I can’t say with any certainty how long fantasy hockey has been around. Some sort of rotisserie can be applied to any sport where individual statistics are tracked and recorded with regularity.

Maybe they weren’t tracking the stats with the passion and fervor of today’s nerds….er…..players, but there was plenty of world-class hockey being played.

Forget about the time-honored argument about how much better today’s players are. You can also spare me the conjecture that the players from another time were so much tougher than the pampered stars of today.

The evolution of the NHL as we know it made some drastic changes over the course of the last 50 years. The stars that redefined the sport now take their rightful place in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

With the great sport of hockey being desecrated by the ignorance of those who seem to care so little of the sports’ rich heritage, eDraft will pay homage to the best fantasy players of the last five decades.

We’ll start in the 1960’s, a decade known for hippies, the Beatles, the Vietnam War and free love. It was a decade dominated by Montreal and Toronto, as the two combined for eight of the ten Stanley Cups won over that time. There were also some legendary players during the 1960’s who left their mark on the scoring tables and the record books.

Here are my top five fantasy players from the 1960’s.

5. Jean Beliveau- The big Montreal center was a point per game player with 240 goals and 393 assists for the decade. Beliveau also got himself four Stanley Cup rings during that time.

4. Frank Mahovlich- The “Big M” played the bulk of the 1960’s in Toronto before joining the Detroit Red Wings in 1968. He finished the decade with 329 goals and 307assists.

3. Gordie Howe-Mr. Hockey was on the backside of his amazing career dropping 317 goals and 463 assists during the 1960s. He would have been a fantasy stud for sure with his gritty, physical play.

2. Stan Mikita-Chicago had two of the NHL’s top players for the better part of the decade. Their scrappy number one center was responsible for 316 goals and 511 assists as points leader for the decade.

1. Bobby Hull- Hull gets the nod over his Blackhawks’’ teammate because of the flash and flair he brought to the league. Recognized as the first NHL star that actually transcended the sport and was a legitimate star. The “Golden Jet” was a scoring machine for the Hawks with 440 goals and 346 assists in the decade.