Sakic and Forsberg scoring comparison in their 6 WCF runs

[LightningStorm]

In their first 7 seasons in Denver from 1996-2002, the Avalanche made the conference finals 6 times, winning them twice, and winning the cup afterwards both times. Here's a detailed look in terms of how Sakic and Forsberg did scoring wise. The general takeaway is Sakic was better in their cup winning years, and Forsberg in the years they lost in game 7 in Dallas or Detroit. Because Forsberg was a strong playoff performer who won 2 cups, people often assume those 2 things are connected, but as we'll see here, that wasn't exactly the case. Meanwhile, Sakic rightly has a reputation as a great and clutch playoff performer for being great in the playoffs both years the Avs won it, but he also had some consistent struggles against the other 2 western powerhouses of the time.

1996 22 GP each
Sakic: 18+16=34 (10-8-8-16 vs Canucks and Panthers, 12-10-8-18 vs Hawks and Wings)
Forsberg: 10+11=21 (10-7-8-15 vs Canucks and Panthers, 12-3-3-6 vs Hawks and Wings)

Sakic was the easy CS winner, but the gap gets bigger when factoring in their tougher competition. Both dominated the overmatched Canucks and Panthers in R1 and the SCF, but against the formidable Hawks and elite Wings, Sakic greatly outperformed Forsberg, who had a 5 game scoring drought in that span. By the time they made it to the finals, Sakic already had the CS clinched if the Avs won, which was basically a forgone conclusion playing the Cinderella Panthers.

1997
Sakic: 17 GP 8+17=25 (6-4-2-6 vs Wings)
Forsberg: 14 GP 5+12=17 (5-0-1-1 vs Wings)

Against the heavy underdog Oilers, who had just upset the Stars in R1, Forsberg dominated, with 10 points (3g, 7a) in the first 3 games before a concussion made him miss the last 2 games of the series. If his performance against the Wings is any indication, he wasn't over it by the next round, and also missed game 5 of that series.

1999 total 19 GP
Sakic: 6+13=19
Forsberg: 8+16=24

vs San Jose 6 GP
Sakic: 3+9=12
Forsberg: 2+6=8

vs Detroit 6 GP
Sakic: 1+1=2
Forsberg: 4+5=9

vs Dallas 7 GP
Sakic: 2+3=5
Forsberg: 2+5=7

This postseason was the reverse of 1996. When the Avs were heavy favorites against the Sharks, Sakic had a huge series. But he struggled against the other 2 elite West teams the next 2 series. Against Dallas, his 3 assists all came in a wild 7-5 game 5 win, and one of his goals was scored in garbage time in game 7 when they were down 4-0. Forsberg, meanwhile, got hot after they fell down 2-0 to the Wings, having 8 points (4g, 4a) in the 4 games they won in a row, then was a PPG against a stifling Dallas D. Funny enough, the leading scorer this series was neither of them nor even Modano, but actually Nieuwendyk with 9 points (3g, 6a), which I think is an underrated reason why he won the CS this year. Combining the 2 series, Forsberg was 13-6-10-16, and Sakic was 13-3-4-7.

2000
Sakic: 17 GP 2+7=9 (5-1-1-2 vs Wings, 7-0-3-3 vs Stars)
Forsberg: 16 GP 7+8=15 (5-4-2-6 vs Wings, 7-2-3-5 vs Stars)

Forsberg once again carried a much bigger load than Sakic against the Wings and Stars, having more goals than Sakic even had points. Totals for those 2 combined series were 12-6-5-11 for Forsberg and 12-1-4-5 for Sakic. While Belfour outdueling Roy is the narrative around the Stars back to back WCF victories over the Avs, the Stars essentially shutting down Sakic (14-2-6-8) has been lost in the fold about these 2 series.

2001 first 2 rounds
Sakic: 9-5-4-9 (4-4-3-7 vs Van, 5-1-1-2 vs LA)
Forsberg: 11-4-10-14 (4-2-4-6 vs Van, 7-2-6-8 vs LA)
Last 2 rounds
Sakic: 12-8-9-17 (5-4-4-8 vs Blues, 7-4-5-9 vs Devils)
Like 1996, Sakic scored over 50 goals this season. In the first 2 rounds against the 2 lowest seeds in the West, Forsberg was dominant. His LA series was his most important in either cup year since the heavy underdog Kings might've pulled off the upset if not for it. A large reason they came close was because Sakic was held to 2 points and missed 2 games in the series with a shoulder injury. But when the series ended, Forsberg had to have emergency surgery, putting him out for the playoffs and the entire following RS. But Sakic, who won the Hart that year, regained his MVP form, and the Avs won the cup without Forsberg in large reason due to that, plus this was their best team in these 7 years. Against the Blues and Devils, who each had a pair of HOF d-men on their teams, Sakic dominated, with 8 points (4g, 4a) in their 5 game series win over the Blues, and 9 points (4g, 5a) in their 7 game finals win over the Devils. This was the best either of them ever played in the playoffs, as Sakic did this with a bad shoulder and opponents able to focus on him more with Forsberg out.

2002
Sakic: 21-9-10-19 (7-2-3-5 vs Wings)
Forsberg: 21-9-18-27 (7-2-6-8 vs Wings)

After missing the entire regular season, Forsberg had the best postseason of his career, leading the playoffs in assists and points despite the Avs losing in the WCF. If ever there was a CS case for a player who didn't even make the finals, this was it. Forsberg was much better once again vs Detroit. In the first 5 games before the Avs got shut out in the last 2 by Hasek, Forsberg had 8 points, including 4 in their game 2 win and the OT goal in game 5. Sakic, meanwhile, had 5 points this series. This could've been an all time great postseason for Forsberg had the Avs won the WCF, which was the true SCF that season.

I'm not saying this to say Sakic being the better player made the Avs better than if Forsberg was. Sakic also had his 2 best RS's the same seasons the Avs won both cups, and his play simply carried over to the playoffs. Also, in neither of their cup wins did they have to play a road game 7 in Dallas or Detroit of all places (though worth pointing out they had a chance to eliminate Dallas at home in 99, and had to stay alive by winning on the road in NJ in 01). Just an interesting pattern I noticed about their postseason performances in specific seasons.

Looking at their playoff scoring performance during these runs provided nuance for me. Against elite teams, both were rarely on at the same time. Taking a look at Forsberg in the playoffs has showed me that despite people viewing playoff performance as ultra sacred, the small sample size can lead to unsustainable things occurring. Forsberg's goal rate increasing and assist rate decreasing in the playoffs were examples of unsustainable small sample size variance. Likewise, the Avs winning the final 2 rounds of the 2001 playoffs without him wasn't able to sustain itself the following RS. Sure, they finished #2 in the West, but they were 17 points behind the Wings, and only 5 ahead of the #8 Canucks, who beat the Oilers by 2 points for the last spot. And this was with Dallas having an off year and missing the playoffs.

I do think Forsberg was the more consistent playoff performer, in spite of Sakic's greatest performances resulting in their cups. Forsberg was consistently better against the Wings and Stars. Though as I said earlier, I do think Sakic's last 2 rounds in 2001 with Forsberg out were the peak for either of them. Overall I'd give the edge to Sakic with his record 8 OT playoff goals, and he grew his legacy more post 2002 than Forsberg. But Forsberg did have some of the greatest playoff runs that didn't result in winning the cup.

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[daver]

I think there is something to be said about one player stepping up when the other player wasn't which may explain why they were not "on" at the same time. We see a bit of this in the Crosby/Malkin duo. Both were great playoff performers that closed the gap between them and Jagr when looking at the best players for their era. That Sakic has the two elite Cup winning runs on his resume plus the "clutch" factor gives him the edge over Forsberg's consistency and superior 2-way game.

 

[bobholly39]

You said in the OP "against elite teams, both were rarely on at the same time". Which just goes to show the importance of having two elite C's. Penguins have had the same luxury throughout Crosby and Malkin's careers - if one is cold the other can get hot, and vice versa. It helps tremendously. Compare it to Oilers of today with Drai + McDavid who often play on the same line - and it's just a different dynamic.

Very interesting to see the breakdown year by year and round by round.

I do give quite a bit of value to Sakic being good and the MVP forward in both cup runs, whereas Forsberg was arguably not even the 3rd most valuable player on the team in either playoff year. ie - it's Sakic who led them over the top, twice, not Forsberg. Still - I think I'd subscribe to the notion that Forsberg was more consistent overall in the playoffs - since Sakic had quite a few series (and 2000, the whole playoffs practically) where he disappointed, that probably caused his team a chance to advance further. I don't know that Forsberg was ever really "bad" in the playoffs in those years

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Sakic was the better player

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

Nice work.

I remember looking at their regular season point shares with different teammates about a year ago, and one thing I’ve thought about is that we’re perhaps underrating the value of their wingers in these comparisons. I mean, quality of linemates is often brought up when discussing Crosby v. Malkin or Ovechkin, it’s worth to consider with Forsberg and Sakic, albeit usually not as straightforward.

Some years it’s hard to say who had the better linemates. Part because they seemed to cycle quite a lot, and part because it can seem like splitting hairs when either have two of Kamensky, Deadmarsh, Lemieux, Young, Simon, etc on their respective lines. 1998-99 I think was a noteworthy season in terms of Sakic and Forsberg often playing on the same line (besides on the powerplay, where they usually combined throughout their time together).

But some years it seemed pretty obvious whichever player centered Tanguay and Hejduk more often would lead the team in scoring. Sakic’s 2000-01 and Forsberg’s 2002-03 were both fueled in parts by routinely centering Hejduk and Tanguay ES. Then one should consider health and distribution of defensive assignments. I believe it was in his post-career SVT documentary that Forsberg pointed out he didn’t have many defensive zone starts in 2002-03, which not only explains the Art Ross, but also him achieving a +52 for the season. Sakic missed 22 games that season, his production seems to take a bigger hit in his less healthy seasons than Forsberg’s does in his, but there may be other reasons for that besides “injured Forsberg great warrior”, different types of injuries, and so on.

Forsberg’s awesome pace when healthy in 2003-04 I think could be explained by Tanguay and Hejduk as well, and Sakic picking up the pace when Forsberg was out of the lineup (and thus not having to carry plugs Selänne and Kariya as often!).

I never looked too closely at playoff scoring, but from the 2000-01 scoring logs it does seem Sakic continued playing with Hejduk and Tanguay into the playoffs, though struggled a bit even strength. Half his points that postseason came on the powerplay. Forsberg seems mostly to have played with Drury and I’m guessing Nieminen before Sakic was injured, and 9 of Foppa’s 14 points were scored even strength. I think we tend to forget what a great postseason that was for Drury though: he scored 13 points even strength, which equaled Sakic, had four goals against the Devils, centering a hard working line with Nieminen and Hinote.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

i feel like someone once did an exhaustive accounting of when and which one did the heavy defensive lifting

does anybody remember this?

 

[The Panther]

I would tend to give Forsberg a partial (not full) 'pass' for 1996's late rounds, as it was his 2nd NHL season and probably the first time in his life he had ever played over 100 competitive hockey games in one season. (Sakic's rookie year also had a hot start, and a slow finish.) Likewise, Forsberg was, at noted, coming back from concussion in 1997 later rounds (back in the days when you got a couple of days off for a concussion and then were thrown back into duty).

That said, Sakic was clearly superior in '96 and '97, as the OP shows.

After that, they're very close and I think there's basically nothing to choose between them. Sakic gets points for his clutch and overtime goals, but Forsberg's even strength results are just way superior to Sakic's. From '98 to '02, Forsberg went +32 and Sakic -3.

 

[86Habs]

I would tend to give Forsberg a partial (not full) 'pass' for 1996's late rounds, as it was his 2nd NHL season and probably the first time in his life he had ever played over 100 competitive hockey games in one season. (Sakic's rookie year also had a hot start, and a slow finish.) Likewise, Forsberg was, at noted, coming back from concussion in 1997 later rounds (back in the days when you got a couple of days off for a concussion and then were thrown back into duty).

That said, Sakic was clearly superior in '96 and '97, as the OP shows.

After that, they're very close and I think there's basically nothing to choose between them. Sakic gets points for his clutch and overtime goals, but Forsberg's even strength results are just way superior to Sakic's. From '98 to '02, Forsberg went +32 and Sakic -3.

Before getting into detail, I'll say that Forsberg was more productive, consistent and perhaps simply just "better" than Sakic in the 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2002 playoffs. There are probably several reasons for that - perhaps injury, perhaps Sakic's tank running low on gas (2002), probably Forsberg being at his peak during this time period (imo), but deployment/utilization by Colorado and its opponents has to be a large factor. In the seasons where Sakic underperformed, he was at some points deployed as a checker; he certainly was in the 2000 Western conference finals against Dallas, where Hartley matched him up against the Modano line. Fair to say Modano won that matchup, as he did in 1999 (contributing to Sakic's negative +/-), but it also had the effect of highlighting Forsberg as Colorado's main offensive weapon, which Hitchcock tried to mitigate by matching up the "grumpy old men" line and Hatcher/Matvichuk against Forsberg. Good defensive players, but not much of a threat offensively...so any ES production by Forsberg would in theory result in a positive +/- as those Dallas players weren't scoring much.

I would say those Dallas and Detroit teams had a really good amount of playoff experience, had just a little more depth than did Colorado during that era, and got some clutch performances from guys like Nieuwendyk with resulted in both Bowman and Hitchcock having the pieces set up on the chessboard to narrowly outmaneuver Hartley in those playoff series.

 

[LightningStorm]

With Forsberg's best postseasons being years the Avs DIDN'T win the cup, one thing I do wonder is if his legacy and career outcome would've been similar to Lindros had that trade not happened and he'd been a Flyer. He wouldn't have had Sakic and Roy to help carry the load had he had a down or absent postseason had he been a Flyer. Both of their styles of play made them vulnerable to injuries, as it eventually caught up to both of them. Overall I'd see Forsberg as a Flyer in the 90's being similar to Lindros with a slightly lower peak and a little bit longer longevity.

 

[LightningStorm]

Side question about Forsberg's playoff career: as pointed out, his goal scoring rate rose in the playoffs (0.35 to 0.42 GPG) while his assist rate dropped (0.9 to 0.71 APG). While I speculated in my OP that it could simply be smaller sample size variance in the playoffs (in addition to 0.9 APG being hard to maintain in the playoffs), what other explanations exist for this? Could it be that teams in the playoffs were trying to take away his playmaking ability first?

 

[Dingo]

Side question about Forsberg's playoff career: as pointed out, his goal scoring rate rose in the playoffs (0.35 to 0.42 GPG) while his assist rate dropped (0.9 to 0.71 APG). While I speculated in my OP that it could simply be smaller sample size variance in the playoffs (in addition to 0.9 APG being hard to maintain in the playoffs), what other explanations exist for this? Could it be that teams in the playoffs were trying to take away his playmaking ability first?

i think he just went for it more.

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

Side question about Forsberg's playoff career: as pointed out, his goal scoring rate rose in the playoffs (0.35 to 0.42 GPG) while his assist rate dropped (0.9 to 0.71 APG). While I speculated in my OP that it could simply be smaller sample size variance in the playoffs (in addition to 0.9 APG being hard to maintain in the playoffs), what other explanations exist for this? Could it be that teams in the playoffs were trying to take away his playmaking ability first?

I listened to a Swedish podcast episode some time ago about the 1996 World Cup where they talked about it becoming painfully obvious during the game versus Canada iirc that Forsberg grew frustrated with linemate Daniel Alfredsson spoiling several opportunities to score, and as a result tried to do much more on his own.

I think it was always a tendency with Forsberg in deadlocked games, to get creative and rely more on his ability to free up time and space, as well to finish the plays himself.

 

[flipp]

When he played in Sweden before he went to NHL he scored almost one goal per game in the playoffs (13 goals in 14 games on two playoff appearances), his regular season goals per game average for the same two seasons were 0.53. The perception in Sweden at the time was that he changed his game somewhat during playoff and played more effective and (selfish). While 14 games is a tiny sample size it goes in the same direction as his NHL stats.

 

[Theokritos]

i feel like someone once did an exhaustive accounting of when and which one did the heavy defensive lifting

does anybody remember this?

Maybe this one? Detailed look at Sakic and Forsberg at Even Strength

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Maybe this one? Detailed look at Sakic and Forsberg at Even Strength

That was the one. Too bad all the tables were lost when they switched servers. Maybe @overpass still has the data?

(EDIT - I re-read that thread. Even if the tables are gone, the analysis and conclusions are still well-summarized).

 

[ItWasJustified]

and he grew his legacy more post 2002 than Forsberg.

Not that strange since Forsberg could barely skate after 2002 due to the injury to his foot. The most incredible thing with Forsberg is how he could be well over 1.00 PPG after that injury.

 

[ZEBROA]

Forsberg was better then i remembered. Miss him.

 

[LiveeviL]

In the old incarnation of this forum there was a good thread which was based on relative corsi (iirc) which showed that - despite the first/second line destination - Forsberg had tougher opposition during play-offs. Anyone who remember that thread? It was a lot of work behind it.

 

[authentic]

i feel like someone once did an exhaustive accounting of when and which one did the heavy defensive lifting

does anybody remember this?

It was overpass. He pretty much clearly showed Forsberg was overall a more dominant player at even strength which was already apparent to me when watching them both.

 

[authentic]

When he played in Sweden before he went to NHL he scored almost one goal per game in the playoffs (13 goals in 14 games on two playoff appearances), his regular season goals per game average for the same two seasons were 0.53. The perception in Sweden at the time was that he changed his game somewhat during playoff and played more effective and (selfish). While 14 games is a tiny sample size it goes in the same direction as his NHL stats.

It also matches up well with what you can clearly see on the ice. He could seemingly score at will when he wanted to.

 

[VanIslander]

The thread title strikes fear in my heart because while Sakic was born on the same street as me (and i swear with 90% certainty he was that awkward kid my kindy class who spoke English as a 2nd language and had a strange smile), yet that **** Forsberg repeatedly made my trips to "GM Place" a nightmare when it mattered most. Is there a greater Canuck foil than Petr?

 

[Jahara]

I listened to a Swedish podcast episode some time ago about the 1996 World Cup.

Which one?

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

Which one?

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