The Toronto Maple Leafs should not be bringing back Jack Campbell, unless it is on an extremely team-friendly deal.
Jack Campbell is a great guy, and he had a pretty good run as the starting goalie for the Toronto Maple Leafs, but giving any kind of term or money to almost any goalie is a bad move, let alone one so injury prone and inconsistent.
The Leafs are locked into their core, and goalie is one place they could drastically alter their team, the perception of their team, and their team’s psychology. So why bring back the guy who – at best – was only OK?
They should be scouring the league for any chance of prying lose one of the few elite netminders. If they can’t do that, I have no problem signing Campbell, as long as it’s for a low cap hit and no term.
Toronto Maple Leafs and Jack Campbell
Given the random nature of goaltending at the pro level, there is almost no point in spending big money or assets on goalies. However, if you can get one of the few elite netminders, that all changes.
If the Leafs could somehow land Andrei Vasilevskiy, Connor Hellebyuck, Jordan Binnington or Ilya Sorokin, they should make that happen.
But if you can’t land the big fish, the difference between Campbell and whoever else you might grab isn’t going to be worth any kind of long-term investment.
Jack Campbell is a nice story, but he is also one of the worst goalies in the NHL over the last three seasons at saving dangerous shots. He ranks 69th out of 75 goalies who played a minimum of 1500 minutes over the last three NHL seasons. (Naturalstattrick.com).
Therefore, he has not established himself enough to earn a multi-year deal from a team in the prime of their contending years.
The Toronto Maple Leafs need a goalie who wasn’t a part of the team the last couple of years, so that when the pressure ratchets up next spring, he can set himself apart, and not worry about it. If there was ever a team that desperately needed the psychological boost that only having a top-tier goalie can provide, it is this team.
Jack Campbell solves nothing, and he just creates questions.
Money for a goalie can easily be found by moving the almost $11 million dollars in cap money going to Jack Muzzin and TJ Brodie, who combine to be about 70 years old. No trade Clauses can be gotten around. They must be, because the only way to change this team enough while still bringing back the core you built around is by changing the goalie, and the only way to really do that is to the two expensive blue-liners.
But even if that isn’t the case, Jack Campbell is a bad bet. The only way the Leafs should sign Campbell to a multi-year extension is if he trades a payday for security, and those extra years are in the $2 million range.
In my opinion, an expensive, multi-year extension for this player is a fireable offense. I like Jack Campbell and on a team-friendly deal I hope he sticks around, but you have Matthews signed for 2 more years, go get a goalie you can bank on.