Toronto Maple Leafs sign Frederik Andersen to five-year, $5 million AAV contract extension

The Toronto Maple Leafs have moved quickly to sign new goaltending acquisition Frederik Andersen to a five-year contract extension worth $25 million.

The extension buys four years of unrestricted free agency eligibility.

This will be a hotly debated move in the days and months to come. The Leafs have acquired a goaltender with just 125 games of career experience – albeit with promising numbers that rank him top 20 in the league since 2013-14 (minimum 90 games played) – at the price of two top 60 picks before signing him long term at a price of $5 million per year.

It’s certainly a confidently aggressive move, one that suggests not just that the Leafs like Andersen’s potential to become a good year-in, year-out starter, but that they’re sold on it enough already to lock him down as their guy of the future as the team moves toward their (hypothetical) competitive window.

There is plenty to like about Andersen’s size (6’4, 218) and short(ish) history in the League. He checks all the boxes for what you want in a starter in today’s NHL. He’s been consistent over three seasons in the NHL and competently carried the bulk of the workload for Anaheim last season over 54 games. The fact that his workload decreased slightly in 2015-16 was more to do with a few injuries and John Gibson’s promise than it does with Andersen taking a step back, and he wrestled the starter’s position back from the game-one starter with some great playoff performances this past Spring. His numbers were, in fact, improved over the year previous (.914 to .919).

Here is how his numbers stack up league wide since he entered the league in 2013-14, minimum 90 games played:

We do know, however, that it’s awfully hard to project goalies without a sizeable body of work to go on, and that’s especially the case when you take one from a good team with a deep defence group and transplant him onto a worse team (in the immediate term) with holes on the blueline.

If the term and salary raised a few eyebrows, there’s also the question of acquisition cost. The fact that it’s technically the first round pick — 30th overall — instead of the second round pick — 31st overall — should mean nothing to anybody. And this is important to keep in mind:

For those saying TOR price on Andersen was extremely high, no one would have batted an eye if Leafs used 30th pick to take 18 yr old G…

— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) June 20, 2016

Expected value of the picks + time value in terms of delay in asset arriving in the NHL is relevant to all of this.

— Stephen Burtch (@SteveBurtch) June 20, 2016

Andersen plays for the team next year. When you factor in how far away a 30th pick/2nd rounder are from the NHL – that matters.

— Stephen Burtch (@SteveBurtch) June 20, 2016

For the reasons stated in the above tweets, there’s more reason to be concerned with the term of the contract the Leafs immediately handed Andersen than the acquisition cost. That said, two top 60 picks for an RFA goaltender in a year when we were told it would be a buyers market to the extreme for goaltenders – especially with the expansion draft looming for next June, leading some to think a bargain buy was realistic – is probably a little more than most thought the Leafs would have to give up for Andersen. No one will care in the slightest about two 30-60th overall picks if the Leafs, a team replete with draft picks, have acquired a quality NHL goaltender here. The bigger question mark is that the Leafs have contractually committed to Andersen like he’s the one, even though it’s hard to confidently declare that to be the case based on what we know today.

For what it’s worth, while their trajectories in the most recent season past are significantly different and that of course matters, Jonathan Bernier stacks up with a .915 compared to Andersen’s .918 since 2013.

It’s certainly an aggressive move at a position that was in major need of addressing for the organization going forward. Have your say below.