I have a little project I'm doing for each team's board. I want to put together all-time teams for all 30 teams.
I'm starting with the Pens of course since this is my home board. Here are the rules...
1) must be past or present player
2) must have dressed for at least 1 game for the team.
3) must have 4 lines, 3 d-pairings, and 2 goaltenders, and 5 players on the pine 1 must be a goaltender.
4) if a player is classified as having a secondary position you may use him there.. Otherwise use him at his natural position (Example: Staal C/LW this season)
Why am I doing this you ask...
I found a website called nhl94.com You are able to play NHL '94 using a genesis or SNES emulator...The best thing about it is you can edit everything about it using graphics editing progs.
I plan releasing an HFboards all-time version...
I'm going to give this 10 days and on sunday, May 6th I'll start tallying votes...Each player mentioned will get a point...The final lineups will be derived from it...
This is pretty difficult, I had to look at some rosters year to year just so I wouldn't leave any possibilities out, but this is what I came up with. I tried to base it on people who I thought of as Penguins, rather than just talented 1 or 2 year stints, also mixing both recent and past.
Lemieux - Crosby - Jagr
Recchi - Francis - Kovalev
Stevens - Malkin - Tocchett
Straka - Lang - Pronovost
The toughest part was trying to recall solid Dmen of Penguins past, because honestly we haven't had all that many defensemen whose fortes were playing defense.
i don't know that i'm a big fan of including Staal or Malkin on the list. I mean....I admit I don't know tons of our history and all, but for Staal especially to be considered one of our top players ever.....after just one year. I don't know.....just pretty crazy.
i don't know that i'm a big fan of including Staal or Malkin on the list. I mean....I admit I don't know tons of our history and all, but for Staal especially to be considered one of our top players ever.....after just one year. I don't know.....just pretty crazy.
Agree. It's waaay too early to pencil in guys like Malkin and Staal, when they only just finished their rookie campaigns. Not to mention it's a disrespect to a lot of earlier generation players who have been with the team longer. And there are also some head-scratchers in there - Robert Lang? Ryan friggin Whitney?! Markus Naslund didn't blossom with us. His best years came after he left the Pens. Including him would be like including John LeClair.
Where are guys like Mike Bullard, Randy Carlyle, Syl Apps, Rick Kehoe, Bryan Trottier? Other borderline candidates include Greg Malone, Ron Stackhouse, Bob Errey, Randy Hillier, Doug Bodger etc.
Only one game qualifies huh? I'd definitely amend that. Otherwise players who had insignificant careers with teams can be included.
F:
Mario Lemieux
Jaromir Jagr
Kevin Stevens
Ron Francis
Bryan Trottier
Luc Robitaille
Jean Pronovost
Rick Tocchet
Andy Bathgate
Joe Mullen
Rick Kehoe
Sidney Crosby
D:
Paul Coffey
Randy Carlyle
Tim Horton
Larry Murphy
Sergei Zubov
Leo Boivin
G:
Tom Barrasso
MA Fleury (very weak goalie history)
I will agree that including Staal is premature, but Malkin isn't far-fetched. How many rookies have scored 85 pts in Penguin history? If Crosby is only a 2nd year player but a shoo-in for candidacy then I have no shame in putting Malkin in the roster, I'd wager that he's among the top 10 more talented Penguins forwards who've had significant roles with the team.
I understand the viewpoint of honoring certain guys like Errey, Mullen, Trottier, Malone, Hillier etc, but my judgment came from guys I thought were the most talented/dominating combine with their service record with the Pens. For example I'd probably prefer the Penguins version of Lang over the Penguins version of Trottier if I were building a team and had to choose. This isn't stating that Lang > Trottier in their careers, I just choose one over the other based on their abilities as Penguins at those times and ages in their career.
The only thing I'd change about my lineup perhaps is Mullen over Straka, although Straka's speed as a Penguin beats out Mullen's goal-scoring prowess as a Penguin, especially considering where I'd have him down the depth chart.
I'd probably throw Lemieux, Jagr, Francis, Crosby and Malkin/Kovalev out on the power play together.
that's a very classic lineup of forwards. again, not the same system I'm working by for putting guys in the lineup, but if you're going for strictly classic Pens that's about as good as you'd get. The only thing I'd change personally would be Robitaille seeing as he only suited up for 46 games and got traded before I even got to take the price tags off of my new Pens Robitaille jersey I bought back in the day. But overall career-wise he'd definitely be a top 6 guy in the Pens lineup.
Forwards:
Lemieux C
Crosby C
Francis C
Apps C
GMalone C
Jagr RW
Kovalev RW
Stevens LW
Bullard RW
Kehoe RW
Pronovost LW
Mullen RW
Straka LW
Recchi RW
Quinn C
Kevin Stevens - Mario Lemieux - Jaromir Jagr
Mike Bullard - Ron Francis - Jean Pronovost
Rod Schutt - Syl Apps - Joe Mullen
Luc Robitaille - Pierre Larouche - Alexei Kovalev
Paul Coffey - Ron Stackhouse
Randy Carlyle - Moe Mantha
Larry Murphy - Ulf Samuelsson
Tom Barrasso
Les Binkley
Extras
Sidney Crosby
Michel Briere
Rick Kehoe
Dave Burrows
Marc-Andre Fleury
Stevens - Lemieux - Jagr
Recchi (circa 1990) - Francis - Kovalev
Dahntahn Robbie Brahn - Crosby - Kehoe
Jean Provanost - Pierre LaRouche - Joey Mullen
D-men:
Coffey - Carlyle
Ulfie - Murphy
Gonchar - Dave Burrows
Goalies:
Barr*******
Binkley
Wow, this was a lot harder than I thought it would be. So many great players, so few spots. I couldn't fit Roman Simicek in there anywhere, what a shame. But seriously, I had to fit in Robbie as a "Sentimental Favorite"
Francis - Lemieux - Jágr
Robitaille - Crosby - Kovalev
Stevens - Malkin - Tochett (this line would be dynamite!)
Smolinski - Barnes - Kehoe (Try to score on this line...)
(Recchi, Mullen)
Only one game qualifies huh? I'd definitely amend that. Otherwise players who had insignificant careers with teams can be included.
F:
Mario Lemieux
Jaromir Jagr
Kevin Stevens
Ron Francis
Bryan Trottier
Luc Robitaille
Jean Pronovost
Rick Tocchet
Andy Bathgate
Joe Mullen
Rick Kehoe
Sidney Crosby
D:
Paul Coffey
Randy Carlyle
Tim Horton
Larry Murphy
Sergei Zubov
Leo Boivin
G:
Tom Barrasso
MA Fleury (very weak goalie history)
I find it very difficult to disagree with this lineup. Maybe add 3 more to fill out the 23 man roster. Ulf, another goalie, and one of Naslund, Malkin or Recchi ('90).
If your going to have this on every board -- you are going to have duplicate players. Now someone like Tocchet was a good Pen (only 179 career games) for a minimal time but he really belongs on the Flyers team. Same for Trottier. Dont know if you care about dups, but just a thought.
I'm not about to put a team together, but I'll tell ya I wouldn't leave Kjell Samuelsson off... IMO he's the most underrated defender of all time. Rarely a mistake on his resume.
If your going to have this on every board -- you are going to have duplicate players. Now someone like Tocchet was a good Pen (only 179 career games) for a minimal time but he really belongs on the Flyers team. Same for Trottier. Dont know if you care about dups, but just a thought.
That was the plan all the way...Seeing how L.A., Edmonton, St. louis, and the Rangers would throw a gripe if Gretzky were left off of their lists...
That was the plan all the way...Seeing how L.A., Edmonton, St. louis, and the Rangers would throw a gripe if Gretzky were left off of their lists...
I know their fans probably would probably disagree, but it shouldn't be that much of a blasphemy if you leave Gretz off the St. Louis all-time lineup. His one season there was unspectacular to say the least.
