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Or, just maybe, we need a different model, a different approach. a different comparison. Say Jari Kurri and Wayne Gretzky in Edmonton. Or Mario Lemieux in Pittsburgh.

Maybe in the most pertinent analysis, McDavid and Draisaitl are more suited to much more of an offensive focus in their game. It would be offence first, defence second, just as it was with Gretzky and Lemieux.

The new NHL game

After the offensive zone was expanded and obstruction rules called more often after the 2005 lock-out, Bowman says the NHL game changed.

The idea was to give more time and space for the game’s best attackers to create in the o-zone. If you could no longer hook and hold them so much, they were more of a threat coming out of the corner. To counter this, NHL coaches started to pack all five defenders into the inner slot, the area right in front of the net where most goals are scored.

This left open the points, so a new defensive task for NHL forwards came to be charging out to those points to block shots. The forwards were no longer in position to deflect shots with sticks, or to pick off passes to and between d-men at the blueline, but they could simply block those shots at net before the outside shot could reach the danger zone, where they might be deflected into the net, or go in because of a screen or a rebound.

Suddenly shot-blocking became a vital skill for an NHL forward.

But this change in the game has made Bowman wonder.

“Scotty can’t even imagine The Rocket blocking shots, or Howe, or Esposito, or Lafleur, Gretzky, or Lemieux….,” Dryden writes of Bowman’s thinking: “Do you want Crosby and Ovechkin and these guys blocking shots? I always wonder, where would Gretzky and Lemieux play in today’s game? They played up high. They were always looking to break out. Do you want them to block shots? I’ve talked to some of the NHL coaches I still know. I say, why can’t you play different styles with different players? It’s only the top two lines who can score anyway. And they’re against the checkers and the checkers can’t score on them, so if the scorers play out further, they’d take away the point shot and be able to jump into the offence. And if the puck gets buy them into the middle near the net, those checkers can’t score anyway. But the coaches just say, ‘The game is too fast. The shifts are too short. It’s too complicated.’ But why? And why don’t they try?”