Author Archives: Graeme

Trades revisited: an exercise in hindsight

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There was a conversation on the IL Indoor message boards recently about Chris Corbeil and how he was traded to the Rush from the Buffalo Bandits. A Bandits fan was unhappy that Corbeil is now the captain of the reigning champs, while the Bandits got draft picks in return. I looked it up and found that the Bandits didn’t get quite as screwed as it might seem. That was fun so I thought I’d look up a few other trades from a few years ago. Now that we know which players played well, which were busts, and which players were drafted with the picks that were exchanged, we can see how they ended up working out.

I just randomly picked a bunch of trades that involved draft picks. This was not planned, but all but one of these trades involved the Edmonton Rush.

Chris Corbeil for picks

September 9, 2011: The Bandits sent Chris Corbeil to the Rush for a 2nd round pick in 2011 and a 1st round pick in 2012.

Chris Corbeil, hopefully in MovemberFour years after this trade, Corbeil is one of the premiere defenders in the league and as stated above, the captain of the defending champions. Did the Bandits get fleeced? Not at all, as it turned out. The second round pick in 2011 turned out to be Jeremy Thompson, but the Bandits traded the first round pick (3rd overall) to Minnesota who used it to draft Kiel Matisz. In return, the Bandits got Brendan Doran, Shawn Williams, the 5th overall pick, and two later picks. The Bandits drafted Dhane Smith and Carter Bender and traded the other pick to the Rock for Glen Bryan and Jamie Rooney. Doran never played for the Bandits and Bender scored 3 points in 3 games. But Bryan, Rooney, and Williams each played two seasons in Buffalo and Dhane Smith is one of the Bandits top offensive weapons.

Thompson played in 14 games for the Bandits in 2012, scored 9 points, won 46% of 140 face-offs, and was traded to the Rush a year later (see below).

Winner: Corbeil vs. Dhane Smith, two years of Williams, Bryan, and Rooney plus a year of Jeremy Thompson? Calling it for Buffalo.

Jeff Cornwall for picks

February 10, 2012: The Bandits sent Jeff Cornwall to the Rush for a 2nd round pick in 2012 and a 2nd round pick in 2014.

The second round pick that the Bandits got in 2012 was Jordan Critch, who scored five points in five games in 2013 and hasn’t played in the NLL since. The 2014 pick got complicated. In July 2013, the Bandits traded that pick, a second round pick in 2013, and Carter Bender to Colorado for Rory Smith and a 4th rounder in 2015 (Tim Edwards). Colorado ended up trading the pick to Calgary for Jackson Decker, and Calgary drafted Tyson Roe.

The end result for the Bandits: they gave up Jeff Cornwall for 5 games from Critch, a season of Rory Smith, and Tim Edwards. Rory Smith was later sent to the Stealth along with Eric Penney for Nick Weiss and even more draft picks, but that’s as far as I think I want to go with this one.

Winner: Hard to determine since the picks got pretty complicated but I’d go with Edmonton.

Anthony Cosmo for picks

February 16, 2012: The Swarm sent Anthony Cosmo to the Bandits for 1st round picks in 2013 and 2014.

Anthony Cosmo was picked up by the Swarm in the Boston Blazers dispersal draft despite the fact that he told them he wouldn’t play for them. He was true to his word and didn’t play, but they held onto him for part of the 2012 season until the Bandits came calling. The Swarm love those first round draft picks and Buffalo offered some, so Cosmo was sent east. In 2013, their pick from Buffalo turned into the first overall pick, which became Logan Schuss. In 2014, it was #5, Shane MacDonald. Schuss scored 104 points for the Swarm in a year and a half before being traded to Vancouver for Johnny Powless, while MacDonald scored 13 points in 11 games last season and has since been traded to New England for Drew Petkoff.

Winner: Cosmo vs. Schuss + Powless. Another tough call but I have to give this one to the Bandits.

Cousins for Williams

July 25, 2011: The Rush sent Ryan Cousins, Andy Secore, and Alex Kedoh Hill to Rochester for Shawn Williams, Aaron Bold, and a 2nd round pick in 2012.

Shawn WilliamsThe second round pick that the Rush received was traded to the Stealth along with Athan Iannucci for Paul Rabil and a first rounder. The Stealth drafted Justin Pychel with that pick, while the Rush picked Mark Matthews. The Rush later traded Rabil to the Knighthawks for Jarrett Davis. The Knighthawks sent Rabil (and others including Jordan Hall) to the Wings for Paul and Dan Dawson.

Cousins played 10 games for the Knighthawks before retiring. Secore never played again, while Hill played 5 games with the Knighthawks before being sent to the Bandits. Shawn Williams played one season in Edmonton before being sent to Buffalo via Minnesota. Aaron Bold, I believe, is still with the Rush.

Winner: From this trade, the Rush ended up with Aaron Bold and a season of Shawn Williams. Add in the Iannucci deal (below) and the draft pick turned into Mark Matthews. I’d call Edmonton the clear winners here.

Thompson for Wilson

November 14, 2012: The Bandits just love sending players to the Rush. This time, it’s Jeremy Thompson for Aaron Wilson and a 2nd round pick in 2013.

The second round pick was Nick Diachenko, who never played for the Bandits but was picked up as a free agent by the Rock. Thompson is one of the best transition players in the game. Aaron Wilson scored 59 points in a year and a half with the Bandits before being sent to the Knighthawks. He only played 4 games last year and retired in the off-season.

Winner: Rush again but the Bandits did OK here.

Merrill for Nooch

August 9, 2011: The Rush sent Brodie Merrill, Mike McLellan, Dean Hill, the 41st overall pick in 2011, and a 4th round in 2013 to the Wings for Athan Iannucci, Alex Turner, Brodie MacDonald, and 1st round picks in 2012, 2013, and 2014.

Athan Iannucci

This was one of the biggest blockbuster trades of the last decade. Merrill had already been named Defender of the Year once and Transition Player of the Year twice, while Iannucci set the single-season goal-scoring record. Not only does his record of 71 still stand, only four people have come within 20 goals of that number in the 7 seasons since.

The picks involved: The 2011 pick ended up in Buffalo (not sure how it got there), who drafted Dwight Bero. The Wings got goalie Don Alton in 2013. Edmonton’s 2012 first rounder went to Buffalo (for Chris Corbeil – see above) and then Minnesota (for the Dhane Smith pick and Shawn Williams – see above) who turned it into Kiel Matisz. The 2013 first rounder was Robert Church. The 2014 pick was sent to the Swarm with Brodie MacDonald for Tyler Carlson, the first overall pick in 2014 (Ben McIntosh) and a second-rounder in 2015 (Dan Taylor).

Merrill had three very good seasons with the Wings before being traded to the Rock. McLellan scored 7 points in 11 games with the Wings in 2013 and hasn’t played in the NLL since. Dean Hill never played with the Wings, but played 40+ games with the Stealth, Mammoth, and Swarm before retiring this past off-season. Alton played one minute in one game, got scored on, and retired with a career GAA of 60.00.

Edmonton’s picks turned into Corbeil, Church, and Tyler Carlson, all of whom are still on the Rush. Alex Turner scored 25 points in two seasons before being traded to the Swarm for a draft pick (later traded to Calgary for Matthew Dinsdale). After scoring 71 in 2008, Nooch never again got within forty goals of that record. He blew out his knee after the 2008 season and hasn’t been the same player since, never scoring more than 29 goals in any season. He refused to report to the Rush and was traded to the Stealth for Paul Rabil and a first rounder, which turned into Mark Matthews.

Winner: Edmonton by a landslide.

The end result from all this analysis: Derek Keenan (who was the Edmonton GM for all of these deals) is pretty good at his job.

Shoutout to John Hoffman (@Corporal763) for his awesome site swarmitup.com, which contains unbelievable detail about every NLL draft.

2016 NLL milestones

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A number of teams and players are edging close to various milestones in the 2016 season. Most of them are arbitrary – is 500 career goals significantly different from 499? No, but we humans seem to like nice round numbers. Others are less arbitrary, for example a player passing another player on the all-time scoring list.

Here is a list of the milestones that could be reached during the upcoming season. All of these represent regular season numbers only.

Teams

Wins & losses

Buffalo needs 7 wins to reach 200, while Rochester needs 15.

Colorado’s next loss will be their 100th, while Calgary needs 3.

Toronto needs to win all 9 home games this year to hit 100 wins at home.

Four different teams could hit 50 home losses: Calgary needs 1, Rochester 2, Colorado 6, and Toronto 7.

 

Goals

Buffalo needs 40 goals to get to 4500, and Rochester needs 131 to reach 4000. Calgary and Toronto can both reach 3000 goals; Calgary needs 68 while Toronto needs 42. Colorado is only 4 goals against away from 2500.

 

Players

Goals

Mark Steenhuis (you’ll be reading that name a lot in this article) needs 4 goals to reach the 400 mark.

Four players could reach 300 career goals: Ryan Benesch needs 10, Shawn Evans needs 20, Dane Dobbie needs 30, and Rhys Duch needs 35.

Two players are sure to reach 200 goals and two more are possible. Curtis Dickson needs 2 to reach 200, while Stephen Leblanc needs 5. Cody Jamieson needs 36 and Garrett Billings needs 37.

A bunch of players are within striking distance of 100 goals: Kevin Buchanan and Jordan MacIntosh are both 7 away, Johnny Powless is 10, Cory Conway is 14, Stephen Keogh is 15, and Dhane Smith is 17.

Steenhuis could have 400 goals, 500 assists, and 1300 loose balls by season's end

Assists

Mark Steenhuis (there’s that name again) needs 36 assists to become only the 12th player in NLL history to reach the 500 plateau.

Four players could reach 400: Ryan Benesch needs 13, Callum Crawford 32, Rhys Duch 42, and Garrett Billings needs 54.

Another four could reach 300: Kasey Beirnes is 21 away, Chad Culp 31, and Cody Jamieson and Darryl Veltman both need 37.

Defender Bill Greer only needs one assist to hit 100 for his career, while Cliff Smith and Sandy Chapman are 6 away from the century mark.

 

Points

Only one player has ever reached 1400 career points in the NLL (one guess who that is), and he’s also the only member of the 1500 club, the 1600 club, and the 1700 club. But three different players could hit 1400 this year: John Grant needs 34 points, Colin Doyle needs 61, and Josh Sanderson needs 85.

Dan Dawson needs 78 points to reach 1200 while Mark Steenhuis (!) is 39 away from 900.

Shawn Evans needs 11 to hit 800 points, Ryan Benesch needs 23 to get to 700, Callum Crawford needs 24 for 600, and Stephen Leblanc needs 45 to get to 500.

 

Loose balls

At one point a few years ago, Jim Veltman’s career total of 2224 loosies seemed completely unbreakable. But this season, two players could easily join Veltman and John Tavares (2065) as the only members of the 2000 club, and one more good season from either of them could break the unbreakable record. Geoff Snider needs 143 loose balls to reach 2000 while Brodie Merrill needs 166. Snider has only finished with fewer than 143 once in his career, though that was last year. However, seeing as he’s currently without a team, Snider’s chances are hard to predict. Merrill didn’t reach 166 LBs in three of his last four seasons, but he blew that number away in his first six.

Mark Steenhuis need 65 to reach 1300.

Three players could hit 1100: John Grant needs 32, Josh Sanderson 34, and Scott Self 65.

Shawn Evans is 75 away from an even 1000, and Jeff Shattler needs 78 to reach that mark.

Colin Doyle is only 2 away from 900.

 

Penalty minutes

Kyle Laverty hasn’t played in the NLL in three years and has been the career penalty minutes leader with 627 for at least that long. But not only could that lead vanish this year, Laverty could be in fourth place by the end of the season. Geoff Snider needs 18 minutes to reach the 600 minute mark, and 45 to reach Laverty’s record. Patrick Merrill needs 42 for 600, and 69 to take over the lead, while Billy Dee Smith is only 10 back of Merrill. These four players will still form the top four at the end of the season, but the ordering is anybody’s guess.

 

Games

At 257 games played, Josh Sanderson is currently tied with Shawn Williams for second on the all-time list, an amazing forty nine behind John Tavares’ 306. Colin Doyle is only a game behind Josh and Willy.

Two players could hit 200 games played, and both are on the Toronto Rock: Patrick Merrill needs 12 while Billy Greer needs 14.

Three other players will likely hit 100 this season: Stephen Leblanc and Brett Mydske will get there in their season debuts, while Scott Carnegie needs 6. Nick Rose is on that list as well, needing 10 games to reach 100, but that’s a little misleading since as a goalie, he seems to get credit for a game played even when he never leaves the bench.

 

Leaders

On the career points list, Mark Steenhuis (haven’t talked about him for a while) is 64 points away from 9th place overall, pushing Gavin Prout down to 10th. Steenhuis could even push himself into 8th place, needing 98 points to pass Lewis Ratcliff.

Shawn Evans could also move up a few spots, needing 34 points to pass his new Black Wolves coach Tracey Kelusky for 13th place, 4 more to pass Mike Accursi, and 6 more after that to pass Blaine Manning.

Bandits star Ryan Benesch is currently in 21st place overall, but with a 100-point season he could vault into 14th. Benny is only a point away from Ryan Ward, 2 away from Derek Malawsky, and 8 away from Pat Maddalena.

 

Goalie minutes

Anthony Cosmo is on his way to a record-setting season. Coz should pass the 10000 minute mark early in the season, since he’s only 113 minutes away.  He needs 392 minutes to pass Pat O’Toole and 553 to pass Bob Watson for first place on the all-time list.

Matt Vinc needs 627 minutes to reach 8000. Mike Poulin needs 265 to get to 5000, and Aaron Bold needs 379 to reach 5000.

Cosmo's on the brink of almost every all-time goalie record

Goals against

Cosmo may not want to be at the top of this list, but with a career this long, it’s not unlikely. His 29th goal against this season will be his 1800th. Allowing 169 will push him past Bob Watson and 183 will pass Pat O’Toole. Since Cosmo gave up 191 in each of the last two seasons, this is certainly reachable. The all-time lead is likely safe for one more season, as Cosmo would have to give up 210 to pass Dallas Eliuk.

Brandon Miller needs 22 to reach 1500, and Matt Vinc is 38 away from the same mark.

 

Saves

Again, Cosmo is poised to set the all-time record. He needs 73 saves to pass Eliuk, 180 to pass O’Toole, and 187 to pass Watson for the overall lead in saves.

Matt Vinc is 1001 behind Cosmo, which means that barring injuries, Vinc will become the all-time leader if his career continues two years after Cosmo retires.

 

Other

John Grant will be 41 when the season starts and is now the oldest player in the NLL. Josh Sanderson, Colin Doyle, and Anthony Cosmo (in that order) are next at 38.

Grant is also now the active points leader at 1366 with Colin Doyle 27 behind him and Josh Sanderson 24 behind Doyle.

Rules of the NLL Drinking Game

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How to get completely plastered while watching an NLL game:

  • When a player is referred to as a “weekend warrior” or his off-the-floor job is mentioned, DRINK. If he’s a firefighter or teacher, DRINK again
  • When the goaltender calls the trainer out to look at his equipment and the trainer simply applies more tape to his shoes, DRINK
  • When you miss a goal or great play because the online feed is showing the kiss cam or dance cam or some other shot of the audience, DRINK
  • When John Tavares is referred to as “ageless”, DRINK
  • When a player commits a blatantly obvious penalty and then stands looking at the ref with his arms outstretched in the classic “what did I do?” pose, DRINK
  • When a player’s name is mispronounced, DRINK
  • When the announcers try to explain a rule and get it wrong (or play is stopped or a penalty is given and they have no idea why), DRINK
  • When nobody is near the benches during play but the bench door is open, DRINK
  • When a goal is scored that the goalie wants back, DRINK
  • If a player and his brother are both playing in the game, DRINK
  • If a player is from Orangeville or Peterborough, DRINK
  • When a player or coach being interviewed talks about “sticking to our game plan” or “playing our game”, DRINK

Drink twice if it's the coach

How to stay completely sober while watching an NLL game:

  • When Major League Lacrosse (MLL) is mentioned by name, DRINK
  • If a head coach smiles during the game, DRINK. If he laughs, DRINK again. If it’s Troy Cordingley, CHUG the bottle

5 things you never knew about the NLL! #3 will shock you

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I originally started this article as a joke, playing on the popularity of sites like Buzzfeed and their click-baity “you won’t believe what happened next”-type headlines. But then I wondered if I could come up with 5 actual things that many NLL fans didn’t know and I hadn’t used on @NLLFactOfTheDay (and that I don’t have to fit into 140 characters). Many people know that John Tavares the (former) lacrosse player is the uncle of John Tavares the hockey player. Many know that Josh Sanderson played for his father Terry (four times, actually: Rochester, Calgary, and Toronto twice). Many know that there are far more failed NLL teams than there are current teams.

But did you know these?

1. Before they secured nll.com, the league’s website was be-lax.com. (OK, I could have squeezed that one into a tweet.)

Gary Roberts

2. The Calgary Roughnecks once drafted former Calgary Flames star Gary Roberts (after he had retired from hockey). He said he was flattered and surprised, but did not report. The Bandits once drafted Gil Nieuwendyk, Joe’s brother and Derek Keenan’s brother-in-law. He never reported either.

3. The 2007 Championship final was hosted by the Arizona Sting rather than the top seed Rochester Knighthawks because of arena unavailability. A circus had booked the Blue Cross Arena and no alternative arena in Rochester could be found. A 2002 playoff game between the 5th place Washington Power and the 6th place Philadelphia Wings was held in Philadelphia because Washington decided they’d lose more money by hosting it than by travelling.

4. In 2001, the league accidentally posted an article on its web site announcing expansion to Montreal before the deal was actually done. The article was immediately pulled and the deal was put on hold. The Montreal Express joined the league a year later.

5. In 2007, the Arizona Sting went on hiatus and the players were loaned to other teams for a year (through a dispersal draft), the idea being that when Arizona returned the next season, they’d continue with the team they had before. After the 2008 season, the players were returned to the Sting, where the team promptly folded and they were dispersed again.

Did I fool you? One of those five is not true; I made it up. But which one?

The NLL’s most successful franchise

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It’s a cycle that almost every pro sports team goes through. If you look back over the history of most teams that have been around for a while, they’ve had periods where they’re really good, at or near the top of the league, and then other periods where they’re terrible. Think of any team that’s been successful over the last year or two: the Royals in baseball, the Clippers in basketball, the Islanders in hockey. It wasn’t that long ago that all three of those teams were terrible, near the bottom of their respective leagues.

Alternatively, think of any team that’s been terrible over the last few years: the Knicks, the Oilers, the Phillies. I can certainly remember times when those teams were at the top of their leagues.  Every team has times where they’re really great and times where they’re really bad. Even the Cubs won the NL Central three times from 2003-2008.

This has certainly happened in the NLL as well. The Edmonton Rush were arguably the best team of each of the last two years but were terrible for a decade before that. The Washington Stealth went to the Championship in three out of their four seasons, but were 4-12 and dead last in the fourth. The Wings won 6 Championships in their first 15 years, then only made the playoffs 3 times in their last 12. The Rock, Bandits, and Mammoth have each won championships and also sat near the bottom of the league during the last 10 years. The Minnesota Swarm may be a bit of an outlier here; they were never a really great team and never reached the finals, but they were a very good team for a few years, getting to the division finals twice. On the flipside, their last couple of years in Minnesota were pretty bad.

(Aside: The NLL is a little different because of the team turnover. I’m only looking at teams that have been around for ten years or more. There are a lot of teams who didn’t have a long enough existence to consider. The New Jersey / Anaheim Storm, Ottawa Rebel, and Montreal Express never stuck around long enough to get good. The Arizona Sting went to 2 Championships in 4 years but never finished above 9-7 or below 7-9.)

Knighthawks

But in the NLL, there are two oddball teams that have mostly defied the longevity rule.

The Calgary Roughnecks were terrible in their first season, when they finished 4-12. But in the 13 seasons since then, they  have only finished below .500 twice, have never missed the playoffs, and have finished with 10+ wins 7 times. Even last year when they started 0-6 and finished 7-11, they managed to get to the Western finals. Other than their debut season (when you kind of expect a team to suck) and for part of 2015, the Roughnecks have never really been terrible.

But take a look at the Rochester Knighthawks. In their twenty-one seasons, they have only finished below .500 three times, and all three times they were just below .500 at 7-9. What’s more: they won the Championship in one of those 7-9 seasons. Let me say that another way: they won the Championship in 2012 after finishing the regular season tied for the worst record in franchise history. They have only missed the playoffs twice in 21 years and as we all remember, are the only team ever to win three straight Championships. In their debut season, they went to the Championship (and lost it in OT).

If you had to pick the most successful NLL franchise during its existence, you could argue the Rock might be the best choice given the number of Championships in that time. But they had a four year stretch where they were 10 games under .500 and missed the playoffs twice. The Wings were one of the best choices for the first half of their lifetime, and one of the worst choices for the second half. The Roughnecks would also have been a very good option, but they’ve had strong regular season numbers and not so much in the playoffs.

For my money, the Rochester Knighthawks win the prize. They have never had a single terrible season, but have had some outstanding ones. I know it’s no 22 in a row, Bandits fans, but they won 16 straight games from 2007-2008. They have never finished last in their division. They have won five Championships and appeared in four more, and have seen some of the best players in the game on their benches including the Gaits, John Grant, Shawn Williams, Shawn Evans, Dan Dawson, Cody Jamieson, and Matt Vinc.

They say any NLL team can beat any other on any given night. This is mostly true for the non-Charlottes and non-Anaheims of the league. But let’s face it, there were years that this was not true for the Rock, Bandits, Mammoth, or Roughnecks. But there has never been a time when playing the Knighthawks that they didn’t have a good chance of beating you.

NLL Trades: one big, two bigger

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After the huge trades we saw at the trade deadline last year involving names like Billings, Suitor, Powless, and Schuss, you’d think the NLL might be all blockbuster’ed out for a while. It lasted about half a year before we started seeing some more “holy crap” trades. But it all seems like one big trade involving almost half the teams in the league. I almost started to lose track of who went where, so I’ll break it down.

Billings went from Toronto to New England for Kevin Crowley but then Crowley was sent back to New England for Dan Lintner while Billings was sent to Vancouver for Tyler Digby who was then traded to Calgary for Shawn Evans. And a bunch of draft picks changed hands as well.

Got it?

OK. At the trade deadline last season, Garrett Billings was sent to New England for Kevin Crowley. As posited by me and totally unconfirmed and uncorroborated, this deal included a gentleman’s agreement that Crowley would be sent back to New England at the end of the season. This happened in early October, as Crowley was traded to the Black Wolves for draft pick Dan Lintner and a second round pick in 2016. This wasn’t quite a Holy Crap trade, but it was significant.

But the combination of Crowley and Billings on the same roster was not to be. Holy Crap Trade #1 happened two weeks later, sending Billings to Vancouver in exchange for Tyler Digby and a second round pick in 2017. This is where Billings’ part of the story ends. He’s now playing in his home town of Langley, and western goalies are very worried about the impact he’ll have on guys like Rhys Duch and Corey Small. But we weren’t done yet. A day later, Holy Crap Trade #2 happened.

Tyler Digby

Tyler Digby, it was said, wanted to be in the East because he recently moved to Pennsylvania. But the ink on his trade to New England was barely dry before he was traded again. Digby went to the Calgary Roughnecks for who else but the reigning league MVP, Shawn Freaking Evans, who wanted to play closer to his home in Peterborough. New England’s first round draft picks in 2018 and 2019 now also belong to Calgary, and Calgary’s third round pick in 2018 goes to New England. This marks only the second time in league history that the current MVP was traded, the first being Gary Gait who was sent from Philadelphia to Baltimore in 1998. But as surprising as the Evans trade was, the Gait trade blows it away. At that point, Gait had won three straight MVP awards and after the trade, he won the next two as well.

Did you sense the trend here? Billings is back home. Evans is closer to home. Crowley lives in Philadelphia, so he’s also closer to home. Digby wanted to be, but it didn’t work out. And the reason Gait was traded in 1998? To be closer to his home in Baltimore.

The trades themselves might have been surprising, but if the reasoning behind them surprises you, you’re obviously new here. Welcome to the NLL.

In a nutshell

I’ll break down my impressions of each team’s outlook once the rosters are announced in December, but here’s the end result for now:

Toronto is down Kevin Crowley and up Dan Lintner and a second.

New England is down Billings and two first rounders (in 3 years), and up Shawn Freaking Evans and a third.

Vancouver is down Tyler Digby and up Garrett Billings

Calgary is down Shawn Freaking Evans, and up Tyler Digby and two firsts.

NLL Rule changes for 2016

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The NLL has announced a number of rule changes going into effect for the 2016 season. The list is here and none of them is hugely significant (though I suppose by definition they are technically all game-changers) but I’ll go over what I think are the more interesting ones.

Rule 28.1: Injured goalie

If the trainer comes out to tend to the ‘tender and he stays more than 50 seconds, the goalie must be replaced. This was 45 seconds last year. The extra five seconds was worthy of a rule change?

nll-logo-750Rule 33.3: Helmet chin cup

Last year, if the chin cup was not properly worn and secured, the player would be removed from the floor. A second violation would get you a delay of game minor penalty. This year, you get the minor penalty right away. Interesting that this rule goes into effect right after the retirement of John Tavares, who was notorious for not wearing his chin cup or leaving it loose.

Rule 44.4: Contesting the ball on the face-off

If a player grabs the ball in the back of his stick during the face-off, he must immediately flip it to the front of this stick or get it to a teammate (“move, rake, or direct it”) before taking more than one step or the other team gets possession. You could call this the Geoff Snider rule but as of this writing, Snider is not on any NLL roster. Plus I believe there was a face-off change made a few years ago that was informally called the Geoff Snider rule though I don’t remember the details.

They tried something like this last year during the pre-season but that rule said that the player couldn’t leave the playoff circle without having the ball in the front of his stick. They dropped the rule before the season started.

Rule 57: Criteria for stoppage of play on a delayed penalty

The only change to this rule is the removal of a clause. In 2016, if the ref has called a delayed penalty and the offensive team pulls their goalie, a loose ball that crosses back over the centerline and rolls towards the open net will not cause a whistle, i.e. the resulting goal will count. I don’t know how often this happens but I suspect it ain’t much.

Rule 63: Illegal cross-checking

A player who cross-checks someone lying down on the turf will get a penalty, whether or not the guy on the floor has the ball.

Rule 67.6: Shooter in crease prior to ball crossing goal line

An oddly specific clause has been added which says that if an attacker shoots and the ball hits the goalie and then a defender and then goes into the net, this will count as a goal as long as the shooter is out of the crease by the time the ball completely crosses the goal line. It sounds like such a goal was waved off last year and someone got angry about it.

Rule 67.9: Contact by a defender

They’ve rewritten this rule entirely (all two sentences of it) to make it clearer. If an offensive player is checked legally into the crease before the ball goes in the net, the goal does not count. If an offensive player is checked illegally into the crease, the defender will get a delayed penalty and if the ball goes in, the goal counts (assuming no other rule violations).

Rule 67.12: No re-entry by ball

If a defender outside the crease gains possession of a ball that’s inside the crease, that defender can now step into the crease as long as the ball wasn’t directed or passed to him by a teammate.

The Crowley Trade Episode II: Attack of the Black Wolves

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An odd trade occurred on Saturday that I suspect began back in March. The Toronto Rock sent Kevin Crowley back from whence he came, the New England Black Wolves, in exchange for Dan Lintner and New England’s second round pick next year. Crowley, of course, was acquired at the trade deadline last season in exchange for holdout Garrett Billings. Lintner was New England’s first round pick at the draft two weeks ago, 8th overall.

Jamie Dawick is quoted in the press release: “…we’re not far off with this deal from what was also on the table at the trade deadline in March.   We needed a player last year so the 2016 first round draft pick didn’t make sense at the time.” So they agreed in principle to trade Billings for a first and a second, but the Rock needed a player right away so they changed it to Crowley. Now they’ve basically reversed it to what they agreed on originally.

Pure speculation on my part, but it sounds to me like this was a two-stage trade from the start. Instead of the two draft picks, you give us Crowley for the rest of the season, then we’ll trade him back to you for the two draft picks once the season’s done. Perhaps the talking at the draft was that rather than the 2016 first, we’ll take Lintner since we wanted him anyway.

New England kind of won the trade last season, just based on numbers. By the time the deal was done the Rock only had four games left, while New England had eight. The Black Wolves got twice as many games from Billings than the Rock got from Crowley, and Billings averaged 4.5 points per game to Crowley’s 3.0. Then again, the Rock did have Crowley for five playoff games while New England missed the playoffs entirely, so that evens things out some.

Kevin CrowleySo the deal ends up being Billings to New England for a 1st round pick (Lintner), a 2nd round pick (in 2016), and the use of Kevin Crowley for half a season. Is this fair value for someone who averaged 105 points over the previous three seasons? On the surface, no. But if you factor in Billings’ surgery last year, it’s possible the Black Wolves are not getting  the same Garrett Billings who put up those big numbers. If he returns to his previous level of dominance and puts up the big numbers, then good for him and the Black Wolves win the trade. But it’s also possible that Lintner pulls a Brett Hickey and comes out of nowhere to score 50 goals. Honestly, that seems less likely, but who knows? He was picked in the first round because that is a possibility.

For now, I’d have to say that the Black Wolves are the winners here, but unless Billings returns to his pre-injury form and Lintner is a bust, I wouldn’t say the Rock got fleeced either. As with most trades, we won’t really know who won it until a long time after.

NLL awards: no big surprises except the big surprise

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The 2015 NLL awards were announced on Tuesday, only four months after the season ended. This was a dumb idea last year, and it’s a dumb idea this year. I get that they’re trying to raise interest in the league during a quiet time when there’s no other lacrosse going on anywhere, but they can do that with the draft. Handing out the awards the night after the draft marginalizes either the draft or the award, and NLL fans that aren’t die-hard fans probably didn’t even notice. Handing them out during or right after the playoffs makes so much more sense. If you want to have it be a big event rather than just announcing the winners, that’s fine but four months later just doesn’t make sense.

Anyway, on to the winners. With one exception, there were no real surprises in the player awards. Shawn Evans was named MVP for the second time in two years, and deservedly so. Kyle Rubisch won the Kyle Rubisch award again. Kyle Buchanan won the Sportsmanship award after playing 18 games with 0 penalty minutes. Rookie of the Year went to Ben McIntosh, who had an excellent rookie campaign. Josh Sanderson won the inaugural “Pinty’s Wingman of the Year” award, following in the footsteps of the Pinty’s Wingman of the Week award, which unofficially went to the person who picked up the most assists every week.

I’d never even heard of the “Shoeless Joe’s Shot of the Year” award until they announced it – Miles Thompson’s sitting-on-his-butt-over-the-shoulder shot. I can’t decide if that’s an ugly goal that’s also beautiful, or a beautiful goal that’s also ugly.

The exception is the Goaltender of the Year award. Matt Vinc won his fifth in six years, with lots of people wondering why Aaron Bold didn’t get it. I have less of a problem with Vinc taking it. First off, the award is supposed to be based on the regular season only. The playoffs (and the fact that Bold’s Rush won the Championship), the Mann Cup, and the WILC should have no bearing on this award. There’s another reason why the awards should be given out during, not after, the playoffs.

Bold allowed one fewer goal in 13 more minutes but in those extra minutes, he still faced ninety fewer shots than Vinc, and Bold’s save percentage was 2.4% lower than Vinc’s. A very close race, to be sure, and either one could definitely have won it, but to say that Bold should have won because he won three Championships in the same year is just wrong.

The three non-player awards had one gimme, one minor surprise, and one huge one. Terry Sanderson won GM of the Year posthumously, and I’m sure the early death of this much-beloved and respected man played a part in the voting. But he also turned a 9-9 Rock team into a 14-4 powerhouse, the top team in the league. He picked up 50-goal-scorer Brett Hickey off the scrap heap and traded for Brodie Merrill, Brock Sorensen, and Jeff Gilbert to shore up the defense. Posthumous or not, T deserved the award.

THead coach of the year was a bit of a surprise to me, in that I expected Derek Keenan to take this one for the second straight year. Keenan missed the first two games while dealing with the death of his wife, two games that the Rush lost. On his return, the Rush started looking like the Rush of 2014, and Keenan’s influence on that team was obvious. But I don’t want to take anything away from the winner, John Lovell, who also had a great season. The Rock lost only one of their first ten games on their way to a franchise-best 14-4 record, first in the league. Lovell’s leadership allowed the Rock to thrive despite losing Garrett Billings and Colin Doyle, and also allowed the seamless additions of Hickey, Merrill, Sorensen, Gilbert, and Kevin Crowley into the dressing room.

The huge surprise is Executive of the Year. Nominated were Lewis Staats of the Knighthawks, Scott Loffler of the Bandits, and Bruce Urban of the Rush. Wait, what? Bruce Urban? He didn’t really get nominated, did he? Yes, he did. Oh well, he has no real chance of winning it, does he? Yes, apparently he does. And he did.

This is the guy who refused offers from the Oilers to buy the franchise. He complained about the mayor and the city and was called out for it. He effectively threatened the Edmonton fans with relocation during the season. Then once they won the championship, he did move the franchise. Thanks to all of you awesome Edmonton fans for your support during the playoffs! I could sell to the Oilers and make sure the team stays in Edmonton, but screw you, I’m taking my team and getting out.

As Gerry Moddejonge of the Edmonton Sun tweeted, Scott Loffler created the #BraverThanBrave campaign which had the attention (and pulled on the heartstrings) of every NLL player, employee, and fan around the league, while Urban announced a charity event that neither had a winner nor gave anything to charity. Nice.

Maybe this is based on the regular season as well so the actual team movement shouldn’t be considered. But given all the other crap that went on, I can’t believe Urban won. But it was the other executives in the league (AFAIK) that chose him, so perhaps he did lots of stuff behind the scenes that made him worthy. I’m trying to give Urban and the NLL the benefit of the doubt here, but I’m still shaking my head.

2015 NLL entry draft

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For the third time in four years, I attended the NLL entry draft this past Monday. I don’t remember why I missed it last year, but I was at the 2013 draft at the TRAC as well as 2012 in Toronto. Considering the NLL is based in New York City, it seems a little surprising that the draft has been held in Southern Ontario for the last four years. OK, that’s a lie, it’s not surprising at all. I don’t have the numbers, but I’d guess 70% of the NLL players live within a couple of hours of here, between all the Toronto guys, Peterborough, Orangeville, and Kitchener.

I arrived around 6:20 and was the first person sitting in the stands. There are a bunch of chairs at the back of the floor but they’re for the players and their families. Lots of NLL coaches and execs are already milling about the floor. John Tavares, Blaine Manning, Gary Gait, and Jim Veltman were having a conversation, and Tracey Kelusky joined a few minutes later. Curt Malawsky and Steve Dietrich had a short chat, Glenn Clark was remembering the old days with Dan Ladouceur, and Curt Styres (one of the few GMs who’s easy to spot when he’s facing away from you) was checking out the table full of fancy new hats that the draftees received. Commissioner George Daniel was standing by himself for a while but then I saw him talking to Steve Toll.

After 10 minutes or so, a few people sat just down from me (turned out to be new Knighthawk Derek Searle and his family), and then Stephen Stamp came by and said “You guys are going to move down there, right?” pointing to the chairs on the floor. We said that we thought they were for players only and he said no, not that many players show up so we’re welcome to move down. This was great since the spectator benches are not terribly comfortable.

Earlier in the day, the Toronto Rock and Minnesota Georgia Swarm made a deal, the Swarm sending tough veteran defender Mike Grimes to the Rock for, essentially, a second round draft pick next year. Great deal for the Rock. Grimes works in Ontario and missed all of last season because of it, so he wasn’t likely to play for the Swarm anyway. It’s OK for the Swarm too; at least they get something for Grimes, even if it isn’t for a year. The Swarm also learned a lesson when making trades: check on the player’s availability first. They gave up Tyler Hass and Dane Stevens for Grimes who never played a game for them.

Lyle Thompson went first overall to nobody’s surprise, and then the Rochester Knighthawks took defender Graeme Hossack second. I had a fun conversation over twitter with the Knighthawks; after I joked that I thought they were drafting me, they admitted that it was a tough decision.

Right at the end of the first round, I noticed Jamie Dawick, who had the next pick, was talking to Curt Malawsky. The Rock then requested an extension and the talks continued. I tweeted about it and thought maybe I had a real scoop but nothing happened. The Rock eventually picked Turner Evans, but Dawick went over to Malawsky after the pick and talked some more.

Jordan KanscalThere was a kid sitting across the aisle from me, wearing a suit. He seemed nervous, as many others did throughout the night, but as we got into the fourth round, his applause at the names being called seemed to get less enthusiastic. I felt bad for the guy, to the point where every time a name was about to be announced I hoped it was him. He eventually went to Calgary in the fifth round – Jordan Kanscal (pictured right – he looked older in real life. Though not much older.) I was almost as excited as he was when his name was called. Similarly, the kid sitting directly in front of me was Matthew Clearwater, who was selected last.

Also sitting near me was Luc Magnan, who was drafted by the Rock. His dad was sitting next to me and I’m pretty sure he was reading this article over my shoulder as I was writing it. Sneak preview!

Just like previous years, Stephen Stamp and Claude Feig were the hosts, and did a great job interviewing the players that were there. Once again Stamp showed his encyclopaedic knowledge of lacrosse players in the NLL, WLA, MSL, Senior A, Junior B, and whatever other letters there are.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend the NLL awards ceremony the next night, also at the TRAC, but I’ll post my thoughts on that in the next couple of days.