Sharks’ Joe Thornton ranks among all-time great centers
San Jose Sharks center Joe Thornton has earned his spot among the all-time great centers.
These days, fans focus heavily on titles. Anyone who hasn’t won one gets mocked (see: Carmelo Anthony, Alex Ovechkin, et al). Perhaps no athlete has suffered more from this than San Jose Sharks center Joe Thornton. Often overlooked throughout his career, he has quietly been one of the most consistent and dominant centers of all time.
When you think of Thornton, the first thing that comes to mind is his offense. While he certainly isn’t much of a goal scorer, few have put up assists like him. On Monday March 6, Thornton picked up his 1000th career assist. Only 12 other players have done so. Eleven of them are in the Hockey Hall of Fame, while the 12th (Jaromir Jagr) will be as soon as he decides to retire. Here’s how he ranks using several metrics, including era adjusted assists.
Thornton’s assists number are extremely impressive because he’s played a majority of his career in an era defined by a lack of offense. Despite this, he still puts up impressive numbers. It’s worth noting that, of the 25 players above him in assists per game, only Evgeni Malkin, Nicklas Backstrom, Sidney Crosby, Bobby Orr and Peter Forsberg didn’t spend at least a part of their career in the 1980s, an era defined by offense.
His offense is a bit of a curse because it causes people to completely overlook his defense. Defensively, Thornton has always been an excellent center. His size allows his to dominate other centers, especially in the face-off circle. Face-off win percentage wasn’t tracked until the 2007-08 season, but since then, Thornton has won at least half of his face-offs each season. Since the 2001-02 season, he has a positive plus-minus ratio in every season except one.
Looking at Joe Thornton’s shot attempt numbers since 2007, it’s baffling how he hasn’t won a Selke Trophy yet. Maybe it’s because he was so good at offense, people naturally overlooked his defense. Crosby suffers from this as well. To be fair, it’s easy to overlook someone’s defense when they’re averaging a point per game.
Thornton’s 2005-06 season remains one of the most outstanding in NHL history. He won the Hart Trophy and the Art Ross despite being traded in November. He’s the only player to have over 90 assists in a season since the 2004 lockout — and he’s done it twice. People point to Thornton’s lack of goal scoring and it’s a fair criticism; he only has two 30-goal seasons to his credit. However, Thornton has been remarkably consistent, scoring at least 15 goals in all but three of his full seasons (including this one). Just think of him as the Ovechkin of assists. Thornton doesn’t need to score much because he helps others score so often.
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While Thornton doesn’t belong in the same category as Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux, he’s among the all-time greats, even if he never wins a Stanley Cup.