Washington Capitals: Without Lockouts Alex Ovechkin Demolishes Gretzky’s Record

Whether you have been cheering for him as a Washington Capitals fan, a fan from another team, or a flat out hater, I think most have come to accept the inevitable. Unless something very bad happens in the next few months or years, Alex Ovechkin is going to break Wayne Gretzky’s all time goal scoring record. It’s been a wonder for years and years, that wonder turned into serious questioning, now I think we’ve all come to grips that we are in fact watching the greatest to ever put a puck into a goal.

If you had any doubt about him going forward to start this year, I think those doubts have been easily squashed by the way he has started this season. We’re twenty-two games into the season and Ovechkin has scored 19 goals.

That amount of goals is impressive for anybody. Even for the best goal scorer of all time the start to this season has been something else. At age thirty-six Ovechkin is on pace for the best year of his career. He is currently on pace for about 130 points, and if that wasn’t ridiculous enough he is going for 70 goals if he sticks to his current pace. His career highs to this point came back in 2007-08 where he scored 65 goals and 112 points. That was his third season in the NHL. He’s in year seventeen and on pace to crush those numbers.

We’ll see if that happens. We have a long ways to go. It wouldn’t shock me at all if those numbers come down quite a bit and he fails to record career bests. Still, at this point, if Ovechkin doesn’t score over 100 points and over 50 goals this season I think we could consider that a pretty big disappointment at this point.

Fifty goals should probably be expected now. That is thirty-one goals away. If he finishes with exactly 50 goals that would put him at 780 when the season ends. That would put him third all time. He would be 21 goals behind Gordie Howe for second, and just 114 away from “The Great One”.

Being that close to Gretzky amazes me, and kind of bums me out at the same time. It bums me out because Ovechkin has been robbed of a lot of games, and a lot of potential goals thanks to some very annoying things.

By annoying things I’m not even talking about injuries or even pandemics. Injuries happen. They are a part of sports. They have robbed countless athletes of greatness. Unfortunately, they are a big part of sports, there is no way to change that.

Something else you can’t change is illnesses. Viruses and diseases happen all the time. It’s not the first time a virus has swept through a region or the entire planet, it won’t be the last. You can’t really change nature, there is absolutely nothing you can do about that.

What’s really annoying are lockouts. People arguing, mostly over money. “I have millions of dollars, I want more!”. On the other side, “I have billions of dollars, how dare you try to take some of my profits away!”. Money makes the world go around. Lockouts are just another way in proving that.

Two separate lockouts have cost Alex Ovechkin in his journey to catch Gretzky, and his 894 goal record. How many goals has it cost him?

When trying to estimate how many goals or points someone could get or could have gotten I always try to go low. Don’t overestimate, go for a low amount, if someone, or you, passes that mark, then great. Under promise and over deliver, don’t go the other route of over promise under deliver.

So lets shoot low for Ovechkin. We’ve already given him 50 goals this season (even though he’s currently on pace for 70 goals through 22 games this season) putting him at 780 at seasons end. Ovechkin scored 52 goals as a rookie in 2005-06. How many goals does he score if there is a 2004-05 season?

Shoot low. Not many guys come into the NHL and score 50, even though he did and maybe or likely would have a year earlier. Lets not give him 50. Instead lets go super low. Just give him 30. If we add that to what we assume will happen, at the end of this season he could, or should have 810 goals after this season.

Ovechkin was also forced to miss another half season thanks to the lockout that cut the 2012-13 season short. Fortunately for him he was able to play that season, unlike in 04-05, and he was able to put up 32 goals in 48 games. Keeping up that pace he would have scored about 45 goals that season if it was 82 games. That gives him around 13 goals lost. Give him those 13 goals to his assumed mark and he now has 823 goals.

At that point he is 71 goals behind Gretzky and he still has four years left on his current contract.

And we went low! What’s to say Ovechkin wouldn’t have scored 50 in his “true” rookie year? That’s another 20 goals at least. We’re down to 51 goals behind number 99. We also are only giving him 50 goals right now even though he is on pace for 70. Cut that down to 60 and if he were to get that then he would be 41 behind Gretzky after this season. Again, with FOUR YEARS to go!

Bad things happen. Illnesses, injuries, family tragedies, etc. A lot of bad things can force you to miss games and miss opportunities to score goals and points. Lockouts are probably the most annoying. Because out of all of those things they are the most avoidable.

Lockouts have cost Ovechkin a lot of goals. If you were to give Ovechkin that time and those goals when this season ends, if he can keep up his pace this year as well, he would be right on Gretzky’s heels. He would be one good season away from passing the greatest player this game has ever seen.

With no lockouts we wouldn’t be talking about Ovechkin possibly breaking the record. If there were no lockouts we’d be talking about how soon Ovechkin would pass Gretzky, and how badly would he end up demolishing this incredible record.