How many points would Wayne Gretzky and/or Mario Lemieux score in today's NHL?

[daver]

Could Ovechkin get the edge in best 3 years if we place a higher value on goals? Lemieux is also playing with Coffey and Jagr in 2 of his 4 best years, whereas Ovechkin doesn't really have a comparable linemate. I also feel expansion caused the stat inflation in 1993. Ovechkin didn't really get the opportunity to feast on 3 brand new teams. If the 1988 or 1996 version of Mario competed at the same time as 2008 or 2009 or 2010 Ovechkin, do you think Ovechkin could have won the hart trophy over him? I think its a strong possibility Ovechkin is winning hart/lindsay trophies over 1988 and 1996 Mario, if you transported that Mario to 2008-2010. He would get far fewer pp opportunites and no jagr/coffey.

1988, not a chance in hell. He didn't have Coffey in that season.

Nor did he have him in 1996 and Mario proved that he didn't need Jagr to put up points. Mario was 3 years removed from a dominating season at ES so I'm not sure it's as simple as reducing his PP scoring percentage-wise. Great players put up points regardless.

OV would have put up 120 points or so with 60+ goals in 1996. Without a doubt he would win the trophies over everyone except Jagr/Mario.

 

[canucks4ever]

1988, not a chance in hell. He didn't have Coffey in that season.

Nor did he have him in 1996 and Mario proved that he didn't need Jagr to put up points. Mario was 3 years removed from a dominating season at ES so I'm not sure it's as simple as reducing his PP scoring percentage-wise. Great players put up points regardless.

OV would have put up 120 points or so with 60+ goals in 1996. Without a doubt he would win the trophies over everyone except Jagr/Mario.

Mario in 1988: 63 points in 31 games without Coffey. 105 points in 46 games with Coffey. he also scored more than half of his points on the powerplay.

 

[daver]

Mario in 1988: 63 points in 31 games without Coffey. 105 points in 46 games with Coffey. he also scored more than half of his points on the powerplay.

You are right, Coffey was on team. My bad.

So he was 2.03 PPG without Coffey, 2.28 with, a 10% difference. Don't see a huge amount evidence here.

That being said, over his career did Mario not prove that he could put up points regardless of teammates? Generational talent like Mario makes players of lesser talent better, not the other way around.

 

[Czech Your Math]

Mario's seasons converted into 2008-2010 vs. Ovechkin:

2008
Ovechkin 65 G, 112 P
'89 Mario 69 G, 146 P
'96 Mario 58 G, 137 P
'88 Mario 58 G, 123 P
'93 Mario 50 G, 116 P
'97 Mario 50 G, 116 P


2009
Ovechkin 56 G, 110 P
'89 Mario 64 G, 153 P
'96 Mario 61 G, 144 P
'88 Mario 53 G, 128 P
'93 Mario 53 G, 122 P
'97 Mario 50 G, 122 P

2010
Ovechkin 50 G, 109 P
'89 Mario 60 G, 144 P
'96 Mario 56 G, 134 P
'88 Mario 51 G, 119 P
'93 Mario 51 G, 117 P
'97 Mario 47 G, 116 P

Conversion factors: games scheduled/season, ES GPG, PP GPG, SH GPG

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Could Ovechkin get the edge in best 3 years if we place a higher value on goals? Lemieux is also playing with Coffey and Jagr in 2 of his 4 best years, whereas Ovechkin doesn't really have a comparable linemate. I also feel expansion caused the stat inflation in 1993. Ovechkin didn't really get the opportunity to feast on 3 brand new teams. If the 1988 or 1996 version of Mario competed at the same time as 2008 or 2009 or 2010 Ovechkin, do you think Ovechkin could have won the hart trophy over him? I think its a strong possibility Ovechkin is winning hart/lindsay trophies over 1988 and 1996 Mario, if you transported that Mario to 2008-2010. He would get far fewer pp opportunites and no jagr/coffey.

Lemieux would handily outscore ovechkin in any scenario. Lemieux was still very lethal at EV

 

[Czech Your Math]

Was OV that great of an ES scorer in those years? 2007/08 was the only year where he was clearly ahead of anyone else in ES scoring. 2008/09 he was second and 2009/10 he was tied with Sedin.

OV had one season which maybe cracks into Mario's top five.

Lemieux at ES:

'86- 5th
'87- t4th, missed 17 games
'88- 2nd to Gretzky
'89- 1st (by 1 over Yzerman & 2 over Gretzky)
'90- t3rd, missed 21 games
'92- 2nd to his linemate Stevens, missed 16 games
'93- 1st, despite missing 24 games
'96- 4th, behind Jagr/Nedved & (2 behind) Lindros
'97- 2nd (2 behind LeClair)

Best adjusted ES seasons between Lemieux & Ovechkin:

'89 Lemieux 124
'08 Ovechkin 121
'93 Lemieux 115
'97 Lemieux 111
'10 Ovechkin 109
'96 Lemieux 104
'09 Ovechkin 96
'92 Lemieux 96
'88 Lemieux 93
'11 Ovechkin 91

 

[blogofmike]

Lemieux at ES:

'86- 5th
'87- t4th, missed 17 games
'88- 2nd to Gretzky
'89- 1st (by 1 over Yzerman & 2 over Gretzky)
'90- t3rd, missed 21 games
'92- 2nd to his linemate Stevens, missed 16 games
'93- 1st, despite missing 24 games
'96- 4th, behind Jagr/Nedved & (2 behind) Lindros
'97- 2nd (2 behind LeClair)

Best adjusted ES seasons between Lemieux & Ovechkin:

'89 Lemieux 124
'08 Ovechkin 121
'93 Lemieux 115
'97 Lemieux 111
'10 Ovechkin 109
'97 Lemieux 104
'09 Ovechkin 96
'96 Lemieux 96
'88 Lemieux 93
'11 Ovechkin 91

I assume the second one is 1987?

Thanks for running the numbers.

Just wondering what the point totals mean, i.e. what the baseline year or GPG estimate is, given that they both make huge gains in ES points over their unadjusted real totals.

 

[Big Phil]

But these guys were at their "best" when the elite forwards were getting more PP time. Crosby's 104 points is roughly the same as his 120 point season in terms of how far ahead of the pack he was. The PPG for the Top 10 scorers in 2006 was 30% higher than last year, and 2014 wasn't too much better.

All that was missing last year was an outlier or two to make it seem more normal but that would have been someone in the high '90s to low 100s. This what a Crosby, Malkin or OV would have put up if they were in their peak form.

A couple things daver, for one, as it has been mentioned, Gretzky was a natural player who wasn't the type that thrived with structure. Mario was a little bit better with a format like the PP because he had a good one-timer and found ways to slow the game down while he was carrying the puck as it was. So the PP was something that fit with him a bit more. Gretzky not so much, he was an expert at deception, which fits more with a "go with the flow" style. So less powerplays isn't going to hurt Gretzky at all. It hurts Dave Andreychuk but not Gretzky.

Secondly, last year there were 8 players with at least 1 PPG. That's it. There are 23 at this point so far. Yes it is early, that will likely drop, but there won't be just 8 players with 1 PPG by season's end. Also the top end players are doing better. Crosby led the NHL in PPG with 1.09 last year. Already Kane is 1.56, Seguin 1.47 and Benn 1.29 so far.

That trifecta is also on pace for:

Kane - 127 points
Seguin - 120 points
Benn - 105 points

Yes, this will likely drop, but we still don't have names like Ovechkin, Crosby, Malkin, Stamkos, Tavares, etc. in the mix yet. All of them are still able to hit 100 points or more.

So 2015 was a bit like 1992. A lower scoring year by its own era's standards but things were back to normal afterwards.

Could Ovechkin get the edge in best 3 years if we place a higher value on goals? Lemieux is also playing with Coffey and Jagr in 2 of his 4 best years, whereas Ovechkin doesn't really have a comparable linemate. I also feel expansion caused the stat inflation in 1993. Ovechkin didn't really get the opportunity to feast on 3 brand new teams. If the 1988 or 1996 version of Mario competed at the same time as 2008 or 2009 or 2010 Ovechkin, do you think Ovechkin could have won the hart trophy over him? I think its a strong possibility Ovechkin is winning hart/lindsay trophies over 1988 and 1996 Mario, if you transported that Mario to 2008-2010. He would get far fewer pp opportunites and no jagr/coffey.

Not a chance. We've got a 1993, 1989, 1988 and 1996 Lemieux. Ovechkin's best is not quite even as good as a 1996 Lemieux. That isn't a knock on Ovechkin since he probably has the 5th best year between the two. But I think we tend to forget just how dominant Mario was those years. 1988 he has Coffey for part of the year and that's about it. Is that really better than Ovechkin in 2010 with Green, Backstrom and Semin? Not like it mattered, Mario could score with whomever, but I think he definitely takes the top 4 seasons between the two of them.

 

[daver]

Secondly, last year there were 8 players with at least 1 PPG. That's it. There are 23 at this point so far. Yes it is early, that will likely drop, but there won't be just 8 players with 1 PPG by season's end. Also the top end players are doing better. Crosby led the NHL in PPG with 1.09 last year. Already Kane is 1.56, Seguin 1.47 and Benn 1.29 so far.

That trifecta is also on pace for:

Kane - 127 points
Seguin - 120 points
Benn - 105 points

Yes, this will likely drop, but we still don't have names like Ovechkin, Crosby, Malkin, Stamkos, Tavares, etc. in the mix yet. All of them are still able to hit 100 points or more.

There's been a total of two 100 point scorers in the last three full seasons so I cannot share your optimism.

Tell you what, bump this thread after the season so there is a new "current NHL" to plug into a statistical translation.

 

[daver]

A couple things daver, for one, as it has been mentioned, Gretzky was a natural player who wasn't the type that thrived with structure. Mario was a little bit better with a format like the PP because he had a good one-timer and found ways to slow the game down while he was carrying the puck as it was. So the PP was something that fit with him a bit more. Gretzky not so much, he was an expert at deception, which fits more with a "go with the flow" style. So less powerplays isn't going to hurt Gretzky at all. It hurts Dave Andreychuk but not Gretzky.

Never said it would or it wouldn't. I am just pointing out that treating seasons from 9 or 10 years ago as the current doesn't make any sense as scoring by the elite forwards has been decreasing steadily since then; a 30% decrease. Statistically it makes no sense to use 2007 in an analysis.

 

[Czech Your Math]

I assume the second one is 1987?

Thanks for running the numbers.

Just wondering what the point totals mean, i.e. what the baseline year or GPG estimate is, given that they both make huge gains in ES points over their unadjusted real totals.

Sorry, I mixed up the years there.
I corrected my OP.

It's adjusted to 6 ES GPG... to make it closer to the norm used for adjusted total points.

 

[blogofmike]

Sorry, I mixed up the years there.
I corrected my OP.

It's adjusted to 6 ES GPG... to make it closer to the norm used for adjusted total points.

Ah! So 2/3 of that would be a modern ES scoring estimate based on numbers Black Gold posted.

Which means Jiri Hudler really did have a good year and was only 2 ES points back of 88 Lemieux after all.

 

[Rhiessan71]

Never said it would or it wouldn't. I am just pointing out that treating seasons from 9 or 10 years ago as the current doesn't make any sense as scoring by the elite forwards has been decreasing steadily since then; a 30% decrease. Statistically it makes no sense to use 2007 in an analysis.

Ok....one last try here.

The POINT we have been making is that an almost 50% drop in PPO's is by far the biggest factor in decreased scoring.
Now since a peak Gretzky relied on the PP for so much less of his points than other star players, it won't matter that much if we use 2007 or 2014 for him.
A 30% drop for everyone else is only a 10-15% drop for Gretzky.

And in the end, as far as % gap goes, Gretzky's % gap would be even higher using 2014 than it would be using 2007 even if his point totals were lower.
That will happen when every other player is losing 25 points per 100 while Gretzky is only losing 12 per 100.

Your horse is dead son, move on.

 

[daver]

Lemieux at ES:

'86- 5th
'87- t4th, missed 17 games
'88- 2nd to Gretzky
'89- 1st (by 1 over Yzerman & 2 over Gretzky)
'90- t3rd, missed 21 games
'92- 2nd to his linemate Stevens, missed 16 games
'93- 1st, despite missing 24 games
'96- 4th, behind Jagr/Nedved & (2 behind) Lindros
'97- 2nd (2 behind LeClair)

Best adjusted ES seasons between Lemieux & Ovechkin:

'89 Lemieux 124
'08 Ovechkin 121
'93 Lemieux 115
'97 Lemieux 111
'10 Ovechkin 109
'96 Lemieux 104
'09 Ovechkin 96
'92 Lemieux 96
'88 Lemieux 93
'11 Ovechkin 91

These numbers don't make sense. First of all, using raw points only has flaws. Are we really going to say that OV was a better ES player in '08 than Mario was in '93 just because Mario only played 60 games. I think we can do better than that.

Secondly, measuring how players performed vs. their peers eliminates some of the biases that come about when comparing seasons from different eras. 1989 Mario was considerably better than 2008 OV in ES scoring when one looks at how far ahead of his peers he was. This is clear even using a raw points analysis.

I don't see any reason to say OV was close in any metric to Mario as an ES scorer.

 

[daver]

Ok....one last try here.

The POINT we have been making is that an almost 50% drop in PPO's is by far the biggest factor in decreased scoring.
Now since a peak Gretzky relied on the PP for so much less of his points than other star players, it won't matter that much if we use 2007 or 2014 for him.
A 30% drop for everyone else is only a 10-15% drop for Gretzky.

And in the end, as far as % gap goes, Gretzky's % gap would be even higher using 2014 than it would be using 2007 even if his point totals were lower.
That will happen when every other player is losing 25 points per 100 while Gretzky is only losing 12 per 100.

So the refs aren't calling as many penalties as they did in 2007. That opens up a whole new discussion.

I believe you thought that the players have gotten used to the new rules and were committing less fouls. In theory, this should have created more scoring. It hasn't and the overwhelming narrative these days is that obstruction has crept back in.

If the star players are getting PP time/game, does this mean they are getting more ES time to compensate? The numbers show they are not and are even getting less ES time.

The conclusion I draw from this is that games are tighter and the stars are apt to get less icetime in comparison to their teammates than in previous years, even 2007.

If we want to avoid having this discussion, we use last year as the base for a statistical analysis. Then if you want add some data about the breakdown of Wayne's ES scoring to the discussion, go right ahead.

I don't think it's as simple as you are making it out to be. The all-time greats simply put up points regardless. Mario had a years where he very high ES numbers, other years he years where he had incredibly high PP numbers. Crosby was shown he could put up high PP numbers, other years he was way ahead in ES scoring. The bottomline is they put up big numbers regardless of whether they did it on the PP or at ES. I don't think you can conclusively say that the level of PPOs would be a positive or negative.

 

[Reindl87]

Just to put things into perspective.

A 37 old banged up Lemieux on an absolute ********* team still put up 1.4 PPG at the height of the dead puck era. (He was running away with the scoring title before he got injured and Kovalev was traded mid season.)

A 30 year old Ovechkin is sitting at 1.2PPG for his career.
He managed to score at a higher rate than Lemieux in 02/03 exactly once in his career. And that by a staggering margin of 0.1PPG.

Ovechkin doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as Mario Lemieux.

 

[Rhiessan71]

So the refs aren't calling as many penalties as they did in 2007. That opens up a whole new discussion.

I believe you thought that the players have gotten used to the new rules and were committing less fouls. In theory, this should have created more scoring. It hasn't and the overwhelming narrative these days is that obstruction has crept back in.

Of course it has but it's of the legal variety. It's done through body positioning now and NO it will not open things up, it would actually have the opposite effect.
And since I am pretty sure you don't understand the actual game, systems and nuances half as well as you think you do, I'll explain it to you as simply as I can.

When hooking and holding went unpunished, it meant that players could play on the offensive side of the puck more often because if the puck went back the other way, all they had to do was turn around and hook/hold any player that had gotten behind them.
In today's game a player has to remain on the defensive side of the puck much more often because the only way to stop another player is to get in front of them and impede them with their body.

If the star players are getting PP time/game, does this mean they are getting more ES time to compensate? The numbers show they are not and are even getting less ES time.

You keep saying this but I have yet to see you back it up with actual facts.
So I had enough waiting for you and looked them up myself...
05/06: League PPO avg-480, Crosby's EStoi/g-13:49, PPtoi/g-5:40
06/07: League PPO avg-398, Crosby's EStoi/g-14:40, PPtoi/g-5:50
14/15: League PPO avg-251, Crosby's EStoi/g-15:59, PPtoi/g-3:36

So ummm...yeah, they ARE getting more ES time or at least Sid is, that's for sure.

The conclusion I draw from this is that games are tighter and the stars are apt to get less icetime in comparison to their teammates than in previous years, even 2007.

So yeah, with the actual facts introduced, we can safely say your conclusion is absolutely wrong due to being based on faulty information.

If we want to avoid having this discussion, we use last year as the base for a statistical analysis. Then if you want add some data about the breakdown of Wayne's ES scoring to the discussion, go right ahead.

As I stated, I don't care what year you want to use. The only difference in using last season is that Wayne's points total will be a little lower than in '06 or '07 but his % gap to 2nd place will be higher due to losing less over-all points from the reduction in PPO's.

I don't think it's as simple as you are making it out to be. The all-time greats simply put up points regardless. Mario had a years where he very high ES numbers, other years he years where he had incredibly high PP numbers. Crosby was shown he could put up high PP numbers, other years he was way ahead in ES scoring. The bottomline is they put up big numbers regardless of whether they did it on the PP or at ES. I don't think you can conclusively say that the level of PPOs would be a positive or negative.

Here's the problem though...even when Mario put up high ES numbers, he also put up league leading PP numbers and his PP points still made up a much greater % of his over-all points than they did with Gretzky.
And if you call Mario's just over 100 ES points high, what in the holy hell do you call Gretzky's 140/season avg for 6 straight seasons???

See, your whole problem is simply that you fail to grasp the scope with which Gretzky dominated at Even Strength.
I'll try and put this in perspective again...
Bossy's absolute peak season which would be a tough season to top by anyone today, was only equal to Gretzky's ES production alone.
In 4 of those 6 seasons, he wins the Art Ross on his ES points alone by 20 points or more.

So any estimate of a peak Gretzky's points where he isn't winning the Art Ross on his ES points alone by 10-20% is inherently in error.
Give Gretzky enough ES points to win the Art Ross by 10-20%, add in enough point to be top-5 in PP points and then toss in a few more SH points than the League leader had.

So sticking to this you give Gretzky about 95-100 ES points, about 35 PP points and about 10 SH points.
Total = 140-145 points last season

For 2007, for the sake of argument, even though I don't actually believe it to be so, I'm going to let Crosby's season be close to on par to Bossy's absolute peak season and only allow Gretzky to match Crosby's total in ES points.
Using the same criteria then you give Gretz 110-120 ES points, 50 PP points and 14 SH points for 174-184 points.

 

[Big Phil]

Never said it would or it wouldn't. I am just pointing out that treating seasons from 9 or 10 years ago as the current doesn't make any sense as scoring by the elite forwards has been decreasing steadily since then; a 30% decrease. Statistically it makes no sense to use 2007 in an analysis.

But 2007 was hardly a "long" time ago. That's all I am saying. Look, it doesn't matter, shouldn't we have learned by now that someone of Gretzky's career doesn't need any charity or need to have a perfect storm in order to maintain his dominance?

 

[daver]

But 2007 was hardly a "long" time ago. That's all I am saying. Look, it doesn't matter, shouldn't we have learned by now that someone of Gretzky's career doesn't need any charity or need to have a perfect storm in order to maintain his dominance?

But from strictly a statistical point of view, there's a difference. Even if you apply Wayne's ES/PP point ratio in a statistical translation, it will make a difference if we look at 2007 instead of 2015. That's my point.

It's clear that there is a difference in the scoring environment from 2007 until now, the numbers clearly show that. So why not use 2015 in order to get as accurate an answer to the OP?

 

[Elvis P]

They'd score a lot, but hypotheticals are not part of hockey history.

 

[Big Phil]

But from strictly a statistical point of view, there's a difference. Even if you apply Wayne's ES/PP point ratio in a statistical translation, it will make a difference if we look at 2007 instead of 2015. That's my point.

It's clear that there is a difference in the scoring environment from 2007 until now, the numbers clearly show that. So why not use 2015 in order to get as accurate an answer to the OP?

Because it looks to be an unusual season, not the norm. Even early in this season I think we are seeing that 2016 is going to have more top level scoring.

 

[Czech Your Math]

These numbers don't make sense. First of all, using raw points only has flaws. Are we really going to say that OV was a better ES player in '08 than Mario was in '93 just because Mario only played 60 games. I think we can do better than that.

Secondly, measuring how players performed vs. their peers eliminates some of the biases that come about when comparing seasons from different eras. 1989 Mario was considerably better than 2008 OV in ES scoring when one looks at how far ahead of his peers he was. This is clear even using a raw points analysis.

I don't see any reason to say OV was close in any metric to Mario as an ES scorer.

Lemieux missed a lot of games and Ovechkin doesn't, that's why it's kinda close.

'89 Lemieux led in ESP by one over Gretzky and two over Yzerman... was 18% above 4th place Nicholls. '08 Ovechkin led in ESP by 14% over Malkin. That's going down to 4th place in a league with less depth (not yet integrated), and they are still similar margins.

 

[Black Gold Extractor]

Using the table breaking down even strength, powerplay, and shorthanded goals here, I adjusted every season of Gretzky, Lemieux, and Orr (except Orr's rookie season due to lack of data) to 2014-15 levels of scoring (4.05 EV, 1.14 PP, and 0.14 SH goals per game). The usual caveats to raw adjusting of stats apply, although I hope that this is closer than just using plain total goals per game for the adjusting ratios.

Gretzky:

Original|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted
Player Season|Games|Goals|Assists|Points|Points/Game
1979-80|81|40|71|111|1.37
1980-81|82|38|81|119|1.45
1981-82|82| 63 |84|147|1.79
1982-83|82|50|93|143|1.74
1983-84|76|59|85|144| 1.89
1984-85|82|50|98|148|1.80
1985-86|82|36| 115 | 151 |1.84
1986-87|81|45|93|138|1.70
1987-88|66|29|82|111|1.68
1988-89|80|39|82|121|1.51
1989-90|75|29|78|107|1.43
1990-91|80|33|98|131|1.64
1991-92|76|23|69|92|1.21
1992-93|44|12|33|45|1.02
1993-94|79|29|71|100|1.27
1994-95|82|17|54|71|0.87
1995-96|80|20|65|85|1.06
1996-97|82|23|69|92|1.12
1997-98|82|24|70|94|1.15
1998-99|70|9|52|61|0.87
Total | 1544 | 668 | 1543 | 2211 | 1.43

Lemieux:

Original|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted
Player Season|Games|Goals|Assists|Points|Points/Game
1984-85|75|30|41|71|0.95
1985-86|81|33|64|97|1.20
1986-87|65|40|41|81|1.25
1987-88|79|48|66|114|1.44
1988-89|78| 57 | 81 | 138 |1.77
1989-90|60|33|57|90|1.50
1990-91|27|15|22|37|1.37
1991-92|66|34|67|101|1.53
1992-93|59|50|64|114| 1.93
1993-94|21|13|16|29|1.38
1995-96|70|53|75|128|1.83
1996-97|76|45|69|114|1.50
2000-01|43|32|39|71|1.65
2001-02|24|6|25|31|1.29
2002-03|67|26|61|87|1.30
2003-04|10|1|8|9|0.90
2005-06|26|6|10|16|0.62
Total | 927 | 522 | 806 | 1328 | 1.43

Orr (minus his rookie season):

Original|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted|Adjusted
Player Season|Games|Goals|Assists|Points|Points/Game
1967-68|51|11|23|34|0.67
1968-69|72|20|44|64|0.89
1969-70|82|33|89|122|1.49
1970-71|82|32| 94 | 126 | 1.54
1971-72|80|33|78|111|1.39
1972-73|66|25|67|92|1.39
1973-74|78|28|84|112|1.44
1974-75|82| 36 |74|110|1.34
1975-76|10|4|10|14|1.40
1976-77|21|4|18|22|1.05
1978-79|6|2|2|4|0.67
Partial Total | 630 | 228 | 583 | 811 | 1.29

Notes:

-Gretzky has five 140+ point "fine-tuned" adjusted seasons, and his 1985-86 season would translate to 151 points today (well, 2014-15).
-Gretzky's most dominant Art Ross-winning season (1986-87) is not his best season here. Honestly, this feels like it passes the "smell test".
-Gretzky would have won the Art Ross last season with 16 of his 20 seasons. He also has 5 seasons where his translated assists would have been Art Ross wins in 2014-15.

-Lemieux owns the best single season points-per-game after the "fine-tuned" adjustments. Yes, it is 1992-93, where it would have translated to 1.93 points per game in 2014-15. Gretzky follows closely with his 1983-84 season (1.89 translated points per game).
-Injuries would still hinder Lemieux's career if all of his career were played in the current era. He never quite cracks 140 points, peaking at 138 translated points in 1988-89.
-Lemieux has 8 seasons that would have translated to Art Ross wins last season. None of his translated assist totals would have won an Art Ross, though, since he's one of those... people who prefers to score goals.

-Holy crap, Bobby Orr! He's a defenseman who has 5 seasons translating to 110+ points in 2014-15 and 2 seasons translating to 120+ points.
-Orr would have 6 seasons that would have translated to Art Ross wins in 2014-15. He also has 2 seasons where his translated assists would have been Art Ross wins in 2014-15.
-No, Erik Karlsson is not the modern-day equivalent of Bobby Orr, whoever-posted-that-on-the-main-boards.

-Both Gretzky and Lemieux would have translated career 1.43 points per game (a career average of a 117-point pace per 82 games in 2014-15).


SUMMARY:

Even after adjusting scoring to super-dismal 2014-15 levels, Gretzky, Lemieux, and Orr turn out to be unfathomably* better than anyone else who is currently playing in the NHL.

*Although, I'm assuming that's why they're three of the Big Four.

 

[Big Phil]

Lemieux missed a lot of games and Ovechkin doesn't, that's why it's kinda close.

'89 Lemieux led in ESP by one over Gretzky and two over Yzerman... was 18% above 4th place Nicholls. '08 Ovechkin led in ESP by 14% over Malkin. That's going down to 4th place in a league with less depth (not yet integrated), and they are still similar margins.

You're a GM. You have the opportunity to pick a 2008 Ovechkin or a 1989 Lemieux, who do you pick? Even just from a 5-on-5 standpoint are we really having this discussion?

 

[daver]

Because it looks to be an unusual season, not the norm. Even early in this season I think we are seeing that 2016 is going to have more top level scoring.

The season before wasn't much better. Only one 90 pt. scorer in the past two years. In the 2007, there was fourteen 90 pt scorers. It's overwhelmingly obvious that scoring by the elite offensive players is going down from 2005/06. I know the league GPG would indicate differently but there is a fundamental difference in the scoring environment for the elite scorers. A decrease in PPOs seems to be the main culprit.

So there seems to be two dynamics in this discussion:

(1) Would Wayne's #'s be affected by the overall drop in league scoring which has seem scoring drop from over 4 goals per game to the DPE era and onwards levels of 2.5 to 3ish goals per game. I think the vast majority believe Wayne that would not be immune to changes in the game be it obstruction, better goalies, better d-systems etc... and 200 point seasons would not be attainable. This doesn't change the massive gap between Wayne and his peers in terms of talent. IMO, despite the latter, a tougher scoring environment means that gap in talent would be minimalized a bit. I would point to playoff scoring as an indicator that this could be the case.

(2) Would Wayne be immune to a decrease in PPOs that seems to primarily affect scoring by the elite scorers but less so in league-wide scoring? There doesn't seem to be any statistical evidence to show that players who put up big ES numbers in 2005-2007 were less likely to see their numbers drop with a decrease in PPOs. There doesn't seem to be any part of Wayne's career to reference how his #'s would change in this environment. I don't believe there was any similar type of changes to PPOs during Wayne's prime.

IMO, the biggest piece of this discussion is how Wayne would do in significantly different NHL that saw overall league scoring drop 30%. There are obviously major changes that have taken place to bring about a major change in scoring levels. The only piece of evidence to draw on is his high Art Ross showing at the age of 37. That season could have very well won him the Art Ross last year. Obviously a 37-year old Wayne is not a prime Wayne but we have also seen other 35-plus players compete and win Art Rosses in the DPE and onwards era. IMO, I don't think this offers any insight into the OP.