I'd agree that I have little interest in the post Spiderman 289 Hobgoblin storylines, ASM 317 was a pretty good McFarlane though I suppose.
I kind of view this period as an important peak in the history of Spiderman. With the dramatic death of Gwen and GG that pretty much took over the Peter Parker drama throughout the 1970s. The new characters were OK at best Punisher, GG2, Tarantula, Jackal, Black Cat with the punisher only coming into his own in the mid 1980s and the Black Cat later in the 1990s to now. Quite a few of the storylines were classic 1970s trash that are now seen as ironic at best. Spidermobile, Aunt May marrying Doc Ock, Clone saga. All subjective, and you may really like these characters or stories but the general consensus is they don't live up.
There were some really nice short sagas and one shots but as ASM hit the 1980's there was a real need to escape that 1970s silliness. Some of the good ones IMO were 161 162 with Nightcrawler, 187 189 190 were decent, 200-203 pretty good too. Madame Web was weak as was Hyrdoman and that silly King Kong story as Hydro and Sandman got mixed up. Foolkiller issue and the spider cover/story of 228 were good. The Black Cat and Moon Knights stories were OK at best.
The Juggernaut 2 part was an early 1980s masterpiece and the start of the Stern / JR jr team getting good.
Then you had the death of Tarantula which almost felt like an important story but kind of fell off as it went too far to the B movie monster route. Like they just watched Kingdom of Spiders or something. A couple one shots follow that feel like fillers, Stiltman?
Once 238 came out Spiderman the the P Parker drama just seemed to shift to a better place. The energy for Spiderman went up: Hobgoblin, Costume change, Black Cat drama, Silver Sable, More Hobgoblin. Plus the change of Team up to Web of was a huge improvement. Even the one shots 246 and 248 are pretty much classics.
Anyway, that's my argument, 238 was a turning point for Spiderman that got him unstuck from the 1970s and the aftermath of the death of Gwen.