In our reader mailbag, I mentioned that I was way off when I picked a group of players I thought to be close to Taylor Hall in era-adjusted offensive production:

Second thing - before running the comps for Hall, I picked out four names that I guessed would be close comparables for Taylor Hall at this point. When I ran through the numbers, I was way off.

The group that I selected was Pavel Bure, Jari Kurri, Mark Messier, Mike Modano, and Rick Nash.

Era-Adjusted Points/82 Age Kurri Bure Modano Nash Messier Hall 18



63 49

58 19



58 68 31 80 20 64 65 72 81 56 103 21 74 90 77 65 69 ?



Nope.



Hall is well clear of all of them already, and in their draft +4 seasons, the group posted an era-adjusted average of 75 points, or (assuming goal-scoring will remain mostly steady) 67 points in 82 games in 2013-14.

I asked for feedback in the comments from our readers to see if they had any of the same inklings that I did:

Take a moment and leave a comment with the four players you feel are close comparables for Taylor Hall at this point in his career.

The answers included: Glenn Anderson, Jason Arnott, Peter Forsberg x 3, Ron Francis, Mike Gartner, Dale Hawerchuk x 4, Bobby Hull, Ales Hemsky, Jarome Iginla x 2, Jaromir Jagr, Patrick Kane x 3, Paul Kariya, Ilya Kovalchuk x 3, Mark Messier x 3, Mike Modano x 2, Rick Nash x 4, Owen Nolan, Adam Oates, Jeremy Roenick, Joe Sakic x 6, Jason Spezza, Eric Staal, Mats Sundin x 2, John Tavares x 3, Keith Tkachuk, Jonathan Toews, Pierre Turgeon x 2, Steve Yzerman x 2.

The four closest comparables for Taylor Hall are listed in the table below:

Era-Adjusted Points/82 Age Kane Sakic Hall Kovalchuk Kariya 18 79 58 58 74

19 76 85 80 77 68 20 95 97 103 103 103 21 90 96 ?

102 121

Taylor Hall's closest era-adjusted comps are Paul Kariya, Ilya Kovalchuk, Joe Sakic and Patrick Kane with Dale Hawerchuk as the next near-miss. In their draft +4 seasons, that group posted an average of 102 era-adjusted points, or (assuming goal-scoring will remain mostly steady) 91 points in 82 games in 2013-14. But Paul Kariya's gargantuan 121 was posted in a hold-out shortened season. The rest of the group posted an average of 96 era-adjusted points, or 86 points in 82 games in 2013-14.

Can Taylor Hall manage 1.05 points per game in 2013-14 and keep company with actual* Hall of Fame talent?





*Not Hall of Fame talent as currently defined where everyone who is now old, or who was nice to the media during their time in the NHL gets in regardless of deservedness.