This is now official:
Welcome to Toronto, Petr!
— Toronto Maple Leafs (@MapleLeafs) July 28, 2021
🖊️ We’ve signed goaltender Petr Mrázek to a three-year contract. #LeafsForever
Kevin Weekes is reporting that the Toronto Maple Leafs are signing goalie Petr Mrazek, 29, to a three-year contract. Mrazek will cost the Leafs $3.8 million against the cap for those three seasons.
**Breaking News** From what I’m told, it appears Petr Mrazek coming off an impressive 3 yr run with the @Canes , will be signing a 3 yr deal with @MapleLeafs @espn @NHL @NHLNetwork #TSNHockey #HockeyTwitter
— Kevin Weekes (@KevinWeekes) July 28, 2021
Mrazek was part of the tandem in Carolina with Alex Nedeljkovic and James Reimer. He only played 12 games this year as Nedeljkovic took the reins (before getting traded) but put up a .923 save percentage. Last year he played 40 games and was a .905. The year before was also 40 games with a .914.
Dreger had the terms of the deal after Weekes reported the agreement. Bob McKenzie noted in his tweet that this was one of the more “affordable” goalie contracts we were going to see. Still a bit much if you ask me.
3 years $3.8 per for Mrazek and Leafs.
— Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) July 28, 2021
Looking at his stats, his numbers in 2018-19 are better than the last two years. Statistically his last three years are near-identical to Frederik Andersen in terms of save percentage and goals saved above average. The big difference between the two goalies is workload, with Mrazek playing about two thirds as much as Andersen did with the Leafs. Looking at only the past two seasons, things are more or less the same with Mrazek and Andersen both falling slightly in terms of goals saved above average, Andersen a step worse than Mrazek who was pretty much average.
I would say it like this: Mrazek’s 2019-20 was about as bad as Andersen’s 2020-21. Both their 2018-19 seasons were good. And this season Mrazek didn’t play very much, but had decent numbers when he did. He also played the last two playoff games for the Canes as they went silently into the night against the Tampa Bay Lightning. He wasn’t exactly impressive in those games either.
Petr Mrázek (3x3.8m with Toronto) over the past three years: +14.6 goals saved over expected. pic.twitter.com/JeykZ5V2Hv
— Micah Blake McCurdy (@IneffectiveMath) July 28, 2021