Trade Grade: Montreal Canadiens trade D Shea Weber to the Vegas Golden Knights

Trades are a big part of sports due to it providing an unpredictability factor. Anybody can be traded at anytime and anywhere, no matter how bad of a contract a player is signed too. There is always a way in the NHL a team can move out of there contracts. That is what the Montreal Canadians and Vegas Golden Knights did in this move. The details of the trade is down below.

Montreal Canadiens Acquire: RW Evgenii Dadonov
Vegas Golden Knights Acquire: D Shea Weber

Montreal Canadiens Side

I like what the Montreal Canadians are doing with the first stage of there rebuild. Especially trading away players that won’t be a part of there team long term. One player who clearly was not going to be a part of there rebuild was Shea Weber. Not because of his age, but due to the massive amount of injuries that have pretty much ended his career. I would never think the Canadians would be able to get out of his massive contract and somehow they did, but acquiring Dadonov.

Yes, Dadonov has a cap hit of 5 million, but he can produce on this team where Shea Weber sadly can’t due to his injuries. The only nitpick for Montreal is that they could not get a draft pick in this deal. Especially, as the Golden Knights were absolutely desperate in trying to fix there salary cap. It might be a little bit of a nitpick. Just getting rid of Weber is a massive win for the Canadiens.

Vegas Golden Knights Side

Vegas had no choice making this deal after they botched the original Dadonov deal. What happened was that the Golden Knights had originally traded Dadonov to the Anaheim Ducks during the trade deadline. Problem was, Dadonov had a modified no trade clause where he had teams on a list that a team he was on could not trade him too. The Ducks were on that list and it result in the trade being voided by the NHL.

Weber is unlikely to play another game of hockey ever again due to his many injuries. Which again sucks because I liked watching Weber play when I was a kid. Currently, Weber has 4 years left on his contract and has a cap hit of 7.85 million dollars.

So why did Vegas trade for Weber you ask? Well the Golden Knights can put Weber on Long-Term IR and get flexibility for there salary cap. To add onto it, the Golden Knights are free of Dadonov’s 5 million dollar cap hit.

Grades for Shea Weber Trade
Montreal Canadiens: A-
Vegas Golden Knights: A

This is a win-win deal for both teams, but i have to give the Golden Knights the win on this deal. Mainly due to the cap flexibility that they get making this move. The Canadians win by just getting something for Shea Weber. If the Canadiens recieved a draft pick as well, bo. Overall great move by both Vegas Golden Knights GM Kelly McCrimmon and Montreal Canadiens GM Kent Hughes.