Nominees
Wade Belak
Belak has just not been the same since October 27, 2005 when one Colton Orr badly broke his nose in a big win. He was hesitant. He started slowly bouncing back and even defeated Orr in a fight or two the next two years, but slowly started losing playing time in the train-wreck that was the Toronto Maple Leaf organization. But 08-09 brought about a tremendous resurgence in a trade to Nashville (via a short stop in Florida). Belak posted a career year in a three fight series with behemoth Derek Boogaard in which he took the series. He had a good knockdown of Cam Janssen and a solid win over Darcy Hordichuk. But he put his name firmly on the map with a huge knockout victory over Donald Brashear.
Eric Boulton
Somehow Boulton career went on a weird journey to never-never land after the lockout. In 2005-06 and 2006-07 he nearly vanished from the fighting landscape, rarely fighting and not doing anything noteworthy in them. In 06-07 he managed a meager 49 PIMs and five fights in 45 games. He bounced back slightly in 07-08 but was still losing to the likes of... Branislav Mezei. Are you serious? In 08-09 he became a potential top 10 fighter again. He had a fight-of-the-year type fight vs. Colton Orr (and actually won), while adding excellent fights vs. Brashear, Vandermeer, Konopka, Cote, and S. Thornton. It was a good year seeing one of the old guard consistently get himself into the penalty box and onto the "win" column more often than not.
Cam Janssen
Cam Janssen's career looked to be in trouble when a dislocated shoulder forced him to the sidelines in pre-season 2007. When he came back, he had lost his starting position on the Devils and even a trade to his hometown Blues didn't really get his fighting back on track. He looked to be on pace to be on the losing side of a 4th line winger battle with DJ King before a season ending injury gave Janssen another shot. Playing everyday, Janssen put up career high numbers in fights, penalty minutes, and even points (ok, so it was only 4). He had one of the fights of the year with Aaron Downey, a brutal beating of Aaron Voros, and plenty of the trademark 1:30 Janssen fights spread throughout the year (with guys like Barch, Stortini, Prust, Peters, etc). It was nice to see Janssen bounce back from a lost year.
Mike Rupp
In 2007-08 it actually looked like Mike Rupp, a big forward who would fight middeweights occassionally, was actually trying to become a heavyweight fighter. In 2008-09, he became one, even garnering some top 10 consideration. He doubled his previous career high in fights with 16, becoming a legitimate force for the Devils. He even started winnings some fights against top guys, defeated Colton Orr, Eric Boulton, Shawn Thornton and Riley Cote. Its been a very impressive transformation for Rupp over the course of the last 2 years, going from fumbling around with the likes of Greg Campbell and Drew Fata to being one of the league's more consistent heavyweights.
Jason Strudwick
Going from virtually out of a job in 06-07 to getting a back-up shot with the Rangers in 07-08 to landing a spot in his hometown of Edmonton this year. As a Ranger Struds was a solid, great locker-room guy who always struck me as an immensely boring fighter. As an Oiler he actually was one of the more exciting fighters around. He fought eight times and racked up excellent fights with Ben Ondrus, Cody McCormick, Daniel Carcillo and Krys Barch. By my count he didn't lose a fight (all against some decent middleweight competition).
My Pick
It looked like
Wade Belak's career would be winding down, but he put a major exclamation point on his career with a major TKO of Donald Brashear which he will be remembered for forever. I think that alone is enough to give him the comeback nod, but he put up a hell of a season around that one fight as well.
Previous Winners
2003-04:
Matt Johnson
2005-06:
John Erskine
2006-07:
George Parros
2007-08:
Aaron Downey