The season of rumours is upon us and this time it takes us between the pipes, where it’s being reported that the Toronto Maple Leafs and Laurent Brossoit have mutual interest in each other.
Originally reported by James Mirtle, the understanding is that Brossoit is looking for a good team that would allow him to start more games. This isn’t the first time a player has viewed the Leafs as an opportunity to gain exposure and earn a bigger payday down the road, Daniel Winnick took that same route and it worked well enough for him (kinda). While that may be a fine plan from the viewpoint of the player and agent, the question for me is if Brossoit is the player you’d look towards as a legitimate 1A or 1B in the short term and if things did go well, how inclined would he be to stay long term?
One thing that can’t be argued is that Brossoit has done well as a backup goaltender. This season with the Winnipeg Jets he posted a 0.927SV% to go along with a solid 2.00GAA in 23 games. Likewise, the year before that he posted an equal 0.927SV% and a 2.17GAA in 11 contests with the Vegas Golden Knights. It’s not his numbers as a backup that concern me, it’s that he has only ever been a backup.
The aim, it would seem, is to find a goaltender that can help manage Joseph Woll’s playing time in an effort to keep the young goaltender healthy so they can truly see what they have in him. If Woll does continue to go down to injury often, then they’ll want a goaltender that has shown the ability to carry the load, I would assume. Brossoit has never played over 24 games in an NHL season. He did manage to dress for 42 contests over the 2022-23 season which was split between the Vegas Golden Knights and their AHL affiliate, the Henderson Silver Knights. Those 42 games include 8 playoff games for Vegas, where his 3.18GAA and 0.894SV% was somehow good enough to earn him a 5-2 record on route to Vegas’ first Stanley Cup win.
If those numbers concern you, they should, as those 8 games constitute the majority of his NHL playoff experience, which spans a total of 10 appearances. While talking about playoff games played by pending unrestricted free agents may be a fools game, as Martin Jones, Cam Talbot and Ilya Samsonov are among the leaders in that category from the group, all of this does raise a valid question. Would the Leafs be doing themselves a disservice by walking into next season with a goalie tandem that doesn’t include 1 player that has at least been asked to carry their team through an NHL campaign at the beginning of a season? Is Laurent Brossoit, who just turned 31 years old and has 140 NHL games of experience in his back pocket the key to improving a goaltending situation that has long been unstable?
Honestly, I would say no. I’d argue that at this juncture and with all of the turmoil surrounding the core players, with new coaches in tow and the unrest among a fanbase that has lost patience due to perpetual losing, that turning to an 30+ year old backup as the solution to your problems without ever having seen him play more than 24 NHL games in a single season isn’t sound reasoning. If the Leafs were in possession of a starting goaltender that regularly played 60 games but could do with more rest, then allowing a fine backup the opportunity to gain exposure and a bigger payday down the road would be good business. However, signing Brossoit, in my opinion, makes far more sense for the player and his future than it does for a team that needs to win when it matters immediately. After all, he has nothing to lose. If he comes to Toronto and does poorly, it will be due to a thin defensive group and new surroundings, whereas if he succeeds he gets to walk away a richer man than before.
It would be the Leafs that are taking the risk here. If they do manage to improve their defense and make big changes to their forwards, after already having hired a new head coach and all of that is foiled by a backup that has limited, but successful time spent behind teams that are notoriously strong defensively, then things will get just about as bad as you can imagine around the team.
Options are thin within the UFA class this summer, but, unfortunately for Brossoit, I don’t believe he’s the right fit at this time.