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I don't even really think of those two events as remotely similar, 1997-98 was so warm in Nino 1.2 it had a negative Modoki value, v. the +0.7 you had in 2009 and 1968.  Look at the Modoki values in 2006-07 (+0.14) v. 1997-98 (-0.66) in DJF. The "El Nino" spectrum to me is like an X-Y axis, -1 to +1 for Modoki structure (1 is like 2009-10, -1 is like 1997-98) and then ONI in DJF is +0.5 to +2.5. This event has "coordinates" of +0.15 and +0.8C to me, which is similar to 2006-07 with some important differences in other areas (AMO notably). The 2005-06 winter was pretty similar to last winter here for what its worth. 2006:12:16:0 0.824027 0.855819 0.238438 0.276899 2007:1:16:0 0.593035 0.65781 0.306874 0.110693 2007:2:16:0 0.367782 0.341768 0.32955 0.0321232 1997:12:16:0 0.854615 3.36762 0.284503 -0.971448 1998:1:16:0 0.974028 2.85706 0.0732014 -0.491103 1998:2:16:0 0.803511 2.41071 0.23594 -0.519815 Box B, the second value, is broadly similar to Nino 1.2 (but bigger) and was at +2.9 for DJF. 2006-07 was kind of a weak basin-wide event.

I think regardless of what form the precipitation takes this winter I expect things to be active, this includes the fall as well. I am hoping we can finally get some good slow moving nor'easters coming up the coast.

One of these years we'll get an east-based El Nino that isn't super strong, and I think a lot of the West will simultaneously recover for water storage and water tables. 2016-17 wasn't half bad, just warm here, so a lot of it evaporated, but it was amazing seeing how quickly the water came in went in the past 18 months. The east-based events seem to exert more control on precip patterns in UT/CO than the Modoki Enso events. My winter last year was among the all-time hot/dry combo winters. The winters that follow those are kind of legendary, and the Summers in those years have been somewhat similar to this year, fairly warm, but also pretty wet. It's 1934, 1976, 1986, 1994, 2006 - those are the years after the all-time terrible winters out here for both heat and precip. The SOI blend for those five years is -14 or something in August, which is kind of what this August looks like. The big -SOI in August is usually a decent indicator for major moisture in Feb/Mar in the following March in the SW.