Osgood Retires

The Detroit Red Wings and goaltender Chris Osgood had a press conference on Tuesday afternoon to announce the retirement of the 38-year old backstop after 17 NHL seasons with the Red Wings, Islanders and Blues.

Osgood leaves the game as one of the most controversial goaltenders, more so about his value as a player in the league during his 17 seasons, rather than anything else, as he was a very good role model for young goaltenders and other players during his tenure in the league.

In his career, Osgood finished up with 401 wins, which ranks 10th all-time among NHL goaltenders, won three Stanley Cups with the Red Wings and did have numerous other accolades, but the real debate about the credits he has earned belong to the great teams he has played with in his career, which discounts his worthiness to be spoken with some of the other NHL greats.

In terms of the hockey pools, Osgood has seen his fair share of ups and downs in the rankings, but the decline in minutes and the loss of the number one job to Jimmy Howard in the past couple of seasons has now fully diminished his fantasy value.  In 2011, Osgood finished 62nd among all goalies, even outside of the normal back-up goalie realm, with only 5 wins and 10 points.  According to my rankings, which only date back to 2002, Osgood did finish as high as 21st in overall scoring, back in 2004, when he finished with 31 wins and 3 shutouts.

The real debate out of all of this is whether or not Osgood is actually Hall of Fame worthy.  If the numbers, awards and Cups are supposed to be an indication of a player worthy of the call, Osgood does have some impressive stats.  I, personally, do lean to the side of the debate that suggests that maybe his teams have had a lot to do with his overall successes, which would probably keep votes away from an eventual inclusion, but there may be a day where the class of players that are ready to be inducted are poor enough that Osgood does make the leap into the hockey shrine.