The Eagle Effect
Why Buying Out Ed Belfour May Have Been the Worst Leafs Move of the Last Five Years


In one day, the Leafs parted ways with all three of Kyle Wellwood, Darcy Tucker, and Andrew Raycroft. At the same time, the odds of Mats Sundin’s return to the Leafs decrease more and more each day.


If you looked hard enough, you might have seen Cliff Fletcher outside the ACC a can of gas and a lighter.


Fletcher’s burning the team to the ground. But why not? The Toronto Maple Leafs have missed the playoffs in three consecutive seasons. A combination of wretched luck, injuries, and management decisions that define all logic have lead to the demise of a once proud organization. And of all the ludicrous moves the Leafs have made in recent history, one must beg the question – Which was the worst?


Before the 2006-2007 season, the Leafs decided to buyout Ed Belfour, paying him $770,000 a year for the next two seasons. The decision itself didn’t really seem to mean too much at the time, but the moves that followed have cost the Leafs a lot more than they expected.


After Belfour was bought out, the Leafs traded promising goaltending prospect Tuukka Rask to the Boston Bruins for Andrew Raycroft. While Raycroft had won the Calder trophy just a few years before, he was coming off an eleven game season in Finland during the lockout, and a campaign in Boston that can only be described as abysmal. His stats didn’t get much better in Toronto, either.


But just think, if Raycroft had returned to Calder form in Toronto, Ferguson would have looked like a genius. I however, unlike most Leafs fans at the time it seems, didn’t think for a single solitary second that would happen.


Given now that Raycroft did not turn out to be the starting goaltender Toronto needed, what does Belfour have to do with this?


First of all, he was not too old to play. In fact, he played with the Florida Panthers the next season, posting a better save percentage and goals against average while the Leafs shelled out $770,000 of their own cap space to him.


Then there is the issue of Tuukka Rask. Now clearly the Leafs organization had two stellar future goaltenders in their lineup. In fact, of all the goaltending prospects under 20 at the time, you could easily argue that the Leafs had two of the top five. So considering that, trading one of them makes sense. But for a goalie?


Consider how long this city has screamed bloody murder at management, begging them to get Sundin the scoring winger he needed. Consider that the Leafs haven’t had a defenseman you could even joke about being of Norris Trophy caliber for well over a decade. Could Rask not have been traded for one of those things? Surely they were available. And if they weren’t, who cares? Wait a while to trade on of them. After all, you have a decent starting goalie with a year left on his contract (Belfour), so why rush?


All of a sudden, Belfour gets bought out, the Leafs have no starting goalie, and the Leafs shelled out arguably their most valuable prospect at the time to a divisional rival for a shaky goaltender coming off a year of bad stats and injuries…am I the only one that seeing the bent logic at play here?


A year passes and Raycroft remained shaky with the Leafs. Of course his defense was horrendous, but you need only search YouTube for a couple seconds to find clips of his many gaffes; most on the glove side. So what now? A new goalie? Crap, I guess we have to.


So the Leafs go to the San Jose Sharks and trade a plethora of draft picks for Vesa Toskala and Mark Bell. While Toskala played well and could be argued as one of the top five goalies in the East, Mark Bell was a cap burden more than anything. He failed to achieve double digits in the goals department in 2007-2008 after serving a suspension and suffering a broken orbital bone during a fight. His one gleaming highlight of the season was absolutely pasting Daniel Alfredsson in the second-last game of the season. To make matters worse, as of June 24th, 2008, provided Sundin does not return to the Leafs, Mark Bell is the Leafs’ second-highest paid forward. Ouch.


So considering the events that followed his buyout, the Leafs pid Ed Belfour to play for another Eastern conference team, it cost the Leafs a $770,000 cap hit for two years, Tuukka Rask, a conditional 1st round selection in 2007, a 2nd round selection in 2007 and a 4th round selection in 2009, and a buyout of Andrew Raycroft contract because nobody even wanted him on waivers.


One year. Belfour had one lousy year left on that contract. Sure, the Leafs wanted to free up cap room, considering they signed Raycroft for cheaper. But with the cap hit of Eddie’s buyout, it didn’t free up much more than one million, and who does that pay for nowadays?


One last glaring note, if the Leafs had so much faith in Raycroft to be a starting goaltender, why was he signed to $2 million a season? How many starting goalies in the NHL over the age of 25 make less than that? Not many. Heck even Martin Gerber makes $3 million.


Thank goodness that Leafs management has changed, because if one buyout in 2006 could effect the team so profoundly two years later, imagine what else could have been done.


Eddie could have played out the last year of his contract. Plain and simple.


Afterthought after writing
Looking back, it probabl;y wasn’t the worst move (Brad Boyes would’ve look awful nice on Sundin’s wing) but I certainly wouldn’t have made it. Change is good because they can’t get much worse.