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Bossy could of had a stick like Ovi's. Remember the hook B. Hull had on his stick? What if- Ovi's stick, Getzsky's hands, Bure's speed, Forsberg's intensity, Jagr's hockey sense Have I almost described McDavid?

What if Bossy had Ovi's stick, Datsyuk's hands, MacKinnon's legs...

Wait. What thread is this? Who wins Game 7 - Mike Bossy or Ovi?

I think we forget to count gretzky as a great goal scorer because he wasn't the same kind of sniper that we generally think of now... honestly I'm too young to know if bossy was that kind of player, too. But gretzky was definitely a great goal scorer in the way that Crosby is... It's like his third or fourth best attribute, but he still did it better than almost anyone else.

I object your honour! Calls for speculation. All those episodes of Law and Order have finally paid off. Nailed it.

I think the only fair way to compare players across eras is to compare them relative to their contemporaries. During Bossy's career, the Islanders had 3,322 goals, of which Bossy scored 573 (17.2%). So far in Ovechkin's career, the Caps have 3,093, of which Ovechkin scored 607 (19.6%). If you look at the top goal scorers in Ovechkin's era... his 607 dominates the next best... 411, 384, 382, 379, 375. His goals per game is also tops... 0.61 to Kovalchuk/Stamkos's 0.52 and Crosby's 0.48. Bossy also dominated goal scorers in his era (with the exception of Gretzky, of course)... 573 for Bossy to Gretzky's 543 and Dionne's 461. Trottier is 4th with 378. Looking at goals per game, Bossy is second to Gretzky... 0.86 to 0.76. And ahead of Kurri's 0.68 and Tim Kerr's 0.61. And then, of course, you have to look at the NHL as a whole... in Bossy's era there were 24 different teams that combined for 61,085 goals (2545 goals per team). In Ovechkin's era, 33 teams have combined for 85,953 goals (2604 goals per team). Of course, that's only 10 seasons for Bossy vs. 12.585 seasons for Ovechkin. So goals per team per season for Bossy... 254.5. Goals per team per season for Ovechkin... 208.32. This assumes that the players each played full seasons. Worth noting that Bossy missed some time over his career... a total of 48 games, or 4.8 games per season. Ovechkin has missed 63, or 5.0 games per season. So factoring that in... Ovechkin has scored 22.8% of the Caps' goals in games that he's played. Bossy scored 18.3% of the Isles's goals in games that he played. So I guess I'd conclude... If Ovechkin played in Bossy's era for an average team, averaging approx 3.18 goals per game, and if he played the same number of games as Bossy (752)... you could argue that he'd score 545 goals. And if Bossy played in Ovechkin's era for an average team, averaging approx 2.54 goals per game, and if he played the same number of games as Ovechkin (1003)... you could argue that he'd score 466 goals. So I've spun myself in a circle. All in all, I think I'd say Ovechkin's the "greater" goal scorer, mostly on the grounds that he has nearly a full 0.1 goals per game more than the next guy. Bossy wasn't even the most productive goal scorer of his era... that goes to Gretzky.