You don’t normally think of big deals going down early on a Sunday morning, particularly after a holiday weekend, but that is exactly what has just happened this week with the Birds. The Swift Current Broncos are saying goodbye to a player as the Seattle Thunderbirds pick him up. Welcome to the team, left wing Andreas Schumacher! Schumacher hails from Stenungsund, Sweden. The left wing stands at 6’4 and weighs 201 pounds. He was born on August 11, 1996 and shoots left.

During the 2014 to 2015 season, Schumacher played in 65 games, scoring 8 goals and making 9 assists. He had scored 17 points altogether during that season. During the season he had 16 penalty minutes. He has had considerably less ice time during the 2015 to 2016 season, with just 17 games played and two goals scored. He has accumulated three points for the season so far and had four penalty minutes.

Since they have added Schumacher to the lineup, Farwell and team have released Gustav Olhaver in accordance with their agreement to maintain only two Import players. Olhaver, also from Sweden, was just acquired by the Thunderbirds just this year during the summer's CHL Import draft, but Thunderbirds general manager Russ Farwell just didn’t feel as if Olhaver has shown the skill that was originally indicated by his potential. In his 31 games played, he has only made two goals and three assists. He racked up just five points during his only season with Seattle.

Schumacher was not the only trade that the Broncos made this week, either. They traded Jake Debrusk, the first-round pick from Boston Bruins, to the Red Deer Rebels in exchange for three goodies: Lane Pederson, whom the Thunderbirds had just traded a few months ago, as well as both a first and third round draft pick. It seems as if the teams are playing three degrees of separation but it just goes to show that what goes around, comes around—or, in this case, who goes around, comes around! Then there is also the fact that Seattle was gunning for Debrusk originally and now the Broncos have him. Will another trade be attempted in the future? It seems a possibility.

Hockey also runs in the Schumacher family. Schumacher’s brother, Michael, is a fellow player in the league. He has played for the Los Angeles Kings, the Denver Cutthroats and the Lake Erie Monsters.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia