Madden Monday: For Alex Ovechkin, there's a difference between most goals and greatest goal-scorer ever

Washington Capitals forward Alex Ovechkin set the all-time NHL goal record Sunday afternoon, scoring on a power play against the New York Islanders to net the 895th of his career.

With the goal, Ovechkin passed Wayne Gretzky for the all-time mark in 1,487 regular season games.

Gretzky played exactly that many games in his career .

However, Mark Madden of TribLive and 105.9 the X says theres a difference between having the most career goals and being the best goal scorer ever.

The numbers dont lie.

(Ovechkin) has the most goals.

I still dont think hes the best goal-scorer in NHL history.

I dont think Gretzky was either, Madden said during this weeks Madden Monday podcast .

I think the two best pure finishers are Mario Lemieux and Mike Bossy.

And I think if both didnt have their careers abbreviated by injury, each would have been a threat to score 1,000 career goals.

I think Mario would have, in fact.

Back problems forced Bossy into retirement at 30.

Lemieux lost extended stretches of numerous seasons to back issues , as well as a Hodgkin lymphoma diagnosis in 1993.

Lemieux ended his career with 690 goals in 915 season games.

Bossy had 573 goals in 752 games.

For an 82-game average, Lemieux and Bossy put up 62 goals, Gretzky and Ovechkin put up 49.

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I was a bit disappointed by the hype leading up to the event and breaking the record, Madden said.

They tried.

The NHL just isnt very good at it.

And right in the middle of March Madness, it seemed to kind of ring flat in terms of national exposure.

Im glad he broke it.

I think hes very deserving.

I think Penguins fans would agree hes a worthy opponent.

Madden says dont rule out the possibility of Ovechkin getting to that 1,000-goal mark.

Three good years, Madden predicted for how long it might take for Ovechkin to reach that plateau.

The odds are against him, certainly.

But I wouldnt bet against him either.

Also, in the podcast , Madden and I discuss the Penguins wild run through the Central division last week, the Pirates bumpy start, and the ongoing quest to see if Aaron Rodgers will sign with the Steelers..

This article has been shared from the original article on triblive, here is the link to the original article.