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Ciccarelli, Cold War-era Russians deserve some HOF attention, too

With the announcement of the 2010 Hockey Hall of Fame inductions set for Tuesday, we’re gearing up for some fun features here at PHT. In a few hours, I’ll share the staff “ballots” as well as choices made by some of our favorite hockey bloggers. Last night, the big debate was whether or not Pavel Bure and Eric Lindros are worthy Hall of Fame inductees.

While Lindros, Bure and a few others will garner most of the attention and debate, I thought it would be wise to mention some candidates who likely won’t get much attention.

(Note: I reserve the right to be wrong since you never know, these players might end up winning the blogger - or even real life - battle to get in the Hall of Fame.)

First, here are three suggestions from esteemed Minnesota hockey writer Michael Russo.

This is not the strongest class -- at least the least-strongest since the year after the lockout. So could this finally be Dino Ciccarelli’s year? There are 18 600-goal scorers in the history of the league and Ciccarelli and Dave Andreychuk are the only eligible 600-goal scorers who aren’t in the Hall. That’s a ton of goals.

I reached out to Dino, but he’d prefer not to say anything prior to the selection committee meeting and announcement Tuesday. Here’s his bio on the HHOF web site. By the way, I think I mentioned in April, but I actually watched Game 7 of the Phoenix-Detroit series with Dino in western Florida at Columbus play-by-play guy Jeff Rimer’s home. Dino still looks like he can strap on the skates.

Could this maybe be Phil Housley’s year? He’s the highest-scoring American defenseman ever.

I get the feeling that Dave Andreychuk will get some attention, too, but Ciccarelli and Housley are interesting choices in their own right.

One of the toughest things to way is success in another league. How do you factor in, say, Warren Moon’s non-NFL days or Bobby Hull’s many WHA goals? Joe Pelletier brings up a few of the best players from those great Russian national teams who haven’t made the Hall of Fame yet, but never received a fair shake in the NHL (thanks to that whole “Cold War” thing?).

Their respective tenures in the NHL, Krutov’s in particular, are remembered as busts. Makarov put together a couple of nice seasons, but without Larionov’s command of English and unquenchable taste for Western life, neither Krutov and Makarov, like so many other Russian stars of the 1980s, ever really had much of a chance of excelling in North America at their advanced age.

Igor Larionov was the unselfish and brainy chessmaster of the KLM Line. With his help, both Vladimir Krutov and Sergei Makarov harnessed their near-limitless raw talent and became the best players in the world.

I am absolutely convinced that both Krutov and Makarov are among the top 5 wingers of the 1980s. I would suggest only Mike Bossy and Jari Kurri would challenge either for top billing, with Michel Goulet maybe rounding out the top 5.

So, do you think crucial (but slightly less famous) members of the old “Big Red Machine” should be given more consideration? What about Dino Ciccarelli, Dave Andreychuk or Phil Housley? Are there others - say, Mike Richter - who come to mind as dark horse candidates? Share your thoughts in the comments.