Byron finally reveals the extent of the damage to Shea Weber and his injury

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Jeff Drouin
June 1, 2022 (1:37 PM)

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At the last trade deadline, the Habs' new GM, Kent Hughes, confirmed that he was close to trading the contract of captain Shea Weber. From what we can understand, the defenseman is too injured to play hockey again in the near future.

His teammate Paul Byron can confirm this. According to him in an interview with Félix Séguin of TVA Sports, Weber should not have even played a single game in the club's last playoff run because he was so "crazy".

"Honestly, I don't even know how he managed to play. He broke his thumb blocking a shot late in the season. We thought his season was over, but he was adamant about playing. Plus, he had knee, hip and ankle injuries. He played with a broken ankle for so long, it did a lot of damage." - Paul Byron

Byron's words were confirmed by Brendan Gallagher and Phillip Danault in the Describer's podcast, which had the CH's 2020-2021 playoff run as its topic. According to his former teammates, Weber would never complain about his fate.

Everyone knew that this playoff run was going to be the Captain's last. They all wanted to win the Cup for him and for Carey Price, and that's why the players are so disappointed that they failed to do so.

"Everybody wanted to win it for him and for Carey Price. We wanted to give everything for them. You never know when you're going to go through that again. Careers go by so fast. It seems like yesterday was my first NHL game, but it's been over 10 years. You never know how many years are left in your career." - Paul Byron

"I felt terrible for him and for Price," Gallagher echoed. We wanted to win for them. They did so much for us, we would have liked to do more for them." - Brendan Gallagher

As of today, Weber still hasn't officially announced his retirement, and he seems to want to wait before doing so. With four full seasons left on his contract that will take up $7.86M annually on the CH's payroll, it's only natural that Hughes would want to get rid of his captain's contract.