Was there any debate about Mario Lemieux winning the Hart Trophy over Doug Gilmour in 1993?

[vadim sharifijanov]

Just nitpicking, but it was the last year of divisional playoffs. They'd have been tied for 2nd/3rd/4th in the division with 87 points.

ah right.

but then now thinking back the tiebreaker would have been the teams' records against each other right? in the 23 games mario missed while in treatment, pittsburgh were 0-2 against the islanders (a harbinger of things to come?) and lost in their only game against jersey.

they were undefeated against washington as always, though, so in this bizarro world if everything lines up the way our limited evidence indicates the penguins finished fourth in the patrick and get to face the most advantageous opponent possible. take that, dale hunter.

 

[scott clam]

Lemieux not winning mvp with 199 points is still the biggest robbery in sports history.

Actually that would be Wilt Chamberlain being denied MVP in 1962. AINEC.

But it's still the biggest robbery in Hockey, save for maybe Bobby Orr in '75.

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Actually that would be Wilt Chamberlain being denied MVP in 1962.

But it's still the biggest robbery in Hockey, save for maybe Bobby Orr in '75.

as great as '89 mario was, you see the argument for gretzky. agree with it or not, there was a reason.

some of those years orr didn't win it, or michael jordan in barkley and malone's MVP years, were flat out inexplicable.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

as great as '89 mario was, you see the argument for gretzky. agree with it or not, there was a reason.

some of those years orr didn't win it, or michael jordan in barkley and malone's MVP years, were flat out inexplicable.

There’s no reason for Gretzky to win in besides a better story. Lemieux dominated him in every category.

 

[Big Phil]

I still marvel at his 1995-96 season because it was obvious he had slowed down. To me that's when it became extremely apparent that he was so much more than just a physical force, as his game was more of a brilliant chess player/tactitian at that point. I had always known his IQ was off the charts, but that season cemented it for me that his was higher than anyone's other than Gretzky. And from time to time when his legs were feeling good, the old Mario emerged to put on a show (5 goal game against St Louis for example).

And yes he was outscored at ES by Jagr, but that was mostly a tactical decision to stack the second line with Nedved-Francis-Jagr letting them run amok, and have Lemieux deal with all the top matchups with Sandstrom and a rookie Naslund as his wingers.

These were Mario's highlights in the 1996 season. Still pretty good and if we are talking about a guy "slowing down" then who wouldn't want this sort of slow down? He still scored some eye popping goals. The one 40 seconds or so in against Tampa, that was a 7 point game. The Vancouver goal in between the legs. The Rangers goal where he shoots on the rush and gets his own rebound and just reaches past (Richter?). It looks like his arms and stick are 8 feet long because he acts like the defenseman isn't even there.


This season in 1996 is probably the last of the "super seasons" that we got used to seeing by Lemieux and Gretzky over the years. Since 1996 there has never been an NHL season better than Lemieux's in 1996.............and the thing is sometimes we complain about this one, haha. Well, I don't, but the odd time someone does. Not Ovechkin, Malkin, Crosby, Jagr, McDavid or anyone has had a better year than in 1996 by Lemieux since. You can argue Hasek in, say, 1998 or 1999, but no player for sure and I am not sure Hasek either.

 

[JackSlater]

NBA MVP voting is worse than we see in the NHL. Realistically there should be almost 30 MVPs just between Abdul-Jabbar, Jordan, and James, but the voters prefer to spread it around. Chamberlain also got hosed a few times, but that is generally his lot in basketball assessment in general.

 

[billybudd]

I personally don't know what business Gilmour had finishing ahead of Lafontaine in Hart voting that year, to say nothing of Lemieux. Or Yzerman, Sundin, Mogilny or Oates, for that matter. If the Flyers had made the playoffs, you could have thrown Recchi into that mix, too.

Tons of guys had monster seasons that year. Gilmour was just one of many. I guess I didn't pay attention to the voting back then because I'd have been shocked at the time to find out that it was Gilmour who finished second in Hart voting. In Pittsburgh, we viewed Lafontaine and Yzerman as Mario's chief MVP competition down the stretch. I didn't consider the notion that Gilmour would be a possibility at all, and don't remember anyone else ever saying anything about him in that capacity at the time.

 

[billybudd]

just curious, do you remember that season very well? He only had 73 even-strength points and was only a plus 10 on an excellent team. 96-97 was a definite step back but 95-96 was the beginning of that.

I remember that season vividly. It was a special teams-heavy club the whole way, with or without Lemieux. Created a kind of mirage in terms of how "excellent" the team actually was. On paper, you had like 6 or 7 point per game (ish) players, but a lot of that had to do with a 30% powerplay rate (or whatever it was) during a year of serious regular season obstruction crackdown (iow, constant penalty calls). The PK, from memory, wasn't anything special, but with a powerplay of historically successful proportions in a year in which minor penalties were also at historic highs, it didn't necessarily need to be. Even strength, it just needed its head above water, which is where it was. The team bided its time until a 5 on 4 and then buried you that way, even when 66 didn't play (as with back to backs). There were so many 5 on 4s that this was a viable strategy to put tons of wins in the bank.

When the whistles totally went away in the Panthers' series, the scoring dried up (though losing Francis and the illegality of the Cats' play certainly didn't help matters) and what you had was a team with good scoring, bad goaltending and a worse defense.


When analytics types push special teams aside to focus more on 5 on 5 results, that's the team that makes me think there's something to this approach.

 

[seventieslord]

I personally don't know what business Gilmour had finishing ahead of Lafontaine in Hart voting that year, to say nothing of Lemieux. Or Yzerman, Sundin, Mogilny or Oates, for that matter. If the Flyers had made the playoffs, you could have thrown Recchi into that mix, too.

Tons of guys had monster seasons that year. Gilmour was just one of many. I guess I didn't pay attention to the voting back then because I'd have been shocked at the time to find out that it was Gilmour who finished second in Hart voting. In Pittsburgh, we viewed Lafontaine and Yzerman as Mario's chief MVP competition down the stretch. I didn't consider the notion that Gilmour would be a possibility at all, and don't remember anyone else ever saying anything about him in that capacity at the time.

I just scanned through all the issues of THN from April to June of 1993, and I can't find any Gilmour Hart hype, but I also don't see any indication that they were the least bit surprised with him being a nominee and eventual runner-up, or that they disagreed in any way. Stan Fischler had a whole column where he posted controversial snippets but the only ones I could find about awards were about Patrick Roy being an ordinary goalie propped up by good checking (and Hrudey was better through four rounds!) and, "Granted, Chelios won the norris, but give me Rob Blake anyday."

Forget team situations for starters and pretend we should just pretend points are scored in a vaccuum. There is solid reason to believe that Gilmour was the 2nd best forward in the world that season. Lafontaine was a run and gun player whose 21 extra points don't necessarily override Gilmour's far superior defense. Same with Oates' 15 more points, and Yzerman's ten more. I shouldn't have to even bring up Turgeon and Selanne should I? And I'm not really sure why Sundin's name even entered this conversation.

Now, back to reality where points aren't actually scored in a vaccuum... look at what kind of help each player had:

- Lafontaine was 2nd in points. Great, but he was helped all season by the guy in 7th/8th.
- Oates was 3rd in points, with some help from the guy in 18th.
- Yzerman was 4th in points, with some help from the guy in 23rd.
- Turgeon was the closest thing to a one-man show aside from Gilmour, but even he had a linemate who managed 87 points (35th).
- Selanne had Housley (23rd) and arguably that season's most potent puck-moving defenseman (he was the one with the most points)

Gilmour had.... Nikolai Borschevsky. Who was 70th.

We also have solid evidence that demonstrates Mogilny, Ciccarelli and Housley were excellent producers for a very long time. Steve Thomas was a legitimate first liner for about 15 years. Juneau was at his peak of course, but he gracefully declined into more of a checker after three more very strong seasons of production (it wasn't until early in 97-98 that he became a sub-PPG player for his career). Borschevsky, on the other hand... well, just look at his career. The only reason he scored 74 points was Doug Gilmour. Once he was off Gilmour's line it was all over for him.

So, not only was Gilmour's strongest regular offensive helper just 70th in the league, it was a guy who didn't exactly get there honestly. He was very unique in this regard in 1992-93.

To demonstrate this statistically, take a look at the top point collaboration scores for this season. This is the average ratio of each player's seasonal PPG compared to the seasonal PPG of each player who collaborated on a goal with him, each time he did:

Lemieux 2.45 (obviously)
Gilmour 2.28
Yzerman 2.10
Bradley 2.03
Turgeon 1.96
Oates 1.95
(and then the pack begins)

Gilmour had a PPG average of 1.53 that season despite the players helping him get his points averaging just 0.67 themselves. Yes, Lafontaine was up at 1.76 himself, but his average collaborator was 0.99 - mainly because he played the entire season with Mogilny.

The award is supposed to be all about value, and there's plenty of reason to believe Gilmour was the 2nd most valuable (or even 2nd best) forward in the league that year. It cheapens the award after 27 years to suggest a few one-dimensional players with a few more points and better linemates were better. The voters back then knew what they were doing.

 

[The Panther]

Somebody linked an article from spring 1989 on here recently, which had a major newspaper projecting Gretzky to win the '89 Hart (he did) and Lemieux to take third place (!) behind Yzerman. (If I recall, at the time, Lemieux had a 26-point lead in the scoring race.)

It seems insane now, but I guess that very late-80s period was one of those periods when the voters started looking at "valuable to his team" more literally than just raw value. I also think Lemieux in '89 suffered from the Gretzky-in-80s comparison. People maybe thought these 170+ point seasons were going to be a common thing for superstars of the future, but they weren't. In other words, if Lemieux had had that same season a few years later, he would have won the Hart hands-down (as he did in '93).

It's one of those things where, even if Lemieux actually deserved the '89 Hart (which he did), Gretzky was a more than worthy winner when you look at his first-year impact on the Kings. So, at least it was an exceptional -- indeed, total one-off, historically -- situation that caused Lemieux to "lose" the '89 Hart. There was no comparable situation in 1993 -- it was his all the way.

Here's one: What if Lemieux had not caught and surpassed Lafontaine by 12 points? Like, what if they'd ended up tied or something, or Lafontaine hangs on to win by 1 point? Does Mario get the Hart?

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

Now, back to reality where points aren't actually scored in a vaccuum... look at what kind of help each player had:

- Lafontaine was 2nd in points. Great, but he was helped all season by the guy in 7th/8th.
- Oates was 3rd in points, with some help from the guy in 18th.
- Yzerman was 4th in points, with some help from the guy in 23rd.
- Turgeon was the closest thing to a one-man show aside from Gilmour, but even he had a linemate who managed 87 points (35th).
- Selanne had Housley (23rd) and arguably that season's most potent puck-moving defenseman (he was the one with the most points)

Gilmour had.... Nikolai Borschevsky. Who was 70th.

i'm not disputing that gilmour was everything to that leafs team, but one linemate wrinkle—

the day before andreychuk's first game as a leaf: gilmour is 10th in scoring, 19 goals, 55 assists, 74 points in 52 games. 5th in assists.

from andreychuk's first game as a leaf to the end of the season: gilmour is 6th in scoring, 13 goals, 40 assists, 53 points in 31 games. 2nd in assists (one assist ahead of oates)

at the end of the year, andreychuk, housley, ciccarelli, and juneau were all within earshot of each other in the 97 to 102 point range. of course, gilmour had "help" for less than 4/10 of the season but he still had some help.

lost in all of this is that gilmour's pre-andreychuk winger was glenn anderson, who was having a bounceback year and was flirting with a point/game at the halfway mark.

 

[BenchBrawl]

These were Mario's highlights in the 1996 season. Still pretty good and if we are talking about a guy "slowing down" then who wouldn't want this sort of slow down? He still scored some eye popping goals. The one 40 seconds or so in against Tampa, that was a 7 point game. The Vancouver goal in between the legs. The Rangers goal where he shoots on the rush and gets his own rebound and just reaches past (Richter?). It looks like his arms and stick are 8 feet long because he acts like the defenseman isn't even there.


This season in 1996 is probably the last of the "super seasons" that we got used to seeing by Lemieux and Gretzky over the years. Since 1996 there has never been an NHL season better than Lemieux's in 1996.............and the thing is sometimes we complain about this one, haha. Well, I don't, but the odd time someone does. Not Ovechkin, Malkin, Crosby, Jagr, McDavid or anyone has had a better year than in 1996 by Lemieux since. You can argue Hasek in, say, 1998 or 1999, but no player for sure and I am not sure Hasek either.

You know... I just watched the video—and keeping in mind this is not the entirety of his points from 1996—but to me he doesn't look too impressive there compared to his usual full career highlights. As you said, there's the goal against Tampa. The between-the-legs goal. The goal where he scores from a very tight angle along the red line (wasn't that his McDonald's moving card?). But in most plays he looks like a guy with a piano on his back. Rigid like a tree trunk.

I'm exagerrating, and the guy scored 161 pts that season, but I can't shake off the feeling that this is not the best season since 1996. Yeah, statistically, it is, but dynamically, as in "dominating the ice", I don't know. Mario was just so precise and so surgical that he could pull it off, and that's to his credit, and in the video he does physically dominate here and there, but this is not "big 4 level".

Is this Mario more valuable than a 2001 Sakic? A Jagr from the few years after? A peak Crosby? Perhaps, probably, but I wouldn't say by far.

Saying this, there might be the equivalent in some of Gretzky's high scoring seasons, but I'm not as familiar to judge.

 

[seventieslord]

i'm not disputing that gilmour was everything to that leafs team, but one linemate wrinkle—

the day before andreychuk's first game as a leaf: gilmour is 10th in scoring, 19 goals, 55 assists, 74 points in 52 games. 5th in assists.

from andreychuk's first game as a leaf to the end of the season: gilmour is 6th in scoring, 13 goals, 40 assists, 53 points in 31 games. 2nd in assists (one assist ahead of oates)

at the end of the year, andreychuk, housley, ciccarelli, and juneau were all within earshot of each other in the 97 to 102 point range. of course, gilmour had "help" for less than 4/10 of the season but he still had some help.

lost in all of this is that gilmour's pre-andreychuk winger was glenn anderson, who was having a bounceback year and was flirting with a point/game at the halfway mark.

That's true, he at least had a Ciccarelli-like player for the last 40% of the year. Andreychuk produced like the 18th highest scorer in the league while in Toronto that season.

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

You know... I just watched the video—and keeping in mind this is not the entirety of his points from 1996—but to me he doesn't look too impressive there compared to his usual full career highlights. As you said, there's the goal against Tampa. The between-the-legs goal. The goal where he scores from a very tight angle along the red line (wasn't that his McDonald's moving card?). But in most plays he looks like a guy with a piano on his back. Rigid like a tree trunk.

I'm exagerrating, and the guy scored 161 pts that season, but I can't shake off the feeling that this is not the best season since 1996. Yeah, statistically, it is, but dynamically, as in "dominating the ice", I don't know. Mario was just so precise and so surgical that he could pull it off, and that's to his credit, and in the video he does physically dominate here and there, but this is not "big 4 level".

Is this Mario more valuable than a 2001 Sakic? A Jagr from the few years after? A peak Crosby? Perhaps, probably, but I wouldn't say by far.

Saying this, there might be the equivalent in some of Gretzky's high scoring seasons, but I'm not as familiar to judge.

189 points is by far more valuable.

 

[BenchBrawl]

189 points is by far more valuable.

What does this has to do with my post?

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

What does this has to do with my post?

You were saying it was not big 4 level? What would you classify 161 points in 70 games then? He had 41 more points than any non penguin. Easily greatest season since his own 93. Crosby etc on his best day doesn’t come close to a 96 Mario.

 

[billybudd]

I just scanned through all the issues of THN from April to June of 1993, and I can't find any Gilmour Hart hype, but I also don't see any indication that they were the least bit surprised with him being a nominee and eventual runner-up, or that they disagreed in any way. Stan Fischler had a whole column where he posted controversial snippets but the only ones I could find about awards were about Patrick Roy being an ordinary goalie propped up by good checking (and Hrudey was better through four rounds!) and, "Granted, Chelios won the norris, but give me Rob Blake anyday."

Forget team situations for starters and pretend we should just pretend points are scored in a vaccuum. There is solid reason to believe that Gilmour was the 2nd best forward in the world that season. Lafontaine was a run and gun player whose 21 extra points don't necessarily override Gilmour's far superior defense. Same with Oates' 15 more points, and Yzerman's ten more. I shouldn't have to even bring up Turgeon and Selanne should I? And I'm not really sure why Sundin's name even entered this conversation.

Now, back to reality where points aren't actually scored in a vaccuum... look at what kind of help each player had:

- Lafontaine was 2nd in points. Great, but he was helped all season by the guy in 7th/8th.
- Oates was 3rd in points, with some help from the guy in 18th.
- Yzerman was 4th in points, with some help from the guy in 23rd.
- Turgeon was the closest thing to a one-man show aside from Gilmour, but even he had a linemate who managed 87 points (35th).
- Selanne had Housley (23rd) and arguably that season's most potent puck-moving defenseman (he was the one with the most points)

Gilmour had.... Nikolai Borschevsky. Who was 70th.

We also have solid evidence that demonstrates Mogilny, Ciccarelli and Housley were excellent producers for a very long time. Steve Thomas was a legitimate first liner for about 15 years. Juneau was at his peak of course, but he gracefully declined into more of a checker after three more very strong seasons of production (it wasn't until early in 97-98 that he became a sub-PPG player for his career). Borschevsky, on the other hand... well, just look at his career. The only reason he scored 74 points was Doug Gilmour. Once he was off Gilmour's line it was all over for him.

So, not only was Gilmour's strongest regular offensive helper just 70th in the league, it was a guy who didn't exactly get there honestly. He was very unique in this regard in 1992-93.

To demonstrate this statistically, take a look at the top point collaboration scores for this season. This is the average ratio of each player's seasonal PPG compared to the seasonal PPG of each player who collaborated on a goal with him, each time he did:

Lemieux 2.45 (obviously)
Gilmour 2.28
Yzerman 2.10
Bradley 2.03
Turgeon 1.96
Oates 1.95
(and then the pack begins)

Gilmour had a PPG average of 1.53 that season despite the players helping him get his points averaging just 0.67 themselves. Yes, Lafontaine was up at 1.76 himself, but his average collaborator was 0.99 - mainly because he played the entire season with Mogilny.

The award is supposed to be all about value, and there's plenty of reason to believe Gilmour was the 2nd most valuable (or even 2nd best) forward in the league that year. It cheapens the award after 27 years to suggest a few one-dimensional players with a few more points and better linemates were better. The voters back then knew what they were doing.

This is great stuff and you make a good case, but I do have one quibble--I don't think it's quite fair to characterize Lafontaine as a one-way or run-and-gun player by the standards of the day for a 1C. He wasn't Ron Francis or Guy Carbonneau or anything, but I don't really remember him cherry-picking up ice like you'd sometimes see with other big point producers in the late 80s, early 90s. He did finish 12th in Selke votes that year.

 

[BenchBrawl]

You were saying it was not big 4 level? What would you classify 161 points in 70 games then? He had 41 more points than any non penguin. Easily greatest season since his own 93. Crosby etc on his best day doesn’t come close to a 96 Mario.

Looking quickly on H-R, consider that in 1996 Lemieux was outscored at even-strenght by his own teammate Petr Nedved.

I know there are many good reasons for that, but is any reason good enough when we're talking about Petr Nedved and Mario Lemieux, supposedly playing at a God level?

Also was Lemieux even remotely responsible defensively? Did he have any restriction by his coach, like most other players? This is forgivable when playing at God-level, less so when you're a chess player. Difference between dominating like a chess player versus like a train, is that the train wear out opponents and have more control on the pace of the game.

I'm not bashing Lemieux' season which was all-time great, but there is a "160 pts !!!!" automatic defensive reaction that almost forbids any scrutiny to the possibility that it wasn't as great as the sexy "160 pts" stat line might indicate.

 

[seventieslord]

This is great stuff and you make a good case, but I do have one quibble--I don't think it's quite fair to characterize Lafontaine as a one-way or run-and-gun player by the standards of the day for a 1C. He wasn't Ron Francis or Guy Carbonneau or anything, but I don't really remember him cherry-picking up ice like you'd sometimes see with other big point producers in the late 80s, early 90s. He did finish 12th in Selke votes that year.

he actually had just one vote. it was a three-man ballot so it wasn't like today where the guy in 14th still had multiple supporters (0-1-0-5-9 or something like that)

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Looking quickly on H-R, consider that in 1996 Lemieux was outscored at even-strenght by his own teammate Petr Nedved.

I know there are many good reasons for that, but is any reason good enough when we're talking about Petr Nedved and Mario Lemieux, supposedly playing at a God level?

Also was Lemieux even remotely responsible defensively? Did he have any restriction by his coach, like most other players? This is forgivable when playing at God-level, less so when you're a chess player. Difference between dominating like a chess player versus like a train, is that the train wear out opponents and have more control on the pace of the game.

I'm not bashing Lemieux' season which was all-time great, but there is a "160 pts !!!!" automatic defensive reaction that almost forbids any scrutiny to the possibility that it wasn't as great as the sexy "160 pts" stat line might indicate.

Gretzky for example was the definition of a chess player. So does it matter?

 

[FerrisRox]

Now, back to reality where points aren't actually scored in a vaccuum... look at what kind of help each player had:

Gilmour had.... Nikolai Borschevsky. Who was 70th.

Borschevsky, on the other hand... well, just look at his career. The only reason he scored 74 points was Doug Gilmour. Once he was off Gilmour's line it was all over for him.

So, not only was Gilmour's strongest regular offensive helper just 70th in the league, it was a guy who didn't exactly get there honestly. He was very unique in this regard in 1992-93.

Are you just totally ignoring that Gilmour had Dave Andreychuk who scored 25 goals in 31 games after being acquired by Toronto and placed on Gilmour's wing?

 

[seventieslord]

Are you just totally ignoring that Gilmour had Dave Andreychuk who scored 25 goals in 31 games after being acquired by Toronto and placed on Gilmour's wing?

Seriously though, I kinda glossed over it, and it was already acknowledged by vadim and I addressed it. I originally said Borschevsky was Gilmour's best "regular" help, as he was there all season. Of course Andreychuk was better than Borschevsky, and Gilmour had some help from him for 40% of the season.

The collaboration scores are what they are, though. Gilmour's average point collaborator was still just 0.67 PPG that season, even with 26 instances of collaborating with the 1.19 PPG Dave Andreychuk included in the calculation.

These numbers include:

- 33 times with Borschevsky
- 27 times with Anderson
- 26 times with Andreychuk
- 22 times with Gill
- 19 times with Ellett
- 14 times with Mironov
- 11 times with Cullen
- 10 times with krushelnyski
- 9 times with Macoun
- 9 times with Berehowsky
- 8 times with Clark
- 8 times with Pearson
- 7 times with Foligno
- 6 times with Osborne
- 6 times with Rouse
- 8 times with all others

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

was Lemieux even remotely responsible defensively?

qftmft

now i don’t think we need to be comparing 96 mario to, say, 94 gretzky, but neither should we compare 96 mario to 88, 89, or 93 mario (nor pre-suter gretzky).

 

[bobholly39]

Somebody linked an article from spring 1989 on here recently, which had a major newspaper projecting Gretzky to win the '89 Hart (he did) and Lemieux to take third place (!) behind Yzerman. (If I recall, at the time, Lemieux had a 26-point lead in the scoring race.)

It seems insane now, but I guess that very late-80s period was one of those periods when the voters started looking at "valuable to his team" more literally than just raw value. I also think Lemieux in '89 suffered from the Gretzky-in-80s comparison. People maybe thought these 170+ point seasons were going to be a common thing for superstars of the future, but they weren't. In other words, if Lemieux had had that same season a few years later, he would have won the Hart hands-down (as he did in '93).

It's one of those things where, even if Lemieux actually deserved the '89 Hart (which he did), Gretzky was a more than worthy winner when you look at his first-year impact on the Kings. So, at least it was an exceptional -- indeed, total one-off, historically -- situation that caused Lemieux to "lose" the '89 Hart. There was no comparable situation in 1993 -- it was his all the way.

Here's one: What if Lemieux had not caught and surpassed Lafontaine by 12 points? Like, what if they'd ended up tied or something, or Lafontaine hangs on to win by 1 point? Does Mario get the Hart?

To the bolded - yes, and by close to the same unanimous way he got it. But - the story is a lot less exciting at that point without the scoring title.
Honestly - even simply hitting 160 points is a nicer story than had he only hit 159. Only 2 players in history have surpassed the 160 points mark - so that's a bit more fun a number than 159 is.

I think Lemieux's story (the cancer, the comeback, Pen's winning streak) all played a huge role in voter's minds, moreso than the raw point total on its own did. You'd have to change a lot of those factors to weaken his hart case.

As for Gretzky in 89 - it was definitely a very nice story - and that is likely what sealed the deal for him - even though Mario was the better player. In 93 - Mario both had the better story and was the better player, so it was a no-brainer (even had he hit only 147 points to Lafontaine's 148 - Lemieux is still easily the "better player" that year). In the grand scheme of things - Gretzky stole an undeserved hart from Lemieux in 89 - and Lemieux stole an undeserved Pearson from Gretzky (in 86) - so it's a tradeoff. The hart bothers me less than the Pearson to Yzerman - i think that was utterly ridiculous.

 

[Big Phil]

You know... I just watched the video—and keeping in mind this is not the entirety of his points from 1996—but to me he doesn't look too impressive there compared to his usual full career highlights. As you said, there's the goal against Tampa. The between-the-legs goal. The goal where he scores from a very tight angle along the red line (wasn't that his McDonald's moving card?). But in most plays he looks like a guy with a piano on his back. Rigid like a tree trunk.

I'm exagerrating, and the guy scored 161 pts that season, but I can't shake off the feeling that this is not the best season since 1996. Yeah, statistically, it is, but dynamically, as in "dominating the ice", I don't know. Mario was just so precise and so surgical that he could pull it off, and that's to his credit, and in the video he does physically dominate here and there, but this is not "big 4 level".

Is this Mario more valuable than a 2001 Sakic? A Jagr from the few years after? A peak Crosby? Perhaps, probably, but I wouldn't say by far.

Saying this, there might be the equivalent in some of Gretzky's high scoring seasons, but I'm not as familiar to judge.

I think from a "wow" factor and a highlight reel factor Mario doesn't dazzle the way he did in, say, pre-1993 days. That's understandable. He had back issues/surgeries by then, cancer, a year off of hockey, etc. His goals are more surgeon-like at this time instead of the 1-0n-1 factor we were used to seeing.

He used his vision, his reach, his accuracy and so on to score more goals at this time. But he still has some nice ones. Keep in mind, this guy had 69 goals that year and he also had 92 assists in 70 games. I would call that season "effective". I think in a way it is like Phil Esposito. No, Mario, even a 1996 Mario, scored prettier goals than Esposito, but you can't say Espo wasn't dominant and effective. He couldn't be stopped some years. He took the centre position to a different level. Mario by 1996 was still outright dominant because he could do the things he always could for the most part. He could slow the game down to his own preferred level and speed. He was still a magician with the puck and even in the goals that he doesn't look like he is skating fast, he is. Paul Kariya in the 2002 Olympics marvelled at how fast Mario was. His quote was that he could "flat out fly". This is a much older Mario by then. He just had different gears at different times. But if he had to turn on the jets he could. You see that on a couple of his breakaways here.

Do I think this season is still the best we've had in the last 24 years? Yes, I do. Lots of great years for sure, but I personally haven't seen a season as good by any one else since.

You are right to mention Gretzky. Watch the types of goals he scored as an Oiler and for half of his Kings' career. The Suter hit took away a lot of his mobility and agility after that, but he was still great. His playmaking was even more emphasized though. So he was more about pretty passes, anticipation and hockey sense. It was a subtle beauty in watching him play that way. He always had that in his game, but he also had the quickness before that. But in his later years this is how he played. Once in a while I don't know what came over him like in the 1993 or 1997 playoffs, but generally in the last 7-8 years of his career he was playing this sort of style.

Mario is no different, you adjust as you get older. We don't see Ovechkin go end to end like we used to or see him blow past a defender. Most of his goals are big one-timers where (let's face it) he is doing a lot of cherry picking. But he's 34, what can we complain about? Mario still made some nice plays even after his comeback in 2000. He just wasn't beating defensemen 1-on-1 like he used to. High bar to keep.