Human performance only gets better with time, right? Better training techniques, better nutrition, better equipment, better technology, better information, better development programs — it all leads to better results. Times in the 100-meter dash only go down. Fastball velocity only goes up. So it’s easy to say that the last guy off the bench in today’s NBA would have been a dominant megastar in the 1960s, that Babe Ruth wouldn’t know what to do with a Jacob deGrom 93-mph slider, that Alex Ovechkin — having passed Gordie Howe on Friday for the second-most goals in NHL history (802), and closing in on Wayne Gretzky’s once-unbreakable record of 894 — is the greatest goal scorer of all time.

But is he?

Comparing athletes across eras is always a fool’s errand, but it’s also a fun one. And whether you’re in a bar arguing with buddies or talking to actual players who lived and played in those eras, well, once you start trying to determine if the modern-day NHL is indeed the most difficult era in which to score, you start talking yourself in circles.

Look, obviously, it’s harder to score now. Look at the size and athleticism of these goalies!

Modern-day goalies are borderline freaks of nature. They’re 6-foot-5, hyper-athletic, as flexible as gymnasts and get across the crease in a split second. They have video and science and the reverse VH and all sorts of practical theory behind the so-called voodoo. When you look at someone like Andrei Vasilevskiy and compare him to the goalies of yesteryear, it’s a wonder every game doesn’t end in a shootout with the score tied 0-0.

For Gordie’s sake, those guys in the 1980s were skinny and tiny and playing that awkward, flailing, stand-up style. And those guys in the 1950s and 1960s didn’t even wear masks! Case closed.

“Look at the butterfly,” said Denis Savard, who potted 473 goals from 1980 to 1997, the highest-scoring era in NHL history. “We didn’t have that. For me, I’d come down the right side and I’d shoot it on the ice, stick side. And it worked! Today, forget about it. It’s a routine save for them. You’ve got to be able to elevate the puck at crazy speed. Obviously, Ovi can do that.”

And goalies aren’t just bigger and better. They also have equipment that helps, rather than hinders.