Canadiens: Kent Hughes Looking To Trade Shea Weber

General Manager Kent Hughes and his crew have a lot to take care of as the March 21st trade deadline approaches. With recent news that trade talks are intensifying with certain teams, it is now being said that Kent Hughes is looking to trade the Canadiens’ captain, Shea Weber.

According to Sportsnet, the 36 year old defenceman is available via trade, but for those who don’t understand why an injured player who may never play again would get traded, allow me to explain.

Despite Shea Weber currently being on the Canadiens’ long term injury reserve (LTIR), the NHL has not yet recognized Weber’s injury as being career ending. Therefore, when the off-season begins, Weber’s $7,857,143 would suddenly count towards the salary cap, which would make signing extensions and free agents more complicated as you cannot be over 10% of the salary cap during the off-season.

The Canadiens would then enter this year’s offseason with a cap hit of $79,771,309 which only leaves $1,728,691 of cap space under the regular $81,500,000 salary cap. With the 10% relief in the offseason, the cap climbs to $89,650,000 giving the Canadiens $9,878,691 in offseason cap space. That includes all of the injury contracts being activated as well as the second to last year of Karl Alzner’s buyout penalty which counts for $833,333 against the salary cap.

This is where things get complicated and moving Shea Weber’s contract is almost a necessity. At the NHL level, the Canadiens will need to make decisions regarding 8 players who will become unrestricted free agents. The number and names will likely change with some of these players most likely to be traded, but for now the UFA list includes: Cedric Paquette, Mathieu Perreault, Laurent Dauphin, Ben Chiarot, Brett Kulak, Chris Wideman, Tyler Pitlick and Andrew Hammond.

Out of that bunch, Chiarot is the most likely candidate to being traded before the deadline while Kulak and Wideman might draw some interest as well.

On top of that, the Canadiens also need to make decisions regarding 8 restricted free agents at the NHL level alone. This RFA list include: Artturi Lehkonen, Rem Pitlick, Michael Pezzetta, Alexander Romanov, Kale Clague, Corey Schueneman, Cayden Primeau and Samuel Montembeault.

From that list, Lehkonen has been in the middle of many trade rumors as he will likely get a significant raise from his current $2.3 million salary. Rem Pitlick ($917,831), Samuel Montembeault ($750,000) and Alexander Romanov ($894,167) are also in line for a nice raise.

So if Shea Weber doesn’t enter the LTIR in the summer, why would a team take his contract then if they are going to lose $7,857,143 in cap space?

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The answer is simple: because certain teams, notable the Arizona Coyotes, are always looking for ways to spend the least amount of money and stay just afloat of the salary floor. Names like Marc Savard or Marian Hossa comes to mind for certain fans as cases where the Coyotes took on inactive contracts in order to reach the salary floor during the off-season. Then once the season starts, teams would either bury the contract in the minors (a less encouraged practice in today’s NHL) or simply figure a way to put the non the injured reserve and let the insurances take care of paying the player’s salary.

Brent Seabrook, the former Stanley Cup winner of the Chicago Blackhawks, has been on the LTIR since 2019 when his career was pretty much over despite having years left on his contract, just like Shea Weber. Seabrook’s contract was eventually traded to the Tampa Bay Lightning where master CBA Circumventor, GM Julien BriseBois, immediately put his name on the LTIR where he will remain until the end of his contract until the end of the 23-24 season.

This is why it is in the Canadiens’ best interest to trade Shea Weber. This is also the reason why you’ve heard so many persistent rumors involving Jeff Petry and Jonathan Drouin. Two heavily salaried players in which the Canadiens can afford to get rid of in order to save on cap space.

It will be strange if this strategy were to happen to hear that Shea Weber got trade. Have no fear however, his playing days are behind him and our last memories of him will be in the bleu-blanc-rouge sweater.