Right Wings

For 1990, RW featured a generational talent in Jaromir Jagr, plus two stars (Owen Nolan, Peter Bondra) who had both amazing single seasons and sustained careers, and two serviceable options (Mikael Renberg, Andrei Kovalenko) for reserves. Jagr's fantasy dominance needs no explanation; and in Nolan you had a two time 40 goal three time 73+ point scorer who five times finished with 61+ points and 137+ PIM, while Bondra tallied 70+ points six times, 52 goals twice, and a league leading 34 goals in 47 games (59 goal pace) during the abbreviated 1994-95 campaign. Former Legion of Doom line member Renberg had four straight 20+ goal seasons, while Kovalenko had three 25+ goal seasons of his own.

That arsenal of RWs is more than enough to outpace the class of 2003, which includes one legitimate star (Corey Perry), plus a mish-mosh of players (Nathan Horton, Dustin Brown, Nikolay Zherdev, Lee Stempniak) who had brief periods of decent but not amazing output in view of the hypothetical stat categories. Big edge to the class of 1990 at RW.

Defensemen

The 1990 class had only one legitimate defenseman star in Sergei Zubov (he of the eight 50+ point seasons, including two 70+, and lifetime +148 rating with six seasons of double digit plus). But unlike what we saw above with LW, the drop off from Zubov to the remainder of the 1990 defenseman pack is very precipitous.

Zubov's former teammates in Dallas – Daryl Sydor (seven consecutive 33+ point seasons) and Derian Hatcher (five 30+ point seasons, seven 100+ PIM seasons) were solid but unspectacular. And beyond them it's mainly a group of "oh yeah, I think I remember him . . . ." rearguards such as Chris Therien, Richard Smehlik, Jason York, Alexander Karpotsev, and Jaroslav Modry. Not a lot for 1990 to hang its hat on, that's for sure.

In stark contrast, defense is a huge strength for the 2003 class, with legitimate stars Ryan Suter, Shea Weber, and Dion Phaneuf. Plus there's Tobias Enstrom and Brent Seabrook, both of whom are likely already more fantasy worthy than all from 1990 except Zubov. And just to highlight how deep 2003's defense is, note that I didn't even mention Matt Carle, who's an also ran for 2003 but would be easily among the class of 1990's top five; nor did I add Dustin Byfuglien or Brent Burns, both of whom I'd consider defensemen when looking at their careers as a whole and would also easily outrank all but Zubov from the 1990 draft corps.

The class of 2003 wins this position in a landslide.

Goalies

The class of 1990 included Martin Brodeur, who, prior to morphing into a bit of a punchline of late, put up some of the best fantasy hockey seasons of all time for a netminder. He led the league in Wins an amazing nine times, posting 40+ on eight occasions. And although he had an NHL-best GAA only once and never led the league in SV%, a lot of that had to do with his prime coinciding with Dominik Hasek's, as Brodeur had a sub-2.30 GAA in nine seasons where he played 70+ games.

The issue with 1990 is beyond Brodeur there's a major drop off, to the likes of Felix Potvin and Roman Turek. Potvin was twice an all-star and hit the 30+ win mark three times, but only once posted a SV% above 91.0% in a full season and, in the same vein, only had a sub-2.50 GAA in one full campaign. And while Turek only played from 1996 to 2003, he had a stretch of four years where he posted between 24 and 47 wins in each season with a GAA ranging from 1.95 to 2.57 and a SV% above 90.0% each year.

There's a wider range of choices from the 2003 draft class, starting with first overall pick Marc-Andre Fleury. Beyond him there's Corey Crawford, Jimmy Howard, Jaroslav Halak, and the second to last pick (291st overall) – Brian Elliott.

Clearly there's no one from 2003 who even approaches Brodeur; but Fleury has been a Wins machine, while also posting four straight seasons of 91.5% or better SV% and 2.32 or lower GAA. Howard and Crawford also have some great Wins seasons, but inconsistent GAA and SV%. Halak had somewhat better peripherals in several campaigns, but only once has played more than 46 games in a season.

In the end, the slim edge goes to the class of 1990, not just because Brodeur is a legendary talent, but also since the 2003 class has lacked a true "clean sweep" netminder to dominate all the goalie categories in a single season, which is something that even Turek managed to do for a couple of campaigns. Also, although 2003 would give better depth for the bench goalie, the 1990s had Potvin, which would've been enough to rotate in and out with Turek since Brodeur almost never got hurt.

Picking the Winner

If you've kept score, the class of 2003 held the edge in two positions (C, D) as did the 1990 draftees (G, RW), with each having one lopsided victory (D for 2003, RW for 1990) and there being one tie (LW).

But in the end, I'm giving the victory to the class of 2003. The reality is that although some 2003 draftees likely have peaked (I'm looking at you Brown, Eriksson, Richards, Michalek, and Moulson) many of them are likely to continue to do well (or even improve) – enough so to likely narrow or even completely close the gap in the two categories they lost, while padding their advantage in the two they won. Plus, in most cases 2003 had better depth players for your bench, which we all know is a key.

All that remains is to wait another ten years to see if any post-2003 draft class emerges to unseat the class of 2003 from its title. We'll just have to wait and see…….