I watched two Brett Hull playoff games and tracked his ice time.
April 22, 1990, Game 3 of division final series between St Louis Blues and Chicago Blackhawks.
April 28, 1991, Game 6 of division final series between St Louis Blues and Minnesota North Stars.
April 22, 1990,
Hull played 18:59 in this game. He played about every third shift at even strength, almost every minute on the power play, and didn't kill any penalties.
His regular EV linemates were Sergio Momesso at LW and Peter Zezel at C. The regular second line was Brind'Amour-Oates-MacLean, and the regular third line was Lowry-Meagher-Rich Sutter.
The fourth line to start was Gino Cavallini, Ron Wilson, and Kelly Chase. Chase got injured on his second shift late in the first period and left the game, but he was the 12th forward so not a big difference. Rick Meagher got injured halfway through the second, which put him out for the playoffs, and Ron Wilson moved up to centre the third line. After Sergio Momesso took a misconduct in the third period, the Blues only had 9 forwards left for the last 8 minutes. Even under these circumstances, Brian Sutter never stopped using three lines at EV.
The Lowry-Meagher-Rich Sutter line, later Lowry-Wilson-Rich Sutter, was used to check the Savard-Larmer line for Chicago
Here's the TOI for the St Louis forwards in this game. Adam Oates took on the second unit PK after Meagher's injury which put him at #1 among forwards.
Hull scored 2 goals and 2 assists in this game.
Assist #1 - on the opening shift of the game, Dave Manson fell down retrieving a puck in his end. Hull retrieved the puck and whipped a pass from the boards to Peter Zezel in front. Zezel's shot produced a rebound on which Sergio Momesso scored.
Goal #1 - power play goal. Hull lined up just behind Oates on the offensive zone faceoff. Oates won it back to Hull who one-timed it and scored.
Assist #2 - power play assist. Hull was the right hand man on a 3-on-2. Received and returned a quick pass from Brind'Amour entering the zone, who then set up Jeff Brown on the left for a one-timer.
Goal #2 - tying goal with less than 5 minutes left. Hull carried the puck into the zone and blasted a slapshot that just missed. The puck works its way around to Gordie Roberts at the left point, who shoots on goal with Hull and one other Blue forward working to get position in front. Hull tipped it for a goal.
Here's a play where Hull showed his speed driving the net against Bob Murray. The announcers noted that Murray, a veteran RHS defenceman who rarely played the left side during his career, had moved to left defence to match up against Hull.
April 28, 1991
Hull played 32:21 in this game. He played about half the game at even strength, most of the power play, and didn't kill any penalties.
His regular centre was Adam Oates, who played 30:46 of ice time. They played with all four LW at different times - Dave Thomlinson, Gino Cavallini, Rod Brind'Amour, and Dave Lowry, roughly in that order. Hull and Oates played so much that they rarely skated with any speed through the neutral zone, noticeably less than in the 1990 game. So they usually had one LW play the first half of their shift and another play the second half, and this LW would skate hard through the neutral zone, forecheck and backcheck hard, fight for the puck, basically everything that Hull and Oates weren't doing because they were playing half the game. It worked OK with Cavallini and Brind'Amour, who had size and speed. Not well at all with Thomlinson, who was too slow to be effective in this role.
Hull and Oates were overplayed in this game and often ineffective, with the North Stars clogging up the neutral zone and shutting them completely down in transition. They both looked a lot better in the 1990 game playing 20 minutes/game on separate lines.
The Blues lack of forward depth was visible in this game. Dave Thomlinson and Steve Tuttle played way too much for two guys who looked like minor leaguers. Dan Quinn and Ron Brind'Amour were a decent duo on the second line, and Quinn was easily the most effective St Louis forward at carrying the puck through the neutral zone, but Sutter kept coming back to Oates and Hull. It seemed to be his only answer.
Hull's 5:15 shift to close the game was something else. His legs were gone and the 1-2 punch of LWs Stew Gavin and Gaetan Duchesne were constantly tying him up and taking away his space. So they put him out at right defence just to give him room to get his shot off, and they didn't take him off for the rest of the game.
Most of the game was played with the score 0-0 and very few penalties. Hull scored a goal and an assist, both in the third period.
Hull's goal - Goalie pulled, offensive zone faceoff, Oates won it back to Hull, Scott Stevens cleared the North Stars out of the way, and Hull sniped it past Casey.
Brett Hull rush, Stew Gavin checked him.
Hull hooked Curt Giles down, no penalty.
Hull picked the puck for a scoring chance. Jon Casey waited him out and stopped the deke.
Hull stole the puck at his blue line and rushed down the right side. Neal Broten got back and knocked the puck away.
Hull wound up just outside the blueline and blasted a slap shot past Casey and off the post.
Replay shows Stew Gavin checking Brett Hull, not even facing the puck, just facing Hull and basically wrestling him with his free hand.
Overall? Hull basically played Bossy-type ice time in the 1990 playoff game, except he played almost every power play minute where Bossy usually played about 2/3 of the power play. And then in the 1991 playoff game, Hull played Florida Pavel Bure-type ice time.
If Hull did indeed play significantly more ice time in the 1990-91 season than in 1989-90 - not just after the Blues traded away their whole second line at the trade deadline - I'm more impressed with his 89-90 season than I was. Remember that he played with Zezel, not Oates, as his centre in 89-90. Even on the power play, Oates played the right point and Zezel played C in the game I tracked. It was the 1991 game where Hull and Oates played almost all their minutes together.