Quote:
Originally Posted by QuietCompany
Would anyone know anything about the following players and how good they might have been? Some of them aren't on that HHOF monitor above though I'd guess that the majority would be below 500.
All of them minus Mickey Roach, Hebert, and Milks won a championship and they all played 200+ games. Hebert and Milks' adjusted pts totals are fairly good.
Alex Smith
Mickey Roach
Jimmy Herbert
Hib Milks
Albert Leduc
Bert McCaffrey
Billy Coutu
Normie Himes
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Very little is known of Alex Smith. LOH says he was an “excellent” defenseman and he was often in the bottom half of the top-10 in defense scoring. No all-star recognition but his prime was before 1931.
Mickey Roach, I don’t know how he played, but he was somewhat of a 2nd or 3rd tier offensive star. Underwhelming offensive stats when you look at what he was scoring compared to the top scorers.
Jimmy Herbert(s) was an excellent player. He was tough and a very strong scorer. He was 7th and 8th in Hart voting and absolutely carried his teams those seasons. Check out their scoring stats and look how far ahead he was.
Hib Milks I always thought of as a bit of a poor man’s Herberts. Often flirted with the top-10 in goals, assists, and points. Had a serious drinking problem.
Battleship Leduc had a few high scoring seasons as a defenseman and was a strong hitter, hence the name. Questionable defensive ability, otherwise he’d get more all-star recognition (he got none that I know of)
Bert McCaffrey was an excellent 2nd tier player who played forward and D. Senior star before he joined the NHL. Was the NHL’s oldest player when he finally retired. Search my name and mccaffrey, you’ll find a nice bio on him.
Billy Coutu was a rough, tough defenseman who played in the NHL’s inaugural pre-merger seasons and was a top pairing defenseman for years for the Habs. He was an offensive non-factor and there’s very little suggesting he was a good defensive player either. He might have been the first goon (while at the same time I recognize he had to be good to have one of just 15-20 top league defense jobs that existed). He eventually got a lifetime ban for attacking a ref but was just following coach’s orders.
Normie Himes was a little sparkplug of a center who, along with Roy Worters, was all the NY Americans had going for them for a while. He was frequently in the top-20 in goals, assists and points for his 6-year prime, and exploded for a high top-10 finish once, which earned him Hart recognition. He was small and not dominant physically but it seems he was a fearless player who would push back.
