1989-90 Which Forwards had the Best Season?

[The Panther]

Gem after gem:

Thanks. A lot of great memories there! (I like how Boston outshot the hapless Nordiques 26-4 in one period...!)

Here's one where Wayne and the Kings beat Boston at the Garden, right at the end of the regular season
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[The Panther]

As to which forwards had the best season.... It's a tough one, which makes this a good season to talk about.

The best forwards in 1989 and 1990 were Gretzky and Lemieux. But Gretzky had just a so-so year by his standards, missed 7 games, had the lowest goals total of his career, had his first mini-slump since 1979, and had a very poor-to-mediocre team that underperformed. All that being said, he was still easily the best ES point producer in the League, was a 'plus' player on a 'minus' team, and paced for 156 points. Mario was the best scorer (slightly) on a per-game basis, but he missed almost 1/4 of the season, was a 'minus' player, and saw his production drop significantly from the year prior. The Pens, like the Kings, also regressed as a team.

Yzerman also saw his points total decrease from 1989 (partly due to his rather crappy November), but he was still having a career-peak type of season, offensively (along with '88 and '89). But the Red Wings crashed and burned, with Yzerman (as I noted somewhere above) on the ice for A LOT of goals against. Detroit was the third-worst team in the League with the fifth-worst defence, so I don't want to punish Yzerman too much, but I think the system Demers was using in '89 and '90 was not working.

Anyway, I choose Messier as the forward with the best season. He played the full season, unlike Wayne and Mario. He was really consistent in scoring across the four quarters of the season. Unlike the other three guys, he wasn't on a down-swing from the preceding season, but instead he was quite a bit better, having his career-best season. He led the Oilers in scoring by 36 points (over Hall of Famer, Kurri) and by 57 points over his linemate, Anderson. He had the best plus/minus of all Oiler forwards (and better than Wayne, Mario, or Steve). Mess's peers in the League also voted him best player this season.

By the way, from mid-January to the end of the season, Messier was actually #1 in NHL scoring, with 61 points in 33 games (and a higher PPG than Gretzky).

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

some facts:

gretzky

missed seven out of the last eight games of the regular season. LA went 1-5-1 in those games. with gretzky, they were 33-34-6, 13th in the league. not great, but better than the 34-39-7 they finished the season with. 15th, or 7th last.

gretzky’s main linemates were bob kudelski and mike krushelnyski in the first half, kudelski and tomas sandstrom in the second half. the other line was robitaille and taylor with nicholls in the first half, and todd elik in the second half.

his PP: duchesne, robitaille, taylor, and nicholls before he was replaced by sandstrom.

mario

likewise was at basically .500 with him in the lineup (27-28-4). they were 12th when he left the lineup. ultimately, the pens finished 17th, or 5th last: 32-40-8.

mario’s main linemates were bob errey and rob brown, until they traded dan quinn for tony tanti and he had errey and tanti for two weeks before he got hurt and missed (effectively) the rest of the year. the second line was was cullen with stevens and recchi.

his PP: coffey, cullen, stevens, and quinn before he was replaced by zarley zalapski.

yzerman

his regular linemates were gallant with a combo of mostly shawn burr and joey kocur on the other wing, with a little dave barr. his PP was chiasson, federko, gallant, and a fifth guy i can’t figure out from the box scores. some jimmy carson.

poor linemate support, sure. but damn, his team was 28-38-14, good for 3rd last in the league.

with all this weighed, it’s hard for me to not see messier and hull as two of the top three forwards, probably with gretzky as the third guy. both were on winning teams that began the playoffs with home ice.

hull

regular linemates were peter zezel and sergio momesso. the other line was oates between paul maclean and rookie brind’amour. there were a few patches when sutter loaded up hull and oates on the top line, but just brief spells (but they were productive). there was more oates with hull toward the end of the season, but sutter went back to zezel in the playoffs.

momesso: 27 ES pts with hull
zezel: 16 ES pts with hull
oates: 17 ES pts with hull (vs 37 in 60 games the next season, so he clearly didn’t play that much with hull in 1990)

the PP unit was jeff brown, zezel, oates, and momesso. i’m pretty sure i’ve read that zezel was the center on the PP that year, with oates on the point. both had 34 PP pts.