TAMPA, Fla. — He has the numbers, he has the awards, he has today’s spotlight.

Does he also have your adoration?

He has the Cups, he has the moments, he has the scoring titles.

Does he also have bragging rights?

Now that Nikita Kucherov has won his second Hart Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable player, is it fair to say he is the greatest athlete among the major sports in Tampa Bay history?

It’s an interesting question. Cryptic enough to make you think. Broad enough to invite debate.

Do you favor records and stats? How about awards? Is a championship a necessity, or does it only apply to individual achievements? And what about away from the fields and rinks? Do charm and accessibility play any role in your deliberations?

Let’s make it easier by limiting it to hockey for a moment.

Would you choose Kucherov or Victor Hedman? How about Steven Stamkos? And then there’s Martin St. Louis and Andrei Vasilevskiy. They all have Stanley Cups. St. Louis and Kucherov have Hart trophies, while Vasilevskiy has two Vezina awards, Hedman has a Norris and Stamkos has two Richard trophies.

St. Louis is the only one currently in the Hall of Fame, but the other four all seem likely to be enshrined.

Stamkos is the franchise leader in goals, but Kucherov will soon pass him on Tampa Bay’s all-time points list. Hedman is the Lightning’s all-time leader in games played, was a Norris finalist six years in a row and has a Conn Smythe. He and Kucherov are also the franchise’s best when it comes to plus/minus numbers.

Confused? Yeah, you should be. You could make a solid argument for all five players.

In the end, I think Kucherov has the greater body of work. You can point out that he has gone missing too many times in the postseason and you can quibble with his aloof personality, but he has arguably been among the top 4-5 players in the NHL for nearly a decade, and that’s how legends are made.

So if Kuch rules the rink, how does he compare to Rays players?

On the surface, this is a pretty easy choice. No Rays player has even finished in the top five of the MVP vote. Other than Wade Boggs and Fred McGriff, who had brief Tampa Bay stays near the end of their careers, no Rays player has made the Hall of Fame.

Carl Crawford shined for a while, David Price and Blake Snell won Cy Young Awards, and Yandy Diaz has a shot at his second American League batting title this season. But none are in Kucherov’s stratosphere when it comes to dominating competition year after year.

The only Rays player in the conversation is Evan Longoria, and that’s based more on intangibles than raw accomplishments. The Rays turned the corner the same year Longoria arrived, and he was the face of the franchise for 10 years. His home run in Game 162 was as dramatic a moment as this market has seen, and Longo represented the organization with a quiet dignity that helped create a standard in the clubhouse.

Still, the accomplishments do not match what Kucherov has done in hockey.

And that brings us to Kucherov and Bucs.

Here’s where it gets tricky and, likely, contentious. The Bucs have produced five Hall of Famers (not including coach Tony Dungy) and had three different players (Lee Roy Selmon, Warren Sapp and Derrick Brooks) win the NFL Defensive Player of the Year award. Maybe it’s not as prestigious as the MVP, but in the NFL that’s an award almost exclusively devoted to quarterbacks. The last time a defensive player won the Associated Press MVP award was 40 years ago.

Ronde Barber and John Lynch had stellar careers and ruled the defensive secondary, but no one would suggest they were in the Peyton Manning, John Elway, Brett Favre stratosphere of names and faces. Selmon was the rock the franchise built on in 1976, but his career was comparatively short and devoid of magical numbers. Sapp had a seven-year run of dominance in Tampa Bay but wasn’t the same player after 30.

That leaves Kucherov vs. Brooks.

Brooks was first- or second-team All-Pro for nine consecutive seasons and received votes for Defensive Player of the Year in four of those seasons. Along with the honors and numbers, Brooks had the respect of the locker room, the community and the entire NFL. He was the picture of grace. Of consistency. Of tenacity.

If you’re stacking honors, records and all-time numbers, pointing at Kucherov is the proper way to go.

As for me, I’m sticking with Brooks for now. The entirety of impact and the memories along the way push him over the top.

You may disagree, which, I suppose, is the whole point.

©2026 Tampa Bay Times. Visit tampabay.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.