Okay, so I'm going to preface this obviously completely hypothetical exercise with a couple of salient points I think need to be addressed:

1. Yes, obviously, Wendel Clark is my favourite hockey player of all time, so even though I know he'll never be inducted I'm certainly biased toward believing he should be, at least on an emotional level.

2.  If this were the hall of fame of any other sport, I wouldn't even bother making this argument.  We all know, however, that the Hockey Hall Of Fame is not always a rational institution when it comes to whom it inducts (i.e. Clark Gillies) or ignores (i.e. Dino Ciccarelli and his 600+ goals), so I believe there is at least a far-flung, out of left field, let's-honour-the-gritty-old-boy-because-it's-a-shit-year-for-candidates chance he could maybe slip through someday, as unlikely as that is.

3.  In the following post I'll be comparing recent stats with those of players from a long time ago.  The argument of course can be made that, especially during the Original Six era, the talent level was much higher as fewer teams meant a less watered down product, and therefore Dick Duff and his Darcy Tuckeresque stats (Duff - 1030 GP, 283-289-572; Tucker - 833 GP, 201-242-443) is more impressive than the above-mentioned Ciccarelli and his almost point-per-game and half-goal-per-game averages over more than 1200 games, or any of a legion of other retired or soon-to-be-retired NHLers who will never be enshrined next to the underground food court at Brookfield Place.  Well whatever.  It's a tired argument, and while it may be true in some respects, it's also true that the physical conditioning of  modern players, the advent of the butterfly goaltender along with the increase in goalie equipment size, advances in both skater and goaltender equipment technology (lighter pads, composite sticks, etc.) and the massive influx of European talent has in a lot of ways mitigated, if not counteracted, that supposition.  So for the purposes of my post I'm just going to call that all a wash and compare stats as if they carry identical value.  One thing I will not do is look at pre-Original-Six-era (anything before 1942) stats, as the game from that period differed so greatly from what came after.  Just because King Clancy only had 136 goals in 592 games, I'm not going to suggest he isn't worthy of the hall.  Clark Gillies though?  Let's just say arguments can be made there...

All that said, let's begin.

We'll start by taking a look at Wendel's career NHL stat totals:

Regular Season    GP         G         A         P        
                                  793        330    234     564
                                  Points-per-game - .71
                                  Goals-per-game - .42

Playoffs                    GP         G         A         P
                                   95          37       32       69
                                  Points-per-game - .72
                                  Goals-per-game - .39

By today's standards, these are far from hall of fame numbers.  Playing less than 800 games, unless you've got numbers like Bobby Orr, Mike Bossy, or Cam Neely, is probably an automatic disqualification these days (hell even if you have those numbers you probably won't get in, ask Eric Lindros).  Plus the lack of a Stanley Cup or any individual hardware doesn't help matters.  But again, for the sake of this argument, let's take the era factor out of it and compare the numbers.  Here are 10 Honoured Members of the Hockey Hall Of Fame, all forwards, who have comparable-or-worse career numbers and/or averages than Wendel Clark:

Regular Season    GP         G         A         P        PPGavg.    GPGavg.

Dick Duff                  1030     283     289    527     .52              .27

Clark Gillies            958       319     378    697     .72              .33

Teeder Kennedy    696       231     329    560     .80               .33

Dave Keon
(NHL+WHA)           1597     498      779    1277  .79              .31
(NHL only)              1296     396      590    986     .76              .31

Edgar Laprade      500        108     172    280     .56              .21

Dickie Moore          719        261     347    608     .85              .36

Bill Mosienko         711        258     282    540     .75              .36

Bert Olmstead       848        181     421    602     .70              .21

Bob Pulford            1079     281     362     643     .59              .26

Harry Watson        809        236     207     443     .55              .29


Now I'm not going to suggest that these guys should not be in the hall of fame.  I don't think anyone would argue against Dickie Moore or Teeder Kennedy being inducted right now if they weren't already, and I dare anyone to tell my father that Dave Keon shouldn't be there (if you take me up on that, I'd suggest wearing a cup and a good pair of running shoes).  Career longevity is a factor, as is importance to a team and comparisons to other players around the league during an inducted member's career.  The point is that from a numbers perspective, Clark certainly deserves consideration.  It's true that there are more deserving players statistically who should be looked at first, but this is my game and it's about Wendel.  Let's rank him against these ten players in each of these categories (using Keon's NHL and WHA totals):

GAMES PLAYED

1. Keon
2. Pulford
3. Duff
4. Gillies
5. Olmstead
6. Watson
7. Clark
8. Moore
9. Mosienko
10. Kennedy
11. Laprade

TOTAL POINTS

1. Keon
2. Gillies
3. Pulford
4. Moore
5. Olmstead
6. Clark
7. Kennedy
8. Mosienko
9. Duff
10. Watson
11. Laprade

GOALS

1. Keon
2. Clark
3. Gillies
4. Duff
5. Pulford
6. Moore
7. Mosienko
8. Watson
9. Kennedy
10. Olmstead
11. Laprade

ASSISTS

1. Keon
2. Olmstead
3. Gillies
4. Pulford
5. Moore
6. Kennedy
7. Duff
8. Mosienko
9. Clark
10. Watson
11. Laprade

POINTS PER GAME

1. Moore
2. Kennedy
3. Keon
4. Mosienko
5. Gillies
6. Clark
7. Olmstead
8. Pulford
9. Laprade
10. Watson
11. Duff

GOALS PER GAME

1. Clark
T2. Moore
T2. Mosienko
T4. Gillies
T4. Kennedy
6. Keon
7. Watson
8. Duff
9. Pulford
T10. Laprade
T10. Olmstead

AVERAGE RANK BASED ON THESE CATEGORIES

1. Keon
2. Gillies
3. Moore
T4. Clark
T4. Pulford
T6. Kennedy
T6. Mosienko
8. Olmstead
9. Duff
10. Watson
11. Laprade

So there you go.  These numbers of course don't prove Clark should be there, or prove any of the other players named shouldn't be.  What I think this does prove is that it's not too far-fetched to have Wendel's name be part of the conversation every year when induction is being discussed.  When you couple his statistical comparablility with the above mentioned hall of famers, along with his obvious impact on his team and on the sport in this city, I don't think there's any doubt that Wendel Clark is at least worthy of being mentioned as a possible Honoured Member of the Hockey Hall of Fame.  Now let the comment debate begin. 

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!