Talk:Mike Bossy

Per Game Stats
I removed the line about Gretzky's numbers if he had retired after his first ten years. First of all, it's misleading because it's only true if you count the other players' full careers versus Gretzky's first ten years. A simple calculation from the individual player pages shows that Mario would've slightly edged out Gretzky in goals per game for their respective first ten years in the NHL with Bossy not that far behind. Also, it seems pointless to include a purely hypothetical stat (since Gretzky didn't retire after ten years) and particularly one about Gretzky when this page is about Mike Bossy.

Career Stats
I think that we need to add Bossy's career stats to this page. The write up is nice, but stats would make it a bit better.

Accomplishments Section
This section is turning an ad for Mario Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky then subsequently a debate between Gretzky and Lemieux fans. Try to focus it on Bossy and if you are going to compare him to the two favorably don't follow it with three sentences intimating about how they are really way better. In situations like this I find it's always better to just try to keep it as brief as possible, get a succinct summary, and not get into an out of place long off-topic debate. Quadzilla99 21:06, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Saraceno's contribution
Considering how many NHL teams passed on Bossy, I don't see why a reference to Henry Saraceno's unusual role in bringing Bossy to the Islanders organization (he knew him as a youth in Laval and advocated his selection as an Islanders scout in '77) should be reverted and now omitted. It's well substantiated by numerous sources, including "Boss" by Bossy and Barry Meisel, it certainly doesn't run afoul of the NPOV guidelines, and it's certainly more pertinent and relevant to Bossy's career than the section on Wayne Gretzky's subjective evaluation of the man.
 * As it happens, I came across Saraceno in research today, and added info mentioning him. Echoedmyron (talk) 22:09, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Contradiction
FYI, the Mike Bossy article says he was ranked 20th on this list. One of them is wrong. (Oops, meant to put this on the 100 best NHL players list, which claims Bossy was ranked #1. The contradiction applies to this article as well, so whatever)

How can he be a 1st overall pick if he was passed over by several teams: 1st round 15th overall. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.236.13.236 (talk) 03:07, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

goals per game record
"Bossy's dominance is exemplified by his .762 goals-per-game ratio, the best in NHL history." Sorry, but no. Joe Malone had a 1.135 GPG ratio in the NHL (1.389 PPG in the NHL, 1.293 career GPG, 1.530 career PPG). And that's not to mention Newsy Lalonde's 1.265 GPG in the NHL. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.255.58.85 (talk) 07:04, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Guy Lafleur?
This line (starting the 7th paragraph) seems to be a non sequitur: "The dominant scoring star of the late 1970s was Guy Lafleur but his skills waned in the 1980s." Remove? Avenger42 (talk) 00:48, 12 July 2012 (UTC)


 * I agree; I've removed the sentence.Sxg169 (talk) 00:57, 27 January 2014 (UTC)

Middle name? "Jean" or "Dean"?
Does anybody have evidence of Mike Bossy's middle name? It had been written here as "Dean" for a long time but User:Marc87 changed it to "Jean" on January 22nd, 2014 (mentioning "SIHR" -- the society for International Hockey Research in his comments. It was changed back to "Dean" shortly thereafter by a not-logged-in user. As I don't have access to the SIHR database, I cannot confirm Bossy's middle name.  Does anyone have any reputable references? Sxg169 (talk) 18:58, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Goggling "Michael Jean Bossy" and "Michael Dean Bossy" it seems to shoe more results for Dean, but seems to have less reliable sources. with the best being Draft Central.com and this card from Legendary Foils (whatever that is). While there are less sources for Jean it has two newspaper cites, the Oshawa Express and the New York Times . Without a better reference for Dean I think that Jean should be used because of the WP:RS. I'll change the page and add the NY Time as a reference.--Mo Rock...Monstrous (leech44) 21:29, 24 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Although it is not a definite answer, Bossy has been falsely perceived as French Canadian due to his somewhat French-sounding name and hometown. When he played junior hockey in Laval the local media often erroneously referred to him as Michel Bossy. In Laval he also found his wife Lucie (sister of former Penguins head coach Pierre Creamer) who speaks French. Perhaps because of this confusion regarding his background also Dean became Jean in some sources. But Bossy's late father Borden was of Ukrainian heritage (Босий -> Bossy) and his mother Dorothy Mills English (from the UK), all his nine siblings also had traditional English names so that Dean is at least not to be considered unlikely until definite proof emerges. -193.175.2.17 (talk) 00:58, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

External links modified (January 2018)
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WHA rights
While Bossy never played in the WHA, and probably didn't seriously consider it, I did want to add information noting he was drafted by Indianapolis in 1977. Reliable sources for WHA drafts are somewhat hard to come by. Oddly, I've found a couple of instances in Stan Fischler pieces where it is suggested that Bossy could have joined the Nordiques, here and here. The 1977 NHL Amateur Draft was held two days before the 1977 WHA Amateur Draft. This makes the suggestion in the first link - that the Leafs didn't draft Bossy because they feared he'd jump to Quebec - dubious, since Bossy had yet to be drafted into the WHA, and for that matter, was about to be drafted by the Racers. If he was draft-eligible for the WHA I would assume that a special signing (like Gretzky had done) wouldn't have been possible. The second link additionally talks about a "substantial offer" made by Quebec. So, I'm trying to figure out what the deal is here - is Fischler barking up the wrong tree, is Bossy's own memory faulty, did Quebec acquire his rights from Indianapolis, or what. Echoedmyron (talk) 22:26, 28 April 2020 (UTC)
 * For that matter, even in 1981 it was being written that "[the Islanders] almost lost Bossy to Quebec of the World Hockey Association" in Sports Illustrated. Now, that one is Larry Brooks, but it's a contemporary article. Echoedmyron (talk) 14:49, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Lung Cancer Death
Does anyone know if Mike Bossy was a smoker? 2601:41:4200:5E80:0:0:0:518C (talk) 19:09, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

Consecutive hat tricks
The note about being tied with Joe Malone for most consecutive hat tricks appears to be incorrect for both players.

The earliest mention of it seems to be an HFboards thread where within a few pages someone went through the game logs and found neither player had done it, but it's still one of the top results for "most consecutive hat tricks" so it keeps getting repeated. 2600:1700:7F84:69D0:D701:D190:FB98:174A (talk) 20:15, 19 February 2024 (UTC)