DitchMarner
It's time.
Assuming all these players are at their best (you can project for the younger players), which group would you rather have?
There's four first-ballot Hall of Famers in the first group and three bonafide top 20 all-time great centers.
The younger group only has one of those IMO, if he stays the course.
This won't be close.
Mack is fantastic so far - but Sakic's peak season of 2001 is on another level. No way to argue Mack has surpassed this yet, nor that he would. Advantage Sakic.
Yzerman scored 155 points at his best. Adjust for era - Eichel will never come anywhere close to scoring at that rate. Big advantage Yzerman
Forsberg vs Matthews. Forsberg is one of those players who at his best was insane, truly great peak. His prime, and certainly career suffer - but for peak he's hard to beat. I actually think super highly of Matthews, and maybe he puts together an insane season that comes close to some of these guys - but absolute best case scenario is he comes close to matching it, he wouldn't top it. Much more likely this remains easy advantage Forsberg.
Fedorov put together a fantastic season in 1994. Many here call it one of the best seasons ever. I personally think it gets overrated quite a bit - but it's still certainly better than anything Barkov has done, or will done. Advantage Fedorov.
The poll isn't clear if we only get them for one peak season, or for a longer set of years in prime. I think if it's prime - the advantage for the older guys is even stronger, as they collectively had a fantastically consistent prime. Very strong batch of players/