"Stats Are For Losers" -- Wayne Gretzky
"Stats are for losers" - Wayne Gretzky" - Michael Scott.
Here we have, oh I don't know, just the most important man in the history of hockey shoving all the analytics dorks in a locker. And not even just the analytics people who watch the game through a calculator to come up with random "Corsi" numbers to make it seem like they know more about the game than anybody else. Wayne could give two shits about Corsi. But he's talking about stats in general. Could be save percentage, could be time on ice, could be anything. Wayne Gretzky is a hockey player. He's the greatest hockey player who has ever lived. He ain't here to talk about numbers, nerd.
You want some numbers? Here are the only ones that matter. 894 career goals. 2857 career points. 4 Stanley Cups. Until anyone in the analytics department has those types of numbers, I'm going to go ahead and have to side with 99 in this debate.
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It's great to hear The Great One say this, though, I must admit. For far too long it's been guys like Mike Milbury, who everybody hates, or bloggers like myself who are just too dumb to understand what the hell all these stats actually mean. When you get guys like Mike Milbury leading the charge against stats, it's easy for everybody else to not want to fall in line with him because he sucks. But when Wayne Gretzky talks, the hockey world should listen. And if he says that stats are for losers, well then guess what? Stats are for losers.
I have a new stat for all the boys and girls at home to keep track of, and it's the most important one of them all. It's called "being really fucking good at hockey", and Connor McDavid leads the league.
No calculators needed to track that one.