1979-80 Season

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The Panther

Registered User
Mar 25, 2014
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Tokyo, Japan
I disagree with this guy's thesis, but indeed the 1979-80 season was quite interesting for all the obvious reasons, most summarized in the video:


Although 1979-80 is before my memories, I have always thought of it as sort-of the start of the "modern" era of hockey. I say this mainly because my club (Edmonton) joined the NHL, but you can look at it also as a very stable League thenceforth (21 clubs from 1979 to 1991), and of course the beginning of players like Messier, Bourque, and Gretzky, who had very long careers.

It remains bizarre that those guys' career slightly overlapped with Keon, Howe, and Mikita...
 
The beginning of the end for dinosaur hockey.

Gretzky went on to be the greatest, everyone else in that top 10, with the exception of Dionne, was totally irrelevant to league scoring by their thirtieth birthdays... at the LATEST.

Really cool that Gordie and Hull were there.

edit - entire top 20, all in their twenties, except Gretzky, all obsolete, except Dionne, and a good excuse for Bossy, by 30.
 
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I disagree with this guy's thesis, but indeed the 1979-80 season was quite interesting for all the obvious reasons, most summarized in the video:


Although 1979-80 is before my memories, I have always thought of it as sort-of the start of the "modern" era of hockey. I say this mainly because my club (Edmonton) joined the NHL, but you can look at it also as a very stable League thenceforth (21 clubs from 1979 to 1991), and of course the beginning of players like Messier, Bourque, and Gretzky, who had very long careers.

It remains bizarre that those guys' career slightly overlapped with Keon, Howe, and Mikita...


I disagree that it was the league's greatest season but it's definitely the start of an era - 21-team league, end of the WHA, first season of Gretzky, change to an 18 year old draft, change in dynasties from Montreal->NYI, basically the rough point where the US/Euro invasion started en masse.

To me the 'eras' in the NHL since WW2 are pretty well-defined :

1945-67 - Original 6 Era
1967-79 - Expansion era
1979-94 - '80s offensive era
1994-04 - Dead Puck Era
2005-present - Cap era

It will be interesting to see if/when/how the current era ends but we're now on a 20-year stretch that has been remarkably consistent in terms of scoring and parity, and largely dominated by two players (Crosby and Malkin) whose careers started exactly in 2005 as well as the salary cap/free agency system that has been largely unchanged since it was introduced.
 
1994-04 - Dead Puck Era
2005-present - Cap era
I basically agree with your first three post-WWII eras, but I'm not sure about these two. It's tricky, because 1995 was only lower-scoring because of intense travel / intra-divisional games, and then 1995-96 is basically back to higher scoring. Also, 1996-97 isn't really the Dead Puck Era yet -- it's the transition season into it.

Post spring-1994 does seem a convenient demarcation point, though, because the game was in such a great state by spring 1994 (coinciding with the MLB players' strike)... and then the Work-Stoppage killed all that NHL momentum.

Really, though, the Dead Puck Era is only 1997-98 to 2003-04 (seven seasons), which seems short to be an "era".

And then the scoring levels circa 2010-11 to 2017-18 are right back to Dead Puck Era levels (esp. when three-on-three overtime goals are discounted).

I do feel like a new-ish era began in about 2018-19, but I'm not sure why...

Thinking about it further, maybe you're right that 1995 to 2003-04 is an "era", but it isn't all Dead Puck. What it really is, is the "size-fetish era". If you were six-foot six and could skate in a straight line, you basically had an NHL job...
 
Because of the competitor league getting away, having Howe, Hull, Brewer, Ratelle, Keon, Mikita, Cheevers, Esposito x2, Henderson, playing in the same league of Bourque-Gretzky up and comers must have been exciting.

A bit like 2006 before the first game, going up in a league with Forsberg come back, Crosby-Ovechkin starting and still Lemieux-Yzerman-Sakic-Hasek-Hull-Belfour, etc... in the mix. Did not went that well for everyone involved, but first week, opening night, felt quite special.

The list of turning point do look quite something in retrospecs (how massive the Islanders would be, how giant Gretzky would be) the Euro arrival phenomenom, not sure if those at the time felt like it, but obviously the expansion would have and an art ross winning rookie of that age by itself was a big deal, even if some would have had some narrative in both case of just wait Lafleur come back.
 
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Because of the competitor league getting away, having Howe, Hull, Brewer, Ratelle, Keon, Mikita, Cheevers, Esposito x2, Henderson, playing in the same league of Bourque-Gretzky up and comers must have been exciting.

A bit like 2006 before the first game, going up in a league with Forsberg come back, Crosby-Ovechkin starting and still Lemieux-Yzerman-Sakic-Hasek-Hull-Belfour, etc... in the mix. Did not went that well for everyone involved, but first week, opening night, felt quite special.

The list of turning point do look quite something in retrospecs (how massive the Islanders would be, how giant Gretzky would be) the Euro arrival phenomenom, not sure if those at the time felt like it, but obviously the expansion would have and an art ross winning rookie of that age by itself was a big deal, even if some would have had some narrative in both case of just wait Lafleur come back.
Watching Bourque and Gretzky and Mark Howe and Kent Nilsson in 1980 was exciting; watching Gordie Howe and Hull and Mikita and Esposito and Keon was the opposite of exciting. The good news was the latter guys were gone very soon, replaced by many skilled young players.
 
A bit similar for a lot of the old player in 2006, but before the first game, all those legends returning in the league could have been.
 
The '79-'80 season certainly wasn't the greatest season ever, but it was arguably the most important season in NHL history. You can see the importance in retrospect, but it was also talked about (by players, coaches, fans, etc.) a lot at the time. In particular, everybody noticed the sudden increase in speed - guys like Bourque, Messier, Gartner, Gretzky, Mark Howe, Hartsburg, Kent Nilsson, etc. flying around the ice for the first time.

That season was the beginning of the greatest influx of speed, skill, talent the NHL had ever seen, and nothing else had ever been close to it.

It was really the beginnings (if any season could be called the begginings) of what the NHL is today. That season was the start of a much bigger talent pool, the best players were better, and the depth of talent was substantially better. It led to better offense, better defense, there was better coaching, these things combined produced better hockey a few years down the road.

The Canadian talent was obviously great - fueled mainly by improvements in infrastructure (indoor rinks, minor hockey programs) and transportation in the 1960s. But this was the start of Americans, Swedes, and Finns as important components of the NHL. There was a lot of talent from these countries entering the NHL in the 1980s. And a few Czechoslovakian players.

The early '80s were exciting (and a bit wild) times in the NHL. The league became very young, and defense took a while to catch up to offense, but it did eventually.

If somebody was going to write a complete history of the NHL, the '79-'80 season would be a good place to start, a good point of comparison for what came before it, and what came after.
 
I basically agree with your first three post-WWII eras, but I'm not sure about these two. It's tricky, because 1995 was only lower-scoring because of intense travel / intra-divisional games, and then 1995-96 is basically back to higher scoring. Also, 1996-97 isn't really the Dead Puck Era yet -- it's the transition season into it.

Post spring-1994 does seem a convenient demarcation point, though, because the game was in such a great state by spring 1994 (coinciding with the MLB players' strike)... and then the Work-Stoppage killed all that NHL momentum.

Really, though, the Dead Puck Era is only 1997-98 to 2003-04 (seven seasons), which seems short to be an "era".

And then the scoring levels circa 2010-11 to 2017-18 are right back to Dead Puck Era levels (esp. when three-on-three overtime goals are discounted).

I do feel like a new-ish era began in about 2018-19, but I'm not sure why...

Thinking about it further, maybe you're right that 1995 to 2003-04 is an "era", but it isn't all Dead Puck. What it really is, is the "size-fetish era". If you were six-foot six and could skate in a straight line, you basically had an NHL job...

The 'pure' DPE was from 1997-2004 but I'd have the era starting with the 1994-95 season for a few reasons :

1) The CBA signed after the 1994 lockout defined that era, through the new salary cap CBA in 2005. This was the start of UFA and the explosion of salaries that quickly killed Quebec and Winnipeg in 1995 and 1996 respectively. Total new financial landscape for the league.

2) The 1995 Cup was won by the Devils playing the Lemaire trap style of hockey that was then basically duplicated by everyone over the next few years.

3) Gretzky and Lemieux combined for 48 points in the 1994-95 season. Even though both would be back with better seasons in the future, this signaled a massive changing of the guard with Lindros and Jagr taking over as the premier NHL forwards.

You could probably call that era a lot of things but to me it's pretty clearly an era. You could even call it the 'goalie era' because more than any other time in NHL history elite goalies were a disproportionate part of the storyline.

The '79-'80 season certainly wasn't the greatest season ever, but it was arguably the most important season in NHL history. You can see the importance in retrospect, but it was also talked about (by players, coaches, fans, etc.) a lot at the time. In particular, everybody noticed the sudden increase in speed - guys like Bourque, Messier, Gartner, Gretzky, Mark Howe, Hartsburg, Kent Nilsson, etc. flying around the ice for the first time.

That season was the beginning of the greatest influx of speed, skill, talent the NHL had ever seen, and nothing else had ever been close to it.

It was really the beginnings (if any season could be called the begginings) of what the NHL is today. That season was the start of a much bigger talent pool, the best players were better, and the depth of talent was substantially better. It led to better offense, better defense, there was better coaching, these things combined produced better hockey a few years down the road.

The Canadian talent was obviously great - fueled mainly by improvements in infrastructure (indoor rinks, minor hockey programs) and transportation in the 1960s. But this was the start of Americans, Swedes, and Finns as important components of the NHL. There was a lot of talent from these countries entering the NHL in the 1980s. And a few Czechoslovakian players.

The early '80s were exciting (and a bit wild) times in the NHL. The league became very young, and defense took a while to catch up to offense, but it did eventually.

If somebody was going to write a complete history of the NHL, the '79-'80 season would be a good place to start, a good point of comparison for what came before it, and what came after.

I've said a few times here over the years that a game in 1980 doesn't look meaningfully different from a game in 1970 but that a game in 1990 looks like it's about 5 leagues higher than a game in 1980. The change that happened over that 10 year period - in terms of the size of the players, the short shift revolution, the athleticism of the players, the pace of the game, the quality of the goaltending - was absolutely insane and greater than at any other point in NHL history, and 79-80 was the start of that.
 

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