Hello all, and welcome to the second edition of HockeyBuzz Debates!
Back in May, Travis and I conceived this idea to keep readers interested and to really explore new ideas and new viewpoints on the NHL’s most controversial topics. The first debate focused around a 7th team being brought to Canada, and thanks to some overwhelming feedback, we've decided to bring forward a number of other hotly contested debates for your enjoyment. Without further ado, let's discuss who truly is the best player in the National Hockey League: Sidney Crosby, or Alexander Ovechkin?
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For the sake of argument, I am just talking about the on-ice personality to each player, since the off-ice personality is based a lot of how the player is perceived.
The debate over who is better between Sidney Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin is hard one to make. Both are great players, both bring a lot to their teams, both can do things with a puck that make you question what you’ve been doing with your life.
However, Crosby is just a little bit better. Sure Ovechkin can shoot and can score but Crosby passes just as well (and as often) as he shoots and seems to come up big in big games. If you look on a pure numbers standpoint, Ovechkin has better numbers with 23 more points. However, if you calculate out the points per game, Crosby’s 1.36 PPG is better than Ovie’s 1.33 (splitting hairs I know).
There’s also the fact that Crosby is a winner. Crosby has a ring and two trips to the Cup Finals. While Ovechkin has a room full of hardware, he’s still missing a ring. To make matters worse, his team has never made it out of the second round. Now you could blame goaltending or the bad management of the goaltenders or the defenses but it doesn’t deny the fact that Ovechkin, despite all his individual achievements, still hasn’t even come close to a Stanley Cup.
Meanwhile, Crosby has almost double playoff points that Ovechkin in double the games played. Simply put, you can put all the awards all the accolades on a scale for both sides and none of them match up to winning that cup and that’s what Crosby’s done. He’s led his team to through the playoffs and come out on top.
To make matters worse, when the two were matched up, head-to-head in the playoffs, Crosby’s team has come out on top. Sure you could argue better team but there’s no way around the fact that Crosby beat Ovechkin when it meant the most and even made the primary assist on the game-winning goal that year.
Also factor in that Crosby’s team Canada beat Ovechkin’s team Russia, a game in which neither appeared on the scoresheet, in the Olympics en route to winning Gold, yet another achievement that Ovechkin has yet to experience.
Perhaps the thing about Crosby that is the best, that puts him above Ovechkin, is his two-way play. Ovechkin is fair in his defensive game but he’s more offensive than defensive while Crosby, like all the truly great centers who have played the game, transitions his game from offense to defense when he needs to. When Ovechkin isn’t scoring he’s not as useful to his team. Conversely while Crosby isn’t scoring, he is still playing solid defense and helping out his team in a much more active way than Ovechkin.
Sure Ovechkin might have his hardware, his physical game, his goals and his Geico face but when you put the two against one another, Crosby’s big-game ability and all-around polished game makes him better than Ovechkin’s.
Continue on to read Travis' post about Ovechkin
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