Is Peter Forsberg underrated?

Has Forsberg become underrated?

  • Yes indeed

  • Maybe slightly

  • Not at all

  • He’s actually overrated


Results are only viewable after voting.

daver

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Apr 4, 2003
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MVP votings are completely irrelevant when evaluating a player who only had three 75+ games played seasons his entire career. And you can’t even take for granted that those three seasons coincided with his highest level of play. Remarkably enough Forsberg managed to be voted 1st team all star 3 times aka best center in the league (one of those he only played 72 games).

We seriously need to rank the "Best 9 game starts to a season in NHL history" as Forsberg clearly isn't getting the recognition he deserves.
 
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tabness

be a playa 🇵🇸
Apr 4, 2014
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We seriously need to rank the "Best 9 game starts to a season in NHL history" as Forsberg clearly isn't getting the recognition he deserves.

brother don't you make a lot out of Crosby's like 20 game 2011-2012 season crunching all the numbers and all that?

glass houses and all that...
 

Ben White

Registered User
Dec 28, 2015
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We have already gone through this exercise,

A healthy Forsberg:

94/95 - Sakic 4th in PPG, Forsberg 19th
95/96 - 5th in PPG, Sakic 4th
96/97 - 5th in PPG, Sakic 0.01 lower before he was injured
97/98 - Forsberg 3rd in PPG, Sakic 17th
98/99 - About the same but Sakic has the higher PPG.
99/00 - Sakic had 2nd best PPG, Forsberg N/A
00/01 - Sakic easily better, Forsberg is 21st in PPG before injury, finishes 4th

More seasons than not, a prime Sakic is outplaying a prime Forsberg

You are basing your whole argument on a 9 game stretch of games in 03/04 and 21 game stretch in 05/06.
How dishonest is this post? You’re excluding Forsberg’s entire peak from 2002 to 2005 cause it doesn’t overlap with Sakic’s prime. Be real. This basically disqualifies your entire argument. But for the sake of it, let’s do some in depth with what you put here.

94/95 - Sakic 4th in PPG, Forsberg 19th
You absolutely can not compare an NHL veteran in his prime to a rookie
95/96 - 5th in PPG, Sakic 4th
Forsberg’s sophomore season. Wasn’t considered Avs’ #1C yet, yet already almost produced at peak Sakic level.
96/97 - 5th in PPG, Sakic 0.01 lower before he was injured
97/98 - Forsberg 3rd in PPG, Sakic 17th
Forsberg is 1st team all star
98/99 - About the same but Sakic has the higher PPG. -Forsberg is 1st team all star though
99/00 - Sakic had 2nd best PPG, Forsberg N/A Forsberg came straight out of back surgery and sitting out the first half of the season.
00/01 - Sakic easily better, Forsberg is 21st in PPG before injury, finishes 4th
Forsberg still wasn’t his old self after the surgery and clearly needed to rest up, which he did the next regular season and the rest is history (which you happened to exclude in your post).

You should seriously be ashamed of yourself for posting such dishonest content.
 
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Ben White

Registered User
Dec 28, 2015
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When it comes to the Forsberg vs Sakic comparison, here are som cold hard facts when it comes to their production:

In Sakic best stretch of seasons (his prime) 1989-90 to 2000-01 it looks like this:
IMG_9477.jpeg


In Forsberg’s prime 1995-06 to 2003-04 it looks like this:
IMG_9476.jpeg


Despite playing the entirety in the DPE with MUCH lower scoring than in Sakic’ stretch from ‘89 to ‘94 Forsberg has him beat in both league ranking and per game numbers when comparing prime vs prime. And this is including two seasons where Forsberg was clearly affected from a back surgery which made his numbers drop drastically for 1,5 season + playing through injuries, playing half injured a lot more in general which hurts his per game numbers.

Let’s look at the playoffs. First Sakic’ prime:
IMG_9478.jpeg

Remarkably enough Forsberg still has him beat despite including his rookie season and playing exclusively in the DPE vs Sakic being in his prime and partly playing in a much higher scoring era.

Let’s look at Forsberg’s prime:
IMG_9479.jpeg

Sakic is doing fine but Forsberg has him clearly beat.


And this is only production. I think we all can agree that Forsberg was the better defensive player and physical presence.

And even if we don’t care about +\-, Forsberg leads the entire league in his prime whereas Sakic is nowhere to be found in his. However since +\- is partly a team stat we can exclude the Quebec days, but still Sakic is only at place 14 when only including his prime years in Colorado.

I think we can end the discussion about who was better between the two now. Feel free to share this post whenever you get tangled up in a Sakic vs Forsberg discussion.
 
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TheGoldenJet

Registered User
Apr 2, 2008
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MVP votings are completely irrelevant
Because they don’t fit your argument.
when evaluating a player who only had three 75+ games played seasons his entire career.
Why did you choose the number 75, I wonder? Forsberg has played 72+ games five times in his prime, yet has a glaring lack of hardware. Auston Matthews won the Hart recently with 73 games played, against McDavid no less.
 

Ben White

Registered User
Dec 28, 2015
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Because they don’t fit your argument.
Then explain how it’s relevant in this context. One outlier 73 GP Hart from Matthew’s doesn’t change the argument. It’s very difficult to challenge for Hart with 72 GP if you’re up against another worthy candidate who has 82. In 1998 Forsberg is defensively giving Jagr a run for his money for Hart had he played closer to 82.
I would also argue that sophomore Forsberg in ‘96, not yet deployed as Avs’
#1C, is not prime Forsberg in the sense that you could expect him to win a major award. And in 2001 he was clearly affected from his back surgery that had him sit out half of the prior season, I wouldn’t call that version of Forsberg “prime Forsberg”. He could’ve won it in 1999 - no excuses there. But he was voted 1st team all star as best center in the league and had a Conn Smythe worthy playoff run that year. I withhold that it’s unreasonable to think that lack of more hardware is something that can be held against Forsberg given the cards on hand.

In his prime, when healthy, Forsberg only had two seasons, and one borderline (72 GP), where it was realistic for him to even sniff any hardware given the amount of games played. Still he won:
1 Hart Trophy
1 Art Ross
1 Calder
1 plus/minus award
1 Selke runner up
3 times 1st team all star as the leagues best center
2 times unofficial playoff scoring champ (despite not playing in the finals)

Tell me how this resume can be held against him?
 
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