Sweet tweet puts Tavares in spotlight
John Tavares’ decision to sign with the Toronto Maple Leafs this summer didn’t just make a splash in the NHL free-agency market, it made one online, too.
Tavares posted a photo of himself as a child sleeping under a Maple Leafs duvet, his head resting on pillows with the team’s logo, and included the caption “Not everyday you can live a childhood dream” July 1, when free agency opened. That tweet served as the official announcement of his homecoming and has since been retweeted more than 31,000 times with more than 109,000 likes.
Twitter released data Wednesday revealing it was the most mentioned NHL moment in Canada over the last 12 months and helped Tavares become the most followed Canadian player in the league, surpassing defenceman P.K. Subban of the Nashville Predators.
“July 1 is always a big day for conversation, free-agent signings, people love to chime in on that,” said Christopher Doyle, head of sports at Twitter Canada.
“The way Tavares represented himself in the Twitter conversation with an amazing tweet, referencing his childhood dream coming true, that was an outstanding tweet.”
Doyle said there are other factors that make the opening day of NHL free agency the hottest day of the year for discussion among the 90 per cent of Canadian Twitter users who consider themselves hockey fans. The fact it’s a national holiday means people have time to engage. Any NHL team could be involved, which gives it broad appeal.
Tomas Plekanec re-signing with the Montreal Canadiens, Paul Stastny leaving the Winnipeg Jets for the Vegas Golden Knights and James van Riemsdyk leaving Toronto for the Philadelphia Flyers were also hot topics July 1.
The second-most mentioned moment of the last year was the Jets’ 5-1 win over the Nashville Predators in Game 7 of their Western Conference semifinal May 10.
Although Winnipeg is the smallest Canadian market to have an NHL franchise, Jets fans are some of the most vocal online.
“We’ve noticed that overall ( Winnipeg ) is a pretty digital-savvy market in general,” said Doyle.