Thoughts on Daniel Alfredsson and the Hockey Hall of Fame

As the Hockey Hall of Fame’s class of 2020 was recognized and enshrined on Monday night, it felt like the perfect opportunity to explore the merits of Daniel Alfredsson’s candidacy.

Alfredsson became first eligible in 2017 and has been overlooked in each of his four years on the ballot. Thanks to the pandemic, a 2021 class will not be honoured. But, with first-year eligibles like Roberto Luongo, Daniel and Henrik Sedin, and Henrik Zetterberg joining the holdovers, many pundits are already looking ahead to 2022 balloting and projecting who may win.

The Athletic re-ran their mock Hockey Hall of Fame committee piece from last year Monday and not surprisingly, Alfredsson failed to make the cut. Ignoring the results and the hilarious fact that Alfredsson garnered the same level of support as Mike Vernon, the article did a fantastic job of highlighting how the actual voting process unfolds.

An 18-member selection committee convenes to nominate players and make a case for their inclusion. In order for a player to be elected, 14 votes are needed. The process begins with the first ballot and once the results are known, players who receive: 1) the required 14 votes; or 2) one or fewer votes; are removed from the second ballot. On the second ballot, committee members are only permitted to vote for up to three candidates.

Based on The Athletic’s mirrored selection committee, their process really demonstrated how important it is to have strong voices in that room making convincing arguments and supporting a player’s candidacy.

For players who spent most of their career in a small market during the era that preceded social media and massive broadcasting deals, having a strong backing voice is paramount to getting elected.

One of the problems facing Alfredsson is that Ottawa’s too polite of a city. It feels like the prevailing attitude is that Alfredsson will eventually get in on his own without any lobbying.

Kevin Lowe and Guy Carbonneau were fine players, but their enshrinement speaks to the power of having influential voices within the selection committee who can sway their peers.

Having Pierre McGuire and Anders Hedberg as Hockey Hall of Fame selection committee members should theoretically benefit Alfredsson. McGuire was hired as the Senators’ senior vice-president of player development this past summer and Hedberg was the Senators’ director of player personnel from 2002 through 2007. Whether the erosion of the relationship between Eugene Melnyk and Alfredsson will impact McGuire’s voice in these meetings remains to be seen, but one can never underestimate the pettiness of the Senators owner.

When I see the inclusion of the Lowes and Carbonneau’s or see pundits write about how the Sedins should be slam dunk candidates in 2022, it bothers me. It is absolutely criminal how disrespected and overlooked Alfredsson’s career is.

It needs to change.

The media and the Senators organization need to do more to amplify the merits of Alfredsson’s career.

Having Elliotte Friedman write in his ‘31 Thoughts’ column that “atop (his) Hall of Fame ‘need to get in list’ are Daniel Alfredsson and Rod Brind’Amour,” is a start. Having Ian Mendes recognize his platform and acknowledge that he will do everything in his power to draw more attention to Alfredsson’s career is huge. If the national platforms pick it up and become vehicles to create momentum, it will only help.

Alfredsson’s NHL numbers are certainly worthy of consideration on their own. His 1,157 points in 1,246 games currently ranks him 54th all-time in NHL scoring. Only 63 players have scored more career goals than Alfie’s 444 goals. Alfredsson is one of only 15 players to have scored more than 130 power play goals and 25 shorthanded goals. His 73 game-winning goals are tied for the 47th most in NHL history.

He entered the league at the beginning of the 1995-96 season and left following the 2013-14 campaign. Only four players — Jaromir Jagr, Teemu Selanne, Joe Thornton and Jarome Iginla — outproduced Alfie during that span of time.

When his numbers are adjusted for era, the strength of Alfredsson’s candidacy grows stronger. Using Hockey-Reference’s data, Alfredsson’s adjusted goals (492, 48th) and points totals (1,261, 34th) move him further up the scoring list.

He was not only one of the more productive players of his era, he was one of his countrymen. Among Swedish-born NHLers, Alfredsson ranks second all-time behind only Mats Sundin in goals and points. He was also the first European captain in NHL history to lead his team to the Stanley Cup Final.

Thanks to the era of analytics, we know that most players experience the prime years of their respective careers between 22 and 27 years of age. At that stage, production tends to plateau and diminish to 31 years of age. After 31 years of age, production and play tend to erode at a significantly faster rate.

Unfortunately for Daniel Alfredsson, his prime occurred between the 1995-96 and 1999-00 seasons — well before the era of websites that made tracked shot and goal data publicly available.

The modern statistical era only began capturing data at the start of the 2007-08 season. In other words, the only segment of Alfredsson’s career that we have significant data on is his age 35 through 41 years of age seasons.

What we do know about that time?

At five-on-five, Alfredsson continued his excellent two-way play. Despite playing on some porous defensive teams that had to play high-event hockey to preserve their competitiveness, Alfredsson remained an important defensive contributor per HockeyViz’s data.

Although he was advanced in age, Alfredsson was still a valuable player. Evolving-Hockey’s ‘goals above replacement’ (GAR) and ‘wins above replacement’ are two different measures reflecting a player’s value. And during this span of time, Alfredsson accrued a GAR of 70.8 and a WAR of 12.0. By these metrics, Alfredsson was within the top 50 most valuable skaters (47th by GAR, T-46th by WAR) during this period.

How Alfredsson Fares Relative to the Other HHOF Eligibles

In addition to Alfredsson, the rest of the 2022 Hockey Hall of Fame eligibles consists of: Rod Brind’Amour, Patrick Elias, Theo Fleury, Sergei Gonchar, Curtis Joseph, Vincent Lecavalier, Roberto Luongo, Alex Mogilny, Jeremy Roenick, Daniel Sedin, Henrik Sedin, Keith Tkachuk, Mike Vernon and Henrik Zetterberg.

For the purpose of comparison, I'll refrain from analyzing Alfredsson’s case against that of the goaltenders or a defenceman like Gonchar.

Here is how the players’ career numbers shake out:

Of these players, the only ones who have scored more than Alfredsson’s 444 career goals are Brind’Amour, Fleury, Mogilny, Roenick and Tkachuk.

Once the era is adjusted for using Hockey-Reference’s data, only Roenick and Tkachuk rank ahead of Alfredsson’s 492.

In terms of career points, only two players have put up more: Brind’Amour and Roenick.

Adjusting for era once again, no one on this list is projected to have had more than Alfredsson’s 1,261 adjusted points.

Knowing that Alfredsson was more productive for his era than pretty much everyone on this list is pretty remarkable considering the context.

For any Senators fan who had the opportunity to watch Alfredsson’s career play out, you realize that what makes it so unique is that he often spent most of it playing away from his team’s best offensive players.

Looking at the great forwards that Ottawa had from the mid-90’s through Alfredsson’s departure following the 2012-13 season, that may sound odd. The Senators roster featured All-Stars like Alexei Yashin, Marian Hossa, Martin Havlat, Radek Bonk, Jason Spezza and Dany Heatley.

Alfredsson would spend time with these players at various points, but he never really played regularly with elite forwards at even strength.

Put this in contrast with the Sedins, for example. They spent 17 years together playing as linemates and according to one Sportsnet article highlighting their careers, the twins combined on 743 goals for the Canucks.

“Only Wayne Gretzky and Jari Kurri combined on more tallies, connecting on 764 during their time together.”

Like the Sedins, Alfredsson spent 17 years playing in a Canadian city. After digging through and cataloguing all of the Hockey-Reference’s scoring logs for Alfredsson’s Senators career, I have some numbers for comparison’s sake.

Alfredsson played parts of nine seasons with Spezza. Together, the duo combined on 216 scores. (Note: scorings plays: Alfredsson assisting on a Spezza goal, Spezza assisting on an Alfie goal, or the two combining to set up a third player.)

Their greatest and most productive hockey began during the 2005-06 season when they were flanked by Dany Heatley. With Pizza Pizza offering a promotion that gave fans in attendance a free slice of pizza whenever the Senators scored more than five goals in a home game, the ‘Pizza Line’ was born.

The trio had a solid four-year stretch, but even looking at Alfredsson’s scoring data with Heatley, the duo combined on 149 scores. Even if you add that figure to Alfredsson’s 216 scoring links with Spezza — ignoring the fact that this combined figure would be inflated because this trio would have combined on goals where all three were credited with a point — the number still pales in comparison to the combined 743 goals that the Sedins totalled. In fact, even if you add in the next four highest scoring totals of forwards playing with Alfie — Alexei Yashin (104), Mike Fisher (94), Shawn McEachern (77) and Todd White (77) — it still falls short of the Sedin’s mark.

Due to his position and Jacques Martin’s philosophy that scoring depth is better than playing talented offensive players together, Alfredsson’s offensive numbers could have been better if he played more even-strength minutes with Ottawa’s more skilled centres.

Of the 104 scores that Alfredsson combined with Alexei Yashin on during their five years on the Senators, almost 52-percent of those goals came on the power play.

Mike Fisher and Todd White were the next two centres that Alfredsson put up the most number of points with, but neither player will be mistaken for a dynamic offensive talent. Fisher’s numbers are a result of him and Alfredsson spending 11 seasons together on the same team. White displayed some offensive aptitude in the minors before joining Ottawa in his mid-20’s, but he provided some serviceable and inexpensive offence for the small market Senators.

The other skilled centre that the Senators had at the time was Radek Bonk, but Jacques Martin preferred to line him up with Marian Hossa. Alfredsson did combine on 56 goals with Bonk, but 60.1-percent of those occurred on the power play.

If playing Alfie with other skilled centres was not going to happen, another alternative could have been swapping Martin Havlat or Marian Hossa to their off-side. Unfortunately, the only times they appeared with Alfredsson were on the power play. Only 8.1-percent of the 37 goals that Hossa and Alfie combined on were scored at even-strength. With Havlat, that number improved somewhat with 24.1-percent of their 29 goals occurring at even-strength.

Those are just the regular season results. Even if you look at the postseason, Alfredsson outproduced many of the other eligibles. The only players who registered more postseason points than Alfredsson’s 100 (T-100th) are Brind’Amour (111, 78th), Elias (125, T-53rd), Roenick (122, T-56th) and Zetterberg (120, T-59th).

So why are the Sedins considered shoo-ins when Alfredsson isn’t?

A lot of it comes down to this belief that hardware should be a significant deciding factor.

Although the twins have never won a Cup, Henrik won the Hart Trophy for his 200-10 season while each twin has won the Art Ross Trophy — Henrik in 2009-10 and Daniel in 2010-11. Both players have been recipients of the King Clancy Memorial Trophy and have been named as NHL First-Team All-Stars.

Alfredsson has won his share of individual hardware. He won the Calder Trophy and was named to the All-Rookie First Team for his 2005-06 season. Like the Sedins, he also has a King Clancy Memorial Trophy under his belt. Alfie won the Mark Messier NHL Leadership Award following his 2012-13 season. And finally, he was also named to the NHL’s Second All-Star Team for his 2005-06 season.

Daniel Alfredsson has appeared in the same number of All-Star Games (6) as the Sedin twins — had you added their careers together. Of course, I say this in jest because many people don’t take All-Star Game nominations seriously when all teams have to be represented and the most deserving players aren’t necessarily the ones who are there.

In a similar vein, however, an issue I have with individual hardware being definitively used for Hall of Fame judgment purposes is that the balloting process isn’t infallible either. One of the highlights from Hailey Salvian’s recent piece detailing a number of untold stories about Jarome Iginla and the 2001-02 Hart Trophy balloting. That year Jose Theodore tied Iginla with the same number of points, but won the tie-breaker having more first-place votes. Salvian then let it be known that one Montreal journalist strategically omitted Iginla from their ballot to help Theodore win the award. Had this same writer given Iginla just a fifth-place vote, Iggy would have been named the league’s most valuable player.

Transparency in the balloting process has helped move things along in the modern era, but it does nothing to help remedy the voting problems of the past. Unfortunately, it is just something that we have to live with and be cognizant of.

On the international stage, Daniel Alfredsson shines like one of those gold helmets that you get to wear after you win the SHL championships.

Alfredsson has represented Sweden at 14 international tournaments — winning Olympic gold in 2006 and silver in 2014. At the World Championships, his teams have medalled four times — silver twice (1995, 2004) and bronze twice (1999, 2000). During the 2004-05 NHL labour stoppage, Alfredsson returned to Frolünda HC. All Alfie did there was lead the league in playoff goals (12) and points (18) while stewarding his club to a league championship. For his efforts, Alfie was named as an Eliteserien All-Star.

According to Eliteprospects.com’s ‘International All-Time Stats Leaderboard’, Alfredsson is the 36th-highest scoring player of all-time. In 154 contests, Alfredsson has scored 42 goals and 115 points — which is good for the fourth-highest total of any Swedish-born player and puts him ahead of other greats like Mats Sundin and Hakan Loob.

His impressive list of international accomplishments eventually helped Alfredsson be elected into the IIHF Hall of Fame in 2018.

Other candidates like Alexander Mogilny and Theo Fleury provide excellent examples of individuals persevering to overcome incredibly arduous circumstances to develop into Hall of Fame talents. Mogilny being the first draftee to defect from the Soviet Union to play in the NHL is a significant historical accomplishment in itself before one even considers his impressive resume. Fleury, on the other hand, was listed at 5’6” and battled through alcoholism to cope with the irreparable harm and sexual abuse that Graham James subjected him to years earlier.

Alfredsson’s story pales in comparison to those unimaginable journeys to the NHL, but as a sixth-round pick (133rd overall, 1994) who broke into the league at 23-years old, he still has a great story to share. And if the selection committee is swayed by philanthropic efforts away from the rink, Alfredsson’s advocacy for mental health was well before its time. Alfredsson went public about his own experiences supporting loved ones who struggled with mental illness. His participation and work on the Royal Ottawa’s ‘You Know Who I am’ campaign earned him the Governor General’s Meritorious Service Cross. The award recognized his contributions in addressing the stigma of mental health and encouraging others to seek help.

As you can see from the details I’ve laid forth, Alfredsson’s a well-rounded and deserving candidate. From his individual accolades and statistics, Alfredsson’s (adjusted) production and two-way play are worthy of recognition. Once you include his humanitarian efforts and an international resume that has already earned him a place in the IIHF’s Hall of Fame, well, his time for induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame should have arrived sooner.

Eventually, his list of accomplishments will get him in, but after Marian Hossa became the first modern Senators draft pick to be enshrined on Monday, I couldn’t shake this feeling that Daniel Alfredsson should have been inducted with him.