if he’d scored the winner in Nagano in 1998 but it wouldn’t make him a Hall of Famer. Likewise, Henderson doesn’t have a case. Please stop trying to make this a thing, sportswriters who are even older than me.
(Photo of Anze Kopitar: Harry How / Getty Images)
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