Am I the only one who would take a healthy Palffy over a healthy Mogilny?
 

I really liked Palffys game, he was a horse, i think he had a bit better skillset. Was able to carry a weak offense on his back.

When Mogilny wanted to play, he was the superior player. Huge Palffy fan here, but he never played any important games in his career, not sure how much of that was on him or not.

I would take Mogilny for sure but then I'm not as huge of a Palffy fan as some are believe it or not so perhaps I wouldn't be the best person to ask. He was a fantastic player for sure but some think he is on another level entirely.

Palffy played in playoff games, which are important games by any sensible definition.

I was probably the biggest Palffy fan outside of Long Island, but if you stack them up against each other playing their best it's not close. Mogilny all the way.

That's exactly why I take Palffy. Mogilny was only a star a small portion of the time.

Superior player? Not even close. Mogilny was a terrible playoff performer so it doesnt really matter if he played in more important games.

When healthy Palffy is guaranteed top 15 scorer, so I would take him.

Mogilny’s top-20 PPG finishes: 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, 14, 14, 18
Palffy’s top-20 PPG finishes: 2, 4, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 20

Beyond their two best seasons, they’re practically identical in terms of per-game production when healthy.

Palffy takes this by having the demonstrably better peak.

Wait, what alternate universe am I in? Palffy played in 24 playoff games his entire career...

That was the problem. Palffy consistently showed up to play, Mogilny did not. Going into a season, Palffy could be counted on for 30+ goals and 80+ points (if healthy), Mogilny could have either a clearly better or a clearly worse year depending on whether he felt like putting in an effort.

Palffy was the better player when healthy, Mogilny had the better career.

http://www.hockey-reference.com/play...order_by=goals

If you take the time to explain, properly, to your kids one day, about what the period known as the Dead Puck Era was all about, I'm going to suggest that they will be very surprised to learn that a 5'10 'soft' player that they never heard of was #4 in points per game in that period.

More difficult to identify would be one of his team mates anywhere on the first page of this list.

Palffy had three great offensive years on a terrible NYI team that never saw the playoffs. He was the ONLY offensive player on that bad team and he scored a lot of points. I'm not doubting his skillset, his hands and vision were outstanding.

But I'm curious why NO TEAM seemed to want him for a playoff run? Even later in his career, was there nobody who wanted this player to put them over the top? He wasn't exactly known for anything except a regular season point producer.

Mogilny was definitely inconsistent but when he was on his game he was unstoppable. His peak (76G, 55G) was far superior to Palffy's, not just his longer career.

I'm an Isles fan and a Palffy fan but let's not revisit history and fall in love with the stats. Palffy was very inconsistent in his effort as well, he just managed to produce a lot of points along the way. Neither will be confused with Gary Roberts or Ryan Smyth or Ryan Callahan or Zach Parise in terms of effort out there.

I know Palffy had great stats. But there's no way he was better than Mogilny. My eyes are deceitful at times and memories can be altered with age, but not in this case.

Yes, its pretty funny that his most skilled teammate in Islanders were Travis Green (Palffy reached 90pts). Then he had Robert Reichel. I think in 98 the lines were something like

Nemchinov - Reichel - Palffy
Chorske - Smolinski - Bertuzzi
Hough - Green - Czerkawski
Before the trades that sent Green to the ducks and Bert to Vancouver.

Beacuse he was a young guy and Milbury officially went out before every deadline and said hes not trading Palffy. He was then traded for some pretty hyped up prospects like Jokinen, Green, Biron and a 1st (I think Isles selected Pyatt with the pick).

Remember how shocked everyone were when he announced his retirement?

Bertuzzi - Reichel - Palffy
Dawe - Smolinski - Czerkawski
Hough - Nemchinov - Chorske
Odjick - Lapointe - Sacco

then they got Linden at the deadline, for Bertuzzi & McCabe.
Isles also had a young Zdeno Chara on defense, but he was tall and awkward and couldn't move his feet well, tended to make defensive zone mistakes.....it was probably best he was moved. :sarcasm:

Reichel was a 90pt guy in Calgary as well.

Palffy never had talent around him, no argument there, but being able to produce points without great talent around you doesn't necessarily mean you're a great player. Alexei Yashin had some nice success (personally) with Sean McEachern and Andreas Dackel.



Milbury was pretty outspoken about being forced to trade Palffy because the owners wanted the team payroll rock bottom (sound familiar Wang?) - I believe (from faded memory) that the team payroll was supposed to be in the 12-14M range (oh how times have changed NHLPA!!!)

He didn't get fair value for Palffy, even Milbury has talked about how tough it is to trade from such a position of weakness.

I voted Palffy on a technically sort of. Meaning I'd probably take healthy and motivated Mogilny first (the few times that happened), but the OP didn't specify motivated, so I picked Palffy, who was consistently an elite scorer when he was healthy.

im pretty sure 100% of the fans of buffalo, Vancouver, Toronto and NJ who were lucky enough to watch him play full multiple seasons would agree that Almo was a vastly superior player. I duno what the haters think about him, but the guy was elite in pretty much every facet of the game, and his physical play is highly underrated, Almo threw some big hits, and not just once in a blue moon.

Well, how was he supposed to be known for anything else when he never played on a playoff team?

Last I checked, I'm a NJ fan who watched 90%+ of the games that Mogilny played with the team.

2000-01 in NJ was one of the few seasons in his career when he was healthy and motivated, and as great as it was, he still didn't finish top 10 in points for the season

And he was pretty clearly not elite in terms of defensive play; the only Devils I've seen take a regular shift on the team who were worse defensively were Ilya Kovalchuk and possibly Scott Gomez.

Yeah, I know.

The poster to which I was responding claimed that Palffy played in zero important games.

Which is not so.

I honestly think Palffy gets overrated on here sometimes (runs and hides)

Im prettysure Chorske and Smolinski played with Bertuzzi (although they got split up at times), the CBS-line. Bertuzzi didnt play much as a 1st liner and there were doubts if he was ever going to be a star.


I forgot about Dawe, yes he was the second liner for sure. Point is Palffy played with some remarkably bad supporting cast. Was Dawe on the Linden - Czerkawski line after the trade?

Yea, I remember the owners wanting him to but Im certain that he also stated that he told the owners he wouldn't. Until he finally got forced to do it and traded him to the Kings.

I'm always out to lunch, but, on my own terms, I wouldn;t even have made this poll. Ziggy is clearly above Mogilny for me. Being motivated is part of the package - Mogilny had one insane year, in a year where a lot of guys had insane years, and he played with another under rated stud in Laffy.

Kariya vs. Palffy would be a more even comparo, to me, but, like I said, I don't line up with consensus too often.

This is just opinion and doesn't mean all that much but should be thrown ou there as food fro thought.

As an NYR fan watching these two in their primes I was never really worried when Palfy had the puck but when Almo had the puck you took notice and were on the edge of your seat till the play was broken up.

Stats have their place in arguements but they dont tell the whole story.