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Leafs acquire Frederik Anderson from Ducks

I don't have a problem with giving up picks in the 30s/40s for a player you project as starting caliber.

The contract is awful though. Not so much the per year salary, but the term. There are a handful of goalies in the league you can justify committing 5 years to, an unproven Andersen is not one of them.

Goaltending consistency from year to year is a rare quality among NHL goalies. I'd prefer to give more money upfront, over a shorter term of 2-3 years than handout 5 year deals to goalies who you don't know will be good enough in year 1 of the deal.

The goaltending position is one position you shouldn't have to overpay for, in terms of assets and cap space. I dont like this approach of gambling on another goalie with a limited history. Whether he plays well or poorly, the Leafs are committed to him for a long time.
 
Good article from Mirtle on the Andersen trade

Why the Leafs' $25-million bet on Frederik Andersen is so important

The Leafs have been wrong on goalies a lot. Past regimes committed to Andrew Raycroft, Vesa Toskala and Jonathan Bernier before they had played 120 regular-season games, and all those deals ended badly.

Raycroft was in the Italian league within four years of the Leafs buying him out in 2008. Toskala struggled through two dozen games in Finland before burning his equipment in a drunken fit and never playing hockey again.
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That is a very good article from Mirtle.


See, nobody thinks Anderson is a bad goalie.

The issue is that the Leafs are making him THE goalie longterm, when his track record doesn't suggest he'll be amongst the best in the league - at a point in time where they should have been in no rush to settle for a middle of the pack goalie longterm, and could have waited until there was an opportunity for an elite goalie to come available.

And there is always the argument that under a cap, paying market price for middle of the pack performance is never a good idea.

This move only makes sense if they really believe he has upside considerably higher than he has shown, which I guess is possible. But it's not like this is a safe move either - in his only season with a starter's workload (not even a very heavy one) he was solidly below average.
 
Yeah I think it's pretty clear that they see something in him that suggests he is a lot better, and in particular, will be a lot better under a Babcock system than the hard numbers suggest. If he can be a legitimate elite top 7-10 goalie, I can deal with this a lot more. If they have access to data that makes them really confident in that idea, then it is hard to complain too much about paying 5 shmil to an elite goalie. But it's hard to blindly trust that at this point. They've done a good job tearing it down but they haven't done enough building of the actual team to blindly trust every move they make.
 
Its a gamble, but its a gamble rooted heavily in statistical analysis. You definitely can't ignore that if Andersen isn't a reliable goalie this will blow up in their face. But at least they are basing it on the numbers instead of the last couple of times the team did this.

I'd rather they have gone after Bishop, but otherwise you can't just wait for a top goalie to become available before you find a reliable starting goalie. It might never happen.
 
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Preston_Mizzi said:
Yeah I think it's pretty clear that they see something in him that suggests he is a lot better, and in particular, will be a lot better under a Babcock system than the hard numbers suggest. If he can be a legitimate elite top 7-10 goalie, I can deal with this a lot more. If they have access to data that makes them really confident in that idea, then it is hard to complain too much about paying 5 shmil to an elite goalie. But it's hard to blindly trust that at this point. They've done a good job tearing it down but they haven't done enough building of the actual team to blindly trust every move they make.
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Well, I wouldn't call 7-10 "elite", but yeah, if you can get someone who you feel can be a consistent performer, then it's not that big of an overpay. But as you saw with Bernier as well, goalies can change pretty quickly.
 
question: why did Andersen cost so much more in assets and contract than a guy like a Cam Talbot?
 
Just to throw this out there....but in the salary cap era, "good" goalies seem to walk away with Stanley Cup rings way more often than elite goalies.

Crawford, quick, niemi, the corpse of hasek, ward, Khabibulin....only Tim Thomas was really elite among cup winning goalies.

Maybe we over think the gap between good and elite?
 
zeke said:
That is a very good article from Mirtle.


See, nobody thinks Anderson is a bad goalie.

The issue is that the Leafs are making him THE goalie longterm, when his track record doesn't suggest he'll be amongst the best in the league - at a point in time where they should have been in no rush to settle for a middle of the pack goalie longterm, and could have waited until there was an opportunity for an elite goalie to come available.

And there is always the argument that under a cap, paying market price for middle of the pack performance is never a good idea.

This move only makes sense if they really believe he has upside considerably higher than he has shown, which I guess is possible. But it's not like this is a safe move either - in his only season with a starter's workload (not even a very heavy one) he was solidly below average.
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And that's exactly what I was trying to say too.

Don't give the guy more terms/ $$ than he's earned, especially in a capped world - and especially for a guy who you just traded.

At least Andersen has posted way better # than Vesa or Raycroft prior to the trades, and that he HAS BEEN a starter for Anaheim for 2 years now (i.e. he isn't switching from a backup to starter like Vesa / Bernier was) ... still, I don't get why give him 5 yrs. I'd rather give him 2 or 3 years, and if he's proven he's a star G by then, I'll show him the bank (especially considering 'show him the money' is really another $1-2M more per year anyways!)
 
MindzEye said:
Just to throw this out there....but in the salary cap era, "good" goalies seem to walk away with Stanley Cup rings way more often than elite goalies.

Crawford, quick, niemi, the corpse of hasek, ward, Khabibulin....only Tim Thomas was really elite among cup winning goalies.

Maybe we over think the gap between good and elite?
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Yeah I mentioned that in another thread. It's a lot easier to win a cup when your goalie isn't eating up 7 million in cap space. 5 is doable as long as he's consistently average-above average for the 5 years.. That's kind of rare for an average goalie to accomplish though. Ryan Miller is more of an exception than a rule.
 
Stud starting goalies are going to be 9-10 million shortly...don't kid yourself. If Freddy is even just a .915-.920 legit starter in years 4 and 5 of that deal, he'll be a major cap savings. By 3ish million probably, more if the Canadian dollar is back in the 90s by then
 
Preston_Mizzi said:
Yeah I mentioned that in another thread. It's a lot easier to win a cup when your goalie isn't eating up 7 million in cap space. 5 is doable as long as he's consistently average-above average for the 5 years.. That's kind of rare for an average goalie to accomplish though. Ryan Miller is more of an exception than a rule.
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Yeah we're pretty much golden as long as Freddy's .914 was the lower end of his performance spectrum. 8f he averages that...we'll yeah this is going to look like a mistake
 
number17 said:
At least Andersen has posted way better # than Vesa or Raycroft prior to the trades, and that he HAS BEEN a starter for Anaheim for 2 years now (i.e. he isn't switching from a backup to starter like Vesa / Bernier was) ... still, I don't get why give him 5 yrs. I'd rather give him 2 or 3 years, and if he's proven he's a star G by then, I'll show him the bank (especially considering 'show him the money' is really another $1-2M more per year anyways!)
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They are literally betting on him and hoping for a good ROI. Its not a safe move, but if he is what they think he is then they'll win the bet.

So in a way they are betting on Dubas here too. This is really our first chance to see what boy wonder is made of.
 
MindzEye said:
Just to throw this out there....but in the salary cap era, "good" goalies seem to walk away with Stanley Cup rings way more often than elite goalies.

Crawford, quick, niemi, the corpse of hasek, ward, Khabibulin....only Tim Thomas was really elite among cup winning goalies.

Maybe we over think the gap between good and elite?
Click to expand...

absolutely. but that doesn't mean paying for mediocrity is a good idea. look at the pens this year - they didn't have to pay fleury at all. iirc of all those guys only crawford and quick won while getting paid that much.

and I will say that crawford's track record looks more and more elite as time goes on.
 
Yep...this move really seems to be the braintrust buying into the dubas wizardry. I'm hoping that our pro scouts agree though so he's not sticking his neck out by himself
 
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