With the season winding down, the talk of Most Valuable Player is really starting to heat up, and one of the favourites is clearly Alexander Ovechkin. My question however, is does he deserve it?
Yes, he leads the league in Points (102) and Goals (58), and has brought his Washington Capitals on the verge of making the post-season for the first time in years. (I can’t even remember the last time they made the dance.) He was named to the All-Star, and will no doubt be named to the First All-Star Team and is running away with the Maurice Richard Trophy, but will all this earn him the coveted Hart?
Whether it will or not is up is not up to me, but I don’t think it should. I have always firmly believed that if a player wins the Hart, he better get his team into play-offs, just like the Adams shouldn’t be given to a coach that doesn’t boss his team into play-offs.
There is no doubt that Ovie is one of the MVP’s of the NHL, otherwise there wouldn’t be any talk about it, but if he doesn’t lead the Caps into the post-season then he couldn’t have been that valuable, because otherwise why isn’t Lecavalier’s name being thrown in there? While his stats are quite a bit below Ovechkin’s, he is still 3rd in points (89) and 5th in goals (40).
I am in no way campaigning for Lecavalier to be named MVP, because realistically I don’t know who should be. I will think about it overnight, and maybe I’ll have an answer for it then, if I do I will post it tomorrow.
**UPDATE**
Alright, so its been almost 3 weeks since I wrote this, and since then the Washington Capitals have climbed in the rankings and took over the Southeast Division lead. So the Caps are in play-offs, and without a doubt, Ovie is going to win MVP. He is going to win the Hart, and it shouldn’t even be close. (April 7th, 2008)
