What NHL regular had the worst season offensively in the modern era?

[buffalowing88]

Pretty self explanatory although im not sure if this has already been made into a thread. Just became curious earlier wondering what NHL regular put together the worst season offensively in league history. Thats a hard task to really figure out but id say itd have to be a player who played at least 65 or more games, wasnt an enforcer only, and played more than 3 seasons in the NHL. Im starting to doubt its possible to widdle it down but if anyone has any suggestions id be interested to hear them. Im going to try and research it myself and find one, i think the most important thing to look at would be points, plus minus, and the minutes these guys were getting.

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[Passchendaele]

Tyler Wright. 1998-99

61GP 0G 0A 0PTS

 

[buffalowing88]

wow. thats pretty incredible.

 

[MS]

wow. thats pretty incredible.

It is, but then he was only averaging 3:46/game of icetime. If an average 4th-liner plays 10 minutes/game, Wright was 'only' scoreless in 20 'equivalent' games.

Bill Muckalt posted 0-8-8 in 70 games in 2001-02, averaging roughly 10 minutes/game. This is doubly impressive because he was an offensive player, and actually scored 5 goals in 8 games the following year before suffering a career-ending shoulder injury.

Muckalt is the only example I know of of a decent non-goon getting regular minutes for 70+ games and not scoring a goal.

 

[Psycho Papa Joe]

Harold Snepts - 0 goals, 7 assists in 71 games in 84-85. He played his fair share of minutes for the North Stars and was a pretty effective player.

 

[Shredder]

Adam Burish was excellent last season. His 81 games, 4 goals and 4 assists may not seem ghastly, but it took a spurt of 3 goals in his last 7 games to get there. He didn't have a point until his 29th game and didn't get a goal until game number 48. Needless to say, he was the recipient of much ridicule.

He's off to a great start again this season with 0 points in 9 games, which incidentally are the same numbers he posted in a 2006-07 call-up.

At his current career pace, he'd have to play 35,355 games to match Gretzky's scoring record.

 

[Gapper]

In 2001-2002 Bob Corkum had 3 goals and 5 assists in 75 games and he was a minus 32.

 

[DaveG]

Glen Wesley in 2003-04. He played in 74 games and put up plenty of ice time, leading the Canes in +/- at +18.

His offensive stats: 0 goals and 6 assists for 6 points.

 

[Hockey Outsider]

Pnep, do you have enough data to calculate "goals versus average"?

You'd take the player's total points and subtract (average points per minute by a forward that year * minutes played). This could be refined further by ES, PP and SH situations. This way a player is penalized for getting a lot of ice time without scoring. (A player scoring 15 points playing 1,600 minutes is worse than a player scoring 5 points in 300 minutes... all other things being equal).

 

[MS]

Lew Morrison in 1976-77 deserves a mention.

Probably the greatest statistical non-entity ever : in 76 games, he recorded only 2 goals and 3 points, and also registered 0 PIM. Was basically a PK specialist.

Jeff Daniels also had a string of years somewhat like this when being used in a similar PK specialist role for the Carolina Hurricanes.

Joe Sacco in 1998-99 posted 3-0-3 while getting 10 minutes/game of icetime over 73 games for the Islanders. For a regular NHL forward to play that many games without picking up a single assist is pretty impressive. Three years later, Sacco would also have a season in Washington where he went goal-less over 65 games.

 

[mattihp]

In 2001-2002 Bob Corkum had 3 goals and 5 assists in 75 games and he was a minus 32.

Considering his faceoff skill, it's an almost an incredible feat that he couldn't get more points.

 

[pitseleh]

Jeff Cowan had 1 assist in 46 games last season while averaging 8:44 of ice time per game, almost all of it at ES.

 

[reckoning]

Bill Muckalt posted 0-8-8 in 70 games in 2001-02, averaging roughly 10 minutes/game. This is doubly impressive because he was an offensive player, and actually scored 5 goals in 8 games the following year before suffering a career-ending shoulder injury.

Muckalt is the only example I know of of a decent non-goon getting regular minutes for 70+ games and not scoring a goal.

The thing I remember about Muckalt that year was when Ottawa let Roger Neilson coach the team for the last two games of the season, he actually kept putting Muckalt on the power-play with the Senator's big guns trying to set him up to get a goal and hopefully get the monkey off his back. It didn't work, but it was still a nice gesture on Neilson's part that a lot of other coaches wouldn't have done.

 

[Big Phil]

Yeah I'm not sure if a forward of Muckalt's level ever had such a worse season. He was horrid that year. And to think this is a guy that came close to winning the Calder Trophy in '99. It isnt as if he couldnt score goals. He was good enough to pop in 25 regularily I thought

 

[MS]

Yeah I'm not sure if a forward of Muckalt's level ever had such a worse season. He was horrid that year. And to think this is a guy that came close to winning the Calder Trophy in '99. It isnt as if he couldnt score goals. He was good enough to pop in 25 regularily I thought

Well, he spent almost that entire season on a 4th line with Chris Herperger and Andre Roy. He was on a team that didn't have room for him on the top 3 lines, and everyone stayed healthy all year so he didn't get a chance to play with better players.

0 goals in 70 games is still brutal, but given the situation there was no way he was going to produce at all.

__________

To change this slightly, what's the worst season someone has ever put up with top-line minutes?

For instance :

Mark Bell scored put up seasons of 45 and 48 points in 2003-04 and 2005-06, respectively. OK for a second-line player and great for a 3rd-liner, but he was on Chicago's first line for almost all of that time getting 18 minutes of icetime/game + first-unit PP minutes. Absolutely awful numbers under those circumstances. Not the worst ever, but you get the idea.

Joe Kocur scored 36 points in 1989-90 playing most of the season with Steve Yzerman 5-on-5, although he didn't get PP time.

 

[foame]

Travis Moen averaged almost 16 min/game last year. He had 8 points in 77 games

 

[Palinka]

In two years with Columbus, Scott Lachance played 138 games and averaged 19:30 per game on the ice. During that time, he had 0 goals and 5 assists to go with a -43 rating.

 

[Alain Racette]

Glen Wesley in 2003-04. He played in 74 games and put up plenty of ice time, leading the Canes in +/- at +18.

His offensive stats: 0 goals and 6 assists for 6 points.

 

[John Belushi]

Muckalt is a good choice, because (Like MS has said) his natural talent exceeds most of the names mentioned in this thread.

Many Vancouver fans were expecting a very good player for years to come after his rookie season. Steve Kariya, too.


Ugh.

 

[the_speedster]

Muckalt is a good choice, because (Like MS has said) his natural talent exceeds most of the names mentioned in this thread.

Many Vancouver fans were expecting a very good player for years to come after his rookie season. Steve Kariya, too.


Ugh.

I still can't for the life of me understand how the canucks missused kariya. I know it was during the "time of the giants" where apes like chris wells (6ft 5) got better chances but come on.. he clicked so well with mogilny and could definately play in the league...