The O'Malley Legend Grows!

[Devise 4,475]

There was always going to be high expectation for Thomas O'Malley when he entered the league as the first overall pick in Season 40. O'Malley was the second player to come from the Green agency, an agency that had just brought the league the hall of fame goalie Remy LeBeau. The question for O'Malley was never will he be good, but just how good will he be? Getting close to the midway point of his 7th season the answer thus far is potentially legendary. 

Through 470 games played Thomas sits with 311 goals, 421 assists and 732 total points. He already sits in the top 50 of all time goals scored, and all time assists. But it his point total pace that really makes you wonder how far O'Malley is going to cement himself in the record books. His current point totals would place him 38th among active players, with still over a season and a half left of his career. O'Malley is on pace to finish this season with well over 100 points, and if he can manage even a 100 point season in his final year? There is no telling where he will finish.

It would be statistically impossible for O'Malley to top all time points leader and the VHL's very own Wayne Gretzky in Scotty Campbell. Scotty finished his dominant career with 1239 points, 268 points better than second place Mike Szatkowski. Mike finished with 971 points. If O'Malley sticks with his current pace, and finishes the season say at 120 points, that would put him at 787 points entering his final season. Which would mean O'Malley would need one final season with at least 113 points to hit the elusive 900 mark. A mark that we only saw hit by 5 total VHL players, all from the early days. Passing Christian Stolzschweiger for 5th all time isn't out of the possibility, but would take a serious final season effort from O'Malley. 

The most impressive part about O'Malley has been how quietly he has been doing this. This is a player who has a chance at cementing himself among the top 10 all time VHL point producers, with a long shot at reaching the top five. A player with one of the larger award cabinets in history. Relevant awards as well. Yet he continues on, humble yet proud determined to help his team win as many championships as possible. A player who isn't just a regular season wonder, has been to the Continental Cup Finals 4 times out of his 7 years with two Cups to show for it all with solid playoff stats to go along with it.

Even crazier is that he was able to amass this much success while only playing for two different teams. He lead a Cologne franchise into a new era and their first championship before platforming an early Helsinki rebuild into a champion. For me, O'Malley is already a VHL legend. It's a sure fire thing. He is a sure first first ballot Hall of Famer already. In so many ways he is already a legend. The last question he has to answer is will be remembered as one of the greatest point producers in VHL history? 

We'll have the rest of Season 46 and 47 to find out. 

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2015 by Mr. Power