Adam Kirshenblatt: HHOF Making the Case: Eric Lindros

Adam Kirshenblatt: HHOF Making the Case: Eric Lindros
- MasWE

if he does get in .. does he go in as a flyer?

Who?

if he does get in .. does he go in as a flyer?
- h.buzz

He'll probably have to check with his parents first. Don't be surprised if there is another holdout.


Kidding aside.... Lindros' play is the reason I'm a flyers fan. He was a beast on the ice.

Adam Kirshenblatt: HHOF Making the Case: Eric Lindros
- MasWE

In
no question

He was a force but with not having won a cup and having not really played a whole lot of games ( he was over a ppg though but still didn't get to the 1000 mark ) how much will his attitude and all the other stuff effect what he accomplished on the ice?

Lindros has better numbers then some in already! He's a simple choice for most knowledgeable fans.

He was a force but with not having won a cup and having not really played a whole lot of games ( he was over a ppg though but still didn't get to the 1000 mark ) how much will his attitude and all the other stuff effect what he accomplished on the ice?
- blizzzard

Better numbers then Cam Neely, and others!

Better numbers then Cam Neely, and others!
- twpguy

I guess that's true lol I am just wondering if all the other stuff ends up laying a big role in this or if they do it proper and only look at his on ice accomplishments

Easy answer, YES..

I think he should. He's a reason many people from the Philadelphia area my age are hockey fans at all. He was the best player in the NHL for years, and was probably the most "complete package" I've ever seen. Sadly, all the injuries stalled what was an amazing career.

Still, aside from Lemieux and Gretzky, he was the best player I've ever watched.

Best player I ever saw live. He was an absolute monster. He even sounded different when he skated.

Easy answer, YES..
- Erik6Karlsson5

Yup. Guy is a huge name, especially for people who were growing up around hockey in the 90s. I don't see any way they can keep him out.

Adam Kirshenblatt: HHOF Making the Case: Eric Lindros
- MasWE

Great write-up by the way!

yup all that really happened. Wow....it could almost make a movie. HOF should be based on talent/production and there is no dought he FAR exceeded the talent/production requirement.....Lindros lost me as a fan when he questioned "publically" the training staff. Were there mistakes? sure but that is not what leaders do. There are ways to deal with stuff with out embarrassing your organization who really gave you the keys to the kingdom.
In the end Lindros was his own worst enemy....he really could have been the next one. I don't always blame his parents...although they played a part, Eric was a big boy, he made his own decisions. Those decisions erked a ton of hockey people some of which have a direct connect to the HOF . In the end Bob Clarke is correct, he deserves to be in....And in the end he will get in...in spite of himself.

don't forget he has 2 Olympic medals, 3 World Jr Championships, a Junior Championship, a Canada Cup championship...it is not just his NHL Stats that "should" be considered...since it is the HHOF not the NHL HOF

great article!! Was very fair to all sides considered.

If Neely and Bure are in then there's no way he shouldn't. He put up very good numbers in arguably the hardest era to score.

I would have loved to have seen the LOD play in this era. They would be unstoppable if they were not allowed to be mugged going down the ice.

I had not seen a player be so dominant in every aspect of the game in my 25 years as a fan. Nobody could hit, score, pass, fight, take faceoffs as a total package like he could.

Those same traits also led to his one weakness that ended his playing days. He never had to learn to play with his head up. He never had to.

To keep someone out just because you don't like how they did business is just plain being vindictive. By not allowing one of the games most dominant players to be included in the games history for all times is a travesty.

Lindros lost me as a fan when he questioned "publically" the training staff. Were there mistakes? sure but that is not what leaders do. There are ways to deal with stuff with out embarrassing your organization who really gave you the keys to the kingdom.
- landros 2

If your training staff is making mistakes, I think a player has a right to call them out on it. What people see is a player, who had a history being needy, coming out and criticizing his organization. What people don't see or hear, is the other side, and what was coming out of the mouths of Bobby Clarke and others, who thought Lindros should "man" up and play through the injuries.

Considering the awareness now of concussions, Lindros should be given a pass on being "whiny". Who knows how his career would have panned out if the awareness we have now was there while he was playing?

Even if you put aside all his on ice success aside he was a tremendously influential pioneer in the way we view concussions, and current players should be grateful for the ground work he laid.

If Lindros played today, I have a feeling he would either be shredding the league and winning the scoring title every year, or he would be the victim of headhunting and have his career cut short by guys clipping him, or elbowing him in the head.

Better numbers then Cam Neely, and others!
- twpguy

Cam Neely has 3 50 goal seasons, one of them being 50 goals in less than 50 games which only a few have done. This was also after the Ulf Sameulson hit.

If this was on his play alone, I'd put Lindros even given the short time he was dominant. All the off ice stuff has definitely tainted everyone's view and I think it's a tough sell when there are other guys that were better professionals.

don't forget he has 2 Olympic medals, 3 World Jr Championships, a Junior Championship, a Canada Cup championship...it is not just his NHL Stats that "should" be considered...since it is the HHOF not the NHL HOF
- Pyzik

These are all good points. I will always be a Lindros fan and think he should be a lock for the HHOF. I wonder if that happens, do the Flyers retire his # as they have done for others? Who would ever wear 88 for the Flyers again?

Best player I ever saw live. He was an absolute monster. He even sounded different when he skated.
- MBFlyerfan

Totally agree. I was amazed at how big he was on skates in real life. Hands down should be in the HHOF.

Normally I slant very heavily toward peak value vs. career totals, so on the one hand Lindros seems like he should be a slam dunk. (And just so I get my cards out on the table -- yes, I think Lindros deserves to be in. Definitely.) At his peak he was in a category that only two other guys could really touch.

POINTS PER GAME, 1993-94 THROUGH 1998-99:

1. Lemieux (1.90)
2. Jagr (1.49)
3. Lindros (1.42)
4. Forsberg (1.28)

But the tricky thing for me is that, while Eric Lindros was all-world for about 8 seasons (give or take), he was so frequently out of the lineup that his raw point production, and his value to a team, were significantly reduced relative his level of talent. Even as a ~1.4 ppg player for several years, he only finished in the top-10 in scoring 3 times. A team might reasonably rather have had a lesser player giving them 82 games per year than Lindros giving them 60-65, which was usually about all he could manage.

Here's a Flyers example. Eric Lindros and John LeClair both played together on the Flyers from 1994-95 through 1999-2000, a period of essentially 5 and a half seasons. There's no question that Lindros was the superior player, by a good margin -- 1.35 points per game vs. 1.13. But over that period LeClair still scored 10 more total points and 55 more goals for the Flyers than Lindros, because LeClair practically never missed a game and Lindros was out of the lineup more than 20% of the time.

In effect, even though Lindros was probably the second or third best forward on the planet from 1994 through 2000, with only really Lemieux and Jagr in the discussion, he arguably provided less overall value to his own team, during his own prime, than John LeClair, simply because LeClair could stay in the lineup every night and Lindros could not.

I'm a "sustained peak performance" guy when it comes to assessing Hall worthiness. I don't really care about a player's career totals, and I'm willing to look the other way even for guys who had trouble staying healthy, because what I care about is, basically, how did a player stack up against the best in the NHL over the best, say, 4-6 year stretch of his career? How long was he in the discussion as one of the very very best players in the game? How long was he legitimately in the NHL elite? Lindros put up points at such an unbelievable rate over a long enough period of time that I think his Hall credentials are not really in doubt. He clears my tests easily.

But it's an interesting discussion, and I understand why those who take a different view of what makes a Hall of Famer think differently. If you needed to win 1 game in the mid-to-late 90s and you could pick any center other than Lemieux to play for you, you'd pick Lindros. (Well, unless your opponent was coached by Scotty Bowman and employed Nicklas Lidstrom and Larry Murphy. Sorry.) But if you needed a guy for a whole season and you knew that if you chose Lindros you were probably only going to get 60-65 games out him, of that changes the equation.

If your training staff is making mistakes, I think a player has a right to call them out on it. What people see is a player, who had a history being needy, coming out and criticizing his organization. What people don't see or hear, is the other side, and what was coming out of the mouths of Bobby Clarke and others, who thought Lindros should "man" up and play through the injuries.

Considering the awareness now of concussions, Lindros should be given a pass on being "whiny". Who knows how his career would have panned out if the awareness we have now was there while he was playing?
- KGBflyers10

its a players body....I agree 100 % he can and should question anything he doesn't agree with....but you don't do it through the media or your parents!!!!