Top 5 most offensively impressive seasons in the Hybrid era.

[Shindigs 1,771]

As always with lists like these, they will be subjective. You won't agree with some of them, and that's fine. We all have bias towards if we value goals over assists, or if we acknowledge that forwards naturally score more than dmen etc. That's just how it is. I'll primarily base this list off of z-scores that are pretty much anything but subjective and give a very solid empirical score on how far away from average a player's season is. Compared to other players who play the same role (forward/dman). But that still leaves room for the goals vs. assists argument, unless you just have a god season in there where both are so elite it's not even a trade-off. As well as other circumstances that may push one season above another in my eyes.

 

1. Aurelien Moreau @Frank S83 - G: 20 (1.15) / A: 92 (3.10) / P: 112 (2.77)

 

The number in parenthesis is the Z-score compared to all non-bot dmen in the hybrid era for that attribute, with 1+ being good, 2+ being elite and 3+ meaning you're basically a god.

 

S83 for Moreau was simply an insane season, putting up an actual honest to god competitive dman point record in the very first hybrid era season. The one thing you can point out about this first season, however, is that a lot of players had very bad builds, and we were in a goalie drought. So naturally offensive numbers among the elite players in this season *should* be slightly inflated. But that doesn't change the fact that a 112 point season from a dman blows anything any forward has achieved offensively in the hybrid era out of the water. Until S86 Moreau also held the Assist record for the hybrid era with those 92, being beaten by Bo Johansson (94).

 

The one knock on this season is the goals, it's the one thing that makes this record beatable. As the top dmen of this era have put up 30+ goals, so realistically it's only a matter of time before all the stars align and we get 30+ goal 90+ assist season from a dman to eclipse the 120 point plateau. The question is how long will it take? Because for every season Frank keeps this record, it becomes more impressive. No one cares about a record that gets beaten the very next season. But a record that stands for 5, 10 or 20+ seasons. Now that's where it starts getting the recognition of a "true" record.

 

2. Paul Atreides @Mr_Hatter S83 - G: 61 (2.79) / A: 59 (1.75) / P: 120 (2.38)

 

The fact that the top two players on this list are both on S83 Toronto tells you a lot about how insane their partnership was. There are really 5 forward seasons that are nearly identical offensively, all 5 being at 120 or 122 points. But Hatter's season is the only one with 60+ goals, meaning it's holding onto the goal record for the Hybrid era, giving it that tiny extra bit of prestige to push it above the others. Atreides and Moreau both had played together on the stacked meta era Moscow team, but due to sharing the ice with monster's like Idaho and Markinson. They never had free reign to score as much as they perhaps could have. Well the S83 season in Toronto told us there was no "perhaps" involved. When made the unmistakable star players they put that Toronto team on their shoulders and went on to form the most iconic hybrid era partnership thus far.

 

The same arguments from Moreau also apply here, obviously, since it was the same team and same season. Namely that due to the weaker goaltending and slightly weaker overall compete level in the VHL due to potato hybrid builds, their stats were probably a bit inflated compared to what they should have been. But so was Scotty Campbell's records from playing against 200 TPE players most of his career, and we still acknowledge those records. So sometimes we just have to tip the hat to the players who end up fortunate enough to have their best season in the best possible season to have it. If your best offensive season is in a season that has some of the best goaltending of all time. Well, that's just very unfortunate. But if you have that same season in the meta era, you're probably having a Justin Lose S81 type deal on your hands. I won't hold the fortunate timing against either of them.

 

3. Saku Kotkakoivu @DollarAndADream  S83 - G: 59 (2.64) / A: 63 (2.03) / P: (2.46)

 

Another S83 entry, how unexpected! I mean at this point it's probably hard to argue against S83 having kinda bloated stats for the players who actually went straight into good builds at high TPA. But whatever, this is one of only two 122 point seasons in the era. The other came from Duncan Idaho on a very strong DC team, where he had all the support he could possibly ask for to help make his season the best one possible. Playing with arguably the best offensive playmaking defenseman in the league that season (Sova) and the Funk winner (Lavelle) there was no lack of supporting pieces to push him up there. Whereas in Calgary, Kotkakoivu was primarily supported by the sound of crickets and carried so hard he pulled Lazar, a clicker, up to a 99 point season alongside him. That's actually insane, there was no reason for Kotka to have a 122 point season with that supporting cast. He just had to will it to be in one of the hardest carries of a team I've ever seen outside of the Edmonton Oilers and their perennial attempts to make McJesus go into a rage induced coma at the vast incompetence of just about everyone else in the org apart from Draisaitl.

 

He was only a single goal off being the other player to hit that 60 goal plateau as well and had he done that, odds are he would have been at least 2nd, possibly 1st on this list. Not because of the raw numbers of what he did, but because of the circumstances under which he did it. I doubt we'll see another season like this anytime soon. The closest one is probably Jerome's hardcarry of London in S85. But since that fell short of the 100 point plateau and the 30 goal plateau both, it diminishes it's value by a fair bit. Just for completion I should note that on goal tie-breaker this season is the Hybrid era point total record, as Idaho had 52 and 122 points.

 

4. Bo Johansson @Shindigs S86 - G: 11 (-0.19) / A: 94 (3.22) / P: 105 (2.45)

 

Now I am biased towards assists, that's why I made a pass first dman to begin with. So I understand that this season probably doesn't make top 5 for most people. But the fact of the matter is that it is the highest assist season in the Hybrid era, and were it not for an absolutely abysmal 4.38% Shot conversion which is the lowest S% of any dman who hit PPG, let alone over 100 point in the entire hybrid era, this would have set the point record too. The only other player to hit PPG with 4.xx% shot conversion was Hari Singh Nalwa in S84 with a 4.63% conversion and exactly 72 points. The lowest S% of another top 5 hybrid era dman is 7.81% for Jerome Reinhart in S83 (Yes, the dman goal record for the hybrid era came off a 7.81% S% season, that's how bloated his shot totals were on that gutted NYA team). So really, Bo had the unluckiest seasons by a top dman in the hybrid era offensively. And still ended the season with 105 points, which is good for 4th among hybrid era dmen. That adds a bit of that "against all odds" touch that Kotka's season had, though for other reasons.

 

Had Bo matched the worst other top 5 S% he would have ended up with 20 goals and 114 points and had he matched Moreau's 10.10% from S83 he would have ended up with 25 goals for 119 points, just one away from that 120 point plateau. So assuming Bo puts up another season like this, but without the cursed S% Moreau's record might very well fall in the next 4 seasons. Though now that I've mentioned it in a MS, Simon will stop it from happening for sure.

 

5. Jerome Reinhart @MexicanCow123 S85 - G: 24 (1.74) / A: 69 (2.09) / P: 99 (2.17)

 

This one is quite the hot take as well, because the raw stats aren't even the best Jerome himself has put up in the hybrid era. Those came in S83 due to some insane stat bloat on NYA, like I touched on before. Which is why I don't rate that season. Also if this was the most impressive season period, not just the most offensively impressive season, then this would go miles below Hard Markinson's S84 campaign. But seeing as we're strictly looking at offensively impressive seasons. I can't in good faith make a hybrid era top 5 and leave this season out. Since it's the dman version of what Kotka did in Calgary S83, on a team that isn't just a shell, setup to make Jerome score as much as possible to bloat his trade value (see S83 NYA). This was actually a real London team, sure it was a pretty mediocre London team. But not bad enough that it's stat bloat central, just the kind of team you expect to putter along and not do a lot of anything all season. But Jerome had other plans, putting the team on his back and willing them into some level of relevance. His consistency this season was scary, and the stat about how many of the game London won Jerome had points in was actually nuts. He *was* London in S85, everyone else was just along for the ride.

 

Had he been able to elevate his teammates to the heights that Kotka elevated Lazar in S83 Calgary, this season would have been contending for 2nd/3rd, as if he had done that it would have automatically resulted in at least 10+ more assists putting this up there as a ~110 point season and making it a mark for excellence to anyone that came across it. But as it stands, if someone just stumbled across this season and didn't know about all the circumstances, it wouldn't even make the top 5 list of dman offensive seasons in the hybrid era. That's what lowers its ranking for me, even though I do find the achievement impressive as hell. The other thing that would likely exclude this pick from just about everyone's top 5 is that most of the league still just hates Jerome for his part in the Metawolves, and that kind of bias is hard to beat.

 

 

This list would have a lot of honorable mentions, but likely I will just make a part 2 of this with 6-10 at a later date. I know a lot of people won't like how dman heavy this list is. But I can tell you that currently, we have 6 dmen over 2.4 Point production Z-score and only 2 forwards. Simply put, the best dmen in the hybrid era have been better than the best forwards in this era. Which is why the common theme in VHFL winners has been an insane d pairing. The gap between the best dmen and average dmen is simply bigger than the gap between the best forwards and average forwards. And I like to highlight that in this top 5, since usually the casual observer just goes "Forward has bigger number! Forward more better! Ooga boga!" which I just find a bit silly and as a result I want to showcase that it's a questionable way of looking at stats. But don't get me wrong, I'm not calling out the VHL userbase in particular, this is just a human thing. We see the same thing in NHL award voting and the like. We just like big numbers, and we rarely want to take the time to find proof that we're wrong in liking those big numbers. Since that goes against confirmation bias.

 

2040+ words, claiming for almost half a season.

[DollarAndADream 3,357]

Definitely was a fun season to watch for me. Thanks for the kind words.

[Frank 5,258]

So what you're saying is Moreau for HOF. 

[Shindigs 1,771]

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