So you create a player in SHL. Most of the time when this happens, it means you were either bored with your last player or you discovered the site for the first time. What does the future hold for this new player? The possibilities are endless, and I'm sure more than a few people go into the journey planning to be attached at the hip with a certain franchise and group of friends. Longevity can be fun in this league, but it is also a rare commodity. Over 2,800 players have been created in the SHL since inception. Only 97 of those players have played 1,000 games. That's 3.5% of all created players. That is an impressive milestone. Sure you have titans of the GP industry like Slip McScruff who is approaching 2,000 games played, but this article is focused on a list more prestigious than that. Of the 97 players who have played 1,000 games in the SHL, only 39 of those have done it with one franchise. That's only 1.4% of players. Experienced SHL vets could probably name half of them before reading any further because of its rarity. The ability for a player to intertwine themselves with the fabric of a franchise is a special thing. Longevity for a single franchise is more than a commitment, it also takes luck and buy-in from GMs. Trades occur, teams are bad, stuff happens. 

This exclusive club used to be VERY rare. With teams only playing 40-50 games a season in the early days, staying with a franchise for more than 1,000 games meant you had to stick around for 20 to 24 seasons. Since season 57, team have played 66 games per season. Over the course of time, this can equate to 3 or 4 extra seasons worth of games compared to the real oldies. Because of this, most of the players is this group have only reached the milestone after season 65. Before season 57, only 8 players were a part of the club. 

The first to ever do it and the founding member of this prestigious club is Joe McKeil. Playing 24 seasons worth of games with Hamilton, Joe was able to just scrape over the line at 1044 for a career (today, that would only take 15.8 seasons). Shows you how hard it was back then. One caveat about McKeil is that he did not play all those games consecutively. He was traded away at the deadline and played with Seattle for a season and a half in S24 - S25. So he is the first member of the club for franchise games played over 1,000, but not consecutively. The 'consecutive' forefather is Esa Anrikkanen in Calgary. Only second to McScruff in seasons played, Anrikkanen is the epitome of a franchise cornerstone player. He stayed with Calgary for 28 seasons and still sits third on the list with 1,458 games played for one franchise. These two would then be followed to the 1k GP mark by Elyk in WPG, Alonso Garbanzo in MIN (first D), Kristian Eriksson in TOR, Alex Mack in CGY, Alexis Metzler in BUF, and Robert Phelps in HAM. The club stayed at these eight for at least six seasons until the floodgates started to open with the 66-game era players. 

Here is the historical progression of who reached the 1,000 games played mark with one franchise:

The blue dot is their first season in the SHL, and the red dot is when they retired. For the most part, logic dictates that this would be roughly the order that they entered the club with McKeil on the left and Atticus Hale on the right. You can see on the left side of the chart how it was more rare to achieve this milestone, as we discussed earlier. 

While McKeil and Anrikkanen were some of the firsts, the crown goes to Ryuuji Minamino in Chicago. Minamino racked up 1502 games in his career, all with Chicago. That's even good for sixth all time, no matter the franchise. In 22 seasons with Chicago, he was a cornerstone and synonymous with the Syndicate. Equally impressive is Andreas Kvalheim in Texas. Playing 24 seasons and 1490 games, Kvalheim is #2 on the list. A note about Kvalheim is that he left at the very end of his career to go to a place that could roster him in rebuilding TOR and MTL, so his GP with Texas does not equal his overall total. Only 31 of the 39 stayed with their franchise their entire careers, with 8 of the others playing for another team at some point of another. If you include playoff games (so all games in the team sweater), Minamino and Kvalheim also rank #1 and #2, respectively. 

Alright, without further ado, here's the list:

Rank | Player | Franchise | Regular Season GP
1 Ryuuji Minamino - CHI - 1502
2 Andreas Kvalheim - TEX - 1490
3 Esa Anrikkanen - CGY - 1458
4 Aaron Wilson - HAM - 1324
5 William Salming - SEA - 1320
6 Vaseline Podcalzone - SEA - 1320
7 Alonso Garbanzo - MIN - 1208
8 Kristian Eriksson - TOR - 1208
9 Puddles O'Duck - ATL - 1188
10 Brennan Kennedy Jr. - CGY - 1144
11 Daniel Smeb - CHI - 1144
12 Julio Tokolosh - EDM - 1126
13 Marcel Beck - WPG - 1122+
14 Lord Raiden - BAP - 1122
15 Tomas Lind - MAN - 1122
16 Dwight Knight - TBB - 1106
17 Steve Harrington - BUF - 1106
18 Sven Yxskaft - NEW - 1090
19 Esa Parmborg - CGY - 1076
20 Michael Withecheck - ATL - 1060
21 Henrik Lekberg Osterman - SFP - 1058
22 Akira Ren - CHI - 1058
23 Konstantin Selich - BUF - 1056+
24 Dirty Boots - TEX - 1056+
25 Atticus Hale - NOL - 1056+
26 Salzberger Lillehammersson - ATL - 1056
27 Ryosuke Sato** - TOR - 1056
28 Chimkin Wing - BUF - 1056
29 Alex Mack - CGY - 1050
30 Alexis Metzler - BUF - 1050
31 Karlstrasse Scholz - EDM - 1044
32 Slap McShotty - NEW - 1044
33 Joe McKeil** - HAM - 1044
34 Martijn Weskbroek - CHI - 1044
35 Sven Svenson - SFP - 1040
36 Bjorn Leppanen - TEX - 1026
37 Elyk - WPG - 1008
38 Robert Phelps - HAM - 1000
39 Nicholas Owens - BUF - 1000

**Non-Consecutive
+Active

As you can see, it jumps quite a bit at the top, with only 8 players over 1,200 GP for one franchise. Of these 39, 4 players currently have an active streak: Marcel Beck of WPG, Dirty Boots of TEX, and Atticus Hale of NOLA. Konstantin Selich recently announced their retirement, so they may add up to one more season of games played. Some of these older players, like Alex Mack and Alexis Metzler, played more seasons (20) than some of the younger names above them who only played 15 seasons. 

Behind these four, there are six active players that are within two seasons of breaking the 1,000 games played mark with one franchise. They are: 

Rank | Player | Franchise | Regular Season GP
1 Shoyo Hinata - ATL - 990
2 Aksel Fiske - MAN - 990
3 Red Kirkby - PHI - 924
4 Ivan Lacksamus - NEW - 924
5 Dave Heinrich - CHI - 924
6 Patya Perevalov - NOL - 924

Interestingly, all six of these players are (or were in Kirkby's case) forwards. The next active defensemen closing in on the club are Antonio Flusso with PHI and Philippe-Eko Eel with ATL, both at 726 GP. In the 1,000 franchise club list above, 13 of the 39 are defensemen. Does this mean we are seeing less defensemen stay with the same franchise? Or less defensemen staying in the league past 1,000 games? Or was there just a talent gap for a few seasons between the current actives in the main list vs the up-and-comers?

If you look at which teams have the most cornerstone players, a few seperate themselves from the pack. Of the 39 players in the 1,000 franchise games played club, Buffalo has the most at five. Calgary and Chicago both have four, followed by ATL, HAM, and TEX at three. Here's how it shakes out:

BUF - 5
CGY - 4
CHI - 4 (+1 within 2 seasons)
ATL - 3 (+1 within 2 seasons)
HAM - 3
TEX - 3
EDM - 2
NEW - 2 (+1 within 2 seasons)
SEA - 2
SFP - 2
TOR - 2
WPG - 2
BAP - 1
MAN - 1 (+1 within 2 seasons)
MIN - 1
NOLA - 1 (+1 within 2 seasons)
TBB - 1
PHI - 0 (+1 within 2 seasons)
LAP - 0
MTL - 0

Not surprisingly, many of the older franchises have more while the younger franchises have less. LAP was so close to having one, but Philipp Winter retired at 996 games played. Reed Kobo is their next active at 792. As for Montreal, Zak Wilson was also close at 990, but they now have a longgg way to go. MTL only has three active players at 264 GP. So, maybe in 12 seasons. 

Since goalies never get any respect, I will include them here and only give them half respect with a screenshot. It's hard to arbitrarily assign a games played number to goalies as their usage fluctuates. A big shoutout should go to Harry Carpet, though, as they were the only goalie to actually surpass the 1,000 games played mark with one franchise (TOR) and make it to the main list. Let's say 650 is the cutoff for goalies, because that seems reasonable. 



A lot of these goalies are household names and have been around for a long time. Calgary gets to pad their team list with two more, and ties them with Buffalo at the top in that case after adding Doyle to the Stampede. 

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As someone who has been tied to one franchise my entire SHL career, it hold this list close to my heart. I hope anyone who has read all the way through gleaned some interesting tidbits and stuff you didn't know or realize. If you would like to look at the Google sheet I made that has the list in a more pleasing visual format, it can be found here. In Beck's case, I hope to keep going with Winnipeg as long as they will let me. 

Do you have a player in the 1,000 Franchise Games Played Club? Do you think you'll ever get there? Let me know!