What does athletic greatness mean in a world of uncertainty?

There's no disputing the facts, Alex Ovechkin is the greatest goal scorer of all-time

It’s very easy to feel the breakneck speed with which life passes. I can still vividly remember Alex Ovechkin’s first phase as an NHL star. Don Cherry called him embarrassing, Ovechkin’s tinted visor, the yellow laces, the wicked shot and proclivity for turning himself into a wrecking ball on the forecheck are all burned into my memory. To a young hockey fan, Ovechkin was a create-a-player come to life while bringing an aspirational joy to a stoic gentlemen’s game.

In Ovechkin’s own words, he never thought catching Wayne Gretzky’s goal record was even possible let alone likely. When the great 8 entered the NHL way back in 2005, the sport was returning from a year long lockout that canceled an entire season of play. Over the course of the first nine seasons of Ovechkin’s career, NHL teams went from averaging 3.03 goals per game and reached a low of 2.67 in 2015-2016 before beginning to gradually increase again.

So, not only did the NHL’s all-time leading goal scorer enter the sport at a time where scoring would decrease on a league wide basis for a full decade, he missed a full 82 game season in 2004-2005 and half of a season in 2012-2013 because of lock outs. He was also robbed of 13 games in 2019-2020 and 26 games in 2020-2021 due to COVID-19 truncated seasons. In spite of a world stopping once in a century pandemic, Ovechkin’s steady march towards history continued on.

As recently as two years ago, there was real conjecture as to whether or not Ovechkin would ever get here. Prevailing wisdom was that he’d play until his body didn’t allow him to continue his pursuit of Gretzky. But somehow, at 36, 37 and now 39-years-old, Ovechkin potted at least 40 goals. Last year was the closest of Ovechkin’s professional career in terms of clearing the 30 goal threshold, finishing with 31 and only having recorded 9 by the end of January. And still, Ovechkin, like a metronome of hockey, found a way to record 22 over the final 35 regular season games.

Sports often serve as a measure of the passage of time, I’m getting to the point in my life now where I’ve seen players debut, play out an entire career and retire. For someone like Ovechkin to overcome all of the odds and become the greatest goal scorer in the history of hockey is nothing short of a once in a generation experience.

That type of consistency, for so long, is the type of greatness that inspires personal reflection and accounting. So much of life is what happens in between milestones and events. It really is about the process and the journey. The first 894 goals of Ovechkin’s career didn’t feature 30 minute ceremonies with speeches from Gretzky or Gary Bettman, hugs from Matt Martin or his parents and children down on the ice. Getting to this point was a testament to greatness.

It’s not hard to understand why people gravitate towards greatness. So much of life is ordinary, going to work, cooking dinner, doing laundry, washing dishes, looking forward to a game or a dinner or a concert and trying to not get too strung out in the process of doing it. To sustain greatness? To be great every single day? That’s impressive beyond what most people are capable of understanding.

We all have bad or off days where our mind is 1000 miles from work and even going through the motions is arduous. Ovechkin’s been able to overcome the adversity associated with greatness to the point that a 31 goal season, a career high for many, was considered a disappointment during the 2023-2024 season.

The process of going from a mercurial shooting star to a great player to a hall of fame player to an all time great is proof of existence. That might sound a bit esoteric, but in an increasingly siloed and nihilistic world where the very nature of reality is up for debate, there’s nothing to debate here. All 895 of Ovechkin’s goals are on video and documented in analog and digital boxscores.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gained a reverence for the work that goes into work. It takes so much time and dedication to just be slightly above average at whatever it is one pursues at a profession, to watch someone be so great, for so long, it inspires me to push further. It’s why for me the all time greats are so aspirational.

Us mere mortals can’t possibly hope to attain the level of physical skill that players like Ovechkin have. But we all understand that Ovechkin has dedicated his entire life to being the best goal scorer possible. There’s an inherent responsibility one has when they have that level of talent. That’s why a prospect busting out is deemed a moral failing in some sectors of sports media.

Obviously a player has to have the physical ability to get themselves drafted which is why on some level, there’s a perceived lack of effort if they don’t have the means of realizing those tools. That’s why long after first take dies a sports media induced death whether or not Stephen A. Smith pursues a political career, people in barber’s chairs or bar stools will argue that Michael Jordan was better than LeBron James.

In the present, where so much of the nature of reality is up for debate, there’s nothing to debate.

There’s no bullshit.

You couldn’t make a player like Ovechkin in central casting. Hockey fans would call your film unrealistic and deem it for casuals. There is no faking being the best ever at something.

When the whole world is tinged with an air of fraud like a boardwalk at the peak of summer, moments of realness feel exceedingly rare. That’s why regardless of how much sports feel like a punch in the stomach, a kick in the balls or a means of existential torture, I’ll never be able to walk away. As much as I love film and TV, it’ll always be fake, sports are human drama in the rawest form.

There is no greater exploration of the human condition than the crucible of professional sports. All time great players aren’t made, they’re revealed in the fire of sport. For someone like Ovechkin, a day at the office is on average 49 goals a season in the world’s best league.

Greatness isn’t tangible, it’s forged over the course of years and decades. How great a player is usually becomes fodder for podcasts, talk shows and columns like this. There isn’t much certainty in the world anymore. With so much happening at every moment of every day and the ability to see it in a few taps or clicks, it’s easy for news to get lost in the shuffle.

In spite of all of that uncertainty, there is one thing that’s certain: Ovechkin is the greatest goal scorer in the history of hockey.