re plus minus stat in article ramsey cs laurentian ca maynard ramsey cs laurentian ca roger maynard writes certainly pluggers are an integral part of any team and that is simply because there are not enough solid two way players to go around who would you rather have as your checking centre doug gilmour or doug jarvis for that matter i would take either gretzky or mario as my checking centres do you think gretzky could cover bob gainey gretzky lemieux gilmour etc do not play the role of checking centreman they play an offensive role as opposed to a defensive one if they were used as defensive centres it would be a waste of their offensive abilities when you compare gretzky et al to jarvis gainey etc you are comparing apples and oranges it is like me telling you that felix potvin isn t very good because a team would be better if the had lemieux instead of him sure lemieux is a better player but he is a different type of player for a team to be successful they need to have all types of players this includes defensive forwards when compared with other defensive forwards bob gainey is the greatest defensive forward ever he is the player who s talents best suited being a defensive forward who completely dominated the game when he played maybe if a more talented player such as gretzky had decided to waste his offensive talents and play defensively he could have been a better defensive forward but he wasn t bob gainey is the best defensive forward that has ever played hockey gregmeister
