Remember When … the Subban-Weber trade broke Twitter
The Montreal Canadiens have never been accused of being a boring franchise. This series is a look back at the moments that made you throw your hands up, lose your mind, ugly cry, hold your breath, scratch your head, and cheer so loudly you scared the dog … sometimes all at once. If you were there the first time around, you know. If you weren’t, hop in the DeLorean cause we’re going back in time.
The Day the Timeline Exploded
Some trades simply adjust the roster.
Others take down social media.
It was June 29, 2016. What started as a typical get-through-hump-day Wednesday afternoon ended with half of the hockey world losing their minds. It turns out that nothing travels faster than news of a blockbuster trade during the off-season.
It was 23 minutes of pure trading madness that caused Twitter to take a timeout. Hockey fans barely had time to process the fact that the Edmonton Oilers traded Taylor Hall to New Jersey when, a mere 20 minutes later, the Montreal Canadiens and Nashville Predators announced they were swapping their franchise defencemen: P.K. Subban for Shea Weber. Three minutes after that, Steven Stamkos confirmed he was staying in Tampa Bay (not really keeping with the Twitter breaking news there Stamkos, but part of the chatter nonetheless).
The Subban-Weber deal was the loudest explosion in the room with many considering it to be one of the biggest NHL trades in recent years. I think we can all agree that former NHL enforcer Georges Laraque wrapped everyone’s thoughts up nicely when he tweeted:
No draft picks or prospects thrown in to sweeten the pot. Just you give us your guy, we’ll give you ours.
The trade came two days before a no-movement clause was to kick in on Subban’s contract so the timing was either ruthlessly efficient or deeply calculated, depending on which camp you fell into. Either way, the reaction was immediate and deeply personal, dividing the fanbase into two sides: one that despised the trade, the other that absolutely loved it.
Tweets from fans, NHL stars, bloggers, and well, everyone really, confirmed that this was no under-the-radar kinda trade. Even Jonathan Toews, watching from Chicago, got in on the action tweeting:
Canadiens owner Geoff Molson admitted he saw “a lot of it on my Twitter account,” which is one way to find out your franchise has just been detonated on social media, and one fan even took took it offline, going old school by taking out a full-page newspaper advertisement to voice his fury over losing Subban. A full-page ad. Now that’s committing.
The Great Debate
The thing about P.K. Subban is you either loved every second of his flair or you spent your Saturday nights grasping you beer yelling, “Stop twirling around and just shoot the damn puck!” every time he held it at the blue line. He was a 2013 Norris Trophy-winner. He committed to raising $10 million for the Montreal Children’s Hospital. He was electric, flamboyant, and Carey Price’s BFF who annoyed their coach to no end with their “triple low five.”
He was also not quite the defensively responsible type that GM Marc Bergevin was looking for, with his flashy game occasionally coming with lapses in his own zone. Weber, by contrast, was the definition of a defensively responsible blue-liner, and his 14 power-play goals in 2015-16 proved the booming slapshot wasn’t just for highlight reels.
Brendan Gallagher, whose relationship with Subban was, shall we say, spirited, kept it as diplomatic as he could: “With us, it was a good move in the sense we needed what Shea’s going to bring to our locker room, the presence that he has. It’s a good addition to our team. P.K.’s going to go there and be P.K. I’m sure he’s going to have success there as well.”
In his debut season, Weber made believers out of the skeptics with the best offensive output of his career, racking up 17 goals, 42 points, nearly 24 minutes of ice time a night, and finishing second in team scoring. In 2017, the Canadiens returned to the playoffs — as did Subban, but he went all the way to the Stanley Cup Final while Montreal was bounced in the first round by the New York Rangers. Cue the revival of the intense online debate.
By September 2018, Weber was named the Canadiens’ 30th captain, and under his watch the team reached the 2021 Stanley Cup Final before the laundry list of injuries finally caught up to him. After the 2021 Stanley Cup Final loss, Bergevin confirmed Weber would not return the following season and likely would not return at all (spoiler alert: he did not). The hockey gods, it turns out, do not care about narrative arcs.
The Verdict: Forever Pending
The debate over who won this trade has never fully been settled, nor will it be. And we’ll never really know what went on behind closed doors, but we do remember that the speculation machine went from zero to DEFCON 1 before anyone could refresh their feed.
Bergevin insisted it was about fit, structure, and the long-term cap situation but he did acknowledge it was “one of the most difficult decisions I had to make” as GM. And former Predators GM David Poile, the man who sent Weber away, eventually said: “In the bigger picture, I wish Shea had never been traded.”
The Subban-Weber trade was one for the ages: it took down Twitter, spawned full-page newspaper ads, and ignited nine years of arguments that show no signs of letting up. Whether it was a masterstroke or a heartbreak depends entirely on who you ask. But one thing is certain: on one Wednesday afternoon in June 2016, the hockey world exploded. And Montreal lit the fuse.
