Toronto Maple Leafs: Time to Revisit Adding Alexandar Georgiev

The Toronto Maple Leafs have often been linked to New York Rangers backup Alexandar Georgiev, but perhaps this summer it actually happens.

Jack Campbell will be entering contract negotiations with the Toronto Maple Leafs and who knows how that will turn out.

That in turn would leave a significant hole on the Toronto Maple Leafs roster; one that Georgiev could very well be a decent fit for, especially given he might be fairly cheap.

Toronto Maple Leafs fans will likely recall the name Georgiev as he seems to often save his best performances for games against their favorite team.

How Much Might it Cost for the Toronto Maple Leafs?

The cost to acquire Georgiev might not prove too steep this summer, with the goalie hitting restricted free agency and very clearly being stuck behind Rangers number one Igor Shesterkin.

The latter fact there likely means that with the right offer the New York Rangers might be willing to accept a trade proposal. Or the Leafs could use his restricted free agent status and see if they could force New York to part with him.

After all, on a $3 million sort of deal, it’s only costing the Toronto Maple Leafs a second-round pick. That doesn’t sound like the worst value for a decent younger goaltender.

That approach assumes that the New York Rangers don’t simply match the offer and indeed that Georgiev himself even accepts an offer sheet. However, it still bears pondering at the very least.

Even though (per CapFriendly) the Rangers will have $9 million in cap space, they have a significant number of contracts they’ll likely look to renew and perhaps $3 million would prove too rich for them.

When you consider Georgiev’s track record in the league, he has a career 0.908 save percentage and 2.94 goals against average in the NHL.

Those are hardly elite numbers and you might even argue they’re numbers undeserving of $3 million. However, there are certainly some signs he could be better given a little more runway.

He is still a technically sound goaltender that doesn’t seem to get unnerved very easily. Where he has seen his averages dip comes from taking a back seat to Shesterkin.

Traffic in front of the net seemed to be a problem this last season for Georgiev and this isn’t exactly ideal for a Toronto Maple Leafs team that doesn’t always do the best job of clearing their goalies net front; Mark Giordano or not!

With that said, you’d have to imagine that the fundamentals are still there and with increased game time Georgiev could get his eye back in and start tracking through traffic much better.

A deal for Georgiev would be a buy-low(ish) kind of deal with the hope that showing such faith in him gives an immediate confidence boost that in turn shines through in net.

If Jack Campbell does indeed end up departing, this is definitely an avenue that the Toronto Maple Leafs should be considering. After all, Georgiev is young enough to shore up the goaltending spot for the next decade if he panned out.