2022 NHL Draft Discussion
- Thread starter herman
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Iafrate said:
I think he'd be God.
Heroic Shrimp
New member
It?s quite amazing how the term ?generational? (in its most frequent usage, anyway) has somehow gone from meaning very literally ?once in a generation? to just ?pretty good?.Iafrate said:
Kin
New member
Heroic Shrimp said:
Although, to be somewhat fair, that term has always been a little useless in sports as its pretty rare for any player to be head and shoulders better than everyone else in his generation. Gretzky, Hasek and Lemieux were all born within four years of each other. Crosby and Ovechkin are two years apart. McDavid and Matthews were born 9 months apart.
Sports, for the most part, always seems to have sort of a Newton's third law thing.
Nik- what you?re saying makes sense, maybe the term generation is meant to represent eras in the sports league, which are shorter than actual generations. So different eras can have different ?generational? players, which to me are players that are head and shoulders above their peers. Like Gagne for the flyers. (There?s a callback I?m sure most won?t remember).
It?s not an exact science and there will be overlap but that?s how I see it.
It?s not an exact science and there will be overlap but that?s how I see it.
Heroic Shrimp
New member
There?s surely gotta be a few users of the ?generational? tag who somehow think it means something like ?they generate offence?.
Bullfrog
Active member
Heroic Shrimp said:
Off-topic: I can't stand "decimate", which once literally meant "to reduce by 1/10th" now means essentially the exact opposite. When people say "the team was decimated", my brain thinks: "so it was reduced by 1 out of 10 people in an effort to motivate through fear?"
Bullfrog said:
I'll decimate my usage of the word decimate based on what you have told me about the word decimate. Before I would use the word decimate to describe a situation in which things had been reduced radically, which as you say is not the proper connotation of the word decimate. Moving forward, if someone asks why I am not using the word decimate, I will explain what the word decimate means, based on your post about the definition of the word decimate. That way I will propagate the proper usage of the word decimate, and hopefully it will get used properly so we don't have the whole literally/figuratively thing happen again, where literally can now mean either literally or figuratively. In order to decimate my usage of the word, I won't include this last sentence.
Nik said:
The way I view it, ?generational? means ?the best player over a multi-year period at his position? or perhaps ?best at X over many years? where X is pretty important (eg: goal scoring). Gretzky was the best player in the early-mid 80s. Lemieux was probably the best player in the late 80s, early 90s. And sure there was some overlap but no biggie. These are rough guidelines and fuzzy definitions. Hasek plays a different position so he can be a generational goaltender. Crosby can be a generational player. Ovechkin can be a generational goal scorer.
It takes a few years to establish one?s self as a generational player rather than a flash in the pan. McDavid seems to be a the best of his generation. Matthews might be a generational scorer like Ovechkin but I think he needs several more Richard trophies to cement it.
