Commandant

Thats true. Another point (on both Couture and Bergeron in fairness), is that a player is never going to say to the media... "this player is total shit".... they are always going to praise fellow players on other teams.

Hamrlik was debated. Shawn told me his top 3 were Cammalleri, Hamrlik, Gionta in that order. I think most if not all of us agreed it was a bushleague way to make a trade. I think the issue is if people thought it was a good return or not... and in hindsight, we got hosed.

Rob Zamuner is better than Ron Francis (who was still near the top of NHL scoring leaders at the time and would play 6 more years in the NHL so he wasn't washed up). At least if you ask team canada brass. Talk to the voters for the Hockey Hall of Fame, and they might have a different definition of who the best player was. If you look in the Subban thread i list at least a dozen other examples. Being picked by team canada is not confirmation that one player is or isnt better than another.

A player from the other conference is not going to see the decline as easily. I think that Bergeron is remembering the Weber he faced in the past, and hasn't played him often enough to notice that his mobility isn't what it used to be. Thats what happens when players with big names decline. Those who play them a lot see it more than those who don't see the player as often.

Yes I'm sure when he goes to the bench, he closes his eyes and doesn't watch what is happening on the ice. He has no clue what happens when its not his shift.

Jake Muzzin is also better than P.K. Subban if we look at the selections of Team Canada as being the arbiter of who is the better player.

Couture also plays on the sharks second line.... Subban isn't normally matched against the other team's second line. (Neither is Weber to be fair).

Apparently messier does. He was the greatest leader in hockey. Leadership is so important that the greatest leader in hockey, took the highest paid team in hockey, and proceeded to miss the playoffs four straight years at the end of his career. But leadership is this big intangible.... so much more important than actually being a better hockey player. I give credence to intangibles. They are great. They are not more important than tangibles though and the Tangibles are that subban is better. The intangible is the cherry on top of the sundae.... it doesn't replace the ice cream, the glass that holds it, the hot sauce, the sprinkles, etc... Or in simpler terms.... Winning the Norris vs Winning the Messier award. An award for tangible play on the ice vs an award for intangibles. I'm sure the Senators will soon be trading non-Messier winner Karlsson for the intangibles of Messier winner Shane Doan. Also the Kings find their winner, Dustin Brown, to be far more important than Drew Doughty. His leadership and intangibles were so great in the former Messier winner, that they stripped him of the Captains C. As for Team Canada, sure... lets use them. I bet you think Draper was better than Crosby in 2006.

All the evidence stastical suggests Subban is either improving in a category, or at the very least staying the same. There is no evidence that he has regressed, unlike Weber. He's not living off his reputation in the same way. Thats the whole point Weber was elite 4 years ago. He isn't at that same level today. Subban is still the same defenceman he was (or is better)... the same reputation concern doesn't come into play. If anything Subban's reputation is worse than his actual play.

I think we should dig up the Cammalleri traded thread. Lets remember the deal... the Habs gave up Cammalleri, Kari Ramo and a 7th for Rene Bourque, Patrick Holland and a 2nd. I remember hating the deal. I also remember some liked it. I think in hindsight, its pretty clear that it was a TERRIBLE trade for the Habs. I wonder if the people who liked it are the same ones defending the Subban trade today.

Two things... when you actually argue against the possibility of getting WEber for free and how that underates him, yes you are missing the point. Neither CC nor anyone else was suggesting that was his actual worth Secondly, As someone who has both watched a fair number of Nashville games (the eye test) and has looked at the stats, I do think he's inferior. The Stats clearly show it. But sure we can argue the eyetest and never agree. I think that by the time november comes and people see that Weber has lost a step, and is not the guy he was 4 or 5 years ago, it will become obvious who the better defenceman is currently. Again that doesnt make Weber a terrible player. It just makes him inferior to Subban.

I doubt many players on that San Jose team think Weber is tough to play against. They torched him repeatedly for 7 games. Of course this is much more damning than guys like Patrice Bergeron who played Weber twice last year saying he's tough to play against, cause when you see a guy 2 times out of 82 games, you may not see that he's declined and he may be living off the reputation. A reputation from when he was younger, quicker, and legitimately a top 5 D in the NHL.

Thats not a fact, thats an opinion. And its an opinion that is not supported by the analytics, which show that Weber gives up way more shots and scoring chances against when he is on the ice than Subban does. Those analytics, they are actual objective facts about past events.

I think you are completely missing the point. CC is not saying that Weber is a bad player. He merely is saying that Weber is not as good a player as subban today, and when you factor in age, the downgrade is even more significant. The whole idea that someone who is not as good as subban means that person is terrible, is something that people defending the trade have come up with and I'm not sure why.

1) I said the "MAIN" reason... not the only reason. 2) Weber is not a good addition, when it took a superior player to acquire him. Its a down grade. If we acquired Weber without giving up subban, great. He's a good player .... Its not an addition, its actually a subtraction to get him. Perfect analogy. Wow, the point went way over your head.... Does it matter who scores the goal, as long as the puck goes in the net. SUbban actually generates more offence, even on the powerplay, when we start counting assists. its close but its subban. 5 on 5, its not near as close. Subban generates more.

The main reason the team is going to be improved is because we expect Carey Price to play more than 12 games. ... I don't know if Bergevin deserves too much credit for that.

Exactly his small moves were decent. When it came time to pull a blockbuster. He shit the bed.

Don gets mad at players who don't Rispek Da Sysdum

I would have agreed at the time of this post. Today the thread seems a lot more prophetic.

Every team has players that go close to UFA, some even getting to July 1st and then re-sign. We did not include these players as eligible for the series. It has to be a pure free agent addition... as in a player who was not playing for the team in the season prior to free agency. For the purposes of the Series, Markov is a drafted player, Kovalev a player we traded for, etc...

The Habs should try to re-sign Galchenyuk long-term this summer. Not letting it get to next year. http://lastwordonsports.com/2016/08/03/canadiens-need-to-re-sign-alex-galchenyuk/

I used game centre last year (it came free with my cable package). It worked well most of the year and nothing was blacked out. One issue is that you have to ignore twitter and the like cause you are a few minutes behind and you'll get spoilers. When the NHL did their tech change after the all-star game, Going from NHL running things in house to MLBAM running it, there were some hiccups with game centre but they seemed to sort themselves by the end of the year.

Maybe that frees up a spot for Scott Luce (one can hope).

There are a ton of defencemen who are better than PK subban on the day he was drafted. At age 17, Subban was a good (but not great) offensive dman, but a complete mess defensively. Subban had an off-the chart development curve though after being drafted. The year after he was drafted he was sensational. At 19 he was even better and one of the best players in the OHL. His first year in Hamilton, he was an elite AHL defenceman as a rookie. Then he came into the NHL, and got better and better each year. So its great and all that Sergachev is ahead. But with respect to Sergachev vs Subban at the same age, it doesn't mean that much because the development curve Subban took was exceptionally rare. That said, I still think Sergachev is the best defenceman in the 2016 draft, so I do agree that he has all the potential in the world. If by some miracle he took a similar exponential development curve to subban he wouldn't just be the best defenceman in the NHL, he'd be an all-time top 5 defenceman. That's the kind of exponential growth Subban took (And the fact that sergachev is starting at a much higher level at 18). I'd just like to see the team not rush him, and give him time to be a true #1 defender in time.

Did Josi fall off playing without Weber? A little in 2015-16, yes... (however in 2014-15 he was a little better without Weber). Both of these are such small sample sizes (less than 200 minutes) that I wouldn't read too much into either result. Weber was worse without Josi as well. Seems that Weber and Josi both play better when together and both play worse when apart. That shouldn't be strange. As many of us, even on the pro-subban side, have said many times Weber is still a very good defenceman. The only issue is that Subban is better than very good. He's been great.