Mike Bossy vs Pavel Bure who's the better goal scorer all time?

[Gorskyontario]

Unless you factor in the scoring environment, what is the argument to say he wasn’t?

60 goals / 136 points

Without considering that context, isn’t Maruk’s 1982 season a lock for one of the top 40 greatest single seasons in 100 years of hockey history?

Dennis Maruk scored 356 goals in 888 games.


If he scored 50-60 every season he played he would have been one of the best goal scorers ever. Consistency matters, Bossy had it.

 

[67 others]

Yes Bure outside its rookie season played in 2 high scoring season, 93 and 94, he scored 60 goals both time, his next healthy season was in the dpe in 1998.

60 goals even then was really good, that was the Rocket winning season of 1994.


I really do not like using league wide goal per games, but if we use it as a gross reference, weighted by how many games they played * that season gpg and make it an average it would look like.

Bossy

season	age	games	gpg	goals	league gpg	weighted
1977-78	21​	73​	0.73​	53​	3.30​	240.9​
1978-79	22​	80​	0.86​	69​	3.50​	280​
1979-80	23​	75​	0.68​	51​	3.51​	263.25​
1980-81	24​	79​	0.86​	68​	3.84​	303.36​
1981-82	25​	80​	0.80​	64​	4.01​	320.8​
1982-83	26​	79​	0.76​	60​	3.86​	304.94​
1983-84	27​	67​	0.76​	51​	3.94​	263.98​
1984-85	28​	76​	0.76​	58​	3.89​	295.64​
1985-86	29​	80​	0.76​	61​	3.97​	317.6​
1986-87	30​	63​	0.60​	38​	3.67​	231.21​
Average	25.5​	752​	0.76​	573​	3.75​	2821.68​

At the bottom we see that the games Bossy played in his career the league team gpg was in average 3.75

Outside 92-93, I think all Bossy season were pretty much highest scoring in the modern nhl.

Bure in comparison

season	age	games	gpg	goals	league gpg	weighted
1991-92	20	65	0.52	34	3.48	226.20
1992-93	21	83	0.72	60	3.63	301.29
1993-94	22	76	0.79	60	3.24	246.24
1994-95	23	44	0.45	20	2.99	131.56
1995-96	24	15	0.40	6	3.14	47.10
1996-97	25	63	0.37	23	2.92	183.96
1997-98	26	82	0.62	51	2.64	216.48
1998-99	27	11	1.18	13	2.63	28.93
1999-00	28	74	0.78	58	2.75	203.50
2000-01	29	82	0.72	59	2.76	226.32
2001-02	30	68	0.50	34	2.62	178.16
2002-03	31	39	0.49	19	2.65	103.35
average		702	0.62	437	2.98	2093.09

Bure played in his career the league team gpg was in average 2.98 vs 3.75, or teams in the games Bure played scored at 79.5% the rate of Bossy league, while Bure scored at 81.5% the rate of Bossy during their respective career, in terms of relative to global scoring they were virtually the same.

This is obviously very rough, scoring distribution and when talking scoring talent, ice time and dedication at things that are not scoring goals, Florida Bure look better than peak pre-injury Bure in Vancouver "adjusted", while he did not become necessarily better at scoring goals, maybe he had more ice times on teams that were going nowhere outside of him scoring goals and dedicated less energy to defense and took more risk trying to score (playing higher and what not) as it was their only chance to win.

This is just a rough idea that we cannot just really plug gpg of someone that played int he 1978-1987 league with someone that played significant part of their career when 45 goals could put you in the Rocket race type of environment.

If you look at a method I prefer, how they scored versus elite Canadian scorer in the league, here again there is no Bossy > Bure.

fullName	count(season)	totalGamesPlayed	TotalAdjGoals	averageSeason	adjGPG
Maurice Richard	18	978	968	53.8	0.99
Alex Ovechkin	16	1197	1146	71.6	0.96
Mario Lemieux	17	915	820	48.2	0.9
Pavel Bure	12	702	627	52.3	0.89
Bobby Hull	16	1063	932	58.2	0.88
Steven Stamkos	13	841	705	54.2	0.84
Mike Bossy	10	752	625	62.5	0.83
Brett Hull	19	1269	983	51.7	0.77
Gordie Howe	26	1767	1338	51.5	0.76
Bernie Geoffrion	16	883	675	42.2	0.76

When it come to a Bure vs Bossy goalscoring conversation, numbers do not help us here, longevity does not help us that much either way, international pre-nhl play, scoring in the playoff when they had the opportunity to do so, eye test etc... they match really well, there is not much magic end of conversation argument one can use.

Bure did lead the league one more time than Bossy, but Bossy had a second place to a 92 goal Gretzky scoring 64 of them, thats not fair.
Bossy scored in the playoff more often than Bure, had way more occasion to do it as well.

All time greatest scorer, I would and easily put Bossy above Bure, he did so many time in a row in the playoff, when you look his game against strong defense-high intensity, regular season against the good defense + playoff + best on best tourney, his scoring is not far from prime Gretzky at all, which make him probably not far from anyone at all. He did it more often, he did in a row, you search tiebreaker and those are good, it is a clear even if not by a lot Bossy > Bure all-time historic goal scorer.

Who was better to score a goal at hockey, pick what you prefer / could depend on the team need, if I am the Islanders surrounded with talent trying to win 5 cups in a row, give me Bossy, team Russia in a short tourney, the Panthers, 94 Canucks, not sure at all Bossy score more goals and can see a Bure argument easily.

The clutching and grabbing of the DPE didn't really hamper Bure. He spent most of it avoiding clutching and grabbing doing figure 8's near the blueline/redline for cherry picks

 

[MadLuke]

Really strong skater and in general as well that help (a bit like Jagr), but still had to shoot around the oversized equipment goaltender.

He did lead the league in power play goals as well with the Panthers, were I doubt cherry picking or not is a big difference (but by a smaller difference going toward your point).