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Minor League Deal: Jarmo swaps Kubalik for Machacek

Everyone was waiting for Jarmo to start making deals…well, here you go.

The move to send big bodied forward Tomas Kubalik to Winnipeg in exchange for RW Spencer Machacek isn’t exactly a blockbuster, but it does give the Falcons a proven AHL scorer for their playoff push. The club is reporting the Machacek will report directly to Springfield, and I’d expect Kubalik will be heading to St. John’s.

All things considered, I am sorry to see Kubalik go. He’s always shown flashes of potential, but he never seemed to be able to put it together at the NHL level, and he’s had a couple of nasty injuries that certainly handicapped his development. This season he wasn’t setting the world on fire, but 14 goals and 6 assists in 54 games is nothing to sneeze at.

The good news on Machachek is that he’s regarded as a very hard working guy and a “never quit” skater who gets to the dirty areas and can back it up with solid physical play. He’s got 11G, 14A in 57 games, but in previous seasons he’s been a pretty consistent 50 point player in the AHL. The downside is his skating is regarded as “average” according to Hockey Prospectus and he’s the equivalent of a Swiss army knife – he can do an OK job at quite a few things, but he isn’t really exceptional at any of them. (And did I mention he’s a -23 this season? Ouch.)

My guess is that he’ll mostly be there to help the Falcons push to the postseason, but he could see time in Columbus if the injury situation calls for a replacement in the bottom six.